The Itch

 

Can we perceive future events—without proof, conscious reasoning or evidence? This is intuition. Prophecy and clairvoyance are related terms.

I have experienced this. When I was a college student, I had an unmistakable vision of calamity before it happened. A friend, Raymond, suggested we drive with a few others from New Mexico to Los Angeles, California during a school break. He looked at me, offering to drive us in his car, and I had a very clear perception of the accident about to happen. But because I had no tangible proof of threat, and I was young and willing, I ignored my inner vision. A few days later, four of us set out. As we entered Arizona and were driving on a two lane highway in the old car, Raymond decided to pass a semi-tractor trailer. He got about half way past the rig when he spotted a car coming toward us. He first sped up but realized he did not have enough speed. I had been dozing in the back seat and woke just as the oncoming car was about to crash into us. “Raymond!” I shouted. He panicked and hit the brakes just as the head-on collision occurred. The two old people in the other car were shaken and bloodied. We were bruised and slightly traumatized. The accident occurred as I had sensed it would.

I had a momentous dream six years before my daughter Naomi was diagnosed with cancer. It foretold in symbols the death of a child very close to me. I was so disturbed by this grand, magnificent and powerful dream that I went to an esteemed psychologist to discuss it. I made a big painting depicting its symbols. Then I forgot it—until Naomi was suddenly diagnosed. Then the dream came back vividly. She died after a heroic two year struggle.

There are many examples in religious history of future times being seen by prophets. They foretell events that unfold thousands of years later.

On a lighter side, I have come to trust that when my left palm itches, money is coming to me soon. A little itch means a small sale and a bigger, more vigorous scratching means a bigger exchange. The phenomenon has to arrive unexpectedly, but when it does it is very accurate. I can count on a sale of my art when, from out of the blue, my palm itches and I scratch it.

I am not the only one:

“Call it the $64 million itch! Brooklyn grandma Mary Shammas was on the bus when her left palm started itching. Remembering the old superstition that an itchy left palm means money is on the way, Shammas, 73, jumped off the bus and bought a lottery ticket.
On Tuesday night, she hit a $64 million jackpot.” (Read the full article here: Jackpot)

The itch occurred yesterday morning and when I went to my gallery at the end of the day, I came in just as a sale was happening.
I like it.

This Dream

On occasion, I have been able to see into another dimension—a spiritual realm of greater reality. It is a place that transcends the material world and goes beyond time and space. I had such an experience just today, but first I will describe a couple other episodes from when I was in my twenties. I was traveling with a few friends to visit a Native American man on the Navajo reservation. We had stopped outside Gallup, New Mexico to visit someone who could tell us the way. I was in a chair, not paying attention to the conversation and instead half dreaming. A vision came to me of driving on a dirt road, and arriving at a place where an Indian fellow was building a house, laying cement blocks by hand. Suddenly it was time to go, so we headed out and in about ½ hour, we were on a dirt road and then came upon the man, building his house exactly as I had seen earlier—including the wall, and him with his trowel in hand laying the blocks.

In my book, A Heart Traced In Sand, I recount another spiritual experience:
For years I had felt the presence of angels that reside in God’s other realms. When I was twenty-two, during a summer break at the Maryland Institute, College of Art, in Baltimore, I moved to a small town in Maryland and rented a room in a YMCA. One evening while ending my prayers, I felt a change occur around me. I seemed to be wrapped in a hazy, otherworldly light, and suddenly the perfumed scent of a thousand roses filled my nostrils. Turning toward the one window in my little cubicle, I saw a shimmering light come down, pass through the wall, and then hover above me in the approximate shape of a person’s aura. Immediately I knew I was in the presence of a spirit and was frightened. The light shimmered in place, waiting for some acknowledgment, until with trepidation I said, “I am afraid. But come into me.” Then it descended into my soul and for a few dazzling moments bestirred my whole being before vanishing.

Every now an then, my third eye glimpses into the spiritual world of light. But I can't predict when the door will open or what I will see. Several times I have been praying from the depths of my soul over some important matter that is weighing heavy on me, such as when my daughter was dying and I could not bear to see it and needed help. I cried out in anguish. And then I got a glimpse of angels who were smiling and  calm as could be. This sort of infuriated me at the time—that I was so anguished and they were absolutely calm in the midst of my storm. I did not understand what help this was to me, but accepted that I was the one whose vision was limited. This happened again today, but it has come to my awareness that in fact, despite appearances here, all is well in heaven. All of us have one foot there already.

Here is a poem by Hafiz:

Forgive The Dream
All your images of winter
I see against your sky.
I understand the wounds
That have not healed in you.
They exist
Because God and Love
Have yet to become real enough
To allow you to forgive
The dream.
You still listen to an old alley song
That brings your body pain;
Now chain your ears
To His pacing drum and flute.
Fix your eyes upon
The magnificent arch of His brow
That supports
And allows this universe to expand.
Your hands, feet, and heart are wise
And want to know the warmth
Of a Perfect One’s circle.
A true saint
Is an earth in eternal spring.
Inside the veins of a petal
On a blooming redbud tree
Are hidden worlds
Where Hafiz sometimes
Resides.
I will spread
A Persian carpet there
Woven with light.
We can drink wine
From a gourd I hollowed
And dried on the roof of my house.
I will bring bread I have kneaded
That contains my own
Divine genes
And cheese from a calf I raised.
My love for your Master is such
You can just lean back
And I will feed you
This truth:
Your wounds of love can only heal
When you can forgive
This dream.

Hey Jude

Sometimes life events transpire that make us turn our face in awe to the invisible realm and wonder at the intelligence that abides there. I have two examples to share; one that I read last week in a news report, and my own recent experience.

The Guardian ran a story titled, WorldCup: Dream told John Brooks he would score USA winner against Ghana. In the report, we learn about a young soccer player for team USA, only 21 years old, who never had played in an official match and was a second-string player, who had a dream two days before the first world-cup match against Ghana, that in the 8oth minute of the match he scored a header goal from the corner of the field that won the game. Two days later in the real game, against all odds, he scored the winning goal exactly as his dream had prophesied—a header from the corner in the 86^th minute. We have to ask ourselves, where did this prior intelligence of future events come from?

Strawbearer, Mixed-media on board, 60 x 36 inches

My own personal experience occurred several days ago. I was in my art gallery when mid-morning, a woman walking her dog breezed in. She was dressed casually, not wearing make-up, and though I try not and judge people as to whether they are art buyers or lookers, I thought certainly, she is a looker out for a stroll. She barely spent five minutes in the gallery, lingering longer in one room. We said good-bye and she disappeared. I quickly forgot about her and went about doing some menial work, but as I worked, a song came into my head and I could not get it out from my brain. The song is Hey Jude, by the Beatles, and it practically screamed in my ears. Fifteen minutes later the lady with her dog arrives again, this time with her husband trailing behind. We all went to an artwork called Strawbearer, an unusual piece I made a couple years ago that I have shown sporadically, and have always been fond of. It is from a photograph I made in India, when I was traveling between cities by car and spotted a person carrying an immense bundle of straw on his head and shoulders. Although I was moving and he was walking, I snapped the shutter and got a dreamily blurred picture of a fantastic scene. Much later, in my studio, I printed the image as a large format picture on canvas, mounted it on board, covered the surface with encaustic (beeswax and resin heated into a liquid medium) and put straw into the surface while it was still hot, so that when it cooled everything remained intact and secure. 

 

The woman and husband took measurements, and she gave me her contact information to e-mail her a photo of the work and possibly take it to her home for a trial installation. They left, and when I looked at the card, noticed her name—Jude. To make a long story short, I took Strawbearer to their home, helped hang it in their living room and two days later, Jude and her husband Lynn bought it.

If I pay attention, I can see a clue had been given in advance of the main event.