Literature

…and the bird continues to sing. The morning inspires it. Not as a prayer. But in pure pleasure. The bird is my song. My solitary seeker. In coolness and in heat. Like the morning…

"...and morning drew softly" is a series of oil paintings about the changing light in the early morning hours...and how it feels in/on my skin (body).

I would like to express my respectful thanks to the whole Ahliah family particularly Nadim Cortas, and Rida Ayyash and her team, and countless others; and also especially to Saleh …

A pot, a hand, embrace me And I see The vastness of the sea As well as its humility Before things yet vaster. Seeing is solidity Melting In a wave of emotion. Gentleness, and Softl…

A black line is sharp. It is as sharp as the image is clear. It is physical and defines the limits of objects. It is a way to capture external reality. Color is subtle. It flows i…

A breath So delicate Interrupted Space Becoming

A Breath I asked to abstract and my brushes touched, A fearless oneness, A ray of light in motion, A tenderness, reflecting, A depth only abundance fulfills, A mirror A breath We…

A call to the stillness that contains all movement where color is sound and light gives shape to the within. It is the consciousness of consciousness revealing itself to itself. It…

A conversation in words and feelings. Restrained. Yet genuine. In real affection. A journey about wood. A journey of wood. Colored and bare. Bare to the bone. Of contention and lov…

Dreams of pregnancy And of impotence Showering rice On a white clad girl Beaming From a hilltop. Dreams of transitions Within silky waters Make the hand on my knee Tremble With rem…

“A day in the life of a pomegranate” is a dual journey of love, violence and time, captured in ink and film by Afaf Zurayk and Cornelia Krafft. The series of fifteen ink drawings i…

A day spent out of Time. In interludes with the magic of drawing. Textures feel Time. Grey sparkles within black and tell of webs and spaces that are dense yet airy in a contradic…

A Delicate Line For me, the fate of the world rests on the delicate line I paint. It is almost invisible to the naked eye and yet so visible, its balance, so fine. I want to rema…

A dozen for a dozen Hurts Frozen in time Move with the space To find a place For being Unwanted. Almost a blessing Separating while connecting Weaving webs That heal.

A dream Lighting paths Like water Cascading Over debris Remembering Its flow

A dream Lighting paths Like water Cascading Over debris Remembering Its flow

A garden Soft as a mother’s womb Expecting surrender.

A garden Soft as a mother’s womb Expecting surrender.

A gentle breeze. One With the trees. Kindness.

A kind insanity permeates my painting. Faces living in the shadows emerge from a pool of blood. Painting their noise, I see their fear and terror lurking within, like children left…

To go to the country we ride the brown New Yorker. It feels comfortable: like home. It is compassionate like its owner. Everything in it makes sense: from the transistor to the bar…

A line, a thought, a crevice, a mount live to tell a story of a lake, a house, white summer heat and cold white snow. A hand gently dipped in icy water to retrieve you full of life…

A little quiet Where silence Grows.

A petal about to bloom No different In death as in life. Enlightenment.

A poem for noon Here and there Infinite Am. Wondering.

A prayer, a song, forgiveness I beseech For all the darkness That caused this absurdity This senselessness My insistence To remain Worthy of the brush Connecting All In the silenc…

A prayer… Rain, rain, rain cleanse me. Clear my path. Nourish me. Move me away from the crypt. From weeds. My dust. Here: in the valley of ignorance. Pushing and pulling. Trying an…

A resounding blue Forgiving The space In-between Living A thread Lest you forget The silence.

A sadness An ether Love Permeate This hostile world Welcoming

A sense of who I am Is A running sentence Of Discovery. A teasing Unraveling Of beauty Held Closely, Unfurling.

A separateness, another dimension, felt like an ether that holds. A caring that comes from the eternal silence. A feeling of the mist in its truth and its presence everywhere witho…

A sham. This union. This childhood. This belief. Your childhood. A story: One communion. One reality. One relationship. Linear. At times circular. You move with the others. In se…

A tear is an expulsion into darkness and away from union. To reconnect we grope in the dark, brushing against light and feeling our warm breaths. We live in the glow within us as w…

A thought is a beginning not an end.

A vertical Lone tree Transitions A togetherness Becoming one with solitude. Ripples in sand dunes: A communal crossing Creating horizons Unforeseen.

A voice, Usually friendly, Is now troubled.

Within the early morning fog I sense a fairy tale. I wonder How many logs Make a fire. Also, Of the relative significance Of each log To the whole. The auburn colored dawn Stands s…

All art is a consciousness made conscious, a gift, a watering, a loving. Painting for me is not an escape, it is an affirmation, a choice without entitlement. It is loving being bi…

All dark Spiraling Towards hope, Grace Fulfilled.

Alone Brush in hand I am.

Alone. Grey. Soft skies. Bluebirds. Chirping songs. Past. One long Stretch. Swimming. Below. Then emerging.

An awareness Miles and miles In the making Shocked into existence By ignorance Gives birth To a solitude Much deepened For having known.

An azure dream Forgiving in its pain Asking Was I reckless to love you thus? Painting, I cross to become A stain on a vast river Giving in and moving out Living the waters And …

An azure dream Forgiving in its pain. Asking. Was I reckless to love you thus? Painting, weaving and breathing, I cross To understand the threshold in the beyond Becoming a stain o…

An innocence, White, Understands Experience, Darkly.

An old lady I sit still Not daring

Anger A softly rounded Red amber I wore To mark The day When For my own Self Within Self I moved.

April is born of nothingness It needs no one It heeds no one. September is born of humility It knew April And is.

For me to make art and to teach the making of art are both transforming experiences that build and support one another. The quality that both need most is that of listening: For th…

As a child I lived in a house with no doors. Thoughts, drenched in sunlight, wandered through its spaces. They lived in the round. They dreamt. In time the sunset erected doors. Vi…

As artist to start believing that your miracle is the Way is the beginning of the undoing of the unexplainable magic. Miracles are manifold, as are the ways life presents itself to…

As you tread Think only of yourself The clearer you are The better you Understand

August in November. The heat unbearable. The sweat. Not from hard work. Sleeping. Endless hours of dreaming. Of protrusions. In eyes. And ribs. Doctored by love. Carefully. Gently.…

Bad girl, Bad child, Bad one, A refrain Heard a multitude of times By those who seemed Giants To my impotent kindness Now turned inward Into fury.

Beauty. The eye Beheld, But gently.

Beauty is the ability to see. Through. Within. In spite of. Because of. Beauty is the culmination. Of absolute experience. Of imagination. Of trust. Beauty is found beyond itself. …

Within the experience of horror a living Light redeems and guides us. Witnessing it through Love, overwhelming darkness is my passage to a deeper, fuller understanding of the delic…

Begin to care intelligently Calibrate As you imagine How you were meant to be Complex, assured, and full of doubt Uncovering hidden pathways To redirect.

Believing, waiting, In silence and with patience, Held by The September sun, warm On my cheek, Caressing.

Beyond In the land Of Evermore Gently I move With care Not To disturb The Softness Of the Blue.

Birth, A petal In the wind, Conversing

Black charcoal on my bed Born with no mouth To utter Just Black charcoal On my bed To ward off The evil. Mother helping To open the gorge Running, running I scream.

Blank Blank I have thought myself Through. Distilled all. What remains is dust To be wiped In days to come. Grey dust. Born of ages Spent believing. I am a fool. I will always B…

Brushes sleep. Sun shares its hopeful light. Waiting.

Brushing doubt with kindness My selfless self Knows.

I talked to my face This morning. I asked it to help me. It smiled and said: After sixty five years You should know better. Than to ask

Its a matter Of bending wills Being always The loser Always.

We covered distances You and I United Untied.

I am engaged Not married. I hear Schubert dial tones And recite songs. Will you engage With me?

I shall move forward As I just realized Its all in the tilling Not In the trees.

Have I arrived? And fulfilled your dreams? Did we overcome our demons? Are art and history parallel? Or is there a vanishing point Where Father And child Meet In perpetual quest.

Solo Means alone I always knew that But not to this Extent

I want another past. I am tired of carrying this one on my back. It is spherical, heavy and grey. I wish for a line, a color, a shape that describe a meadow or an open field. I wa…

Always a virgin Seeing blood As if its The first time Again.

Shampoo your body Sweetest if days Loveliest If moments

Mother and child Light and dark Chose Not to meet Fate With me But face Their own. Another lesson.

Saying goodbye Is full with Anticipation Like saying hello

Masses Incapable of weeping. Dry wells. No comfort. Rocks and Suspended canvases Color my days. With waiting

A storm in a tea cup. A Rodman’s cup, actually, Bought years ago For one dollar. I shall keep smiling. There is no other option.

A lonely easel Waiting for seeds An eternity A beginning

Had I received a kind word From him I would not have been able to write With such Drunken disdain

A bird call. A hundred miles To freedom. The sun hovering Over disputes Resolved in seconds. A round table With angles.

Have you ever noticed The difference between Angle and angel. Its only a point of view. A change of direction. A haven for A new beginning. I could not spell either For I had gone …

Footsteps Echo a center A gentle reminder Of gardens. A delight In what is yet unborn To unravel. Slowly

Reflections. Uncertain times. Hunger In and out. Lonely tables listen to violins And cry.

In my dream I took the wrong turn Went right instead of left Finally I arrived at the place Which was where I was Anyway A place for food With a lemon green Brushstroke Painted o…

My voice Crouching to be heard By me.

Graves That is what we have To look forward to. Open graves. Wounds that never heal. A scorching sun. An open desert Millions of dead.

I am an artist. I change pasts. I form futures. I look beyond without fear or doubt. For I contain both. In a bottle of my own making. My unmaking.

A picture Is a thousand words Coming to terms With the inevitable. A road Less traveled Fit only for armies In quest of food. Permanently.

Pregnant Always pregnant. With war. Multitudes Defy A birth A canvas A word

Building A thought Each time You think Is a craft You learn As you Compose A self Fluidity In this case Is not An option Except In your Heart As you Tread The path Marked Only Fo…

Busy signal. Unanswered calls. Children weeping With longing Bending Like a moan Desolate with desperation.

Carrying my garbage lashed closely to my back, I walk through the clamor onto the light, leaving behind me a nursery of souls preferring the dark, pretending, to imagine my complex…

Saying farewell was a very long process of coming to terms with the darkness of finality and its ever present emerging light. The depth of this terrain forced me to look with pierc…

Celestial blue Protects my morning Covering it with A haze Of pure love. A few steps in the day And the darkness returns. My ever-present battle Between Lux and Lucifer… A double s…

Cluttered spaces. Open hearts Forgive.

Confront the vacuum. The hollow empty space. The no-thing We have been avoiding For years. Now it fills us. This ever present non-existence. The bell tolls. We are dust. My brea…

Connecting and separating Are Tidal waves That carry us Only To drop us. As one.

Continually I fall back on the negative shortcomings of life and of myself. By now, these feelings are so familiar to me, their pain is oddly comforting. I have felt pain when my n…

When he was first asked to document it, Noel instantly felt that the driftwood held a story beyond the obvious, a story that happened to be his as well. Fused in black and then in …

Converse. The way Will appear. To reveal.

Dawn A belief I hold on to.

Deceptively fragile I continue to draw strength From the plentitude offered me.

Disconnected moments Thread my life wondering

Do I feel safe? I begin to question the notion of safety. Would I feel safe knowing the horrors will surface any minute, or being in their midst experiencing life as it is presenti…

Do you ever miss me That way Or am I still Only a voice?

Drawing Within My solitude I raise the bar And make A mountain Out of a mountain Forming A self Never to be Erased. Again.

I touch lands browned by the earth that reach beyond the expected Into Dreams of pregnancy And the memory of desire. Uncertain greys Wash out years of introspection Layers Swim in …

Dreams talk. You are within me Whether we both Like it or not. What I hear I cannot believe For I know I am Within you too. Yet we do not Meet in real time, But continue to move to…

Coming home. In a transformed state. After consciousness roamed the seas. Complex being. Past and present Containing future. Alone yet together Female and male Always in flux. A sp…

Driftwood darkness In anguish, we emerged from a wound too deep to recall. Singing a song of hope, our bodies communicated in waves of sound. Shifting sands and kneeling, we create…

Driftwoods are insights. They, like us, are specs that contain. They, like us, travel the great river, flowing within its immense embrace. They, like us, transform as they stream. …

Drop the shackles Gift yourself Trusting

Locked in an embrace Of dust The open sea Accumulating Diligently, If not beautifully.

Empty my heart. Fill it. By detaching. From only earth. And earthly Concerns. Look towards The infinite Connector. And believe. Thank you.

Empty though full The intricate dreams Of a childhood Blow bubbles Through the dense air On a path In between

Entangled pasts Draw A present Captive A future Ripe

Ephemeral space, both celestial and earthly. Tender light. Gentle presences. Allow visions from the beyond: wondrous, connected and limitless. Souls enfold a belonging. Transcendin…

Etched by foam I roam. To settle.

Painted manuscripts are by their very nature a synthesis of text and image. The independence and full development of these components are often compromised for the sake of the whol…

Mists Eluding form Nature Feels a sigh Eternity

Whenever I need to relax I visualize myself painting, with the gentlest of brushstrokes, the upper lid of the right eye, in the cavity where it meets the upper part of the nose and…

Father. When all is lost. What you built, stone by stone. When you see no redeeming light. And you spend your day Making accounts As if their balance Will cure That pierce Of the n…

At the source It is fear. Always fear. How to confront Its force. How to contain it. To continue Living in truth. Of your own worth And that of others. That is strength.

Feeling anxious comes when I least expect it. It asks me to fill the void of not knowing. I reach for the earthly colored graphite for comfort and begin painting. I paint in short,…

Feeling good Begins by being open And trusting In this strange And chaotic world Feeling good Grows By making you larger than you really are And so much more beautiful. Like ripe…

Feeling good in spite Feeling good in hope Feeling good as you put one foot ahead of the other while you walk your road. The one marked for you. Feeling good as you put one word b…

I need to be With myself Near the fire Again.

Fleeting moments Leave traces Carved with passion Misty and vast Our breath Recollects In marks So fine We hear Our selves Tremble In continuity. Transient Our breath A haze…

Shifting To thanks And Appreciation Is My newly found Footprint. To be.

For the love of touching: Of connecting with another in an infinite fraction of ephemeral time; bonding beyond the physical where sensuality is experienced within an idea of suspen…

A force All seeing Holds me dear And close. Enough to wander Through the forest And wade.

Forever unfolding. Forever real. A bird – A soul.

Forgive yourself The narrow road You took To turn your leaf Toward the light All you wanted Was a tree To be born Within the forest Of your mind.

Friends are rivers That go through me I always have to be in the tunnel To remain true Once I become part of the world (put a price on my searches) I become ritualized And accepted…

From barely touching, feeling the darkest void, to merely sensing in a mist of eternal space, a life of connection, a life of wonder. And wander. They are both the same. The darke…

From dark to light In a constant swirl Of knowing Graceful music Moves In gentle curves Awkwardly Uneasy fright Welcomes you Intact From past Journeys Looking through Mirr…

From the sea depths I rise And touch Your poetry.

Being conscious is my gift, Being aware is my passage, I struggle, in commitment and with belief, To comprehend my intrinsic value, As I traverse.

With the trust of a true gardener I planted seeds Water is scarce And the heat Unrelenting I keep digging And wait For fruit Knowing My garden only needs love And true love Is slow…

Gateways to oblivion, Nearer than we think, Closing.

Light and Dark Intermingled Leaving me room For an act of Almost insane, yet Loving generosity Beginning the way To realize my own Becoming.

Giving solace A kinship In the darkness of the night My solitude is a breath, Out of time and place, Of a life well lived. But kindly.

Transparent and fragile Fine As a leaf pressed Between the covers Of a precious Book I carpet The earth With words Of hope In Kindness And with Grace Wiser For Having been bound…

Refashioning goblets of blood In a rented room Named fear, I listen to a mandolin And strings Exchanging love eternal. Suspended thus I continue. Until I can no more.

Going from the edge of time to meet another who could be you in different form. You converse thus about the here and the now, the there and the then, confronting your beasts; but g…

Gratitude Is a belief In goodness When all Is opaque And dark. Painting Despite the deafening Noise Is an affirmation. A trust. A release. I invoke.

Grey, Grey, Grey commitment Is loving you enough to untie.

Tenderness. Yellow calm Turned real.

Green Summer sounds. Water.

Blue distance Hovering. Thunderstorms.

Love spreads its wings Touching me As I Sing.

Breath Deep enough To touch. You.

Uneasy gloves Cover. Moist love.

Winding Cobra-like. Cue missed. I am waiting.

Happy hours Of nuances Played To the sounds of raindrops. Usher in. Welcome. Me. To the fold. Again. At the twilight of my years.

Mother always took us to Hashim’s in Bab Idriss to buy our shoes. It was magical. The salesmen were kind and courteous and knew that mother had the last word, no matter. To make su…

He says little. in his way He says a lot. Laughter curls his lips like a swan unfolding its body getting ready to glide into happiness. He gives little. in his way He gives a lot. …

Your art is Your intent. When you put the time, Others, For whom your paint is soft, Will heed. And matter.

His name was Adam. Legend has it that as a child he walked from Turkey to Beirut. He was the delivery boy for a tiny grocery shop in Hamra. The shop had everything. The grocer’s br…

Hope A thread Connecting

When place is a vision And light Is not a time Our hope turns into faith To exit as we enter.

How do I access love? I want to be love In real time Not in dream. Do I contain fear But have love contain me? Is that the source Of eternal truth? Is that question the call That …

Why is it always About ‘I’? In the hazy, misty, Evening veils, The ‘I’ dissipates And connects To what becomes An all consuming Clarity. The silence empties Its love. Making the ‘I…

I am Naturally, Softly, Tenderly Still And waiting To rise Softly, Tenderly And naturally Above In the spirit Of flying Like a bird At peace.

I am Unspent A seed Of Earth And Mystery Living Beyond memory Whole And still able to see.

I am a Ras Beirut girl, born and bred. I am who I am because of the sea shore, and the mountains as well. If others see through this the hell we all humans live, I only see my red…

i am at present painting what seems to me to be layered incoherence. i am asking myself if art is a process of realizing or is art an image. and can one make a non image using th…

I am beyond. I tread, Softly.

I am faith In every stroke No wonder I am a magician Of the unsaid – Said

I am finite. And shall end. The ills are not mine. I shall disappear. For The view is skewed. Perhaps it is for the best.

I am learning to live Within the sounds of words Not to share them But to relish them As companions Of an immeasurable Solitude. Craft as verb And craft as process And craft as att…

Parentless and childless I am fully With my Maker Transient Yet connected With a brilliance That is worthy.

I am on the edge of nowhere Returning to nowhere Uncertain And on the precipice Treading these waters I experience Certainty A gift and privilege Of living Fully.

Brush in hand I am one Alone Brush in hand I am

I am painting layered incoherence. An experience of fear and psychosis. Is my art a process of realizing or is it the formation of an image. Phrasing the question makes me an artis…

I am part of this place A harmony Resurrected. A memory Relived. Forgiveness.

I am still The child Looking out Feeling in Not seeing

Learning to love, I arrive as light Nurturing passages To understand The child within. In real time.

I behold light inside my soul Trace portals alone and not My body gives space a shape And rests, believing.

I came back to Lebanon in the fall of 2006 after living in Washington, DC for nearly twenty- five years. For a time my return was full of uncertainty as I learned to view the famil…

I cannot argue with the force I felt today As I sat in my space Surrounded by my paintings Monochromatic and firm Rooted in strength And movement Definite And real Trying to conta…

I cannot sleep. My legs hurt. Tenderness disappearing, Rather slowly. Rain coming. The door, not yet fixed. Too many paintings. An idea, a look, a thought, Capture voices. My lulla…

I clutch ropes Through clouds Not knowing Below

I color my days With flowing Remembrance Of a mist Unforeseen and Forgotten

I cry for the quiet beauty of being alive. I cry for the terror that keeps me unstable for years. I cry for the love I so passionately feel in moments of utter despair. I cry while…

I dedicated myself to painting professionally when I was 28 years old, during the civil war in Lebanon. Concentrating on my art helped me come to terms with all that was happening …

I dream of you As if We are still A possibility.

I drew the blinds To veil the light And painted so insistently My eyes Lit.

I empty my soul. And wait for Guidance. I am a child In this Space. In this Form. In this Color. No longer a wanderer I am open and free. Ready, present and waiting To transition…

I feel life in each piece of driftwood. I sense a still, yet animate, force beneath the intricacies of its appearance. Life within the driftwood is rich. It reveals itself daily. E…

I feel the shore Coming to me Years after I let it go. Its foam Touches my toes Through my body To safety. At last.

I have been lost in the city. Many times. As a child. And as a young adolescent. Not knowing whether to turn left or right. To get out of the maze. Has been my nightmare since I w…

I imagine an immense space with all possibilities moving, meeting and existing in any configuration – a cloud, a wave, a constant ephemeral softness, a blue. Moving within that spa…

I listen to the energy coming to me so it can come through me.

I listen to the presence of silence Alternating between Being and Shedding Its music is like A soft Enveloping Cloud Keeping rhythm And staying in tune Incubating And ready For…

I move with purpose though the weight of the world sits heavily on my shoulders. I know what to do and when to do it though I am full of menacing doubt that leaves me paralyzed. Do…

I need to purge My childhood To have faith

I needed to travel To know. My search was painful. And I blamed it On childhood myths. How very enriching It was for me To discover That Ras Beirut Is neither a place Nor an event …

I never made you laugh Nor see the world lit. Except by my lantern. Which sees the dark Through you. I envy her your space And your smile. Dark paintings brood Gently, Rememberin…

I No longer Care I Am Full I See The Moon Beckon, Following.

I pray For my anger To dissipate For love To bathe me Inside out For my composure To refigure – Aligning.

I quietly dwell Anticipating Your return Forgiving your smile For her.

I remember her laughter. And her tears when voices had echoes. I remember her dreams. Intensely, though quietly, she gave with her hands. Her friendships, made of clay, formed and …

I sat alone watching the trees bend but never break. They made room for force; side stepped it; allowed it through. All the while preserving their essence. Being proud.

I see the shadow Of a singing bird Among the crossed bars Of my awareness. Lightly It flies away Leaving me in song So kindly.

I sense The shift Everywhere. Ambiguous and absolute It allows me To sift. I see The Call to prayer Come to an end. My trees, Bountiful and free, Listen. And then cry.

Thinking, I sense yellow. I move Ever so lightly, In exit.

I started painting professionally during the civil war in Lebanon, when I was 28 years old. My art served as a coping mechanism and as a way to come to terms with all that was happ…

I trust The shore of forgiveness And unlearn

I want another past. I am tired of carrying this one on my back. It is spherical, heavy and grey. I wish for a line, a color, a shape that describe a meadow or an open field. I wa…

I want another past. I am tired of carrying this one on my back It is spherical, heavy and grey I wish for a line A color A shape That describe a meadow or an open field I wa…

I was angry, and I was not punished. A revelation. Feeling love returning, In aloneness together, I am.

I was born Yesterday With a memory Of life Before sunsets You were born On a lake Of silky waters As deep as the ocean

I was born and raised in Lebanon, and I have lived in Washington D.C. since 1983. I started painting as a child and have had several exhibitions in Beirut and in Washington. In my …

I was initiated into the art of looking from the inside out the first day I entered the rawdah class at Ahliah way back in 1953. This initiation became an understanding which in tu…

I want to go home, mother, I whisper, I am very tired. I, A little girl with a pony tail, Always skipping to find gifts Of glee, Enter the circle of grey mists Into clouds that n…

If I thought I will be Spared The torture I stand corrected Having put Pen to paper To amass Courage.

If only I can Suspend thought To see Through The cup of life So full Clear water Remaining.

Imagine Your hidden pathways uncovered Your doubt redirected. You calibrate Through the darkest night, Learning to care. Again.

In a moment of utter vulnerability, where the line separating creator and created is non- existent, I ask my paintings for help.

In kinder garden I had a friend, a little girl, with golden curly hair, and a smile. I remember her smile to this day. It got us out of many troubles, safely. The troubles children…

In Ras Beirut Peace is A foundation That connects And sustains Rooted Deeply In Knowledge Of frailty And of strength Alone in community Or together We form the unknown With the gra…

In the early morning hours I am all of mankind. Stripped of History, Culture and Narrative. I am tall, full, and fluid. I am beyond Art, Beyond Negotiation. I am transparent. Aware…

In the path of light The leaves remain green My heart beats with love And I stand still.

In the presence of immense horror, there is always Light, Light that redeems, Light that Guides. Witnessing it through Love, the darkness for me became a passage to understanding.

In realizing The extent power Wields in Our very intimate Relationships I remember that It was my moment Of pure loving kindness And generosity both of spirit And of matter That be…

Intersecting Coming together. Intensely. And moving. To unknown lights. And heights. Lines breathe a life. Meet for a second. And transgress. Forming a universe. More of the soul t…

It all starts with the wood. And my perceptions. I transitioned into color, recently. I seem to have transitioned in my perceptions too. I now move into more fantasy than expressio…

It is How you are. Ultimately.

It is all a mist Of the bluest blue That the eye feels As it touches Creation. Alone.

It is as if you have been through the battle and survived: bloodied but whole. I cannot make out your look….is it one of reproach, one of looking ahead for another battle, one of i…

It is not all about us Though we have to travel Inwards to immense depths To realize that. It is about questioning And honest mirroring. Emerging lighter Though much indebted Wishi…

It is sensation captured between dream and wakefulness leading to understanding Grace, no stranger to darkness. Loving. A crevice in the abyss. A dawn. A walk.

It’s all about faith The struggle Is. Whether you birth Children Or Art You need to focus Beyond. Before Beginnings.

It’s all about faith, The struggle Is. Whether you birth Children Or Art You need to focus Beyond Before Beginnings.

Taking my first steps as a nineteen year old student at the Art Department of AUB, I could not have imagined that I would be standing here today to celebrate the professor who welc…

Beware of the sly joke Coming at you Like a snake In the guise Of a bird To make light Of choices you made In blood As if their choices Were the only Right ones to make Turning Yo…

Just liberate yourself And be good In your skin And underneath Your heart, for Someone is watching And taking note Of your conscience.

Silence. Letting me know beyond words. How to understand the rules Of nothingness. Better. Embraced by The kindness of Impotence. And Its strength. I watch the rain. And mour…

Knowing trust. Unlearning. Forgiveness

Forever soft Moving with the tenderness of lace Across the surface Of my failing vision. Expressions of a life Of doubting indecision And the aimless roaming Of my innards Spread o…

Leaning over Making sure your child Is not a burden Carried To shore And suspended In layered strings Of heavy delight To meet an earth Wet with angles Set at a distance To steady…

Be quiet and still in yourself Listen to the colors Feel. Stretch your hopes To embrace Them. All. With the rhythm Of your line Etch and voice a piano note. Gently. Life can be kin…

Life in art is a journey: From the tangible to the ephemeral From the one to the many in my understanding of selfhood (making choices) From the solid to the fluid in my concept of…

Life stood still today A wash of blue So alive And promising

Light Forever drawn Touches, teases, caresses In the early hours My hands Ever faithful Reach out to embrace Temptation Invites me To surrender All desire Ancient flower…

Sleep, blessed sleep… Bringing tender golden radiance To a tired body Misused and abandoned Gently recovering from a rupture Of souls Connecting again to the wilderness Of life In …

Amber light Never foreseen Always dreaded Without reason. Transplanted chaos Brushing a circle Inwardly. Forever

Through the blinds Impossible to discern Shadows of lives Through Shafts of light. Warm

The years of living softly…. Catching the blue light of dawn As it disappears into twilight And life becomes possible Again…. Doubt enfolded in dreams of Credits by one beloved …

Solitude Filled with light Emanating In rays of stark Shadows Melting Into dawn Footsteps Tap the day Promising Promising

Min jouwa La barra Always in layers Of light Exchanged With insights Understood in the dark Void Of living Non facts.

Ambient light Whispered longing In song Reciting blue gray Love Unwavering and constant Searching For gods that guide Infinite wisdom

In the early morning light I paint A love song To others Whose Longing is Arriving Brushing shadows away I know How hard It has become To see.

A lilac welcome Quietly becoming An enveloping kindness Churning my insides Slowly mocking My doubt. A day opens With guarded decisions. A rhythm Of celestial hues Shifts within A…

The soft misty light Of darkness Illuminates As the morning dew Begins And ends The mystery of the shift In gray circles Ever turning Ever mourning.

Light cuts through pain Inviting my brushes To caress

All dark And spiraling Towards hope I call For Wisdom Where Silence And Reason Dawn Fulfilling Grace

Light of Darkness Bathed bare in the light of darkness, I listen. Set free, I become. And can see.

Despite the darkness of the night I deepen my solitude with dialogue And gently awaken to light Without bondage.

Like Cinderella The hour Home Must come. The shoe fitting Is another story.

Listen And Be

Listening, I withdraw To better hear The pain.

Listening, I care for the child. Long overdue.

Living between Michelangelo’s David and total, embracing, surrender is a moment, a lifetime, of realization.

Living through layers, Transparent, opaque, Real, imaginary, Softly embroidered. Pins piercing, Needles threading, A life, Complete, And still, As a cushion, Or a shawl– Protecting…

Look forward, angel Your wings Guiding Your love Within Your past. A lesson.

Looking at the driftwood I see agonized forms. Though still, they express long journeys. Ones of pushing out only to pull back in again. The very presence of the driftwood and thei…

I am putting out a call to the void. As I make my call, I sit still. I feel my body real and solid. I feel my spirit connected. I welcome love. And understand when it is withdrawn.…

Image 1b: Ink: I await your voice Patiently For comfort. Silver: Do you have dreams That cover your body With dew And make you reach the sky Empty of vines? Image 2b: Gentle…

1. I was born Yesterday With a memory Of life Before sunsets. 2. You were born On a lake Of silky waters As deep as the ocean. 3. Love me As you would A tree. 4. Ta…

Your love Roots me In a sea of solitude And I begin.

I trust you. Can I trust in you? Paintings became passages. And I became a dream.

A being joins the infinite unknown in the process of becoming. I love you As I draw Unfolding senses in space.

Tranquil passion Circles my body Loving you. And bars Erect visions That give Peace A home.

The thought of a fire Hurts Where once it Caressed.

As notes unfold with tenderness Which, Like rays of translucent light, Caresses wells of pain And terror recoils. Sustaining calm I become Oxford Defying knots.

White pain Trying to make Sense of A rupture that bonds.

An expanse of oaks and water Breathing life To mirrors. Inclusive. Titian beckons from a distance While Beirut homes Draw jeweled belts around emotions.

Seeing hands through a prism My love Is Light. I drew keyholes And one-eyed men.

Love me As you would A tree Take me to your castle And let me Touch Your fragrance As you Sleep

Love spreads its wings Caressing me As I Breathe. Touching You, I paint The space That contains us, Quietly.

I was born Yesterday With a memory Of life Before sunsets You were born On a lake Of silky waters As deep as the ocean Love me As you would A tree Take me to your castle And let m…

I kiss the hand That digs the earth And bathes me In red Gentle voice Caressing Without words Cleansing my spirit With light I wear your clothes To protect The mist which Envelop…

I waited for you Behind wrought-iron doors You gave me words that fit They cried so hard It made you wince I only felt That god gave you to me Afterwards we lay on a bed of flowe…

Loving you is like Walking on the seashore Hovering between Wakefulness and sleep Getting wet In splashes Heavenly water Washing away Years of tiredness Years of anxiously waiting…

Do you have dreams That cover your body With dew And make you reach the sky Empty of vines I hold you tightly With a closeness That allows dreams Of an impossible love Making ever…

Your voice scratches My body Drawing farewells With a conviction that Leaves me Naked but For remembrance and pain

A summer of peace And water Empty of wolves And other predators Invading An otherwise tranquil night A gift Of tenderness Far greater Than any words Could ever express A month …

I eat the leftover Brie So you could be in me Full and tender Your hands keep their distance While I busy mine with paint Loving you over dinner Makes me speak And laugh In fear

Come Let me show you My home White washed walls High ceilings And rich marble columns That protect Exquisite embroidery Hidden beneath Drop cloths Come Let us together Search The …

Sacred home Violated a hundred times ln a bewitching game Of darts A dream slowly unclothed Waiting impatiently To unravel

A fire is born Through hands That rock the wood Gently even Fondly As if it were A child A fire is born Through hands That speak In words of touch Holding cradles That protect K…

“Lovesong” is a suite of poems, drawings and paintings that considers love both as light and as shadow. The rhythmic sequence expresses a deep awareness of love as a vehicle for un…

Quietly I tread Anticipating your return Forgiving your smile For her

Loving I turn the other cheek To continue

Loving without fear I distill belief. And paint.

Loving you despite your freedom Is a prison Of emotions undiluted And intact. Can we survive faith?

Lucid beauty. Your narrative is your self witnessing and being, told in sequences of growth. Your awareness becomes your honesty, your key to all questioning. Emerging from the d…

Maybe I cannot sleep Because I need to Think of the shadow. Maybe I need to think Of how the shadow Came to be a brushstroke A second coming A presence Coming into my living room F…

Maybe it is best To remain in the dark To watch light Grow To only Love Or perhaps To just Be

I only want To quiet down The din Of the past. For it is only din Now… Based on imagination And suppositions… Documented In my mind As fact… How do I know What went on In others’ …

Memory Is so elusive. To retain all What I truly want Is to sit by the seashore And watch the ripples Disappear.

Living Stripped of all shackles Meeting My maker honestly A miracle to achieve And to behold Every day In beauty. Freely.

Perhaps it is all In what we choose To see Not in what is there. Really. We are human After all. A mixture of love And the terror Of loving. We live with Mirrors That define us. Th…

Fleeting mists Is all that we see Composed and still And ready for our thoughts. Reaching for the unknown We stretch And bend And flow Becoming mists Ourselves. In the process.

Moments to remember As life proceeds To take us Under its wings, Teaching us To fly

Morning muse I will find myself Within The sandals that Were gifted me And that fit so well

Mother embraces me Before her own birth Gives way to a love so fluid It squares my circle. Intricate, wondering, cajoling, Life envelopes Me.

Mother. What fullness. And what mystery. To us she was simply mama. To my cousins she was nana. Her love grew with us. It was intuitive, silent and beckoning. Always flowing. Like …

Moving in the dark Vacant. Is there a compass?

I look up at the world Through moving shadows Held still, as white Stirs And turns into oblivion.

Muddy waters Drives my sleep In a never ending spiral Of discontent. Reminded softly Of the immensity That awaits me My brush Surrenders. And I paint.

Grateful For the sounds I hear Coming To tell me It is all in the How Of the music That Has meaning. All else Is repetition.

I hear The music of the spheres And dance. Trusting The sound beneath the noise I reach pure acceptance As I shift, align, and transform.

My brush Moves Ever so gently To caress my body Imaging.

My childhood gave me A crystal bowl For safekeeping I broke the rim It’s healing

My father died in 2000 but it was only in 2009 that I was able to give myself time to grieve and relive the memories that colored my life up until then. It all started when I accid…

My new life. My new disconnecting. Of circles. And the like. The breeze touching my shoulders. As it did. On the beach. Decades ago. Then it was almost a game. To enjoy. Circles. T…

My paintings are nursery rhymes. They build relationships with voids. Sometimes the void has an edge. Like a child peering over an object, I can see a line, a color, a shade. An im…

My Skin The Shape of Night On Fire The night envelopes me in a darkness I have come to appreciate and discover. It is a darkness I can almost touch, thick like fog. Through it, …

My skin The shape of night On fire.

My solitude is political My politics is solitary I enter community In faith And dialogue To fulfill

My Song I dreamt of singing one of Schubert’s songs, of singing it with compassion and strength, expressing light within the dark and darkness in light. And then I awoke. With t…

A new intimacy With strangers Who hear Distant voices And nod In recognition. Voices That listen As the circle Expands Containing And evolving Our very Quiet Conversation.

No tenderness remembering, No tenderness forgetting, Colors so fixed, It is frightening.

Not to achieve union. But to be union. With all the precision and expansion of the uncanny meeting of both inner and outer. At the moment of greatest need.

Nothing. A tiredness so pervasive It is best perceived As vacuum.

Nothingness. Full of potential. Life. As is.

A couple of notes, Circular in tone, Ascend To ground me. Time Moving imperceptibly Turns blue Into white, As water does on stone, Making me descend To meet my Oblivion Freely, A…

Still As recovering night shadows In flight, We travel distances With the hope of finding the eternal. Drawing our reflections With water We welcome Oblivion, A dark and spacious …

I love you As I draw Unfolding senses in space. Seeing hands through a prism My love Is Light.

Quiet, slow turmoil Swims peacefully Through your hands: Trying hard to understand, Accepting nonetheless. Your love Roots me In a sea of solitude. And I begin.

This portfolio talks of love. Love as light and love as shadow; transparent love as well as contradictory love. Ultimately it is about pain: the pain of a connection that separates…

Sacred Oxford Violated a hundred times ln a bewitching game Of darts. A dream slowly unclothed Impatiently waiting To unravel.

If I leave Will I still Sleep soundly Brushing wolves away With tenderness. If I leave Will I still paint Trusting. If I leave Will faith Abandon its hold on me, Inventing A shad…

I am a witness to your light So rare So tender and Elusive I smile At my efforts to give it shape Not realizing The inherent contradiction. Now I only want To be blessed by it.

Stationary I stand at the edge Sculpting our friendship. Hurting you.

Your voice Gently wraps itself Around my waist Warming me With untroubled sleep.

My soul found its home With you. The geese told me so this morning. It has been a long journey To reach the shore Only to find that my love for you Is not quite enough. To conquer.…

Filling the vacuum With imagination I confuse the issues. As usual. I await your voice Patiently for comfort.

Your voice pierces The void we have Become. It makes me ashamed To order A ham and Swiss From Megan Who witnessed others. The thought of a fire Hurts Where once it Caressed. Do I…

Sitting quietly Hearing you think I open the silence With desire And close it With love.

Transparent love Will you ever Unveil? I trust you. Can I trust in you?

Do I detect A rose blush In the sunlight On L street Because I saw you In a crowd And loved you I want to Brush my lips Against your cheek Like a butterfly Fluttering its Wings Pr…

On being an artist Painting is not an escape. It is an affirmation. Of a consciousness made conscious. In love and with love.

Art, like water, surges from arid rock. It finds its way through sharp crevices and open spaces. With guards down, the artist follows, and gushing waters begin to stream–unexplaina…

I ask my paintings for help in a moment of utter vulnerability where the line separating creator and created is non- existent.

What gives me courage is the glimpse of heaven I experience as I paint and write. Nothing else. Nothing less.

Art, between Michelangelo’s David and a total embracing surrender, is a moment, a lifetime, of realization.

It all began with a piece of tree root. Given with the hope of merging. What emerged is a reality made up of many. They were unraveled daily in drawings and watercolors. An entity …

On merging, emerging and the beyond During the decade 1990- 2000 I painted driftwood by merging paint with wood. It was for me multi-dimensional both in process and in outcome. Thr…

Making these pieces – part sculpture, part painting – is a multi-dimensional activity for me, both in process and in result. I give myself the challenge of discovering in seemingl…

One always…being a part spatially and emotionally….immersing. Fluid, gentle and soft like milk…nourishing in its whiteness…cleansing. Scars in tree trunks…curved to allow the sun…e…

Only the birdsong remains Screaming gently Of yellow surrender Through ashes Softly

Our Lands I asked to abstract and my brush touched A fearless oneness, A breath of light in motion, A tenderness, reflecting, A depth that only abundance fulfills, A mirror, A lif…

Our life a mist We grow Old.

Out of the debris Comes a heart So soft, I know.

Overwhelming trust. Anxiety ancestral. Learning.

At daybreak A thought To own myself Occurs to me. It spills forth Like a revelation, Making me So sure All that was Had been In preparation, Only.

The first impression was one of total darkness. The monumental trees towered above and engulfed me as I walked through this part of the Eastern Shore. After a while, I sensed light…

Ligaments breathing in brushstrokes. That cut through layered mists. Dropping the waste Into the already full garbage. Making The world my oyster. Now.

Will you take my pain, I asked Silent space Accepting.

The only remaining realization is that what truly counts in the final analysis is the purity and honesty of my painting, physically and psychically. Love, friendship, family, the a…

Painting driftwood, for me, is multi-dimensional both in process and in outcome. It involves the transformation of a seemingly ordinary piece of wood into a multi-entity object thr…

Painting driftwood, for me, is multi-dimensional both in process and in outcome. It involves the transformation of a seemingly ordinary piece of wood into a multientity object thro…

Painting in white The shade Matters. It fills the room. And empties the soul Of debris Accumulated over years Of struggle With the love You knew And the clutter You faced. Your bru…

Painting is alchemy…..it transforms a buttress into a raft… There is no one shore to arrive at… There is no one buttress/raft to take you there… There is the willingness to sit sti…

Painting is allowing myself to jump off a cliff knowing that I will be held, but not knowing how. But jump, I must.

Painting, the art of receiving.

Paintings, apparitions Move An unquiet mind To stillness. Searching.

Paradoxes Make of love A silent retreat, A quiet childhood Blanket.

Parallel lives Erupting Lucifer Remaining Fertile Despite. The amber coal Feeds on itself As I Stoke what should be left alone Refusing to die In the bowels.

As I ate my tender peach this morning I felt forgiveness. And forgave despair.

Petals soft Reach out to touch Hard rock Driftwood drifts In my attempt To know You Yellow-orange Deep in thought Brings forth Blue-green And I succumb Black holes Cover y…

Chartres reveals itself. Slowly. With infinite concentration, his hands prod the burning wood. Receptive, he draws. Its dramatic birth betrays Time. Memory evolves as pain settles.…

‘You broke my sister’s gold piano’ I said. ‘We have been through that many times already,’ you said. I lost the keys to my house. Forever. Then. And Opened.

Poetic and real, imaginative and tangible, my story with driftwood began as play. Touching and feeling each piece from within, multiple entities emerged. Souls followed as cavities…

During the past decade Zurayk has been developing ‘poetic renderings’ in which paintings and poetic prose are integral to the full appreciation of her creative expression. She bega…

Transparency, A way of being in the world, Makes of politics A child’s play Of hide and seek. When you paint yourself With the brushstrokes You paint others with, Your colors will …

Portfolio Holding Mists Mists proved to be layers which grew to be myths I birthed and that in turn birthed me. Name: Afaf Zurayk Date of Birth: September 21, 1948 City: Beirut …

Premonition Ancestral voices Seal my present An abyss of childhood Keeping score with the unknown To unbalance.

Pretend Pretend to draw…pretend to see… pretend to understand…pretend to be… Perched at the point of no return…you take off…to put on again…and mask…what is truly happening…with p…

Processing of the many wars in the psyche of the Lebanese. The presence of bloodshed and despair in the expanse of nature. The hope to transcend into a state of forgiveness so that…

I trust All will Happen As it Should When It should That is The unwritten Pact I made With Providence When I Was born. Today I rest An Open Book In the making.

Twenty five for twenty five Almost a blessing Separating as it connects Healing

Marking dust, I transit. Ephemeral death in life, As life is, in death. Floating bare and clear, Finally. Recording vacuum. In Time and with Rhythm, Gently.

Frozen within space Weaving webs And soothing intricacies. Beings separate and connect In strokes that capture Moments In slow time. A truth. A blessing.

The terror of being together The fear of being apart Intricate webs Woven by the spider Of time And frozen in space A truth A blessing

The fear of togetherness Dissipates in a sea of Intricacies Woven by time The spider Of truths And blessings. Frozen, etched and melted Burning from within Forming candles Inside…

Qissah is a series of technical pen ink drawings on 10cmx12cm Arches papers. Drawing daily, I allowed my hand the freedom it needed to express, and sometimes to narrate, the many …

Quiet, quiet, thoughts Where silence Speaks. Loving halos Connect. And the ‘I’ Exits the body To join.

Quietly weaving your stories with everlasting music of a score so deep it frightens the weak of heart and draws the devils out of their nests to become birds that fly into endless …

I am painting quietude. Neither before nor after the storm. Not even during. Sometimes centered. Sometimes fluid. Always aware. Brush, pencil, pen, charcoal, distil. Contain. Move …

It is interesting. That The amount of good Releases so much Anger And opens the gate. To quietude.

The years of living softly…. Catching the blue light of dawn As it disappears into twilight And life becomes possible Again…. Beginning Anew At dusk, With thanks, Dear Raghida.

Rainfall Gently pounding Insides. Tremors.

Ras Beirut Birthed me With a round face Sometimes accepting And at others negating Angles. I lived not knowing How to choose Between the soft And the sharp In my art And in my lif…

Ras Beirut doors, gates, entrances are always welcoming. Finely crafted, they reflect who we are. Our legacy, intricate and fragile, is of storms that break us, perpetually. We are…

Always with style, Ras Beiruties negotiate. Crossing the street and other more risky crossings. There are no traffic lights that work, nor parking meters. Only guts. And what guts …

Ras Beirut Lit my path To live to paint Beauty With the gift Of Having known A love Distilled and pure Intertwined Within a complexity So integral It blesses While It heals.

Ras Beirut vibrates. With deep assimilation. Of experience, of passion, of compassion. A maze of tolerance, its streets mirror the imagination needed for it to be. And to create. …

Silence. The way Reason Dawns.

Receiving Your gift From the angels, I draw its outline From water.

Receiving Your gift From the angels, I draw its Outlines With water

Titian beckons from a distance While Beirut homes Draw jewelled belts around emotions. Features discern themselves Through layers of immense darkness As notes unfold with tendernes…

Red turbans Changed into helmets. Fire (or was it five) Women breathing deeply. Unimagined terrors Invading. An interlude.

I struggle To remain Real In this world Of charades And power. Rejection is easy Because It does not Need work. Just opacity. Am I Equally guilty?

Remnants of childhood safety help me sleep soundly while living the edge of reason and decency, the edge of being human. In my sleep, I begin to witness a history. I See the person…

I want To always Be A river Kind Fluid Inclusive Flowing Bold In the way Life Is meant To be A pulsating Stream Vibrant And Caring.

Live roaches In dark and damp Basements Are better Than human roaches In pristine homes Feeding on each other In case They are discovered Naked. And alone.

Absorbed within the dark and softened by it, I paint a fine line that divides what is good from what is evil. Separating only to connect, I paint the fine line upon which my sanity…

An endless tunnel Of relentless Avoidance. A most obvious Passage Towards extinction. You hope The rubble Remains undisturbed Under your feet So tired. And continue.

Russian roulette A real sport To settle matters. Whatever happened to dialogue? Gamblers all. And we are sitting ducks.

I feel Each Word Thought And act. I Listen. Sacredness.

Safely on edge I unravel.

I had my first experience of deep communion When I was about ten years of age Drawing and painting At the Sami Salibi School of Fine Arts On Sadat Street. It was then that I knew W…

Seeing light in another, our spirits awaken, our bodies nearing our souls. With light illuminating our perceptions we begin to trust one another, tentatively, then more deeply–melt…

Sitting still On the precipice Of shallow waters Protecting Emotions Of such magnitude Moving Ever so lightly To let The wind Slight by Erasing.

Your shadow is your reality Tucked beneath you Like a child Recovering from a wound Spilt open And still vulnerable Peering at us With eyes Wide open Survivors of a journey To the …

So hard to arrive So hard to maintain So essential The breadth Of it The wisdom Of it. Silence.

It is contained in a moving vessel. That can dock at any port. Any time. You view it from many angles. It makes itself felt. For your conversation. Is inside. Swimming in a sea of …

The sitting duck I cradled all these years in my womb resurfaces these days of the revolution. To remind me today that I am still here despite its presence within me. That I am her…

Anchoring long summer days and brisk winter Sundays, the stone house sat comfortably on a hill overlooking Beirut. Protected by a carob tree and a sea of hydrangeas, it welcomed ev…

Slow slow time Making me Wince. Appreciating.

So fine. Anger, Almost.

So here we are Aborted And left to float On trepid waters At best Indifferent To the unborn Life Still within us.

A tear, Soft and round, Forgives.

Soft clouds Reflect your skin Which hardens When touched Pebbles born of water Settle solidly in my room Reminding me Of you Sounds filter noise Preparing me To submit To your…

Soft pain. A wall. I spiral.

Sound with no sound I reach moments of aloneness, where everyone is a stranger and a messenger as well. I listen to the void, not its silence, but through absence, learning love.

Space and silence A fraction of time Everlasting.

Spending time in the company of strangers. Getting acquainted. To evolve. At sea. And. As sea.” “The process takes years. The transformation, seconds. The seas open up. And I ride…

Standing Tall Listening, I care for the child. Long overdue.

Stillness A gift of nature Reconstructing itself. An inner hurricane Subdued.

Submitting and attentive I paint softness Waiting

In its essence, landscape painting reflects the artist’s relationship to the land. This relationship is a dynamic interaction which involves what is familiar and what is unknown. S…

A presence In my living space, A misty cloud I enter as I wake. To meet you Languidly Stretched before the fireplace Of past comforts. Reminder of a life Lived in real Fancies Of…

Surrendering I listen.

A tiredness so pervasive It is best perceived As vacuum Tears Frail and tender Embrace me As I seek A permeating presence, A clearing, Lit to allow Despair to breathe And love to …

I am out of context Living in an Ether of possibilities I shall water My arid earth With tender grace And in that Arrive to the Garden gate Fully embraced.

Tender textures Illumined by water Sleep willingly In the fold Of the beloved Extending dreams And sharing breaths Of a wondrous Eternity.

Tenderness, The other side of transparency, An encounter.

Tenderness, Loving A self Left bare.

Thank you home My anchor, my shore. You contain my sea. Its waves writing my odes to you. I ask for nothing more.

To be able to face ‘Nothing’ and still be real. To access joy as a state of mind, inspired by itself, only. To care by not caring. To be present, enough, alone. That is love.

The amber coal Feeds on itself As I Stoke Its refusal To die In my bowels Reminding me It is Fertile still In spite Of The years. I suffer Its flames With erupting Tendernes…

The art comes through me while I am both in control and submitting, alive and extinct: the source of my profound Awe.

The color of sound Permeates As we quest For peace. To forgive Is to understand The crimes that have Led To our death. It is To pierce through Into the light That never dims. It i…