perspective

"Shards of glass can cut and wound or magnify a vision." 

- Terry Tempest Williams

snapshots: inspiration for a series of paintings

a delightful day

"I can afford to say what I wish."

- J. Paul Getty 

snapshots taken at the Getty Museum today...

from Tupac Shakur to Ravi Shankar

snapshots taken at the Grammy Museum this afternoon

thy food

"Let food be thy medicine, thy medicine shall be thy food."

- Hippocrates

snapshots from the farmer's market

travel makes one modest

"Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.”

 – Gustave Flaubert

snapshots from our amazing road trip

silence

"Language is wine upon the lips."

- Virginia Woolf

el árbol de dolores

" I think that I shall never see -

A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest -

Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,

And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in Summer wear

A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;

Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree."

- Joyce Kilmer

snapshots of an inspirational, magical tree on Dolores Street...

into the universe

"The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness."

- John Muir

Estrella Maruca: my beloved grandmother

a story about a little star who dreams of becoming a mother:

"Un día, una estrellita muy bonita fue hablar con el Padre Sol, pidiéndole un gran favor.

- Padre, yo sueño con ser Madre. Quisiera vivir en la tierra para sentir y amar hasta llorar.

--- Estrellita, hija mía, tu lugar es en el cielo, de donde puedes alumbrar y atravez de esa luz, amar.

- O, Padre Sol, te pido que me dejes caminar el mundo. Prometo llevar conmigo el manto de nuestra Madre María, ya que es por Ella que sueño con ser Madre un día." - CASIMIRA 

excerpt from "Estrella Maruca" © 2005 written for my beloved grandmother, in her honor

change of scenery

yesterday a vintage penny, today an accurate fortune cookie...

"A change of scenery will be good for you." 

I saved the fortune.

I saved the penny.

I saved the red thread.

snapshot: a colorful corner of my home studio 

weathered 54-year-old

A penny for my thoughts?

I found this penny today. It is from the year 1961. What adventures has this weathered 54-year-old been on? How many hands and pockets have held it? Who has saved it and who has wished it away? Somebody dropped it or tossed it aside. The copper coin was lost, forgotten, abandoned, overlooked and ignored before I noticed it and picked it up from the ground...

Abraham Lincoln.

Liberty.

In God We Trust.

I am keeping the cent for its lovely patina...

discord and chaos do not touch me

"Because I keep myself centered in inner peace, I have peace in my outer world. Although others may have discord and chaos, it does not touch me, for I declare peace for myself. The Universe is one of great order and peacefulness, and I reflect this in every moment of my life. The stars and the planets do not need to be worried or fearful in order to maintain their heavenly orbits, nor does chaotic thinking contribute to my peaceful existence in life. I choose to express peacefulness, for I am peace."

- Louise L. Hay

fox medicine

"To honor the animals is very simple. All it takes is a consciousness and awareness of the tremendous contributions they make to our lives each and every day...

FOX: Trust your intuition, and be wary of someone you're involved with who's attempting to trick you in some way. Your intelligence and ingenuity are more useful right now than confrontation and righteousness. It's better for you to remain in the background and exert and influence from that position than to take an active leadership role. It's best to blend in with your surroundings, move with stealth, and keep your intentions to yourself. It's important at this time to break out of your social conditioning and express yourself more freely. Listen and hear, look and see, sense and feel - trust your senses to guide you."

- Dr. Steven Farmer

I believe animals are spiritual guides, messengers...our ancestors and indigenous people trusted the wisdom of unusual or repeated encounters with animals...

snapshot: a corner of my home 

merging with an ocean

"Sir, have you forgotten the promise you made in your mother's womb, to die before you die?

When will you remember what you intended?

Don't let your donkey wander loose! It will stray into your neighbor's saffron garden. Think of the damage it might do, and the punishment!

Who then will carry you naked to your own death?"

- Lalla (1320-1392)

I enjoyed playing with these recent snapshots of me on the beach...

 

Much gratitude and original photo credits go to Catalina Checa...

seven magical mystical years

"The natural state of motherhood is unselfishness. When you become a mother, you are no longer the center of your own universe. You relinquish that position to your children."

- Jessica Lange

celebrating seven years of magical, mystical, blessed, wild motherhood...

to be the air that inhabits you

"I would like to watch you sleeping, 

which may not happen.

I would like to watch you, 

sleeping. I would like to sleep 

with you, to enter 

your sleep as its smooth dark wave 

slides over my head

and walk with you through that lucent 

wavering forest of bluegreen leaves 

with its watery sun and three moons 

towards the cave where you must descend, 

towards your worst fear.

I would like to give you the silver 

branch, the small white flower, the one 

word that will protect you 

from the grief at the center 

of your dream, from the grief 

at the center. I would like to follow 

you up the long stairway 

again and become

the boat that would row you back

carefully, a flame

in two cupped hands 

to where your body lies 

beside me, and you enter 

it as easily as breathing in.

I would like to be the air

that inhabits you for a moment

only. I would like to be that unnoticed

and that necessary."

- Margaret Atwood

unnoticed and necessary...

air...breath...yes...

to enter your sleep on this full, blue moon...

blue moon

the blue moon invited me out to play...

she howled as I danced...

snapshots: details from 2015 mixed medias on canvases which I completed under the full, blue moon

turning essences into honey

"It's Gala who discovers and brings me all the essences, which I then turn into honey in the busy hive of my mind.  Without Gala, the world would have no genie: Dali would not exist."

- Salvador Dali (1904-1989)

limited edition print from mixed media on paper original

feliz 28

"MAMA, Charlie Brown is learning to speak Spanish and Quechua..."

- my son 

He was delighted to receive the little handmade adornment I brought home from a Peruvian Embassy event at the Organization of American States today.

not a matter of wanting

"Creativity is a shapechanger. One moment it takes this form, the next that. It is like a dazzling spirit who appears to us all, yet is hard to describe for no one agrees on what they saw in that brilliant flash...Some say the creative life is in ideas, some say it is in doing. It seems in most instances to be a simple being. It is not virtuosity, although that is very fine in itself. It is the love of something, having so much love for something - whether a person, a word, an image, an idea, the land, or humanity --- that all that can be done with the overflow is to create. It is not a matter of wanting to, not a singular act of will; one solely must."

- Clarissa Pinkola Estes

She dreamed with art.

She dreamed with him.

In sacred circle she sat and provided the fire.

The light came through her flame.

She dreamed with silk and pearls.

She dreamed with him.

Where was he? What had he become?

excerpt from journals

snapshot: detail from one of my silks, circa 2005 

the answer better be yes

- 2013 mixed media on paper -

"Do I move you?  Are you willing?
Do I groove you?  Is it thrilling?
Do I soothe you?  Tell the truth now,
Do I move you?  Are you loose now?
The answer better be - YES, yes...it pleases me.

Are you ready for this action?
Does it give you satisfaction?
Are you hip to what I'm saying?
If you are then let's start swaying.
The answer better be - YES, yes...it pleases me.

When I touch you, do you quiver?
From your head down to your liver?
If you like it let me know it...
Don't be psychic or you'll blow it...
The answer better be - YES, yes...that pleases me."
- Nina Simone

wild geese heading home again

"You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting — over and over announcing your place in the family of things."

- Mary Oliver

a wink of an eye

"Maybe that's what life is... a wink of the eye and winking stars."

- Jack Kerouac 

a wink of an eye, indeed...

mi amor de miles de años

"Ya veremos, ya aprenderemos. 

Siempre hay cosas nuevas. 

Siempre ligadas a las antiguas vivas. 

Alado...mi amor de miles de años." 

- Frida Kahlo 

mi amor de miles de años

de miles de años

mi amor