what is self and what is not?

'What the Earth Knew about Certain Things'

Flight Notes:

(found in a small ragged notebook while clearing my desk)

The lateral view of the sides of things

gives way to the patchwork scape

of how humans have carved and divided

all overseen by puffy clouds that don’t know or care,

great white castles that float  lightly in mid-air…

the Earth knows, she remembers Every Thing

but we don’t pay attention or

even bother to speak with her-

lost in our tangle of dreams,

Life goes by-

the slow turn of geological time,

the Musings of the Mother

through the Millenia

'Water Tree'

The Tree of Life, a ‘water’ version

Water cycling  through all Life

it’s raining again, another easterly

a damaged possum was in the garden yesterday,

falling over wobbly, with lots of fur missing

in the morning he was lying dead in the patio-

we didn’t see him until it got light

i felt sorry for him (though possums are my ‘arch enemies’)

i buried his body next to the purple kale

and  found a clump of chives

pushing up new shoots through the mulch.

the vegetable kingdom can teach us alot

about life and death-

i though the chives had gone,

all scratched up by the chickens-

but plants die and rebirth regularly

so they ‘know’ the deeper truth…

the purple kale will thrive on the possum’s molecules

once liberated to soil by worms and micro workers

and the cycle of life continues…

we with our heads in cloud

have also our roots in earth

and rain in our hearts.

Sun Fire Sculpture

the longest night, the shortest day

Winter Solstice,

  when time is said  to stop for an instant

at the ‘still point’ in the pendulum’s swing…

(and the animals acquire for that moment

the power of speech…well, maybe?)

fire magic…

with it’s branches outlined in flames

and a blazing heart at the center

in one photograph,

 the heart became the head of a figure,

one of the Fire Spirits

that often come out in photographs

of Fire Sculptures-

marking the dark node of the year

with Fire and Light

celebrating the Sun’s journey

around the wheel of the year

and now, every day a little longer,

every night a little shorter…

The Green Man sheltering from the Elements

I am glad I got this photo of the Green Man- he was helping clean up ( that’s a broom handle in his hand) which he was happy enough to do-

he was out of the rain which was my main concern but i forgot about the bloody Possums- i wondered what that strange papery tearing sound was the other night and sadly it turns out to have been the Green Man’s face …

Alas, he will have to be re-skinned as the sharp possum claws tore him up badly however he is ultimately repairable ( the Mermaid suffered worse when over winter the mice ate her whole face away except for the eyes and lips-spooky)

Interestingly, in this early Winter, the  frost ravaged garden is wilted and in tatters, just like  the poor shredded Green Man, so maybe it is not inappropriate after all?

This is the time after the Harvest, when leaves turn brown and fall, when the energy goes underground and waits to be reborn in Spring, rather in keeping with the Spirit of the Vegetable Kingdom? 

pumpkins

Six beautiful Pumpkins-the Harvest! And like the pumpkin vines which have composted into the soil ready for next years crop, the Green Man will walk abroad again with a new smile (and a washed and mended suit which had holes in the knees anyway!)

after my recent storage debacle

(and the ongoing bid to make dry storage

for  ’10,ooo things’ while the rain pours down)

i have a growing appreciation for Small Things.

 i have been spending rather more time building sheds

and less time painting

but this small watercolour has just gone off to the Framers-

it is about the suprises Life presents

when one least expects,

the finding that happens when we stop looking

and remembering to honour those

‘Unexpected Revelations’!

spent some time with the watercolours over summer… 

working small, slowly  inventing a new format,  

revamping the approach 

watercolours are gloriously simple, 

well suited to building slowly 

wash over wash, the layers… 

'Water meets Air'

 ”Remembrance of Things Future”    small watercolour, 2008

scattered like millions of stars

by the big bang that is birth-

our turbulent entry into a  life’s journey.

One by one ,

we gather

 back into understanding

the wayward pieces of our bright nature

"Red Shoes and Other Stories from the Beginning' 2008

Hey, it isn’t just  his-story, it’s our story-

all of our stories that make up the one great river of life.

The true ‘Brave New World’ is not an Orwellian phantasm

it is everyone here, sharing stories and experience,

finding the Human Voice that emerges from multiplicity,

our ’Different Worlds’ merging to make One World.

We  have an amazing transformational tool

in Information Technology,

 a way to save ourselves if there is a way-

Power through Information, not Brutality

charting the last  frontier which is the Mind

damp and foggy today again-

fires burning on the mainland already

and it’s not even summer yet!

When it rains here,

it seems like it’s raining Everywhere-

hard to imagine it all on fire again

but the memory returns quickly

with a whiff of bushfire smoke-

this picture was done after our big fire-

in the Year of the Fire Pig,

the tuesday when i thought our place would go-

 helicopters in the sky,

 firetrucks rolling through the town,

smoke haze stinging our eyes

and a horrible pall of brown smoke

that looked like it had taken Irishtown

but the fire changed it’s mind,

ran down to the coast at 120k/hour.

people running for their lives,

many houses burned to the ground..

it was all so strange, seemed like

it couldn’t be happening here-

the worst part for me was the waiting,

 the not knowing…