Water :: Earth :: Wind :: Fire
Art and Art Education with the Elements
“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power.
They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues.
They are messengers of overwhelming grief…and unspeakable love.”
~ Washington Irving
For a more practical view on tears, read this from Aeon Magazine.
“Sometimes I need
only to stand
wherever I am
to be blessed.”~Mary Oliver
I am babysitting my grandson, so my son and his wife can have an evening alone. I have been at their house a few days and have let Henry take the lead in deciding when and how much to trust his Montana Gma, how close to let her come. He gives me cues. I follow. He has started coming to me. Just a little. I am happy to have that.
So here I am in their cozy home, for a little while, alone with this sweet sleeping child. I hear him crying. I go to my grandson in his little bed on the floor in the corner of his parents’ room. He is crying in the darkness, woken from a dream, or maybe from a dreamless sleep … by something. A chill? A small sound? The cat stepping across his blanket? Or just coming to the light part of his sleeping when any little thing will make him drift up from sleep like a bubble of air rising in still water.
He is used to his mommy or daddy cuddling on the bed when he wakes in the night, so I try that… but I smell different. My humming voice sounds different. My body bigger, not mama’s not dada’s. He looks at me in the dark with wide eyes and cries some more. His daddy told me to try cuddling, try milk, try just rubbing his back. Try not to bring him out into the kitchen/living room into the light…well, that’s not working … so we go into the kitchen to make a bottle of milk.
He cries quietly in my arms. Watches me make the bottle. We go back into the darkened bedroom, wrap up in a fuzzy blanket and sit in the rocking chair. He pushes the milk on the floor. Not having that! I keep rocking. I whisper the song I used to sing to his daddy. I love you … bigger than a great big whale, softer than a bunny, greener than the grass. I love you farther than the farthest star, taller than a redwood tree, deeper than the sea… and within minutes he is breathing slow and calm, sleeping on my chest.
Regardless of how hard you try to follow the rules, to be good, you will always be led to what you’re meant to learn. The rhythm of things, of sleep and waking and grief. The movement. The heartbeat. The connection of breath to breath. This is what you needed to learn. To follow your heart. And that was always to sit holding him, breathing with your face resting on the top of his head, smelling the sweetness of his long curls and his soft baby skin. Tears wetting your cheek and the top of his head. Crying in the half-dark, not from sadness, or any sort of disconnect but from the wild and precious connection you feel with this small child. This child who possesses a piece of you. Who holds a big part of your heart in his chubby little hand and makes little sleeping noises against your chest.
In this moment. In the darkness. In the quiet warm house you know all you need to know and you stay rocking him for longer than you need to.
___________________
I end with an excerpt from another poem by Mary Oliver, Invitation:
… believe us, they say,
it is a serious thingjust to be alive
on this fresh morning
in the broken world.
I beg of you,…
It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant, when he wrote:
You must change your life.
___________________
Links for this Post:
Dear beautiful young woman:
It is true.
You are beautiful.
You are strong. You are solid
with a will like an arrow
and eyes like the sun.
Your heart will attract love.
You will be cherished
and protected like you
have always wished you had been.
Do you believe what I am saying?
You have a gift.
Plant that knowledge in your heart.
Water it with understanding and strength and
with the same tenderness you have
when you care for your child.
Someday you will blossom
because you cared and because someone else
loved that little girl in you – the best you.
I want you to get that – really get it deep and strong.
Do you believe you have a gift?
Maybe you have been passed
from one place to another, unwanted.
Or … made bad choices and had to learn the hard way.
You were hard when I met you. Angry. Hurt.
Have you ever felt wanted? Have you
ever felt what’s like to be safe
in the presence of another human being?
Have you ever known what it’s like
to be someone’s priority?
Do you believe that right now you are someone’s priority?
I am saying only what’s true: you are important.
You are worth it. You deserve it. And it’s true that
today – this very moment – you have a chance
to grab on to your beautiful future. Never let it go.
Do something amazing!
There are folks right here who, even when
you are in trouble, never give up on you.
They give you some love and they give you room
to be the beauty they know you are.
Do you believe you deserve that kind of regard?
Yes, beautiful young woman. You are beautiful.
You are smart and strong and capable.
Figure out how to be comfortable being you.
Open your eyes
believe in yourself.
You know what’s right and what’s wrong.
You can see what you want.
Let your best self be in charge.
Do you believe you have a best self? Do you know how to find her?
So … you fell back today. That’s the old you.
At least you care – when I first met you, you didn’t care.
Now you care that you let someone down:
your child. your family. the people who love you and believe in you.
You care that you let your best self down. Well,
I say this: “Old you, meet the new you, the best you.” It’s an experience,
and all the experiences you have had in your life –
you can turn those into something amazing.
Do you believe you are amazing? You are!
You have a spark of goodness in you that the rest of the world needs to see.
You are raising your child the best way you know.
You are determined to be a better parent than the ones you were given.
You will do things in new ways. You will do good things
for yourself and your child.
Your bravery inspires me. You have inspired me to take a leap I was afraid to take.
You have inspired me to create something new in my life.
Thank you for just being so totally and perfectly yourself.
You helped me see my own best self.
Photos Copyright by Maureen Shaughnessy, Raymond LaRose, Mark Sebastian and Sam Agnew.
You can tell alot about people by the books in their homes. Here are a few of the books Tim and I have in our living room. What can you tell?
My friend and writer/poet/blogger/nature-lover/people-lover-especially-grandchildren-lover, Joyce Ellen Davis, has recently published her (at least) 3rd book of poetry, A Book of Fours.
It’s an honor, Joyce, to have my collage with your poetry. Thank you.
A garden is a peaceful place to connect with every part of creation . . .
I have worked with my son, Gabe and his best friend Jack, on spring garden cleanup for some of my design clients. I love hanging out in these gardens! For me, that is one way I know I have succeeded in a garden design. Another sign of a successful design is that my clients are happy in and with their own gardens, even years after the first installation.
The almost life-size Buddha (above) rests among the “ten thousand things” in a Contemplative Garden we have installed over the last two summers. “Ten thousand things” is a Buddhist expression representing the interconnection and simultaneous unity and diversity of everything in the universe.
Each one of us is here for a reason and the world would be incomplete without us.
In the Huichol spiritual tradition my husband and I follow, there is a similar concept, that each of us has all of creation inside our hearts:
“Huichols say we are all joyous beings of light. We were created out of love, from all the elements of the natural world — fire, air, water, and earth. Because of this, each of us is a miniature universe, a mirror of the natural world outside of ourselves, and also a mirror of the spirit world. All the knowledge and secrets of those two worlds are also inside of us, and everything is perfectly arranged. Our job is to tap into that arrangement, to understand it and to live in harmony with it.” — Brant Secunda, Huichol Shaman and Healer
If we strive to deeply understand and perceive our world as inseparable from ourselves, then we will have empathy for every part of creation. We are an integral part of everything. Every one of the ten thousand things is, in the true sense, part of us. And everything is perfectly arranged!
This — whether we paint, draw, sing, pray, dance, cook,write code or write poetry — this empathy makes every one of us an artist and a spiritual being.
So, today, go out into a “Garden,” no matter where it is and see your connection to nature as a work of art and as an act of prayer: in a wildlife refuge, in your back yard, on your balcony, in a city park, in a plant nursery or just in a clay pot on your kitchen windowsill.
Find your connection with nature: watch the unfolding of leaf buds and see not just a “plant” but also freedom, flight, wings, wind, the lightness of a heart. Can you see your own life in the artistry of the natural sculpture in the photo below?