Heartsong Studio

It didn’t occur to me at the time.  I was resolving some personal stuff when the painting and a poem I was working on turned out to be about the same subject. Not that I set out to illustrate this, in either paint or poetry. I had something quite mundane in mind. I was just the technician, as the paint, the words, and my emotional freeing expressed themselves through me.

Looking at this finished painting as I ate lunch, the connection suddenly jumped out. It feels like I have awakened, for the very first time, once again. Miracles just keep on happening when you least expect them. “All” you need do is stay open to the possibility and do your own work.

My very first memory has always been of being an infant lying swaddled in a blanket on the forest floor. I remember forest sounds and the soft brush on my face of an owl’s wing, and feeling perfectly safe and belonging. There’s no way of checking if this is factual, only that it has always been quietly beside me.

Here is the very large acrylic on canvas. Click to enlarge.

Awakening 48″ X 36″

Here is what I wrote at the same time.

Awakening

I awoke and everything was new, that first time,

the earth supporting with a subtle strength,

no sense of the unseen, nor warning hush of fear,

it was enough to feel a soft owl’s wing waft innocent cheek,

to be secure in the forest’s trusted lullaby —

later, seeking solace among unknown tangled roots

of conflict and wild woods I came to recognize as myself,

instructive hints prodded my skin from all directions,

until — realizing that perhaps all my life I’ve longed

many times for some miracle through the maze,

and even found contentment once or twice

in the tiniest drop of glistening water, a noble beetle,

tracery of cedars, doves’ voices settling at dusk –

then suddenly I awaken, and everything is changed

as though for the first time, to find myself blessed

with a clear light high above, and to taste

the essence of wholeness and wild potential,

open to the chance of yet another miracle, who knows,

possibly already unfolding on my path.