NB: Yes, there are now ads on this site as it’s a freebie from WordPress and always has been. I use Chrome as my browser with Adblocker Genesis Plus. Only a few sites will not allow you to view or read info if you have this.
I begin this chapter on some of my latest sculptural work through this poem. There are a few extra framings and wall hangings tossed into the soup for good measure. A dee~lite~ful expression.
Three companions for you:
Number one:
What you own. He won’t even leave the house
for some danger you might be in. He stays inside.
Number two:
Your good friend. He at least comes to the funeral.
He stands and talks at the gravesite. No further.
The third companion:
What you do, your work, goes down into death to be there with you, to help.
Take deep refuge with that companion, beforehand.
~ Jalaluddin Rumi ~ 1207-1273 CE
as translated by Coleman Barks from Open Secret
I was introduced to the poetic works of the Sufis through an Episcopalian pastor [Anglican in Canada & the UK {no need to Google} who lived in NY in 2003. I met Dr. Joel Clark Mason after a calamitous car crash going to a conference in Hendersonville, North Carolina, entitled Journey into Wholeness. We entered a friendship that has endured, despite the geography and the fact that I am no Christian, even though being raised by a somewhat ecumenical father. I have truths which change, but, no beliefs. The mystery of the Yin/Yang.
The interpolation of other images, such as a few interior wall hangings allows me an opportunity for a full posting. For those who know me well, I see ALL as interrelated, intertwined and thoroughly entangled.
Introduced to the works of the late Irish poet, John O’Donohue, through a podcast with Krista Tippett, in her PBS program of On Being. I am currently reading John’s: Anam Cara, which is Gaelic for “soul friend”. One phrase has stuck in my craw from initial reading: * The passionate heart never ages.*
An Iconic Garden of Sacredness in Symbolism…begins.
In a December 2018 piece in the UK’s The Spectator, Camille Paglia had this to say when asked: What is true multiculturalism?
“As I repeatedly argue in Provocations, comparative religion is the true multiculturalism and should be installed as the core curriculum in every undergraduate program. From my perspective as an atheist as well as a career college teacher, secular humanism has been a disastrous failure. Too many young people raised in affluent liberal homes are arriving at elite colleges and universities with skittish, unformed personalities and shockingly narrow views of human existence, confined to inflammatory and divisive identity politics.” …
This sculpture garden of icons, is the culmination of my life’s journey through the turmoil of understanding the duality of being simultaneously, both human and being, in a form that is based entirely upon all that has died and decayed, i.e., the food we eat.
As I reflect on a more than 60 year period of creativity, comparative religious studies with plenty of philosophical twists and turns, I see now that this Friend, this third companion, has been a lifelong soul friend of mine without even the knowing. A felt sense shall we say? Coleman Barks teaches us in his expansive manner, that knowledge is part of the human lineage. Little is truly original in content. All comes to us through what has gone down beforehand. That’s the lineage he speaks to! Yet another take on Oneness, Advaita or the more secular nonduality.
This so-called sculpture garden of icons, is my method of showing that there is a way to stop the hate, to end the tribalism of cultures, religions and all belief systems, by embracing the common heritage we have as both human and being. *That* is the essence of these old icons, which, I felt the immensity of all last winter, by making and colouring them. What an incredible honour and humility to do so!
I had some leftover hemlock lumber, dried in the attic from the fabrication of Pi . Somehow the turbulence of the human world drove me to find an answer of acceptance and tolerance of others, ideas, behaviours and the resultant to-ing and fro-ing through my work and through the love of ideas. There are several themes brought forth with the genesis of the sculpture garden. The few interior pieces have been made mostly on rainy days [a lot this spring], as I doubled between the workshop and the vegetable garden.
There are those of us who live alone, who have chosen the rural existence, far from the maddening crowd, yet still close enough to experience barking dogs, ATV’s and lawnmowers on Sundays. 😁 Those few of us who long ago, adopted an evidence-based diet, which, just happens to be plants, who see Spirit energized within all forms, both animate and inanimate, who see the seemingly relentless extinction crisis bearing down, there is this, our work, that provides purpose, calm and a peace with the natural world [All That There IS] in order to maintain some semblance of a meaningful existence. All of this allows me to grieve what may befall if business as usual continues. This IS my personal Tao.
The mentor whom I initially travelled [2003 Hendersonville, NC] from my then home in ON, to hear in person, was Brian Swimme. Together with Father Thomas Berry, they were a team, instrumental in bringing to the fore a new story of The Universe. It was a comingling of spirituality and science for me, begun in 1999 through Sunday evening discussions [there were about a dozen participants], at the century home in Port Hope, ON, of Tom & Pat Lawson, ageing social and political activists, who delighted in dragging you kicking and screaming into their puddles. hahaha I immediately subscribed!
John O’Donohue writes [pg.79] in Anam Cara: “The Celtic mind was never drawn to the single line; it avoided ways of seeing and being that seek satisfaction in certainty. …The circle never reduces the mystery to a single direction or preference. …The secret and the sacred are sisters.”
Brian told the assembled audience that creativity IS a spiritual discipline. For this scribbler, now well into his septuagenarian decade, it has been a lifelong calling, a force that refuses to cease showing up. I don’t question that force. I now know through spending time in the silence + through movement, that creativity is the most natural vibration of The Universe. Our Universe [One song], is self-regulating and self-correcting. That’s an oft used expression of MW [Marianne Williamson, yet another mentor]. The Universe eats its own garbage. How much our high-tech culture has forgotten. Sigh!
Long ago, my father was fond of saying that Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It’s what artists or craftspeople do. I’ll not enter the perennial debate of art VS craft. As Alan Watts teaches, words are a segue into something deeper, for those who desire to enter the risk of the unknown.
I struggled for 3 days trying to figure out the acute angles on this Baha’i 9-pointed star. I finally adopted a Nova Scotian idiom that is popular with builders: “It’s close enough an’ that’s good.” hahaha
By themselves, words may mean little to the uninitiated, taken out of their environmental and cultural epoch. That all we create eventually dissolves into dust is a reality, especially for me.
For exterior structures fabricated out of wood, with some paint and metal devices for creating upright sculptures, decomposition is a certainty, sooner rather than later. hahaha The carpenter ants in conjunction with rain are already exacting a cost. I smile, since what is present IS all and *that changes* as we breathe and blink. Yet, still we persist in fashioning form, that we alone deem of great importance and beauty, but, only in the moment.
To save our species and that of life itself, a simple answer would be to drawback, which is what Brian suggested all those long 16 years ago. Yet our economic guidepost of continual growth with all costs externalized is costing collective humanity our E-air-th. [thanks to David Abram for his spelling in his latest tome: Becoming Animal]
I’ve been a student of comparative religions, philosophies, plus secular ideas all my life. The tribalism, lack of intolerance for other people’s traditions and ideas, ways of worship, expressed thoughts, which, at their core, create no aggressive behaviour directed towards us, is looked at through the lens of this craftsman for this installation. He uses the established practice of simply making, with a good degree of literary, poetic and artistic license thrown into the mix for a very good recipe. hahaha
There is no real originality. All we are, all knowledge, i.e., information [not to be confused with wisdom], comes to us through the lineage of our cultural environment and geographic crossroads as Coleman assures us; all that has breached the boundaries of what has been bestowed generation after generation, down through the ages.
Where is the knowledge lost in information? Where is the wisdom lost in knowledge?
T.S. Eliot ~ 1888-1965
Again, the indoor playful additions were produced from winter 2018 through summer 2019.
When Elvis Presley was criticized for wearing the ‘pagan’ Ankh among his many other crosses, he commented: “I don’t want to miss out on heaven because of a technicality.” pg.9, Secret Signs and Symbols by Adele Nozedar
The number of individual icons was determined at 9. This is a magical number. For those up on numerology, view this fascinating frolic from Gary Lite.
I didn’t want the sculptures pushing past the front door, although I finally let the AUM have her way with me… Pi becomes the portal to this special purpose garden. The former works of Balance or Pi remain uncounted.
Out Beyond Ideas:
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase “each other”
doesn’t make any sense.
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don’t go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don’t go back to sleep.
~ Jalaluddin Rumi ~ 1207-1273 CE
Before the project pieces can advance to painting, they must be rough assembled, patterned and cutout, before final shaping and sanding. Just an ole guy playin’ with form. hahaha What do you play within the expenditure of your waking hours?
It’s written as AUM or as OM. Pronunciation is crucial, stressing the ‘ahh-ooo-mmm’ all said continuously. I’m told that this is the sound of The Universe [One song]. Okay. No argument. Some ideas are truly harmless. 😁 1000mm X 800 mm app.
The above AUM gives a satisfaction that is beyond pride or ego. This time of year, the sun rises almost due east over the forest canopy. Since the Aum is the icon farthest west, it gets pinioned with bright early dawn light ’round 6:30 AM. It’s as if the sound of The Universe is on fire through this brilliant glossy crimson colour. Amen. Amin. Aum!
A current mystic who goes by the name of Sadhguru gave a talk about Being. He said: ‘the word “belief”, means that one has concretized assumptions of which they know nothing about…But you can’t believe something all by yourself. So you need a hundred people around you. That’s why always, believers are in groups. Seekers are alone. You don’t have to teach seeking. You have to teach belief systems…’
After nearly 50 years, I along with many others still sing the Lyrics penned by Yoko for John Lennon’s Imagine from 1971. It’s only recently that Yoko Ono was credited for much of the words of that famous song from her 1964 book entitled: Grapefruit. Kudos for righting the inequity.
Moving down the path of inspection, we find this Bronze Age cross. The Christian cross has so obviously been pirated from other traditions that came before. That’s the meaning of Coleman’s lineage. Bronze is an amalgamation of brass and copper, which makes a harder and more resilient metal alloy.
When I climbed atop the 8′ stepladder, I saw for the first time the full installation. What struck me initially was all the vibrant colour! I struggled with choices since there isn’t any undisputed scheme earmarked for posterity in any of the literature I investigated. Even for this maker, it’s too vast a collection of artefacts from humanity’s recent past to comprehend in a few hours or several days.
As the summer moves through its season, the space now adorned with its own floral version of our collective past, will surely reveal more of the energy force behind the motivation of humanity’s path through this, our current wilderness of Being. I’m totally with Thomas and Brian when they state categorically that we’re in this mess because we don’t have a story.
One of my favourite expressions comes from Thomas Berry:
“The Universe is not a collection of objects; it’s a communion of subjects. An’ if we don’t get that, nothing’s gonna work.” Thomas Berry ~ 1914 – 2009
Next up below is some chip carving on a line from ‘Arabi. He was an Andalusian Sufi who lived most of his adult life in the Middle East. Many orthodox Muslims do not take kindly to their mystical brethren in this offshoot, yet, all Sufis swear allegiance to Muhammad, the Qur’an and Islam. andsoitgoes…
On your way out the curved yellow brick road, don’t forget to look up on PI for what ‘Arabi has to say.
Below, is the poem that was the original intellectual motivation for the title of this sculpture garden installation. Many thanks to Joel, for introducing me to the poetry of the Sufis, the mystical branch of Islam, through poets & poetesses. I’ve dubbed these configurations in other places, the poetry of swoon.
A Garden Amidst Flames
O Marvel! a garden amidst flames.
My heart has become capable of every form:
it is a pasture for gazelles and a convent for Christian monks,
and a temple for idols and the pilgrim’s Ka’bah,
and the tables of the Torah and the book of the Qur’an.
I follow the religion of Love: whatever way Love’s camels take,
that is my religion and my faith.Ibn ‘Arabi [1165-1240CE]
I Am John Gabriel Ötvös
aka jayöh
PS: I only use the free version of WordPress. There are several formatting issues that disturb a pedant such as this scribbler, but I’ll not pay. I don’t monetize this site and the few craft items I hawk would cost more for the shipping and packaging than the articles themselves. These changes are new, as subtle pressure is brought to bear on those of us with fixed incomes who are unable to go premium. Thanks for the free service though!
One response to “The Third Companion”
-
Lynn Shiner says:
Hello – what a fascinating blog you have! I have just found it, and think I will enjoy taking my time to read through it a bit at a time. There’s much to read, absorb and think about, as well as beautiful wood pieces to admire. But for now, you’ve reminded me that I need to reread Anem Cara. Off to locate my copy – thank you !