Yesterday I heard a poem entitled Rapture on NPR's The Writer's Almanac.  It amounted to conceptual rapture for me, worthy of serious meditation:

Rapture

by Richard Jones

In the desert, a traveler
returning to his family
is surprised
by a wild beast.

To save himself
from the fierce animal,
he leaps into a deep well
empty of water.

But at the bottom
is a dragon, waiting
with open mouth
to devour him.

The unhappy man,
not daring to go out
lest he should be
the prey of the beast,

not daring to jump
to the bottom
lest he should be
devoured by the dragon,

clings to the branch
of a bush growing
in the cracks of the well.
Hanging upon the bough,

he feels his hands
weaken, yet still
he clings, afraid
of his certain fate.

Then he sees two mice,
one white, the other black,
moving about the bush,
gnawing the roots.

The traveler sees this
and knows that he must
inevitably perish, that he will
never see his sons again.

But while thus hanging
he looks about and sees
on the leaves of the bush
some drops of honey.

These leaves
he reaches with his tongue
and licks the honey off,
with rapture.

"Rapture" by Richard Jones, from The Blessing: New and Selected Poems. © Copper Canyon Press, 2000.

This is a work in progress made from a watercolor painting, scanned, detailed in Photoshop and filtered with diffuse glow.  More work is needed, and I will post progress when it happens.

"The Romans read places like faces, as outward revelations of inner living spirit.  Each place (like each person) had its individual Genius - which might manifest itself, on occasion, as a snake."

The Poetics of Gardens by Charles W. Moore, William J. Mitchell and William Turnbull

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I have taken to reading places during the last few years and find myself usually reading alone.  It does not seem to be a Western value to "read places" to find its "inner living spirit."  So I am heartened to know that my "reading" of places is not indicative of a loose screw, rather participation in a tradition that dates back to the Roman Empire.  Most friends dismissively flip that rational Western hand and pronounce that they do not "be-lieve" in that kind of stuff.

Still, how does one explain perfectly still chandeliers in a nave except for one lurching, swinging (first clockwise, then counter-clockwise)?

How can we understand how a place grips and exerts energy on the soul?  What are the energies there, and how do we find words, much less appropriate responses, to the energies of individual Genius that claw or stroke our emotions, influence our thinking and alternately leave us be and take us over?  How do we define these energies and determine whether they are friend or foe, out to nourish or destroy us?  How many of us know the disguises of evil?  Is the only way to be delivered from evil to walk through hell?

I don't care what Western hand flips in my face.  I know the power of place, both good and evil, so I approach places with caution these days. I watch where I go because I do not only think - I know - that demons dwell in places of beauty, and knowing this keeps me from sitting beneath swinging chandeliers.

Are there any swinging chandeliers over your head?  Have you been seduced lately?

This will not make any sense right now, but it will shortly.  Ideas being integrated for inspiration in the studio include:

• Thinking with the heart - combining left and right brain functions inspired by Jesus 
• My Own Darling Place inspired by Edna Ferber
• Turquoise Thinking inspired by Clare Graves' waves of existence.

Do other artists synthesize ideas for inspiration like this?  Does the muse bring you books, words spoken in conversation with others, a longing to drink a color or untangle a secret?  So you study before you create?

Does anyone else examine the world through turquoise colored glasses?

"...The church faces a choice between the love of power and the power of love. Inevitably when the warfare image is deployed we begin to speak about power. The church must beware that in the struggle for society we are not struggling to maintain the powerful position that we have traditionally occupied. Part of what has called forth a more militant Christianity in recent years is not concern for the kingdom of God but the fear that we are losing control and not getting our own way. But when we play the world at its own game of being hungry for power, for cultural dominance, have we not already lost the battle? Power corrupts. A symptom of its corruption is when we find ourselves using the world's weapons. When Christians, or their organizations, bend the truth, massage statistics, use sensational headlines, deal in rumors, despise their enemies, behave aggressively, use the levers of power to their own advantage, they are behaving no differently from the rest."
~From A Theology of the Dark Side: Putting the Power of Evil in Its Place by Nigel Goring Wright

The Christian mantra to "love your neighbor as yourself" is an interesting one.  In my opinion it is also completely and totally misunderstood and practiced less in church settings than anywhere I know.  That is because so much of church "politics" is power mongering, and the church is just a xerox copy of the world with pious-sounding accompaniment.  It is mongering with a mantra; crawling over people to stand big and tall on platitudes.

Love is not only about what one does; it may be about what one can do but does not do.  Working in the justice system, I have known this for a long time.  I finally found a Christian writing that recognizes the value of some things left undone:    

"While reactive victims are primarily known by their 'against' stances, proactive people do not demand rights, they live them.  Power is not something you demand or deserve, it is something you express.  The ultimate expression of power is love; it is the ability not to express power, but to restrain it.  Proactive people are able to 'love others as themselves.'"

From Boundaries by Henry Cloud and John Townsend

"There is a powerful kind of silence that engages my consciousness during my most centered and productive moments.  This inner space has a quality of active, very alive, utter stillness.  It is where I hear the voice of my creative muse most clearly."

~Leslie Montana

There are not enough days of stillness, but when they come, my insides hum with clarity and ideas.  The dogs sleep, the TV sleeps, no music floats on the air.  Only the gurgling noise of coffee brewing and a train whistle in the background can be heard.  I wear my robe all day; I forego makeup; I have never been more beautiful.  I cannot say that I am at peace, but I am at something somehow better...a joy of clarity.  I know things I have not known and am grateful for the insight.  I am a crucible of creativity, and there is mist and fire in the crucible. 

"The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers." ~M. Scott Peck

I have been away gathering fleece, but now I am back with a quotation that says a thing I believe with all my mind and heart:

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience, we are spiritual beings having a human experience.”  ~Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Sometimes I think we get it backward. 

I have often heard artists refer to the act of creation as a spiritual expression whereby the great spirit (some might say the muse) works through the artist as an instrument.  This may be wrong; it could be the other way around.  Maybe our spirit swells up and spills out our humanity in color's passion, line's seductiveness, tone's modulation and design's intelligence.     

When considered from this angle, maybe the artist is the image.  That might account for how precious a gift of art is.  To take such a gift deceitfully is more than theft.  The deceitfulness is the theft, but the actual receipt of the gift is rape.

I once knew a woman who wanted to be cremated and her ashes incorporated into a painting.  When I first heard this I thought what a neat and unusual idea.  But the more I have pondered it, I realize the profound spiritual poverty such an idea reveals.  What an artist pours onto the canvas is her own revelation of humanity, not the human debris of another.   To do so would be an invasive violation of spiritual energy and a disgusting attention seeking desire to grab attention in a physical way even in death. 

Or as Sipsy says in Fried Green Tomatoes, "A lady always knows when it's time to leave."

I think it is high time for me to recognize the precious humanity revealed in my art as an expression of the spirit I am.  It is mine, it is enough and it is wonderful.  Realizing that is golden fleece.