unfinished work

A poor but sufficient shot of one of my latest works… "Regarding the Prayers of Mothers for Newborn Children" acrylic, shellac, and latex on paper

when I was young, before even the days that i began speak (which were fairly late in my childhood), my mother would communicate to me by putting her mouth very close to my ear and saying my name softly. there is a black and white picture of my mother doing this, even, when i am about three years old, looking off into space beyond—but, as all the relatives would soon learn, still paying attention quite acutely (they say that when I started speaking at three years old, i was speaking in sentences).

i still remember this. i was reminded of it during a more contemporary encounter and she did the same thing—maybe for memory's sake—but how quickly did my childhood memory surface! i think there truly is something about us as children that ingrains itself as experience—experience of our parents' presence—very early on in our lives, and it continues to define us even into old age.

the presence of my mother, however, is something that i think i will continue to treasure, and it especially dearly. both my parents are very important to me, and i'll remember each in a way that i think they would be proud to be remembered as—but when it comes to spirituality, i find it strange that we often refer to "father" god.

perhaps this is one aspect of patriarchy that should be rooted out. in truth, even by some simple common sense, god has no gender, but is beyond and contains all possibility of gender. this is because god is infinite in presence, and is continually growing in life and in human flesh in anticipation of the eschaton. but the image of father god becomes an image that may only be comforting on certain levels and not others. father is often the maker of discipline, the imparter of advice, so on—and this is good, and may lead to a very close relationship.

but from the male perspective, there is something unique about the son and mother relationship. it is by the mother, and my memories of my mother, that i will later judge all women that i find. it is by a mother's presence that a man looks for his lover, for he seeks after the same love that first loved him.

so as "father god" is a discipliner and imparter of advice, he can also be detached—i. e. has to go to work, so on. the relationship between a man and his father is at once close and personal, yet also tumultuous—and maybe for both sides. i have no doubt that our image of "father god" causes us to look on god with a particularly gendered stereotype. god can certainly fulfill it, but i wonder—what opportunity for hermeneutics could there be in an alternate gender—in "Mother god", the god who is love and is the definition of love, for the male—because it was from her being that he first precipitated, and all the nutrients that was first Hers now belongs to him.

i should say that the last few weeks have been extremely difficult for me. if it were not for the support of close friends and family (immediate or extended), i'm not sure how i would have fared, or even if i could have fared at all, during this past month. many of the issues have to deal with the search for a romantic relationship, but there are also many spiritual complications that i feel are part of the journey of contemplation. sometimes the things that we desire, no matter how greatly we desire them, were not meant for us. i found that, perhaps, some of the greatest pent-up obsessions and longings may have been part of my own creation, or at the very least were (or became) a vessel from which a greater, larger message began unfolding. that message is still unfolding, but in realizing that there were some things i should probably let go of, a great peace—if only a temporary one—settled.

the prophet elijah supposedly heard the voice of god in two ways. the first was a great, rushing wind, during the height of the prophet's victory. the next, however, was when he was exiled in a cave, and it was the subtlest of all sounds—nearly imperceptible. there's a great opportunity for gender hermeneutics if i ever saw it! one is large and masculine, roaring and present. the other is quiet and feminine—powerful still and wondrous, but carrying with it a softness that reminds one of not just who god is, but who also they are.

in coming to realize these new messages for me in the past weeks i had to listen very carefully. and indeed i was—but i was listening for the wrong kind of voice. i was expecting a loud, rushing voice—declaring something in the hear and now clearly and abruptly. but i had not been listening for the other kind of voice.

while i had been viewing and expecting god to act in a very masculine sort of way, i instead found a god that talked to me, or was trying to talk, in a way much more similar to the way my mother first spoke to me when i was young—quiet whispers, close by and into the ear. i, like then, am staring off into space. but perhaps i'm beginning to pay attention.

and as such, this Mother-god who first imparted to me love (as well as my name, and repeated it many times so i would know it), thereby defined love, and set me on the journey towards love. yet love has an end in relationships, and ultimately a completion in not just human flesh, but divine creation. if we are agents of spirit, then there is work about and present in our day to day lives that is at once beyond our control, yet also dependent. like a child to his mother, we may choose to listen closely to this spirit, bringing about good things in relationships and the earth itself. but if we do not listen, we may not just forget these things—we may also forget who we are, for it was our name that was first called into being, into existence, and that with a mission—a mission implied in love—for us to complete.

(my apologies for any typos in this post: this one is a late, late entry)