“I wish I could show you, when you are lonely or in darkness, the astonishing light of your own being.” — Hafiz
Your radiance is sometimes fierce, fiery, abundant, sometimes fragile and flickering. One day it’s a golden Garuda, with a full set of glowing wings and talons bigger than our combined hands, or an all-consuming bonfire that purifies and illuminates everything within reach of its smoke, heat and light. Another day it’s the gentle glint off a bread knife at the breakfast table, the mellow glow of a nearly submerged candle, the sun peeking out from behind heavy clouds. But your radiance is always with you, always available to you, even when it’s feeling quiet or shy, when it’s been nearly stamped out by someone else’s unresolved anger or fear, or when it’s so buried within you that you can’t see a way forward anymore. It doesn’t burn out, or expire, or abandon people who are tired and hurting. It just slips into energy-saving mode from time to time to regenerate, to find fresh fuel, to borrow from the sun. But I know (and Hafiz knew all those years ago) that the light of your being is still astonishing, even if you’re overwhelmed by a wave of seemingly unending darkness or a loneliness that stings so much it’s only bearable when you close your eyes.
— heidi kalyani, 2017
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line