vanilla

it's amazing.

i can eat a bowl of ice cream.

and stop.

i can feel full.

i'm amazed

and thankful.

desire

the old in me is dead
pure desire is left.

i cannot live without it.

the wheel is in my own hands
i see where desire has taken me

there is no map
but there is always a sense
of the right direction.

oh, yes.

now
i am turning it inward.

i trust it to lead me home,
continually,
without end.

notes from the dark moon

notes from the Dark Moon

just follow the simple directions
leave the Beauty to me.

you are wearing yourself out
doing a job that has been
done.

bring your Desire forward
and I will create with it.

a poem

My desire is pushing, lighting me through this mud.

I am the lotus.

Can I focus on anything but the light?

The light takes forms

And the forms vanish

Again and again.

The Sun is calling the Moon.

I am relieved,

Sense cannot be made.



woman, flowering  oil on panel 11x12, barbara heile

Lilith unveiled Innocence

oh, Lilith 

where I went, 

well, there are words for it, and images, and feelings.

my ring came off,

my ears went bare

and I descended 

I was yours again.

she has taken me before,

into this dark territory

and it is always my move to find the place where I say stop,

where I raise my hand and say, "stop."

I learn how to make the journey 

I learn when to return.

This cauldron the body

the intensity the fire of desire

This depth the soul

The stillness the water where the treasure awaits the light.

my outer life is gratefully uneventful

my inner is the river of life, 

sometimes gently streaming

sometimes tumultuously raging.

the gate opened 

and the fruit of the dark moved through me

I looked

I felt

and deleted and deleted and deleted what was not mine

letting pass what could not hold me.  

I landed at the feet of love. 

tears flowed as I felt being met there.

I found what was lost
innocence.

here,

where 

nothing is ever really happening.

just this pulse is real.

hot and humbled, I am walking on

these smiling dancin' feet.

The crows are cawing their own story out of the same stillness.

an invitation I couldn't resist any longer

That invitation,

she made it so easy, effortless.

What would that look like,

 when I am at one with myself?

As a woman, I would be at one with all my past experiences if I am at one with myself.

As a woman, I will be,

I am, she says.

I am

I am here. 

Would I even have words for this myself, 

this that they call spiritual awakening?

This seems to be all there is now, everywhere at all times.

There is a lucidity even on cloudy days.

Even as the stress rises and flows through my body,

There is lucidity.

The maiden and the mother have been brought along by this river of life.

The thickening, the widening in my body today shows the birth of the crone.

I want to write about spontaneous painting.

I really do

And there is such passion whirling around the etheric membranes,

My inner galaxy……

But

And 

And But, these are telling words on their own…..

I feel a steadiness, an awe, when I am painting spontaneously with tempera paint. With the soft brushes.

 I wanted them since two years, but the oil paint didn’t want them. 

The oil paint loves her knife. It is the knife that allows her to spontaneously paint with oil. 

That is the freedom I seek, and the path I see unfolding is with women, maybe someday men, painting from the heart. 
It is just so simple an offering, such an open, inviting portal.

A white piece of paper and color and water.

Start with a brush but who knows what will be called upon to express the inexpressible?

When I was 19

She saw white paper

She said don't marry that guy

She said hold on like a bulldog.

I am here to find words to describe spontaneous painting, process painting. 

Fred says it is Zen.

It is zen-like, so open, without judgement, such a flow, grasping nothing, no attachment, no held interpretations.

 It is prayer. Without a goal. More like gratitude.

My desire is pushing, lighting me through this mud.

I am the lotus.

Can I focus on anything but the light?

The light takes forms

And the forms vanish

Again and again.

The Sun is calling the Moon.

I am relieved,

Sense cannot be made.

This is how it goes, it looks a bit scattered.

Moving from here to there and back again and on again.

You certainly do not have to follow this breadcrumb trail.

Oh, I can do it better, put it in order, yes, I can do that, too.

I am just warming up again.

I told her I would show up.

She will bring me to focus, and bring the fire

that brings me to the gifts I want to share.

She just did.

Lucidity is so erotic.