Killing Me Softly

“Aesthetic rapture” is a term that describes the overwhelming sense of emotional intensity that someone feels when deeply moved by art.

It was conceptualized by thinkers like Thomas Aquinas, who viewed it as an intense intellectual activity, and James Joyce, who saw it more like a spiritual and transcendent experience.

Something about where I'm at in my life right now made me listen to "Killing Me Softly With His Song" in a way I hadn't before.

Like so many other artists, on top of creating art, I’m also an avid consumer. Recently I've been finding things that perfectly encapsulate the feelings I want to achieve and incite in others as a creator. It's helped me stay aligned with why I make art in the first place: to remind everyone that we're connected in more ways than we admit.

So I listen to “Killing Me Softly” and immerse myself with this context in mind. The epiphany comes to me after listening to this verse:

“I felt all flushed with fever, embarrassed by the crowd

I felt he'd found my letters and read each one out loud

I prayed that he would finish, but he just kept right on

Strumming my pain with his fingers

Singing my life with his words

Killing me softly with his song”

This song is an internal confession about the intimate resonance felt by the observer of the art. It's a musical narration of aesthetic rapture.

If we are courageous enough to live authentically as artists, that is the impact we want to incite and feel.