Turquoise Soul

Turquoise Soul

The world of my dreams drips - rich in images, symbols and swirling paint. 

Many years ago I began to think of the dream world as a reality that formed or was in parallel with that of the waking world.  Dream visions and symbols began to pass through my being, the paintbrush in my hands, and onto the canvas that I painted.  In reverse, the same occurrence was also true.  Paintings that waited unfinished on the easel slipped into my dreams where the next layer of their becoming was revealed through symbols, events and other dream realm beings and participants.  This has remained an ongoing reality.

My dreams are the voices of ancient and unborn storytellers.  These storytellers read life back to me, reveal messages of what has yet come to pass and weave the thread of my life's story with images, symbols, colors, sounds and otherworldly happenings.  When the dreams sound their calling I have learned to listen.  When the dreams do not speak, their silence is deafening,  My body is the borderland where the worlds of dream and waking meet. 

It has been almost 20 years since I had the dream that was the impetus and inspiration for the painting that bares the title "Turquoise Soul" .  When I awoke to find myself in this particularly dreamscape I had not yet laid eyes upon this land and earth which would become my home.  It would be another eleven years before this waking world would move in tandem to the messages the dream had conveyed.  It would be fifteen years until the borderlands of my body would bring these two realities together and join them in paint, turquoise, beads, feathers, copper wire and the soil of this land.  But before I picked up the paintbrush and swirled the image of the dream into being, the experience of waking and walking in the dream world on that particular night was written in the pages of my journal...

Dream of the Winged God.

Above is an ocean of cerulean blue.
Cliffs formed from layers of sand and story rising to greet the sky
A solitary wind howls and moans.  
The wind’s voice seems to carry the sound of a name that I cannot quite hear.

I am holding my son’s hand and we are walking through this pregnant canyon
    There is a slight pause,
            an irregular beat in the rhythm of space
It is enough to reveal that we are in the land of dreams
Off in the distance I see a large bird soaring through the open sky.
The great bird approaches
my mind tries to comprehend the truth of the message that my eyes continue to send.
As the distance between us closes, the illusion fades in its entirety and I am left standing in the presence of an approaching god.

In his wings span the centuries of time
    painted in the flame of turquoise, gold, white and copper
Trails of wind left by his soaring wings push down upon us with the force of a gale.
In the passage of the wind from his wings is a song that sings of the deepest rivers of sadness.
In the passage of the wind from his wings is the hope for a people and of a place.
In the passage of his wings are the threads of songs that are unraveling and forgotten – lost in the holes of time.
In the passage of the wind from his wings is an embrace, which holds the breath of hope – eternal return
Tears swell from in ancient eternal river and I weep at the aching love story,
    An ancient, rooted song so old and so fragile,

As the feathers of his wings brush by my head,
    he rises and shoots straight into the painted sky.
The sky opens and an emblem of beauty is revealed.  
    Ancient symbols dancing to form a magical portal, a door.
    Designs formed from the color of clouds, gilded feathers, stones that sing, and the metal made from stars receive him into the heavens from which he came.
I am left in the wake of a passing deity
    holding my small son’s small hand
        Listening to the wind echo the lament and sadness that has been conveyed by his proximity.
The wind’s voice seems to carry the sound of a name that I cannot quite hear.            
 …blowing through the canyon from the time in the memory of before.

 The dreams have once again begun sounding their calling.  Fresh paint is drying on the canvas in the studio.  The storytellers are turning the pages of time.  There is a new chapter which has been carved into the stones of memory.   I am walking between the worlds of what has been and what is yet to come.  

---

If you wish to share a comment or a thought please click on the word COMMENTS below.