All Embracing– At West End Gallery
Your way begins
on the other side
become the sky
take an axe to the prison wall
escape
walk out like someone
suddenly born into color
do it now
–Rumi, Quietness
I had a post early in the year about a small painting that I title Born into Color. My friend Linda (shoreacres) from down in Texas responded in the comment section with the poem above from the 13th century Persian poet Rumi. I was unaware of the poem, but it set off all kinds of fireworks in my head. In its simple straightforward way, it said so much.
Eight lines and twenty-eight words saying precisely what I struggled to express in my work.
Every line, every word brings memories and images instantly to mind, as if they were keys unlocking some inner hidden vault containing my truth.
I tingle a bit just looking at the poem on the screen.
Dissolve (2011) At West End Gallery
For example, become the sky describes a thought that has inhabited my mind for many years, one where our corporeal selves dissolve and become one with the sky. This idea really came to form for me around 2001 in paintings like Dissolve shown here on the right.
Then there’s take an axe to the prison wall which speaks to me of the need for the individual to sometime destroy one world so that another might rise. I have described just that on this blog a few times, often mentioning the Hermann Hesse novel, Demian, in doing so.
That book contained a similar line: Whoever wants to be born, must first destroy a world. I first read that sentence when I was undergoing a desperate time in my life and that short sentence, those ten simple words, brought both clarity and peace to my mind then.
And, of course, that transitions into walk out like somebody suddenly born into color. That brings to mind the scene from The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy, in tones of a dusty sepia brown, goes the door of her tornado ravaged home into the magnificent colors of Munchinkinland.
Her old world was seemingly destroyed, and she found herself now in a new and unknown world of wonder. A new consciousness rose in her.
The poem ends with do it now. Our time here is short with nothing promised to us for our future. Tomorrow might never come. There is only today.
Like I said, a short and simple poem that says volumes about living one’s life. I wasn’t planning on going on that much about it this morning. For one thing, I doubt I can do it justice with my words, especially in this short format. But it is such a powerful piece that I couldn’t resist trying.
For this Sunday Morning Music selection, I am going with a song that I shared several years back. This is Colors from The Black Pumas.
What a wonderful response to the poem. Although it’s always been a favorite from my first reading of it, getting an artist’s perspective was especially interesting. I’m glad the poem occasioned it!