This is a mixed media collage and poem exploring the concept of the line “The cure for pain is in the pain,” said by the Sufi poet, Rumi.
The Artwork: You Must Descend
The Poem: You Must Descend (Here is Magic)
In the twilight of unmoving hours
everything feels alien, even our senses.
We grasp at shadows, stitching
nightmares out of thread, letting
dusty plastic and dancing bags distract us
while the vast sky offers itself
with hankering, mystical moonlight.
Colossal stars carry possibility
in their particles, shining on all
we must put our attention towards.
They walk with us
to the chasm
where we must descend,
the long voyage
towards our terror
in the center of ourselves.
Follow
The
Beat
(Who goes there?)
You can barely see,
save for a sliver of starlight
bouncing between fears.
(This is you.)
The mud, suddenly weightless, rolls open
pulling down the sky, and
cracking open a concrete grail –
a splendid consciousness breaks through
and you find yourself holding
a dazzling wholeness,
a system that is both one and zero,
a being and a seeing of every moment –
a constellation that is both forever and an instant.