“You showed me

What a human life can be -

To reach and crave,

To fall and to be brave,

To mourn when the dream is lost

And then to get back up

and dream again.

And though I have traded

aching for a bed of soft pillows,

And the dark places inside myself

for a porcelain illusion,

I would take this humanness a thousand times again.

And I would cry for the version of myself

That might have strayed

From this journey,

The girl that could have never reached, never been broken, and never really lived.

The girl who would never have known

this feeling of longing

burned into my skin,

Demanding I go deeper

into the recesses of myself

than I even knew were there.

I could have missed it all,

Like kisses that you once imagined you would have

But never did,

Let the familiarity of “letting go”

And “non attachment”

Become the barren road

I walked forever,

Never to touch

The heart of myself,

The seed of my desire -

The place where pain meets resonance

And the whole world

Turns ablaze

with the wondrous longing

of a single lit-up heart.”

Oil, mixed media and 24-karat gold leaf on gallery wrapped canvas, 8” x 8” x 1.5”

Framed in a maple hardwood floater frame. Overall dimensions with frame: 9.25” x 9.25” x 2.5”

Comes signed, wired and ready to hang with certificate of authenticity and accompanying poem.