When I was younger I discovered the Dada Manifesto. Something about the beautiful absurdity of it appealed to me, I’ve thought about (my vague memory of) it a lot over the years. I’ve written a few manifestos of my own. I love firmly held beliefs, as long as they waver when new circumstances or information require them to. So, in true Magpies make-the-road-by-walking style, here is an incomplete, incoherent, and seemingly endless list of the values and beliefs that seem to me, at this moment, to provide the framework for Tidings of Magpies.

* We value honesty. Not just not telling lies, but an emotional honesty, a sincerity, a fundamental sense of being true to oneself and others in all the ways that make us alive and whole and strange, in all of the things we create and the ways that we move about the world.

*We value generosity. Not just in the sense of giving things, but in the way we think about and treat other people, animals, and the world, which we should do with no judgment and much empathy. We should ” … care for most people exactly as one would for children, and for some of them as one would for the sick in hospitals.”

*We value connection: The way if we’re given two facts we find a way to connect them, the surprising way all people are connected, the way that we’re connected to the world around us, the way words combine to make sentences, and lines combine to form pictures. All of it.

*We value silence.

* We believe that the way we define success, and the achievements that we value and reward in our society are skewed. Compassion, kindness, and imagination deserve more recognition than wealth, fame, or salesmanship, and are worth passionately pursuing.

* We believe that there’s value in all forms of employment if they’re done with love and care, and that working a day job, caring for people, and serving people can only make us better people and better artists.

* We believe that creativity is valuable – for each person and for all people in a society. This is true on a large scale – in the creation of books and films and music, but it is true on the small scale of the ordinary as well. Day-to-day life can be elevated by the application of imagination and observation. Preparing meals, for instance, which seems like a tedious chore to many, can become a source of joy as well as sustenance.

*We believe that In all creative endeavors, as in life, soul, grace, and honesty are more important than cleverness or talent.

*We believe that listening, watching, reading, being moved, and admiring, are just as much a part of the creative process as creating. Appreciating the work of others is a valuable skill, a gift, as well as a source of happiness.

* We believe there’s beauty in economy — in using every part of something — in having what you need and using what you have.

*We believe in gleaning, in finding beauty and meaning and sustenance in the unlikely, the odd, the broken, the overlooked, and the discarded. 

*We believe in asking questions that have no answers. There is beauty in dazed ignorance, in confusion, bewilderment, perplexion. The less we can capture and hold something, the more beautiful it is. 

* We believe it’s important to find balance in your life — to find a way that you’re comfortable taking things from the world and giving them back to the world.

*We believe that time is running and passing, so we’d better spend it wisely.

What a remarkable issue of Tidings of Magpies we share this month! Full of such treasures. As ever, I am beyond grateful to everyone who shared their remarkable work and words with us. Please take the time to read, and, as ever, submit, support, subscribe. And have a look at Tidings of Magpies on Instagram.