Dynamic Serenity

After Projection's Storm

You stand before me robed in brilliant white light

As multi-hued, feathery bands of spiraling energy

Pass through one another in languid wisps

And slowly move upward around you

You stand clear and peaceful

Your newly found calm a joy to behold

Describing your journey through confusion and pain

Analyzing, aligning, moving more fully into clarity

I'm speechless in the beauty of this moment.

The purity of your hard-earned peace,  
                       the edge of your piercing intellect

I'm in awe of your dedication and the years
             of disciplined introspection

That have sharpened your senses,
                trained your body and mind.

You are most beautiful in the simple clarity of your truth

Sharing in this moment, rejoicing in your coming home

I am enriched and in the deepest reverence

You have captured the Citadel and are sovereign there

El/2001

Butterfly Wing Series

I finished a flight imagery series today and as luck would have it, found a poem about flight that evoked the same feeling tone as the one that propelled these visions into being.  I hope you enjoy.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth 

Of sun-split clouds -- and done a hundred things 

You have not dreamed of -- wheeled and soared and swung 

High in the sunlit silence. 

Hov'ring there, I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung 

My eager craft through footless halls of air. 

Up, up the long delirious, burning blue 

I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace 

Where never lark, or even eagle flew 

And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod 

The high untrespassed sanctity of space, 

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God. 

High Flight, by John Gillespie Magee (1922-1941)

Once More Round the Circle

It has been almost a year since my initial post. A century of a year, so much has occurred. A lifetime of a year that has left me humbler, softer, clearer and more deeply in love with the miracle of Being than I will ever be able to express.

Pertinent to this particular entry is the site's change of focus, which reflects my own. I have lost touch with my Thai friend. I have found my 'voice' as an artist, joined my kids on FaceBook, moved to another city, welcomed a new baby into the family, formed new friendships, written new poetry and painted for evenings and weekends on end.

From now on I'll use this spot in space to share my paintings and poetry with the hope they may bring a twinkle to at least one other pair of eyes. I paint and write to express the joy that rises up in me and will not let me rest until it has manifested. I paint for the joy that activity creates in me -- the wonder of juxtaposed forms, colours, textures, contrasts and most wonderful of all -- edges.

Edges fascinate me. As demarcations between impossibilities, they exist where one thing ceases and another begins. A leaf becomes bark, a cloud becomes the sun. Transformations can be sudden, shocking, even brutal, or fade gently from one way of being to another in such sensual gradation that they carry you aloft, like the colours in a sunset sky.

May you be aware of your edges and feel them as they touch and reform around the world as you move and speak and breathe. May you find joy and wonder and serenity here, dancing amongst the colours.

The piece that leads this post is entitled, The Incredible Lightness I'm Feeling and was completed a few days ago...El