When we wander the cemetery at the end of our street I sometimes see the headstones, not as location stones, but as boundaries-marked-in-time. Before. After. The leaping place of souls.
There are stones placed to indicate a borderline. I imagine the stone with the spray-painted message is one of those: beyond this point is the land of love. Who wouldn’t want to cross this border? Who wouldn’t want to step over this divide and wander in the frontier of love?
People stack stones to mark the way. To help others. To help themselves find the way home. Ease of passage.
This stone quietly standing along the bike trail does not call attention to itself. In fact, we’ve passed it many times and only just saw its message. Like a pictograph left by the ancients, someone-in-time felt compelled to leave a message on the path for others to see. A boundary in time? A borderline? A passage marker? An aspiration for travelers along this route?
Sometimes I want to believe in magic. I want to think there is an angel at my side. I want to sit in the certainty of Rumi, knowing without doubt that the entire universe, the whole of infinity, is tipping in my favor.
Sometimes I want to know what tomorrow will bring. No surprises. I want to know that the good people will win over the rage-mongers and truth-spinners. Just like in the movies. I want to know that perseverance will inevitably meet ideal circumstance and all will be well in the end. I want to be at the other end of the week so I can tell the story of what happened, the story of stamina and fortitude fulfilled.
Sometimes I want to know that the eagle flying by at just the right moment or the hovering hawk or the owl hooting outside my window at midnight is bringing me a message: we’ve got your back. Fear not. Take another step. From our height we can see the meadow, the sun and tall grasses. We can feel the hope, breathe the calm.
Sometimes when she spies a heart-shape and kneels to capture it for her collection, I want the gentle spirit, the gnome or sprite living in the tree or residing in the leaf shaped like the symbol, to make themself visible to us and affirm that there is meaning in the mystery, that in this life there is more sense than we can possibly imagine. There is reason. A reason. Yet, I already know what it would avow if it allowed us to see it: the meaning of the mystery is always found right where we knew it would be, where we know it to be: in the heart. Our vast open hearts. We do not need to seek it or wish for it. We need only enter and listen – more than just sometimes.
Tonight, as we near the day of clover, the celebration of St. Patrick’s snake dance, we will make corned beef and cabbage for our weekly dinner with 20. There will be Guinness, too. The snakes in the story, by-the-way, are symbolic. There were no actual snakes in the region. Remember, as I will when tipping my Guinness, it’s a religious holiday though, through the advent of Guinness, pagans like me can play, too.
One of my favorite things about human beings is how blind they are to their natural curiosity. For instance, read the wikipedia entry for four-leaf clover! There’s layers and layers of data on the odds of finding a four-leaf clover. Sometimes curiosity looks like study. Sometimes it looks like science. Or engineering. It’s one of my least favorite things about human beings: we can kill the spark, snuff the magic of the curious story-telling-mind, by how we tell the story.
Believe the snakes are literal and you miss the point of the story and misunderstand the reason for the holiday. The same is true with arks filled with animals and the Red Sea parting. Metaphors made literal: the apple remains uneaten. Knowledge dies on the vine.
Symbols open stories. Symbols make the story universal which is impressive if you stop and think about it. How can two people, living in two different cultures, who don’t share a common language, understand in-a-flash the same idea? Symbol. Metaphor. Heart openers. Mind expanders. Experience joiners.
In the epic of Saint Patrick, as a pagan I’d be one of the metaphoric snakes driven into the sea.
And remember, the data suggests that for every ten thousand three-leaf clover that you spy, you’ll find one stem with four. A symbol of good luck, no matter what the data suggests.
“Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does.” ~ James Baldwin
We watched each day as the pink tulips passed through their many phases of life, each beautiful and surprising. As they neared the last chapter, I thought they echoed orchids. The subtle pinks ran to the edges of the wrinkling petals, heads bowed, devotees in quiet prayer.
Initially, the tulips brought hope and light into our house. For weeks the table had been stacked with so-much-paper, a mammoth project. We cleared the table of its heavy burden and replaced the weighty paper with a row of delicate tulips. We’d catch ourselves staring into the dining room; inevitably one of us would say, “I love this.”
20 would call it the contrast principle. The delicate lightness of the tulips were made more pronounced because of the heaps of paper that preceded it. Perhaps. All I know is that the tulips lifted my spirit like few other things have in these winter months. They became a celebration of love. A symbol that joins daisies in our canon of symbols and will forever signify a step into love. A new chapter. A next chapter.
As it bowed its petals, as they began to fall, we found ourselves more rapt in their beauty, not less. Their age made them translucent. Fragile. Their impermanence somehow made them eternal. As it should be. Passing through transformation.
Posted on February 19, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative
Shapes become symbols. The alphabet is my evidence. Or the silhouette of a dove carrying an olive branch. Two equilateral triangles merged into a star, once the property of Venus and now under the stewardship of David.
Occasionally I incorporate calligraphy-like strokes in my paintings. The marks resemble the Chinese alphabet. Patrons have asked me what the symbols mean? I’ve learned to smile as if keeping a secret. They want the lines, the symbol, to have a meaning. I’ve learned not to rob them of their wanting. “What does it mean to you?” I ask. A question answered with a question.
Kerri saw this marking in a felled tree. “It’s I love you in sign language!” she exclaimed. ILY. Her family flashes the hand sign for I Love You when it’s time to depart. It’s the last thing we see as we drive down the street, turn the corner.
Lately, our world is populated with emojis. Heart, heart, heart. So many yellow faces with so many possible expressions. Symbols adding nuance to symbols. “What does this one mean,” I sometimes ask. I am a clumsy user of emojis. It’s yet a foreign language and I have been reprimanded for symbolizing the wrong thing; sending the wrong message. “But I love this whacky face!” I insist. I like using the wrinkled face, one eye open, tongue sticking out.
She rolls her eyes. I flash the I Love You sign. She rolls her eyes again only this time it is followed with a warm hug.
Posted on January 3, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative
There was a time when humans didn’t know how to translate three dimensional space into a two dimensional rendering. We either had no capacity for understanding visual perspective or no reason to pursue it. Art was symbolic, purely. And then came Brunelleschi. An architect. Linear perspective, a mathematical construct, became all the artistic rage. The wilds of symbol met the dictates of the representational. Horizon lines and vanishing points, the one-two step of perspective danced into the arts in a crazy time we know as the Renaissance. A painting could pull us into its world. The ghost of the ancient Greeks whispered 15 centuries into the future.
With perspective came a wholly new set of questions. The magic of math. The study of nature. How close can we come to understanding how things work? What are the secrets driving the universe and what we see? What lurks behind and beyond the symbol? What do we not see?
The trees in Kerri’s photo are roughly the same size. The trees retreat into the distance so the furthest tree appears to be smaller, the closest tree taller. It’s an illusion that we take for granted, so steeped are we in the necessities of perspective. The smallest child with a crayon wouldn’t care or perhaps even see the distance. They’d happily scribble the symbol: tree. An older child would put down their crayon and insist that they couldn’t draw because the magic of perspective is intimidating. Trying to “capture” reality in two or three dimensions is a tall order. Trying to place yourself and others inside it is overwhelming.
On this foggy day on the coast of Lake Michigan, I admire the perfect lesson in perspective taught by the trees stretching out in front of me. The fog brings to mind string-theory and the mathematics of multiple realities existing in a single space or Stephen Hawking’s bubble theory, many many universes brushing each other as they pass. What would Brunelleschi think of that? Follow the lines of perspective far enough and it becomes necessary to sail beyond the known horizon. Expressionistic. Conceptual.
Both Picasso and Einstein broke apart our understanding of space and invited an entirely new form of perspective into our conversation. The mystic and the mathematical. Multiverse and many dimensions.
Standing in the park, fingers cold, swallowed by the dense fog, I am a lucky child with a crayon knowing that all I can manage to do is scribble.
Posted on December 25, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
As additions-to-traditions go, the bauble-on-the-tree is a relatively recent inclusion. People have decorated their dwellings with pine boughs, a symbol of renewal and rebirth (of the light), for many, many centuries. Placing ornaments-on-trees only began in the 1800’s.
We decided this year – for reasons that reach beyond words – to bring out Beaky and Pa’s ornaments. We are minimalists mostly so in the decade of my Wisconsin life these ornaments have lived in a box in the basement. We look at them every year but have never – until now - hung them on a tree. They are glass and fragile so we worked slowly, placing them with care.
Having them with us this season has been more powerful than I imagined. Having them with us this morning is more meaningful than I thought possible. Family is with us. And, isn’t that, after all is said and done, the point of it all? Given family and chosen family. To feast our long line of belonging and celebrate our brief time on this earth together. To honor that we are, as Jean Houston wrote, “…the burning point of the ancestral ship.” To gather, adding to the rich bank of shared memory. We reach back in time with gratitude. We live forward through our children and their children and their children…
This morning we sit quietly, sipping our coffee, sharing stories, hanging out with Beaky and Pa, in our recognition and deep appreciation of this time of life’s Renewal.
Posted on December 22, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
When I was a wee-turnip I found a textbook on the shelf from a course my dad took in college. Comparative religions. It’s a big-big book full of many-many comparisons. It now resides on my shelf. This book sparked a life-long fascination for me. The universal nature of myth and story across individual cultures and how these stories and symbols are, over time, pulled and twisted like taffy, co-opted, integrated and sometimes claimed as the private property of religion x or y.
Today, as I write this, we sit squarely on the solstice. I thought a few tidbits of story-symbol might be fun to visit so, together, we might taste the taffy.
In Italian tradition, La Befana is the goddess of the solstice. She rides a broom through the skies leaving candy and presents to the good little boys and girls. As a broom-riding pagan goddess, she predates Saint Nick by more than a few centuries. The Christian tradition snagged her and after a bit of twisting, she became a character in the Magi story. On a cold, cold night she gave shelter to those three wise-men but declined to join them on their quest because she had unfinished chores. After they left she had a change of heart but couldn’t find the manger on her own so she gave the gifts she had in tow to the nice children she met during her manger-search.
On the solstice, the goddess Isis gave birth to her son Horus, the sun god. Leta gave birth to Apollo on the solstice. The Persian god of light, Mithra, was born on the solstice. These births were technically virgin births since the conception in every case was immaculate. Egyptian. Greek. Persian. These stories predate the Christian story by centuries. It’s a ripple across time and culture of the same human impulse: after a long dark season to celebrate the return of the light.
We lose more than we know when we – to borrow a great term from Joseph Campbell – concretize a symbol. The stories and myths are meant to open us to greater unity with each other and the world we share. They are not meant to be taken or understood literally. Holding them literally slams the door on their greater meaning and unifying power. It renders them a possession, a plot point on a map.
On this winter solstice I can imagine no greater gift to this divided world than to recognize we are, through our unique symbols and characters, telling the same story, yearning for the same possibilities, sharing the same ideals whether they soar through the air on a broomstick or in a sleigh, both rides brimming with toys for good girls and boys. We borrow each others best ideas and ideals, rewriting them to fit our unique audience. From Isis and Horus to Mary and Jesus, it’s time once again to celebrate the rich warm return of the light through our myriad forms and cultural traditions, to feel the push and pull of something ancient and deeply human. Together.
Posted on November 24, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
We don’t always see them but we know they are present. The deer. We note their tracks and have learned where they usually cross the path. They follow careful pathways, game trails that are visible when we are walking slow enough to spot them.
As a symbol, they are heart-centered. They are associated with gentleness and it’s easy to understand why. They are gentle creatures. Even when bounding away, their leap is graceful and quiet, as if they are careful not to disturb the grasses and ground. They are mindful of their impact on the world.
We feel fortunate when we see them. It sometimes feels as if they show themselves to us. They seem to know when our hearts are hurting so reveal themselves, even for a moment, to help fill us with peace. It’s always true that we stop all movement, all thinking, all worry, all despair…when they show themselves. They are like magical makers of space, instantly turning tumult into vast acres of serenity. They look at us with large black eyes to make sure our spirits are calm, our hearts refreshed, and then they disappear as quickly as they appeared. “What were we talking about?”
“I can’t remember.”
The calm stays with us as we become like the deer, filled with their intentional spirit, quiet and innocent. Present, that special place beyond our future worries and past regrets.
Posted on November 9, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
I know a bank where the wild thyme blows, Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows, Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine, With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine: There sleeps Titania sometime of the night…
I played Oberon for the Walden Theatre Company at the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts when I was way too young to play the role. I said the words and, although I did my research, I only had an abstract grasp of wild thyme and luscious woodbine. I had no depth of understanding of relationship and the mischief it invokes.
Now, those things are visceral. I know them to my core.
Luscious woodbine climbs and covers the fence beside our driveway. The leaves turn to fire in the fall, and when they drop, they reveal the blue berries, toxic to humans but delicious to birds. In a few days, the berries disappear. Woodbine symbolizes the bond of love since it entwines and embraces trees and other plants. And fences. The locals call it Virginia Creeper.
I was witness to the great actor, Jim Edmondson, play Lear for the first time. He was astonishing. After the performance, he said, “I don’t have enough colors in my paint box yet to play this role.” I sometimes wonder, as he aged, if he found the colors he felt he lacked. The intimate depth of understanding of growing old, of losing power, of being shelved. Loss upon loss. Leaves turn to fire and fall. All that remains is the vine.
I’m growing to understand the paradox of life: none of us has enough colors in our paint box when we are young and moving through the complexity. The colors are cumulative. How many times have I said, “Man, if I only knew then what I know now.”
“I know a bank where the wild thyme blows…” Yes. I do. At last.
The Direction of Intention 