For She Is The Storm - Copyright R.Weal 2011

One of my family’s favourite stories about me (of which there
are many), is how I was born under a raging summer storm.
In fact, that August in the year of my birth was a very stormy one and apparently even as a babe, I was never frightened of the storms – mainly I slept peacefully through them.

As I grew I became increasingly fascinated by storms and I’ve always been able to tell when a storm is coming, even before the clouds roll in and the ozone coats the air about us.  Every so often in my life there has been a special storm, one that feels familiar and right.  A deep gravitational pull exists between us, pulling us into each other’s sphere of being, speaking deeply of home and belonging.  She is the elemental force from which an unknowable part of me was sprung the night I was born, my mother storm.

As I sense mother storm I feel the need to go out and meet her; (for I cannot think of her as an ‘it’), to commune with her essence.  I can only describe it as a perfect feeling of being welcomed home.  She always comes when I need guidance or support, when my reserves are low and my spirit ebbing.  She infuses my being, filling me up with her rejuvenating power, firing my creativity with her lightning, warming my heart with her raucous thunder.  And as for her blessed rain?  Oh, to be kissed by her tears – for a moment to be washed clean of all my earthly bonds and pains is a truly indescribable experience.  For when her essence whips about me I am not of this earth – I am the wind, I am the rain and I dance to the thunder beneath the lancing lightning that binds my spirit to her.

Storm Swept - Copyright R.Weal 2011

Whilst I commune with her time stands still and yet moves faster than anything I have ever known.  The exceptional bond between us defies all reason.  When she leaves me I am bereft, for a moment so heartbroken I wonder how I will even find my next breath.  But then the world reasserts itself, my heart beats and I find that I am once again whole, infused with a new lustre and will to go on.  Her gift to me is the elemental sorcery that always resides within me, keeping me safe in the light until she can find me again.

She visited me earlier this month and brought forth a torrent of poetry and art (which you can see here in this post), stoking the fire into life from the dying embers of my creativity.  Below you will find the video I captured of my mother storm and the piece of poetic prose I wrote for her.  I hope maybe some of her power leaps out from them into you.

Thank you mother storm, ‘till we commune again I will ever be your earthbound daughter.

Tread safely in the light.

Wealie x

Reunited

She felt the presence long before she consciously understood. Something called up from deep within her – dormant electricity brought forth into being with only a thought, brightening the very blood within her veins to sing in anticipation.

Alive with power, glowing with effervescence and a pure spark of life, she stepped out into the world no longer entirely a part of it. The wind’s whispers grew into a loving caress, promising the birth of magic to come. Brooding clouds crowded about her, transforming her into an ethereal form. The very weather itself courted her like an attentive lover – framing her like an ancient goddess among men.

And then she knew; knew her storm was calling her home. So long since last they communed, too long since she was filled with the ancient power in her veins and blessed with the mighty kiss of the storm’s tears. So long since she had been absolved of all earthly bounds and shame.

Original Sketch of Storm Goddess - Copyright R.Weal 2011

“Come,” she plaintively called
“Come to me,” she breathlessly heaved
“Breathe new life into my tired soul.
Imbue these wizened veins with the elixir of your simple truth.
Release my true self and I will be your earthly emissary.”

And so her storm came, rushing over, under, around and through her – flooding her system with cleansing power, covering her with tears of joy as it sung her thunderous praises, ecstatically lighting up the sky with the excitement of their reunion. Woman and storm converged in sorcerous communion, her earth bound spirit set free, birthed anew in the tender love of her mighty Mother Storm.

With regretful motion the two were parted, neither knowing when next they would converge as one. But always within they carry a vital element of the other, so that they might always find each other across the long oceans of time and the lost, lonely valleys of each day and night. For in truth they can never truly be parted.

Ruth Weal

For Mother Storm, until we meet again I am ever your earthbound daughter
x

Written during a beautiful Summer Storm

Copyright R.Weal © 7 May 2011 1.10 am

Don’t get me wrong, the great moments are obviously important, they shape our views and opinions, send us down one path and close off another forever, but we only ever exist in a finite space and time and those great moments are over almost before they’ve begun.   I live right here, right now, in this space, in this very moment – I’ll likely remember it for the rest of tonight, I may remember it tomorrow, maybe even in a week, but the clarity of it will surely fade with time, because the importance of this moment was fairly low in the scheme of my life. But like all the memories I have of keeping this blog, it will join the amalgam of feelings I am building, of the contentment and catharsis, the joy and fulfilment that I associate with this space where I freely share something of my art, my views and feelings.

Maybe an example will help clarify my meaning!  I can’t remember every experience of writing or painting, but I remember painting Convergence after my Nan died, how that individual piece helped me to make sense of my feelings.  Then there’s the poem “Witness to the Storm” that was such a powerful and liberating experience of writing my very spirit and essence onto the page in a visceral and enlightening experience.   Those two memories stand out loud and proud, they were pivotal pieces of art that happened and became defining moments in my life, but even as important as they are, they fail to match the overriding sense of purpose, rightness, contentment, catharsis and achievement that my experiences as a whole of creating art over the years of my life has given me.  That body of work to date started as early as 7, when I used to make up stories for my little sisters and comes right up to now, to this blog post I’m writing at this very moment.  Together the collective span of artistic experiences have and will continue to shape my life immeasurably, the collective emotions of those memories are far more important that one single stand out experience.

So that’s what the poem “Between the Rapture and the Ruin” is all about, those seemingly insignificant moments that make up the majority of our lives, that when brought together have the weight and gravitas to create those emotional caveats around our repeated experiences and to elevate the mundane and familiar memories to a status beyond import. The rapture tonight is my words, weaving around me, spilling forth like a font of spiced wine, captivating me as they haven’t for a while and the ruin is a picture, a place I have visited so many times in my life, a beautiful ruined castle that speaks to me on a deep and personal level – Corfe Castle in Purbeck, Dorset, on the South West coast of England.

I took this picture in 2009 on my birthday, it was a beautiful, hot, sunny day, with some truly atmospheric cloud formations that worked very well with the high contrast, black and white treatment.  It seemed a fitting picture to put with this poem.

Take a moment why don’t you to contemplate the great divide between the rapture and the ruin in your life and hopefully you’ll find something magical too, maybe even an ephemeral wisp to hold on to.

Wealie x

Corfe Castle - Copyright R.Weal 2009

BETWEEN THE RAPTURE & THE RUIN

Life is not the moments that define it
Not the rapturous joy
Nor the ruinous pain
Life is the moments in between
Each sunrise
Every sunset
Everything you have ever been and all you are not yet
The cumulative clamour of your every heartbeat
Every reckless breath
Each considered thought
All your comforting words and thoughtless taunts

Life is not the moments that define it
It is the passing through of the seasons
The time that so easily slips unnoticed through the fingers
The complete volume of all your tears both sorrow and joy
Your every seasoned plan or Machiavellian ploy
Each tremulous smile
Every small slight
The sum of all your warm kisses and bitter delights
Every delicate touch
Each blundered fumble
It’s every moment through which you’ve soared or tumbled

Life is not the moments that define it
It’s the passage in between
Grant me not great joy
But spare me great pain
The sincerest wish I ponder
That there is a man with whom I might wander
Who will share with me contentment
Between the rapture and the ruin
Be a part of me like a second skin
On whom I might always lean
Who’ll live with me in the ephemeral wisps of the moments in between

Ruth Weal
14 April 2008 8.22 pm

Copyright R.Weal 2008 ©

Written in an ephemeral wisp, of a moment in between

x

Unfortunately on this day my train back to Salisbury was delayed.  There was lots of grumbles and annoyance amongst the surrounding crowd and from myself as I was very tired and just wanted to get home.  Then the tannoy system announced:

“We apologise for the delay to your service, there has been a death on line and we are working to get the service back running as soon as possible.”

It made me pause and feel a bit guilty for my grumbles only moments earlier, but sadly many of the people surrounding me only grumbled more, as if the life of a person meant nothing if it stopped them from getting home early or stuck in commuter traffic.

Suddenly a few lines of the poem I wrote about the experience came into my head and I got out my handy Pentax Optio 6 camera to capture the moment in pictures.  As it turned out my train was only delayed by a mere 15 minutes, which became the title of the poem that I finished off on the train home.

15 Min Delay - Copyright R.Weal 2007

FIFTEEN MINUTE DELAY

I was delayed today
Whether Murphy’s law or my bad luck
Me and trains don’t get on that much
Disgruntled faces
Impatient people, desperate to be other places
Just another cancelled train
Angry whispers mutter and complain
Just another fifteen minute delay
Fifteen minutes I’ll never get to replay
Lamenting the terrible state of British transport
The reason not given much thought
And then the announcement to which all should have paused
The answer, an untimely death my fifteen minute delay’s cause
A miniscule effect upon my day
But the tragedy left a mark that stays
And still I wonder why so few paused
A callous lack of sympathy for so tragic a cause
I was delayed today

Ruth Weal - 31 May 2007 5.41 pm
Copyright R.Weal 2007

WHY WRITE

Someone asked me once “Why do you write?”  I couldn’t answer them, I simply didn’t know, decades of prolific work spanned out before me and I didn’t know?  Now time has marched on and that question still rings within my ears begging for an answer to be told.

Why do I unfold the tortured soul out upon the page, why is the written word the only way to vent my rage?  Why does my heartache court my prose, why here that my constant quest for wisdom only ever told?

How come the words always seem to fit, the sentences to knit and then follows truth, spinning out this epic tale of a woman named Ruth?

When you read my words what do they speak to you, what dark secrets do they unearth that you never knew?  Where do you go as you close your eyes and my prose washes over you?  What light do they leave in your heart as they wipe away the stain of my unending fear?

I know now why I write, a part of me has always known, but so simple an answer too inconceivable to be the whole truth.

I write because I must, because to not to is to deny my whole.  I write because I breathe, because to not to is not a choice.  I write because writing is simply who I am, because poetry runs as surely as blood through these veins.

My words, my constant companions until the moment I cease to breathe, their existence testament to this life and the thoughts in my head.  May they live long in the hearts and minds of other when I am finally just dust and dead.

Ruth Weal 19 Sept 2005 9.35 pm
© Copyright R Weal 2005

Related articles from other bloggers

Provoking Thought by Ryan S Fortney on his blog Paxcorpus
Creativity – Where is the on switch? by V. Furnas on her blog Life 4 Me By Me

OPEN

Open your stride; tell me…, what do you see?

“Nothing”
Nothing?
“Nothing”

But there is so much to see, so much, possibility
Exotic lands you have yet to tread, every step a journey you have not led
Every pause to rest a blessing, leaving you time enough for the balm of confessing
Bringing you ever closer to your ending, returning you to the beginning for the final mending
So that you might fall at the feet of great love and sup from the fount of divine knowledge above
Then you might accept the random fleetingness of this life indeed, as you spread new life with your sown seed

Open your arms; tell me…, what do you see?

“Nothing”
Nothing?
“Nothing”

But there is so much you can be, so much, opportunity
Untried but true, your great love’s embrace; wanton but pure, still innocent and chaste
Unknown but fast, a protective circle you cast
Enveloping the unborn child, protecting the innocence mild
The fearful, desperate clasp to stave off dark death, or the jealous, binding grasp of unflinching selfishness
All these promises dormant in your arms they wait; waiting only on your actions and the hand of fate

Open your hands; tell me…, what do you see?

“Nothing”
Nothing?
“Nothing”

And yet I see only the possibilities, a great abundance of opportunities
A wealth of works as yet unformed and a thousand caresses awaiting their dawn
A weapon raised or a cradle for the babe, so many situations to choose or evade
The hand of friendship or a mortal wound, the choice to win a heart or seal your doom
A means to build bridges or plunder and destroy, to lead and be bold or hide and be coy
Raised in surrender or held out in peace to those you greet, your hands unfold the story of all whom you meet

Open your heart; tell me…, what do you feel?

“Everything”
Everything?
“Everything”

Everything, all the many splendid possibilities, each and every sacred opportunity
Every hurt I might inflict, each wound I won’t intend and all the many sorrows that I may have to mend
Each gentle look, every unshed tear, all the times I held back, when I could have interfered
Every unmatched moment, each forgettable kiss, I see them all before me and not a one would I miss
Everything I could ever be, every possibility, and all the many opportunities
The path to love and tenderness, that begins and ends within this flesh

Ruth Weal 25 August 2009 7.28 am
© Copyright R Weal 2009