Great News!

I guess it's alright to just throw this out into the universe now... I'm pregnant! 13 weeks and counting! We're very very very excited.

This is our great new collaboration.

I realize that pregnant women glow because inside them shines twice the light. It still amazes me, especially when I'm doing ordinary things, like waiting in line at the grocery store or choosing a book at the library or eating. It hits me. This wave of awe hits me. There's a life forming inside me. Somehow, this divine energy has chosen to manifest itself through Edber and I.

At other times, a different wave hits me. Everything tilts slightly to the side, like the earth is tipping. Nausea. Waves and waves of it throughout the day. Nature's way of having me lay down without protest. Of having me be aware that my body is in charge for now. And is it ever so loud! My body hollers at me like a drill sergeant when I exert too much effort, when I eat something that's not quite good for me. It magnetizes me toward healthy things. Like fruits and vegetables and fresh air and trees.

It's all true. There's nothing like this. No painting will ever match this creative process. I am constantly aware of being part of something bigger than me. I am constantly aware that the same creative force that allowed the universe to be is working inside me. This is the most sacred thing I've ever experienced.

I feel like I am being carefully prepared to step up to the next level of my consciousness. A new godliness. a new godessness. I am about to tap into powers I haven't used in this lifetime.

I am excited, but at the same time, scared. How have other women gone through this? Can I handle it? CAn I be a good mother? MOTHER. One of the biggest words in the English language. It's up there with SKY or OCEAN or SPACE. Can that word fit in me?

This is my gift right now. The gift of being still and treating myself to what's good for me ( and the baby of course). The gift of being polished, like a gem. No more rough spots. I have to be better. I am better. With twice the light, twice the power. I will never look at other mothers the same way. I bow with my deepest respect to all of you.

The You of Kisses

I have known you for thirteen years.
Your body should be made of my kisses by now.

No,no. Not muscle and bone but kisses.
Hard kisses and soft kisses

Kisses and kindnesses
make you up.
which is why you always smell like
all the good things I've ever known

What are kisses
but all the good things we never said?

Long kisses and fast kisses
ones by the door
ones sprawled over by the couch
consolation kisses
question kisses

Your body of kisses
is made of all my truths
all my missing
all my silliness
pent up

Bottled in a pair of cupped lips
transferred though your skin
or your mouth
sometimes waiting


After thirteen years
you are now made
of my good kisses
and I am made of yours

I Hold Your Hand

I hold your hand
skin, biology
mass, volume
moment
atoms

I hold your dust.

Illusion.

carrying intentions
affection
tenderness
the mind of my skin
touching yours

I hold your hand
in all its forms
and meanings
and conjugations
and synonyms

but most of all
I hold your hand
and it holds mine

Beginnings

Soaking up the words of Louis Khan in "Between Silence and Light" has instilled in me the ability to fall in love with the beginning of things. This was his system for finding the essence in everything.

The first school was a man sitting under a tree with another man, telling a story. The first wall was a rock protecting man from the elements and predators. The first window was a hole through this wall that man made to see outside. The wall did not like having this hole through it at first, but man made a frame around it to appease it. It worked out.

I've recently looked at my work through the filter of this philosophy. I thought about the first painting. I believe that the first painting was a mark on the ground made by a man for the purpose of talking to God . The first painting was the first prayer.

These paintings that I make, these marks that come from the movements of this body, these are my prayers of gratitude.

In honor of Louis Khan and the great wonder for beginnings, I made this:


The First Laughter on Earth

I was as surprised as you were
The word Funny hadn't been invented yet
Nothing much had been invented
Except, maybe, birth and hunger and bliss

This felt like all of that

Breath spilling out like lava
out of soft volcano mouths
Cackling pink fire
from dry wood and flames

Delicious like a yawn
except several times over
A strange method of touching
only from farther away

Making bodies tremble
shaking ribcages
until hearts open,
dead, outer skin cracking off

Piece by piece
like very dry rose petals

This is how hearts are remade
Brand spanking new

This is what it is
to laugh
Pure Yummy
Divine Power.

Afterward
Sparks
still swimming
inside us

in that moment
we understood
what it meant
to be grateful