Wednesday, April 18, 2007

The broken are not always gathered together, of course, and not all mysteries of the flesh are solved. We speak of "senseless tragedies,", but really: Is there any other kind? Mothers and wives disappear without a trace. Children are killed. Madmen ravage the world, leaving wounds immeasurably deep, and endlessly mourned. Loved ones whose presence once filled us move into the distance; our eyes follow them as long as possible as they recede from view. Maybe we chase them -- clumsily, across railroad tracks and trafficked streets; over roads new-printed with their footsteps, the dust still whirling in the wake of them; through impossibly big cities people with strangers whose faces and bodies carry fragments of their faces and bodies, whose laughter, steadiness, pluck , stubbornness, remind us of the beloved we seek. Maybe we stay put, left behind, and look for them in our dreams. But we never stop looking, not even after those we love become part of the unreachable horizon. We can never top carrying the heavy weight of love on this pilgrimage; we can only transfigure what we carry. We can only shatter it and send it whirling into the world so that it can take shape in some new way.


--Stephanie Kallos
'Broken For You'


JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

9 comments:

Christy Woolum said...

Thank you for reminding me of this quote. I loved it when I read the book and the book was amazing. I have a simplier heart picture/poem I will posting on my poem for the day. I guess it is a week that broken and heart are two words that have woven themselves into our thoughts. I appreciated the post.

Anonymous said...

This is a poignant and very timely quote, Jbelle. Thank you for sharing it.

There is much I would like to respond to in these words - but they speak for themselves.

Bonsoir.

MarmiteToasty said...

Sigh.............. xx

The Fool said...

Beautiful words, and an intriguing piece of statuary. Is the "heart" a piece in your collection?

"...we can only transfigure what we carry. We can only shatter it and send it whirling into the world so that it can take shape in some new way."

So powerful. So true.

Yes.

The Fool said...

Heads up. Grafitti in vogue today.

Anonymous said...

Jesus, I don't mean to say this again but, yeah, what The Fool said:

"...we can only transfigure what we carry. We can only shatter it and send it whirling into the world so that it can take shape in some new way."

Simply. Power. Full.

Timely.
Then again, when wouldn't this piece "be"?

Thank you,
Beauty

--

Carla said...

A beautiful, beautiful excerpt. Most timely, indeed.

JBelle said...

The heart is a piece in my collection. The artist fashions the heart from clay, fires the piece, then breaks it. (making face here) Then hand rubs the pieces with glaze and finish about 12 times. A hugely laborious process. Finally, they are reassembled into whole pieces and mounted on the little stands. I love these. Love them to death. sigh. When we moved the office about 6 years ago, I put this piece on a window sill in my personal office. About six months later, I woke up in the middle of the night, not remembering having seen it for a long seen. Woke straight up and into anxiety over this heart. I wonder if I was dreaming? One of the people on staff who came in at 6 am got quite a strange call from me at 5:59, saying GO TO MY OFFICE! DO YOU SEE A TERRA COTTA HEART ANYWHERE?! you do? really?

sweet.

:)

I am really deeply connected to my art on a darkly fundamental level, I think. I try to get to each piece each day and never grow tired of seeing any of it.

The Fool said...

Thank you, JBelle for the insights to the process and your connections. It's appreciated.