Tag Archives: contemplation

I Close My Eyes

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photoI close my eyes.

Breathe. Breathe, and think nothing–deliberately think nothing: not thoughts about nothingness, but no thinking. Just feel. Feel my breathing. Let it slow and deepen. Sense how my lungs are filling and how cool and soothing the air can be. Feel the inside of my eyelids becoming less dry and harsh, softening with the renewing almost-tears that mark the relief of closing my eyes after too little sleep and too long a day to follow it. Breathe.

I can smell the familiar scent of my freshly washed shirt collar that’s pulled up close to my chin, not because I’m cold but because it’s a favorite and a comfortable, so-soft shirt. All I hear is the gentle whirring of the air through the house, the light flickering of leaves outside the window in the slightest breeze, and a bird not far away, practicing its sweet and simple arias without tiring. The sun’s warmth, coming in the window, is blushing its way through my eyelids but still I keep my eyes lightly closed. I am content to maintain my steady breaths, my slowness, my calm, my emptiness, and simply to feel. My pulse ticks softly, steadily, unhurried.

There is no need to think of anything just now. Nothing I could think would change what is real in my world or better my place in it, at the moment, so it is good to turn off the thinking and just let go of my usual tense grip on it all for a little while. The world will wait for me.

I can visit other worlds if I like. Sometimes, with my eyes closed, I will. I can make such wonderful worlds inside, when I wish.

But for now, what I want most is this silence that I have sorted out from what’s outside of me; these slow and steady and uncomplicated open spaces I am cultivating and embracing on the inside. The warmth of the sun, through glass, caressing my face. The depth of soothing air moving through my lungs in a grateful, peaceful sigh.

Everything that must Happen and Change and Do will have to wait for me while I am so very un-busy just being. That is enough for now; sitting, eyes closed, breathing, silent, open. For now, that is everything.photo

A New Lens

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17
digital painting of a mixed media original

My world is water-colored . . .

Having spent much of my life near the coast, both at home and abroad, I am less of a swimmer than you might expect, though most of my water time has been spent near northern shores, if that explains anything for you. But I am greatly comforted by being near water without needing to be in it. Rivers, oceans, lakes and ponds, streams and waterfalls, puddles and pools alike all have their appeal and the sight and sound of them soothes my soul like few other things can do. A walk along a riverbank or beach boardwalk, out on the mud flats or wading in the cool fringes of a foaming inbound tide–all have the power to send the complications of life fleeing, if only for a while.

Not so surprising, then, that many of my artworks play with the cool hues of water and the shadowy welcome of its associations. Whether in the impressionistic and abstract styles seen here or in images quite specific to the sea, the hold that water has on my heart must make its appearance often just to comfort me.digital photo-paintingAll the same, as a northerner by birth and years of residence, I have always been wildly fascinated too by the idea of those mythic turquoise tropical waters whose gem-like clarity would surely entice me in, offering the siren-like assurance that I must be utterly safe in them since I can see practically forever in their depths. I know that this is not entirely true, but the appeal of their warmth and seemingly pure glassy transparency has its potent pull on my imagination anyway. So it was a bit of a fait accompli that I should love it when I did at last have my chance to step into the perfectly sheer aquas and blues of the Caribbean for the first time. It was everything I’d hoped, and of course a little something more.mixed media + textSwimming in Warm Water

I:     Skimming along as if in flight Just under the surface of a lake, I can look up and see through its tinted lens A circular and absurdly distorted universe Of inbent trees examining me in kind, Of ship-sized cumulus zeppelin clouds whizzing by, The pillowed prows of ducks plowing past me And convoluted birds careening In zigzag traffic from shore to shore.

II:     Looking down, I see dazzling curtains of kelp Dyeing mottled sunlight as it Cooks the lake like a giant kettle full of fish. Flitting, darting shapes shoot up to nip me Or casually brush by And I exult in floating a subtle touch Toward a parti-colored veil-tailed fish When it fixes me with its dully silver, Unemotional lidless eye.

digital painting made from an oil pastel drawing

Perhaps I shall always be looking for a sea change . . .

Because for all that we know and admire about its clarity and simplicity, and surely for its necessity to life, water is also still a source of great mystery and power and its depths both literally and metaphorically may never be fully plumbed.

Who are We, Really?

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23

digital image + text

Earthen Vessel

Who am I?

Breath captured

in an earthen vessel

Spirit wedded

to primeval soil

Imperfect Mirror of

essential Being

Wrapped in the terrestrial

winding-sheet

of Human clay

Simple creatures, perhaps, we humans–but is there not a mote, a speck, a spark in us of something grander than what we usually appear? Some bit of wonder that belies the humble forms of mortality and speaks of the transcendent? The perpetual questions that pull at us when we regard an existential view must at least spring from something larger than the plain facts of our selves . . . what can it all mean?

I certainly have no expectation of answering any such things, or even approaching their periphery, in my life, but like generations before me, still feel compelled to ask. That in itself is an intrigue, an oddity of being what we so proudly name Homo sapiens. Does this merely prove that we are so self-centered and hubristic that we assume importance in our existence that no other species dares–or bothers–to impute? It may. The idea of a dog, a pig, a horse or elephant, no matter how intelligent it is, bothering to sit around and study itself and its centrality in the universe so intently is amusing but ultimately quite ridiculous; it wouldn’t in fact be an utter shock to discover that they think the same of us, if they could be troubled to notice it at all.

Most particularly I hope that there is much that is far greater than we are, knowing how puny and foolish and improbable and fallible we tend to be even at our finest times. It’s highly reassuring to me that, when I’ve done my puzzling and my contemplation of my place in space, my purpose in appearing here on earth, it’s still quite insignificant; that a real and precious Otherness is more than all of us, more than enough to fill the emptiness of space whether we little creatures stay or grow or cease to exist. This is comfort enough that I can go to sleep at night, content that I am not the sun or the source of anything necessary, that all will go on long, long, long after I have returned to shimmering dust.

It’s Good to be Otherworldly

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32

At times, time should just stop. Hold its breath, keep confidence with every secretive thing because some little happening occurs, a tiny treasured thing appears, as small as dust in air perhaps but so perfect in its lack of discipline as to be solace beyond words, a wonder like a young child’s hair lit by a momentary ray of sunlight to become more beautiful than all the votive flames that ever lit the night, like a killdeer’s evening call fluting out from where it hides in the tall grass.

graphite drawing

. . . an hour in which enforced quiet time in a waiting room is transformed into time for invention in the sketchbook . . .

Let the treasury of life be honored by our awed obeisance, however brief, as we take our meditative pause to contemplate those little motes of sweetness that make up, in total, something so ethereal and grand–the sharp, resinous perfume rising from a path through piny woods on a sun-baked day; that bright mercurial flash of a school of tiny fry all turning in the shoals at once, glinting; an amorous bird showing off its vocal flashiness from a leafy grove across the way . . .

graphite drawing

. . . a piece of rustic dark bread with butter melting into it . . . .

May we never forget to stop, if only for that little moment, to absorb the pleasurable surprise of living in the midst of millions of small miracles each night and every day, even if they’re often lost to us as too minute to catch our notice. The air we breathe is redolent with them–each step we take can draw us further into that precise great incident of wonder that should startle every heart into eternal admiration.