No Pain, No Gain

"Man's fate is according to his pains." -Robert Herrick, (English, 24 August 1591 – 15 October 1674)


Is fasting like weightlifting? Yes. They both abide by the dictum, “No pain no gain.”
A body builder must push his muscles to greater exertions in order to build them. In the process he feels pain. Microscopic muscle fibers tear, only to be rebuilt stronger with greater mass.

The other day, on the sixteenth day of my nineteen day fast, (see previous post), I was leaving my gallery, riding my bike to the lot where I park my van. I felt lightheaded, and realized hunger and thirst in the background of my activities. Turning a corner, I took hold of the distress. I had the feeling of being able to lift it up like a weightlifter; as if I were exercising spiritual muscles. I felt stronger by stressing my body—same as working out. But inasmuch as this effort is aimed at relying upon the pleasure of God, a much more lasting result is achieved by building spiritual character.

The road to achievement runs through hardship. My daughter Naomi Boone (January 11, 1980 - July 5, 1999)  knew this. She was diagnosed with cancer, which ultimately took her life at the age of nineteen. In the beginning of her ordeal, she wrote in her journal, “Hardship will make us stronger. I think that in every situation, there is good in it.”

Ecstasies Of Heavenly Union

“True loss is for him whose days have been spent in utter ignorance of his self.” —Baha’u’llah

I am at the midway point of the Baha’i nineteen day fast I observe each year. I began in 1971 and will continue, God willing, until 2022. The dates of fasting are March 2-20. The way it works is if you are healthy, between the ages of 15 - 70, not pregnant or breast feeding, then you give up food and water between sunrise and sunset. It is difficult to practice faithfully, but each year about a week before the start I have deep yearning for it. Like no other discipline, it affirms that I am a spiritual being, far beyond the material elements that compose my body. Sometimes I think that if a Divine command were to arrive that I must not ever again pass anything beyond my lips, I would be obedient until death were to release me from the physical bonds entirely. Then like a bird escaping its cage, I would wing my way into grand celestial spheres and sing the ecstasies of heavenly union with Divine Spirit in limitless freedom.

It seems just about every religion has a fasting period. The prophets, who are like Divine Doctors, prescribe it for us for our own good.

Metamorphosis

A wounded man lies on a dark battlefield littered with corpses and not a living soul near. His blood drains away, seeping into the silent earth and he thinks, “it will all be over soon and then I will fly to heaven.”

Another person is in a garden of splendor. Roses open themselves to the warm life-giving rays of the sun. He delights in their varied form, color and fragrance and wanders among them, with soft grass underfoot. Birds sing from branches of trees and their songs are sweet. Bees buzz from blossom to blossom busy with the work of collecting pollen to make their honey. The gentle play of air currents across his skin is like a sublime caress from an unseen hand.

One heart is elated, open, enchanted and confirmed. Another is stabbed to the quick.

A caterpillar will someday emerge as something almost entirely different—a butterfly.  First it must die to its old form and be born again. In its cocoon, the caterpillar form disintegrates and from the primal ingredients another, very different creature is born. What a wonder to open its marvelous wings and stretch them out . . . to fly. To go from one that crawls and eats leaves to one that moves freely through the air and feeds on nectar. The butterfly might fly across a dark abyss. But it will not land there. It will find flowers.




Some poems from my past:

Perfumed Dawn

Someone said that
you are easily distracted by
butterfly wings and
the sound of trees.
They said you only speak
in the language of dreams.

I know the picture.
You are intoxicated from the
fragrance of a perfumed dawn.
That morning, the scent of a thousand roses
arose from the mist of your memory.
A sublime light filled
the corners of your mind.
You fell weeping on the floor.

Since then you have not been the same.
You wander streets, staring
into the faces of strangers as
if looking for a long-lost friend.
When a glimmer of recognition
is seen in someones eyes
you cry, and where
your tears fall, birds arise.

It seems there is nothing to do
to solve this madness. Sirens
are calling for you to drown
in a surreal sea.


 Drowning

What world is this,
where I must learn to drown
or else be set on fire.
Those who do not discover the secret
risk going up in smoke.

Throw yourself in—
go to the bottom.
It is better not to resist.
Let water take you;
                   be like a fish

Soon you will feel at home.


Footprints in the Sand 

Beautiful the dawn when you
danced along the shore
wearing pain
like a bracelet of bells.

Birds circled above—made a halo
around your head while waves
caressed your feet.

How many lovers
has the ocean drowned?

Wind and tides quickly
swept away your footprints,

Your hymn is in the hills.





All writing © 2004 -2018 Steven Boone

A Thousand Candles

 

Amira seemed timid and mysterious during my first visits to her home in Luxor several years ago. After all, I was a stranger from America who did not share her Egyptian life or speak her language. What might I be thinking of her poor, humble earth home and impoverished family? Her father, Hagag, and I were becoming friends. Each day I walked on the dusty dirt road along the Nile River to be with him, his wife Edleah and five children.

Mother, grandmother and daughter—Amira. Three year ago in 2014.

Bilal, the youngest, age 3, often ran around with nothing on but a t-shirt. He sparkled like a gem—full of happy exuberance, whether playing with cats, racing about the compound, or being at my side. His mother was amused when he scolded her to go away so that he could have me for himself as playmate.

Mohammed, the oldest son, took me on a sojourn to a nearby village. I sat atop the family donkey while he walked beside. He spoke enough English to allow us to converse. Amira had just reached the age to cover her head with a scarf. She could only glance at me shyly in passing. Nubi, the next oldest boy seemed shy and aloof. Iyah, the youngest girl was bubbly and playful, her reddish-brown curly hair pulled back and tied behind her head. She looked curiously at me while smiling in delight.

I came to know and love the entire family, and the grandmother too.

Three years later, last December, I arrived again in Luxor and stayed for three weeks. Mohammed had gone into the army. He could not avoid it since the family had no money for college. He returned home for a week while I visited. In the army he earns one dollar per day and must pay for his uniform and shoes. The family cannot afford it, but pays for his bus trips home and back to his army post. He only has a few months of his two year service left. After that he said, “I want to work and help my family.”


My time in Luxor was split between my friend Hagag’s family and my other Egyptian friend Abul’ Ezz and his big family. Hagag is poorer than Ezz, but by American standards they both are quite poor. Yet such heart in these people! I feel humble in their presence.

Edleah and Hagag. 2017

Hagag is a farmer with a tiny plot of greens. He has a bad back that needs surgery but labors on. The children have grown and with this visit opened up to me. Bilal wanted to be sure he was not asleep if I were coming. Iyah made drawings—including my portrait. Nubi gave me rides on the donkey cart if I was going on to Ezz’s home. Amira stopped her studies to look deeply into my eyes and speak a little in English.

Women, on bread baking day.

I always had my camera and the families accepted my picture taking.

Amira is coming of age, finishing secondary school. She is bright, honest and pure hearted. Her hope is to attend college and study business or accounting. But it is impossible for the family to afford.

All four children sleep in one small room. Amira’s bed is a straw mat spread upon the hard earth floor. The others sleep togerther on cushions on simple divans. Perhaps Amira sleeps on the earth because of her age—because she is a young woman. There is no complaint in her.

I told Amira I would be sure she can go to college. Her heart soared and it was as if a thousand candles lit within her breast. Such a smile of gratitude. I imagine her at college, ardent in her studies, sharing a room with another student, and with a bed to sleep in.

Long Love Letter

Steven's writing

After the writer's death, reading his journal is like receiving a long letter.
—Jean Cocteau (French: 5 July 1889 – 11 October 1963)

My oldest daughter Naomi began a diary when she was only nine years old—and kept writing until she died at the age of nineteen. As her father, I did not know she was being so attentive about the intimate details of her life until she was seventeen. She kept her journals private.

After she passed away, her personal writings were indeed like receiving a long letter from her.

I wrote during my youth as well—but not so early in life. My first diary began when I wrote on my seventeenth birthday. I would use the little cloth-bound book as a record; “So that the sentimentalist I think I might be in the future can look back and remember the person he once was and the changes he went through.”

Naomi's writings

Naomi, at age nine was simply taking delight in life and honoring it by writing her observances, dreams, thoughts and feelings. Her first entries are full of incorrectly spelled words—she was terrible at spelling until almost high school. She would try and get her notions down on paper and guess at word spelling. For instance she wrote when 12: “We were playing with the new puppy, (we are thinking of naming her Soffy or Sophia). We were playing tug-of-war and then Sarah put the tug-of-war thing in her mouth and so I grabid it and both of us tuged a wile and Sarah’s tooth ended up gone! I feel really bad about it and stuff!
Just a minute ago I found her tooth!
She lost and I found it!”

After my teen years I stopped keeping a diary. Instead I kept a dream journal. It filled quickly and then tapered off when I did not remember them often. Then, as my life as a visual artist came to the fore, I married, had children and gave up writing.

Naomi fell ill with cancer at age seventeen, and I began keeping a record of her struggle. I wanted to write about her success in beating her disease. I kept writing until her death, determined to tell her story of courage, grace and spirit. It became the story of her soul and how she transitioned into a magnificent spiritual being. The writing took three years and produced, A Heart Traced In Sand, Reflections on a Daughter’s Struggle For Life.

During her last two years Naomi wrote her observances of life and her surroundings, and was gaining wisdom: “Today I saw myself in my English class dancing with joy because I was cured. I saw myself telling people that the most important thing in life is to bask in it with all of its glory. Hardship is something that will make us stronger. I don’t know if I have complete evidence of this  but I think that in every situation there is good  in it. I feel so much wisdom and I know that I will learn more!”

Naomi wrote many affirmations, picturing how she envisioned her life. She also wrote her fears and sometimes anger. Life was becoming painful and short. Close to the end, she wrote of her pain, anxiety, and a nagging doubt that was with her. Once, she thought of somebody reading her diary after her death and was angry, writing she would rather burn her journal.
The last writing Naomi did was on a small piece of paper two nights before her death. “Dream of a blissful cruise. I don’t remember much of it. I just remember glimpses of it. I am happy.” The note was on her bedside table when she died.

Soon afterward I made my first journal entry: “It has been sixteen days since Naomi passed away. I am still sorting out the pieces of my life. At the studio; I was here yesterday and could not manage to begin painting. Here again today . . .  I will try and begin again.”

My stack of writing books

Eventually, I became single and felt Naomi’s spirit encouraging me to live life fully without fear. Since then I have been around the world twice and lived in many lands. My stack of journals is tall. I write this blog every week and have 587 posts. There is one little book that is special. It is only for my notes to God. Here is an entry from September 25, 2009: Dear God. To look in any direction is to see miracles. Above is the endless sky, and below is mother earth. On every side is mystery. Even the senses I use to perceive my world are miraculous gifts I do not fully comprehend.

Someday my end will come and I will go to be with Naomi again. My writings will be left behind. Sarah, my surviving daughter will find them and read them as a long love letter to her and life.

Looking Into A Face

What is more magical than looking into a face? A sunrise has its charms, as does the flaming spectacle at the end of day. Changing clouds, dark forests, mossy rock and gurgling brook all entice. Microscopic life viewed under microscopes and galaxies seen through telescopes put us in awe. But none of these express as much as a human face.

A face is a poem, a book, a treatise. It speaks every language and conveys in every language. It dances, groans, howls, cries, kisses, laughs . . . it is sympathetic or remote, suspicious or loving.

We can tell the passage of time in a face. Yet eyes do not age . . . they retain their features.

In my photographic pursuits I am attracted to making images that capture faces. Wherever I am in the world I look for the human face to tell its story.

The desert or mountain is splendid, as are the cities and villages, but it is a face that goes with the location that is most expressive.

God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.  —William Shakespeare

The Horizon I have Been Dreaming

 

During my youth I daydreamed and used imagination to make simple pencil drawings. I often drew a road beginning under my feet extending toward the horizon, getting smaller until at last disappearing there.

Even now, as an artist many decades later, I make paintings with disappearing roads, paths or rivers in a landscape.

I have a passion for street photography. It takes me on thoroughfares across the globe. I begin with a known place underfoot and start traveling—soon to disappear into the horizon of the unknown. I feel free.

Erice, Sicily, Italy

When I am making street photos, surprise is my ally. I look for the odd, or combinations of elements that combined make for a visual poem.

Venice, Italy

As I grow older, my road steadily nears an unseen and mysterious end.

Central India

I look forward to meeting that horizon I have been dreaming of all my life.


More art of: Steven Boone

Kaleidoscope of Sensual Surprises

Life is a kaleidoscope of sensual surprises.  During travel, I leave familiar surroundings to engage in the unknown and see with fresh eyes, hear with new ears, and think new thoughts. All the while being mesmerized and awed by little revelations. Yet even without going anywhere, the kaleidoscope of patterns, sights, sounds, tastes and smells is always turning; a bite of cold wind across the face, coming indoors to fragrant aromas of cooking foods, hearing the song of a strange bird for the first time, a fabulous sunset or sunrise.

A surprise can be simple and appear like a gift from an unseen hand. I have deep windowsills at home. In my bedroom I placed a model of a sailing ship on a window ledge. Recently, before taking a nap after lunch, I pulled the curtains closed. After rising, I went to the curtains and saw the ships shadows cast upon the fabric. It captured my imagination and I went and got my camera. The rippling folds of cloth were like ocean waves that took my vessel into an etheric sea. Why did I notice it? The winter light and angle of the sun made the picture come to life. Also, I was willing to see . . . because if my emotions and thoughts had been obscuring my perceptions, the little shadow theater would have had no attraction. I had seen it before. Now the elements lined up to capture my senses and I was ready.
 

I like happy accidents and am open to experiencing them during my creative process. Recently, during my month sojourn in Venice, Italy, I fell into a hobby of making photographs of people taking “selfies.” World famous Rialto Bridge was just minutes from my flat. Everyday, thousands of selfies are made there. So whenever I was passing over the bridge, 2 or 3 times a day, I would linger to photograph. Once, I spotted two fellows making a portrait, and surreptitiously became involved with my camera. Just as they were composing, I shot my picture from behind, capturing the subject’s face through the triangle of arm, shoulder and head of the picture taker.

Because I am creative, poems arise from what is garbage to others. One day I was walking on the stone sidewalks of Cuenca, Ecuador. I often look down at the patterns and crevices of the walkways as I sojourn. Something stopped me. A picture had fallen face up onto the grimy patterned  stonework. It was a family portrait of a boy. I noticed how the smiling, lovely face was vulnerable on the dirty sidewalk where it would be stepped on. Why did the scene attract me to take a photograph? Most people would ignore it. I found the incongruity evoked pathos in me. I reflected upon what happens to people in life. The purity of their beginnings fall to earth. At early stages innocence suffers degradation, injury, abandonment, death. Yet the smile and light is in the picture.

Unity Of Existence

 

In pure moments of being, I perceive behind the veil of the material world in the realm of non-duality, or oneness. Here, love reigns supreme. Unity rules the real existence.

During periods of high creativity, I am able to let go of selfishness so as to merge completely and seamlessly with the whole. While painting, time vanishes, the joy of process takes over, and as the picture takes shape, surprises occur as if I am not in control at all. The best photography occurs when I lose everything that is a barrier between me and the subject. In writing, ego must fall, so that I am not writing with an eye to myself; rather the process unfolds on its own.

When meeting anyone new, I love being in this space of oneness. As if to say, “I have no judgement of you, we come from the same dust, created by the same Hand. I remember you—a friend from before this existence. We met on the shores of dawn.” Thus, I can look in the face of a foreigner and see a fellow being I have known all my life.
A king is my brother, same as a pauper. A person of a different color, with different features and dress—no matter, I combine just as well with them as with one of my own kind.



There are limitations. My body is not so quick to lose itself. It has adapted in certain environments. It has learned to be friendly with some elements and not friendly with others. Experience says it does not like hot, humid jungles. It reacts violently to some contamination in water in foreign lands that those people are immune to (India) . It is repelled by certain foods that other people eat—such as spiders (Cambodia). I can’t help that.

I have been in all these situations and appreciate them as part of the fabric of life. Behind all is the unity of existence.

Along The Way

We are slowed down sound and light waves, a walking bundle of frequencies tuned into the cosmos. We are souls dressed up in sacred biochemical garments and our bodies are the instruments through which our souls play their music.    -Albert Einstein

I have been home for two weeks now, and the sights and sounds of the previous two months continue to reverberate in my being. The photographs I took, the paintings and writings, all testify to my soul journey.

This blog is over ten years old now, with 582 posts to date. It is a book—a record with photos.

So many experiences in life are bound to be buried. Little surprises that happened along the way come to life with pictures or writing.

Like this. I was walking in Paris on the left bank, heading back to my hotel in Saint-Germaine. I came to a woman in a wheelchair, surrounded by pigeons she was feeding. It was cold, and she was wearing tennis shoes. An oversized beige beret sat on her head. When our gaze met, she smiled warmly with light in her eyes. I wondered about her life and circumstances, and asked to take her picture. She had no pretensions and to my surprise spoke fluent English. “I love speaking English,” she said. We chatted some small talk, then I took her picture. I noted that she was not begging, but imperturbably living on the street, taking care of pigeons in the midst of the flowing crowds around her.






I have close to two thousand pictures from my last sojourn—from Washington DC to Paris, on to Venice for a month, then Egypt for three weeks.

Memories jump to life with pictures that add "a thousand words".

Deep To My Soul

I am glad I had my paints, camera and pen along with me. Oh, and my laptop. Two pair of shoes was enough. So was two pair of pants, four shirts, socks and underwear. I used the umbrella in Venice a few times. Never wore the shorts and decided to leave them in Egypt.

Everything fit in a medium size suitcase and carry-on with wheels. I never needed anything more and came home without a pair of shoes I gave away, and also left shorts, and shirts behind. The special item I brought back is the Jellabiya, (man’s gown) that was made for me in Egypt.

Oh, the four paintings I sent from Italy and two from Egypt arrived safely by courier. No equipment damaged, over 1,800 photos safely stored, and some foreign money in my pocket for souvenir.
The damage that occurred was in my body when I took a flu medication in Luxor and it wreaked havoc on my urinary system which is already slowing down because it is over six decades old. I had to come home sooner than expected. That was the biggest of the problems that arrived. All part of THE DREAM.

Friendships and bonds deepened. With my brother Wade and his family in Washington DC, with Cristiana in Venice, Italy, Fred the hotelier in Paris, and my Egyptian brothers, Hagag and Abu’l Ezz in Luxor, Egypt along with their families.

 

Perhaps I left a footprint behind in the places I sojourned. A memory that I was there.  My friends remember me, and cried when I left them. They went deep to my soul as well.