Krishna Plays the Flute

Tags

abstract painting, Gerberas, Krishna, Shiva

I used to think this was Shiva, but now I am wondering if it is Krishna…

Photo by Candia Dixon-Stuart

Roche Court, Wiltshire

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Arts Centre, cows, Roche Court, rusted sculpture, sculpture park, Wiltshire, Winterslow

Cows at Winterslow, with matching sculpture

Photo by Candia Dixon-Stuart

Peony Power

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herbaceous borders, peonies, peony

Photos by Candia Dixon-Stuart.  All Rights reserved.

Yesterday’s Photo… now a Painting

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acrylics, Australian landscape, NSW, sheep

with variations

Photo and acrylic painting by Candia

Golden Hour

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Australia, Golden Hour, irises, Japanese screens, NGV, Spring borders, Victoria

Golden Hour by Candia Dixon-Stuart

I was reminded of a Japanese screen which I saw at The NGV, Victoria.

Transfiguration of the Ordinary

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domestic visions, epiphany, spiritual enlightenment, transfiguration, transformation of the ordinary

Photo by Candia Dixon-Stuart

Good Friday by John Donne

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crucifixion, Good Friday, John Donne, Metaphysical poets, salvation, St Paul’s Cathedral, the cross

John Donne’s monument in St Paul’s Cathedral ( in his shroud)

Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward

 

By John Donne

Let mans Soule be a Spheare, and then, in this,

The intelligence that moves, devotion is,

And as the other Spheares, by being growne

Subject to forraigne motion, lose their owne,

And being by others hurried every day,

Scarce in a yeare their naturall forme obey:

Pleasure or businesse, so, our Soules admit

For their first mover, and are whirld by it.

Hence is’t, that I am carryed towards the West

This day, when my Soules forme bends toward the East.

There I should see a Sunne, by rising set,

And by that setting endlesse day beget;

But that Christ on this Crosse, did rise and fall,

Sinne had eternally benighted all.

Yet dare I’almost be glad, I do not see

That spectacle of too much weight for mee.

Who sees Gods face, that is selfe life, must dye;

What a death were it then to see God dye?

It made his owne Lieutenant Nature shrinke,

It made his footstoole crack, and the Sunne winke.

Could I behold those hands which span the Poles,

And tune all spheares at once peirc’d with those holes?

Could I behold that endlesse height which is

Zenith to us, and our Antipodes,

Humbled below us? or that blood which is

The seat of all our Soules, if not of his,

Made durt of dust, or that flesh which was worne

By God, for his apparell, rag’d, and torne?

If on these things I durst not looke, durst I

Upon his miserable mother cast mine eye,

Who was Gods partner here, and furnish’d thus

Halfe of that Sacrifice, which ransom’d us?

Though these things, as I ride, be from mine eye,

They’are present yet unto my memory,

For that looks towards them; and thou look’st towards mee,

O Saviour, as thou hang’st upon the tree;

I turne my backe to thee, but to receive

Corrections, till thy mercies bid thee leave.

O thinke mee worth thine anger, punish mee,

Burne off my rusts, and my deformity,

Restore thine Image, so much, by thy grace,

That thou may’st know mee, and I’ll turne my face.

 

Spooky Houses

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Cotswolds, Nature Reserve, spooky house, suburban landscape

Photo by Candia Dixon-Stuart

A Man’s A Man For A’ That

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Burns' Night, Rabbie Burns, Robert Burns, Scotland's National Poet, Scottish Literature, Sydney statue

Rabbie Burns – even celebrated Down Under (Sydney)

Photos by Candia

The Temptation of St Anthony by Sidney Nolan

Tags

Australian art, billabongs, Black Mist, catharsis, Cooper's Creek, desertification, drought, Emu Fields, eucalypt, gamma rays, grail, Graves' Disease, isotopes, manus dei, Maralinga, Mount Hopeless, nuthatch, Regin, Rimbaud, Sidney Nolan, St Anthon's Fire, Temptation of St Anthony

Image: The Temptation of St Anthony by Sidney Nolan: NGV, Victoria.

 

Rimbaud: I sought voyages to disperse enchantments

that had colonised my mind.

 

Where the sun strikes and the prickly thorn proffers

no shelter and the cicada no relief,

there’s a dessicated torment and no

solitude in the desert, as Christ found.

Harsh glare distorts even a saint’s vision.

The reclusive can lose their perspective.

Gamma rays will cause some to lose their minds.

 

A goanna is my constant totem

and a huge dragonfly lures me to leave,

but Satan has monopolised the air.

 

If I kill the dragon; dip my finger

in its blood, will it reveal its secret?

Will it transform me into a prophet,

who may see the approach of The Black Mist,

or experience St Anthony’s Fire?

The drought has made the billabongs brackish.

The gold cache tempts for a month of Sundays.

 

The Manus Dei issues no blessing;

no intervention.  The struggle is mine.

The mind is its own place and my free will

may choose to receive the full stigmata.

 

I foresee The Darkening Ecliptic;

the universal diagnosis is

Graves’ disease – even for haloed beings.

Should I go to the wars and fight Regin,

or heed the nuthatches’ advice and act?

I must carry knowledge in my own grail:

the only way to be a dark hero.

 

My own survival strategy was the

weaving of eucalypt leaves, to combat

oppressions of desertification:

devil-delivered snakes, beasts, scorpions.

Yet each seemed to lack power in itself.

If I was confident and mocked demons,

might I reduce them to a puff of smoke?

 

The last man, or woman, on this scorched Earth

will carry in their bodies isotopes,

blown from Maralinga and Emu Fields.

The thunder brings no catharsis as yet.

Each must pass Mount Hopeless; find Cooper’s Creek.