EAGLE

How to see the object of our perception for what it really is. The eagle, especially the bald eagle has become a symbol for power & authority but specifically for imperialism.... American Imperialism.  The only true hope for human civilization is the new awakening. As more and more of us become aware the existing power structure will have to adapt & change & ultimately disappear. I do not advocate violence but awareness. As the human spirit enters into its true awareness many of the destructive processes we are addicted to will become obsolete & vanish. The signs are all around us. The quickening has occurred. We are in the new age. We will know we have arrived when the eagle no longer stands for power & greed but will simply be one of the most beautiful creatures in existence. The world was not made for man but for all its myriad creatures.

LAST SUPPER

All art is a conversation... a reflection back and forth from one observer to the next over the continents & over the generations. We look into the mirror of the work of art & we see the image of both the artist & ourselves. Leonardo painted the Last Supper on the wall of that refectory & it ripples down to me five hundred years later. Likewise, I always thought the second coming was the return of an actual human being. I have come to know that the second coming is a possibility in each & every one of us & manifests as the brilliant surfacing of our true & eternal selves.

SENSES

We have five (plus). How do we sketch out a field of reality from little electric blips arriving at  the mother board of our brains? Somehow it all coheres. I am mesmerized by the patterns of the world seen scintillating across the surface of a lake. In the scraps & fragments of reflected, refracted light I make out a pattern I can comprehend. What little I know of science baffles & perplexes me. Photons... discrete packets of energy...  from a neighboring star cross empty space strike an eagle flying above the surface of a body of water on an orbiting rock & ricochet through the complex optics of the globe of my eye & the resulting sequence of co-ordinated depolarizations map out the world as it is. Seems incredible. I wish to express my incredulity & my awe.

REFLECTION

My two great themes are water & light. I see myself as a master of light. My goal in this painting: to capture both the eagle’s flight & the play of light on the surface of rippling water. My other goal... paint an eagle realistically. I wish to simultaneously acknowledge the place of painting in the modern world & to render what is seen in a manner that approaches verisimilitude. The bald eagle has been hijacked as a symbol by the American Imperial power structure. This does not interest me. The raptors,  like the sharks, are the most beautiful creatures of all. Bald Eagle. Reflection of Bald Eagle. My contemplation of the great source of life... light itself.

SOURCE

How ever we define the complexities of being alive it always comes down to a sense of being divided from who we once we were & who we are. Being born, ironically, is a taking leave... a dying as it were. Dying is an entering... a returning... a being born. How do we reconcile the division of our divine selves from the loving awareness that created & creates, not only us, but all that is? I recognize in glimpses of recollection... when the fog of amnesia is not upon me... that there is no division. I am at the centre always. The Source emanates... radiates eternally. It includes all the facets, all the fractals. It expands ever-outward, kaleidoscopes ever-inward from the centre. My fellow sentient being: walk the labyrinth with me, inward, spiraling, circling, orbiting to the centre. To the source.

GRID

The understanding of the Divinity of the universe comes to me through the grids of science. If nature is  circular, spiral , spherical; a grid is an abstract, linear construct used to delineate the extent of the ever-unfolding beauty. Try to get your head around the concept of a field... a gravitational field... a geo-magnetic field. A field is a potential... a possibility... the Taoistic ‘non-being’... not “nothing”... but an emptiness that contains influence once entered....everything in gestation, in embryonic form. The mind... my mind in fact is nothing more than the field of my consciousness. The Universe is the Mind of the Creator... a field on which every thing, like a sudden thought in my day’s ponderings, comes into being.

NEGATIVE SPACE

 In drawing we learn to define the object of our vision by what it is not. In the Tao I never know whether it is the Jar that holds the water or the water that fills the Jar. Is it the dancer that dances the dance, or the dance that defines the dancer dancing? I am drawn to the shadows... to the deep space between the stars. How do I know who I am except by learning what I am not? Being.... Not-being. Night followed by day. As an artist I create the object of my vision in all its beauty or I give shape to the shadows... the dark spaces that in the contrast delineate the pattern that needs to come into being. 

SPIRAL

Hear what the white cat speaks.
See what the black cat sees.
But know what the orange cat knows.
One then / one now / one.... forever one.

Close your eyes & all you see is green...
A sea of green... the air a trillium breathes...
Emerald light... a meadow pond in May...
The aloe dream of seedlings’ winter day.

Where are we from? Who are we? 
We have been sent. We mean to heal.
& we are with you. We are here.
We have been sent. We are here. 

There’s a tree at the spiral’s stillest centre.
It’s at the end, the start, it’s where we enter.
Walk & walk... each step’s a breathless breath.
Breathe the labyrinth... slow the starlit path.

Hear what the white cat speaks
See what the black cat sees
But know what the orange cat knows
One then / one now / one.... forever one 

LABYRINTH

My spiritual mentor Michael lives in a place of serenity. On his farm in the grasslands of Saskatchewan he has mapped out a Cretan labyrinth with field stones. Medieval monks walked such a labyrinth at Chartres, between masses, deep in meditation. Breath comes into rhythm with step. Time slows. The spiral leads to the centre.  A tree grows at the heart of the labyrinth. There is a simple bench to sit on. Facing west. The afternoon sun sinks toward the horizon. The meadowlarks  & magpies call out in the wolf willow. In our inner selves there lies such a spiral. Walk inwards with your being. The centre is a place of eternal stillness. Calm. Silent. The Source. Be there. 

SHE

 Who is she? I know, like me, you have seen her. She stands just beyond the far tree in the rain-fall forest, in a gown the colour of mist. She waits behind the pillar in the arcade,  patient. She dresses in a shawl of snow & drifts between the tall banks  in the winter fields. She swims up to you in your boat & you are sure you can see her down below the golden green.  You looked into her eyes the moment you were born & then for the next year & more. She whispers in your ear the moment you fall asleep & in the moment just before you awaken. She contains all mystery but she is calm & serene as the light of an April dawn. She is older than the Creator. She knows you for who you truly are.  You belong. Beloved.

THE NINE

I have endeavoured in several art forms in my brief sojourn here on the third rock from the star Sol. Music, poetry, painting, writing. What I have come to realize is that anything of value that I arrive at as an artist comes to me as a gift. I am the conduit. The vessel. The medium. My role is to ready myself... to discipline my skills to the highest level so that when the inspiration comes I am ready. I venerate the muses.... all nine of them. It is they who have on occasion chosen me. Lord knows, many times they do not come through to me. I offer myself in sacrifice. I pay the highest respect. The artistic process is sacred. My muse is very shy... very fragile... & very jealous. She has grey eyes & when she chooses to come to me. to speak through me, the world around me becomes clear as mountain spring water.

RUTHLESS BLADE

The sunshine penetrates the opium gloom
& though we drift the silk across our face
Our whisper words are gone without a trace.
The light so cruelly paints our secret room,
The sky so naked past the honest glass...
& you, still lost in forests, dark with jewels,
& I, still drinking drafts from tidal pools.
The lingering mist still blurs the day’s trim grass.

We wove love’s skin upon the moon’s gossamer loom...

In shades of violet sought the hidden place.

The air was silver with necromancer’s gas.

We saw with fingertips, our senses keen.

The sun unsheathes its blade of wide awake.

The lovelies flee before its ruthless blade.

 

AXLE TREE

I live near a living tree... a limber pine... that grows on a ridge in the foothills of the Rockies. It entered its sapling youth centuries before Columbus landed on the continent he had the hubris to claim for his branch of the species. Lying on my back under the great spreading branches, the wind stirring the summer boughs, the greens scintillating from yellow to blue & back... turquoise, emerald, avocado.... the sun dazzling & daubing in penetrating strokes I know absolutely the earth belongs to the trees. Under their quiet majesty I feel in my core the creation is perfect & cannot be perfected. From root to sprig. Eyes closed.   I am at peace.

THE RED BULLS OF THE SUN

Odysseus, the great first hero of the western tradition, was cautioned never to kill the bulls of the sun. His men, starving, could not resist. When Odysseus came back to camp he found his men eating of the forbidden flesh & all but Odysseus were doomed from that moment forward. As humans we are suspended between two worlds, the world of the spirit & the world of the flesh. On the plateau above Delphi I came upon two red bulls under an ancient tree. I was filled with a moment of fear. The bulls were huge, unfenced, with sharp horns. I saw them suddenly with my otherworldly eyes. In that moment, I knew myself as Odysseus. I heeded the warning. I saw the bulls of the sun were to be known but not to be possessed. I bowed my youthful head & accepted the gift of my vision. The bulls watched me in silence with their soft gaze. They let me pass. The sun above was blindingly bright.

SCARAB

 The ancient Egyptians saw the lowly dung beetle as a symbol of the resurrection... each day the sun god Ra was reborn & the sun was rolled towards the horizon. Albert Camus saw the myth of Sisyphus, perpetually rolling his boulder up the steep slope, as a metaphor for modern man. I saw the bugs in real time on the slopes of Mount Parnassus in Greece. As as works of creation these insects are hilarious, miraculous... delightful. Pushing their globes of cow manure, filled with eggs, over the dusty ground.   Creativity equals Spirituality. The Creation is endlessly unfolding in perpetual beauty. It is marvelous. It is going to be alright. The world is perfect. I know because the scarab beetles showed me.

THE ORACLE

“There are more things in Heaven & Earth, Horatio,  than are dreamt of in your philosophy”. Thus saith the bard. Have you not stood in places you know hold mysterious, interstellar properties? I know you have. There are sacred spots that hold enormous spiritual energy. Maybe it is alignment of the geomagnetic fields. Maybe they are portals. Maybe they are worm holes. Maybe it is a trick of the forests yonder & the mountains beyond or maybe we place the magic grid of our thought patterns over the landscape & wish for the miraculous.Delphi is one such place. For hundreds of years leaders from around the world came to ask the riddles of the Sphinx. The Sybil from her cloisters would emerge & give the reading. “The Oracle has spoken”. stood above the ruins, above the gulf of Corinth, high up under Mount Parnassus where Apollo, God of the Sun lives. The nine muses circled the summit. Below me Scarabs, like sisters of Sisyphus, scurried, pushing globes of dung, laden with eggs. Two red bulls watched from beneath the Acacia.  The Sun was King. The Moon was queen. I stood at the centre of the vortex. All was still.

AWARENESS = DIVINITY

My recent insight: Divinity is in direct proportion to awareness. The more aware I become the more I approach that Divinity. Absolute awareness is synonymous with absolute Divinity. Hence for me the sun itself becomes one & the same with the luminosity of the source. True there may be a source of Light more brilliant than the sun but all we know comes from the brilliance of our star. Astronomy teaches us that our planet, our home, hived off the sun itself.  All our light, all our life, comes directly from that brilliance. It stands as always as the luminous centre of our awareness.  There may be other places to live in this great multiverse but there is no doubt that the planet Earth is the most beauteous most abundant spot in all Creation. We must open our eyes. We are living in the Garden of Eden. Water. Light. My quest... your quest is to enter into the luminous. Let that light pour in. Manifest the Light yourself. The more aware... the more radiant you become the closer we approach the source of Light of Divine Awareness that engenders us forever.

HOLY GRAIL

The King of Cups is my card in the Tarot Deck. The King of Cups has perfect mastery over the element in question: water; feelings, the soul, beliefs, matters of the heart. He offers you & I , in his outstretched hand, the Holy Grail. It speaks to me, at my core, of my old friend John who knows me better than anyone I know. John is a brilliant psychiatrist.... a “healer of the soul” (in direct translation from the Greek). It is a profound sadness when people become disordered & ailing in the function of their minds & more deeply of their souls. All illness, in the end, is spiritual illness. I deeply respect the physicians willing to address rationally & compassionately those of us who have become unhinged from our true selves. It takes great courage to proffer an open hand to show a way  out of the fire of their chaos. John with clear eyes & unblinking gaze & deep skill is a master of the art of healing the soul.

SHIP

The metaphor we will all agree upon is The Journey. The Journey through space. The Journey through time. The Journey through life. The Spiritual Journey. Who are your traveling companions? Where are you from? Where are you going? Which vessel have you chosen? Who is the captain? Is there a captain? When I was 26, I spent three months hitchhiking through Spain. I learned for the first time to be alone with myself. I learned to trust complete strangers. Somehow I always arrived at the place I needed to be. In one piece. I fall in love with my life all over again. There are so many places to go. So many wonders to see. So many people to meet. My fellow traveller, let us walk up the path aways together. Where are you from? Where are you going? Tell me your story.

FISH

On Friday noon at holy convent school

The girls say grace before the chowder soup.

Our mother superior lifts the ocean grail

& Brother Jesus splashes his silver tail.

My favourite Beatle George begins to sing

And thirteen moons like pearls on silver string

Arise in sequence from the sea of mirth.

The salmon swim, swim for the rivers of their birth.

                   

In our month, it’s half and half, the sun is seen.

The night of winter turns to water green.

The world’s a little rock in empty black 

But under silver skin we find no gap.

                       The fish is the ticket to the undertow.

                       My heart is not a muscle red or frail.

                       On the skin of the fish it’s a silver scale.

                       Can I breathe and breathless be?

                       The deep is as deep as it’s always been.

                       The fish is the ticket to the undertow.

TRANSFIGURATION

Accept the premise: The world is infinitely more mysterious than we dream of in our philosophies. We look to the heavens for the arrival of angels. We seek the eternal in the yet-to-come... the infinite in the ephemeral. We seek the Holy Grail in journeys to distant mountain peaks. Look around the world we live in. Behold! The luminous presence of the Divine is everywhere. What surfaces in the quicksilver of time? Out of the corner of my eye I catch a glimpse. In the gaze of a stranger, I see the open white light of my Creator. In front of my very eyes the most astounding miracle occurs. What I thought I knew as mundane, metamorphoses into the miraculous. This is not faith it is fact. The two key ingredients to allow life to come out of Oblivion. Water & Light. The abundance & bounty here in the green & blue is endless. Why do we exclude ourselves from this great astounding globe of sublime beauty? It is not necessary. We are living in the Garden of endlessly blooming jewelled Life. 

I ease back into the cloud bank, the easy chair of certainty. “All is flux all is new, but not this love I know of You”. 

KING OF KINGS

Depthless deep & emerald green, the ocean surges.

Upon his throne of stone he sits.

His ship of state, becalmed, awaits the wind.

Will you drink & quench your thirst?

O did you need to know for sure at first?

& from water he emerges, into water he submerges,

The King of Kings before you sits.

The light, the light, to see without... within.

Will you drink & quench your thirst?.

O did you need to know for sure at first?

& now you feel the waters flow.

Now you know you know you know.

The golden light, the flower’s flow.

The source is deep & wide & clear.

The golden light, the flower’s flow.

The source is deep & wide & clear.

The veil of mist, above, around, converges

& you, in doubt, once said “Does He exist?

The wind has caught your sail… the wind... the wind.

Will you drink & quench your thirst?

O did you need to know for sure at first?

& now you feel the waters flow.

Now you know you know you know.

The golden light, the flower’s flow.

The source is deep & wide & clear.

The golden light, the flower’s flow.

The source is deep & wide & clear.