‘This is a wonderful day.
I've never seen this one before.’
Maya Angelou
All We Imagine As Light, Payal Kapadia
It’s 8:21 a.m. in Fayoum. I’m sitting on a palm wood chair on a patch of grass at the far end of the pottery school’s pool. The sun is perched high in the sky, directly in front of me, and my whole body is bathed in its warm light. I’m drying off from a swim I had twenty minutes ago. A chorus of birds sings in harmony from the trees encircling the pool.
In front of me stands a beautiful, tall white bird of paradise plant. Behind me, palm trees sway alongside vibrant pink and yellow blooms. To my right, just beyond the pool, towering eucalyptus trees dance in the breeze—the sound of their rustling leaves whispering in my ears.
In front of me stands a beautiful, tall white bird of paradise plant. Behind me, palm trees sway alongside vibrant pink and yellow blooms. To my right, just beyond the pool, towering eucalyptus trees dance in the breeze—the sound of their rustling leaves whispering in my ears.
The Man Who Talks with the Flowers
‘He is tied only to the God of the flowers. He is as free as the flowers which give themselves to the sunshine and to the dew. Because he is so like the flowers in his relaxation and selflessness, the flowers give up their secrets to him.’Picture: Flowers by Yoshihiko Ueda
“You have to love it enough,” said Dr. Carver. “Anything will give up its secrets if you love it enough. Not only have I found that when I talk to the little flower or little peanut it will give up its secrets,” he continued as if talking to himself, “but I have found that when I silently commune with people they give up their secrets also—if you love them enough. In a crowded auditorium of people I can pick out the spiritual souls almost at a glance.’
“You have to love it enough,” said Dr. Carver. “Anything will give up its secrets if you love it enough. Not only have I found that when I talk to the little flower or little peanut it will give up its secrets,” he continued as if talking to himself, “but I have found that when I silently commune with people they give up their secrets also—if you love them enough. In a crowded auditorium of people I can pick out the spiritual souls almost at a glance.’
Oceanic Feeling
In a 1927 letter to Sigmund Freud, Romain Rolland coined the phrase "oceanic feeling" to describe a sensation of boundlessness—an experience of eternity, limitless and unbounded. He wrote about this feeling as:
"The simple and direct fact of the feeling of the eternal (which can very well not be eternal, but simply without perceptible limits, and like oceanic)."
— Letter from Rolland to Freud, December 5, 1927
Rolland associated this "oceanic sentiment" with the mystical states experienced by figures like Ramakrishna, as well as his own personal experience. It describes the sensation of being one with the external world, of an indissoluble bond that transcends the boundaries of self.
In her book "On Not Being Able to Paint" (1950), Marion Milner, a writer and psychologist, explores the psychological and emotional processes involved in creativity. While she doesn’t use the term "oceanic feeling" directly, she describes a similar state of immersion and absorption in the act of creation:
"The moment of complete absorption in the act of creation is one in which the self, as a separate entity, ceases to exist. One is at one with the process, and this loss of boundaries is a necessary part of the creative experience."
— Marion Milner, On Not Being Able to Paint (1950)
Secrets Of Divine Love A.Helwa
"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it"RUMI
Just as water wheels raise water from a flowing river toward a fetilega-den, prayer pulls our consciousness from the flow of our passing thoughts toward the garden of the eternal soul. Prayer is more than physical motions; it is more than words of praise and gestures of humility. When we pray, we join the orbit of love: we flow with the rivers, sway with the trees, dance with the moon, and sing with the birds. When we pray, we join with what's and has always been, in constant praise of the Divine.
“Have you not considered that those in the heavens and the Earth, the sun, the moon, the stars, the mountains, the trees, the animals, and many people, all bow down to God?"
QUR'AN 22:18
I live like water—soft, open, ever-changing. Shaped by all I touch, transformed with each moment, I meet life as a wave meets the shore—flowing with presence and devotion. I move in rhythm with the Earth, attuned to its tides, its stillness, its turning. I let life move through me. I listen. I surrender. In flowing, I return to myself.
To give ourselves wholeheartedly—to a moment, a choice, a relationship—is to plant seeds in fertile ground. When we show up fully, the garden of life responds. It unfolds in its own time, in its own shape. And even when the outcome isn’t what we imagined, there is still something sacred there.
Each experience becomes a teacher—if we let it. If we surrender. If we trust.
Life moves in cycles—beginnings, endings, stillness, growth. When we stop resisting and start listening, we see each part has its place.
Each experience becomes a teacher—if we let it. If we surrender. If we trust.
Life moves in cycles—beginnings, endings, stillness, growth. When we stop resisting and start listening, we see each part has its place.
Whatever is fluid, soft, and yielding will overcome whatever is rigid and hard.
What is soft is strong.
Lao Tzu
Photograph by Maxine Pennington
Wanderers Of The Desert, Nacer Khemir
I desire to be surrounded by nature, to see the sunset every night, the moon rise, the stars and the milky way, walk at dusk and wake up at dawn. Look out into the horizon and be aware of the vastness of this planet and the whole universe. To be surrounded by animals, plants, water and all their sounds. Feel the sun caress my skin and talk to the trees. To simply be in Gaia’s essence connected to all her elements.
Cut a chrysalis open, and you will find a rotting caterpillar. What you will never find is that mythical creature, half caterpillar, half butterfly, a fit emblem of the human soul, for those whose cast of mind leads them to seek such emblems. No, the process of transformation consists almost entirely of decay." But the butterfly is so fit an emblem of the human soul that its name in Greek is psyche, the word for soul. We have not much language to appreciate this phase of decay, this withdrawal, this era of ending that must precede beginning. Nor of the violence of the metamorphosis, which is often spoken of as though it were as graceful as a flower blooming.
Perfect Days,
Wim Wenders
By her changing face we measure time and it is the Moon who watches over the arrival of children here on Earth. Let us gather our thanks for Grandmother Moon together in a pile, layer upon layer of gratitude, and then joyfully fling that pile of thanks high into the night sky that she will know. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to our Grandmother, the Moon.
We give thanks to the Stars who are spread across the sky like jewelry. We see them at night, helping the Moon to light the darkness and bringing dew to the gardens and growing things. When we travel at night, they guide us home. With our minds gathered as one, we send greetings and thanks to all the Stars. Now our minds are one.
Photograph by Maxine Pennington
Solange Knowles, When I Get Home
All that you touch
You Change.
All that you Change
Changes you.
The Only lasting truth
Is Change.
God
Is Change.
Octavia E. Butler
Laurie Anderson on The Power of Art
Bijoy Jain,
Studio Mumbai
"Silence has a sound, it may be quiet, but we do hear it within ourselves; that is the sound of our breathing. It is synchronous in all of us. Silence, time, and space are eternal, as are water, air, and light, our elemental constructs. This abundance of sensory phenomena, dreams, memory, imagination, emotions, and intuition, stem from this pool of experiences, embedded in the corners of our eyes, in the soles of our feet, in the lobes of our ear, in the timbre of our voices, in the whisper of our breath, and in the palm of our hand."
Give you the world if it was mine
Blow you right to my door
Feels fine
Feels like
You're mine
Feels right
So fine
I'm yours
You're mine
Like paradise
I'd give you the world if it was mine
Feels fine
Feels like
You're mine
I'm yours
So fine
Like paradise
I'd wash the sand off the shore
Give you the world if it was mine
Blow you right to my door
Feels fine
Feels like
You're mine
Feels right
So fine
I'm yours
You're mine
Like paradise
Ooh, what a life
Ooh, what a life
Ooh, what a life
Ooh, what a life
I wanna share my life
Wanna share my life with you
Wanna share my life
I wanna share my life
Wanna share my life with you
Wanna share my life
I wanna share my life
Wanna share my life with you
(Ooh, what a life)
Wanna share my life
Wanna share my life with you
(Like paradise)
Wanna share my life
Wanna share my life with you
Wanna share my life
Wanna share my life with you
“It is my belief that the present state of restlessness that traps the modern individual has its roots in a dysfunctional relationship with the ances-tors. In many non-Western cultures, the ancestors have an intimate and absolutely vital connection with the world of the living. They are always available to guide, to teach, and to nurture. They represent one of the pathways between the knowledge of this world and the next. Most impor-tantly—and paradoxically-they embody the guidelines for successful living—all that is most valuable about life. Unless the relationship between the living and the dead is in balance, chaos results. When a person from my culture looks at the descendants of the Westerners who invaded their culture, they see a people who are ashamed of their ancestors because they were killers and marauders masquerading as artisans of progress. The fact that these people have a sick culture comes as no surprise to them.”
oletha imvula uletha ukuphila,
Sumayya Vally
“They who brings rain, brings life” IsiZulu proverb
“Wielding the comings of rain is a tradition practiced by cultures across geographies. To possess the power to command rainfall is by inference possessing the power to dictate the flow of the natural cycle and climatic conditions. Across Southern Africa, rain-making rituals are directed towards royal ancestors because they were believed to have control over rain and other natural phenomena. One of these is the Moroka of the Pedi tribe in South Africa. Here, a series of fired and unfired clay vessels are assembled as a temporal space to hold gatherings. Over the course of DAS, a series of performances which draw on the traditions of rain-making and harvest are performed in the space where the hands that formed the pots also work to un-form them. The rituals include the use of water, which allows the un-fired pots to dissolve over time, revealing areas and niches of gathering contained by the pots, as well as rhythmic drumming that evokes the sound of thunder at the end of each day.”
“Wielding the comings of rain is a tradition practiced by cultures across geographies. To possess the power to command rainfall is by inference possessing the power to dictate the flow of the natural cycle and climatic conditions. Across Southern Africa, rain-making rituals are directed towards royal ancestors because they were believed to have control over rain and other natural phenomena. One of these is the Moroka of the Pedi tribe in South Africa. Here, a series of fired and unfired clay vessels are assembled as a temporal space to hold gatherings. Over the course of DAS, a series of performances which draw on the traditions of rain-making and harvest are performed in the space where the hands that formed the pots also work to un-form them. The rituals include the use of water, which allows the un-fired pots to dissolve over time, revealing areas and niches of gathering contained by the pots, as well as rhythmic drumming that evokes the sound of thunder at the end of each day.”
Heremakono, Abderrahmane Sissako
A Book of My Own,
Scholastique Mukasonga
“All colonized peoples have been victims of cultural aggression, as the colonizers attempt to impose their own cultures, presented as superior to indigenous cultures, which are deemed primitive or deviant by the colonizers’ standards. This is the “civilizing mission” that the Europeans called upon to impose domination over their African colonies. Rwanda did not escape this cultural agression that, in addition to Christianization, was marked by a racial interpretation of the country’s social and political structure. This is, many decades later, what resulted in the Tutsi genocide of 1994.”
Mafruha Ahmed & Worms Magazine
“Hey, I'm in the motions of writing a recipe book but in the process, I would love your feedback. I wanted to create a small mailing list where I can share recipes with you twice a month for 6 months. What I would love is images - the good, the bad, the ugly..Other things: if you changed the recipes; if you liked/disliked it; if you had company; if you were listening to music et...
I hope to create a zine to go alongside the book including your images, anecdotes, thoughts & ideas on the recipes shared..
Maf x”