Posts Tagged with lineart

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being with water

Perched on the edge of the dock, the smallest amount of my flesh possible in contact with the wood, I try to appear casual, as if slipping into the water below is as routine and natural as drinking tea. A thing to do alone or with company. A commonplace activity we all learned to be comfortable with long ago. But it’s not. The tightness in my stomach tells me so. There are too many unknowns, suffocating memories, habitually reactivated fears. There is clearly a way to be with water that I haven’t discovered yet. An ease that exists, is present in those near me, but rushes into dark corners whenever I’m around. It’s not a thing to fake; “Look at me jumping, splashing, diving in!” Choking. Gasping. Drowning. Dead. Not a game of “breathe and push through it”, although I’ve played that one before and enjoyed the outcome. Sometimes fear is fear. The knot in my stomach tells me so. So I sit, chatting with the nearest soul, sunning myself, counting minutes off like elongated years, hoping no one will notice that I’m not yet wet.

— heidi kalyani, 2017 
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line

Published

breathing

“and i said to my body. softly. ‘i want to be your friend.’ it took a long breath. and replied ‘i have been waiting my whole life for this.’” ― Nayyirah Waheed

I have been waiting my whole life for a breath deep enough to melt the fear of being too much of everything. Too energetic. Too intelligent. Too fast. Beautiful. Capable. Reverent. Loving… For years, (decades maybe) I hardly breathed at all, trying to make myself small, unthreatening, invisible. I wore shapeless clothes, spoke in whispers, shifted my eyes, smiled only when caught off guard, pretended I didn’t know. I tried to hide myself away, dull my shiny bits, keep my impact on others to a minimum. But one day, when the pain of being bound in such a tiny box finally became more than I could bear, I broke down and sobbed. I sobbed for hours. For days. For weeks. Until the force of my sobbing (and the long desperate breaths that came with it) burst the restrictive bars that kept me small. Then for a long time, I lay there, stunned by the spaciousness ― delighting in each breath. Inhaling vastness. Exhaling pain. Inhaling wonder. Exhaling fear. Until I was huge and other people’s words didn’t hurt anymore. Until I could feel my feet connecting to the earth. Until I was on fire… wild and energizing and lighting up the whole sky!

— heidi kalyani, 2017 
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line

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what do I hunger for?


When the moon is full, and the stars are faded by its light, I hunger for your touch — your rough, calloused fingers sliding up and down my spine, or tracing circles around the tender skin of my throat. When the rain is moving horizontally, and my body feels as ripped and torn as an old flag from the battering of the wind, I hunger for a blanket in front of the fire, or a long, deep soak in a tub. When I’ve been tossed back and forth to the point of overwhelm on a sea of powerful emotions (mine or others), I hunger for tears and a cup of tea. In the depths of winter, on days that are so cold the insides of my nose freeze when I breathe, and every person I pass on the street is a hunched and smoking dragon, I hunger for those days we spent snowbound in a cabin — stories, decadent food and curiosity keeping us warm. When I’m surrounded by concrete and glass and other hard edges, I hunger for the smoothness of well-worn rocks in water, the roundness of flower petals heavy with dew, the softness of fruit beneath its skin. On humid afternoons in the middle of summer, when my head is so swollen my brain no longer works and my body so heavy and foreign I feel like my soul has been displaced, I hunger for the photos of king penguins on ice floes that barely registered when I first saw them, but now seem like gifts from another world. When the room is noisy and full of people spitting words, trying to mark their territory as a way of facing the intense sense of scarcity that throbs in their veins, I hunger for a space where we hold each other in the light so thoroughly and with such care, that none of us hurts for long. On a moonless night, when the stars are the brightest thing in the sky, I hunger for solitude and a quiet walk with the fire of my own light.

— heidi kalyani, 2017 
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line

Published

the more beautiful world my heart knows is possible


When each breath is full and deep, and my belly is a bowl of softness, when the madness of the world slows down enough that I can see each muscle shift, each weight change, of the great universal somersault, when the light from the stars on a moonless night is brighter than anything humans have created, that’s the more beautiful world my heart knows is possible.

When your arms flash around me and your lips, with a gentle kiss, brush the top of my head in a gesture both intimate and fleeting, when words flow out of me in thin, rising, entangling streams, like the curly smoke of incense in warm moist air, when my throat is so open and the room so resonant, that the resulting vibrations finally loosen everything I’ve been trying not to hold onto, that’s the more beautiful world my heart knows is possible.

When I’ve pushed my brain into a dark corner, just before the claustrophobic panic sets in, I breathe and remember how light and vast the world can be, when your hand slides onto my thigh while we’re driving in the darkness and leaves a five-pointed pool of warmth that I retrace with my own hand for days afterwards, when the combination of garlic, basil and olive oil bites my tongue with a near orgasmic splendour, that’s the more beautiful world my heart knows is possible.

When I’m tense and tired and your late-night email makes me laugh so hard everything melts away, when in the stillness of deeply listening to music, I see the shine of tears running down your face, when the sun illuminates a golden path through my room, inching slowly because this time I’ve remembered to notice, that’s the more beautiful world my heart knows is possible.

When the air and ground are so cold that the snow beneath my boots is the only thing brave enough to make a sound, when the tea in my mug is too hot to drink, but I sip it anyway knowing that some kinds of pain actually feel good, when my cry for help in the dark hours of the night is answered by the love of people I am grateful to call friends, that’s the more beautiful world my heart knows is possible.

— heidi kalyani, 2017 
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line

 

Published

self-love

I finally know — really know with every cell of my body — that I’m okay, that I will be okay, that the pain of falling, crashing and being shattered will dissipate and fade, that I will learn to love myself again… fully… with my whole heart, instead of just the sliver I allowed myself before. I see now that I was defensive, quick to explain and justify, to compromise, to acquiesce… wanting to hide anything I thought you might not approve of. I wanted to be loved, to be included, to be invited, but I didn’t fully love, include, or invite myself. I wasn’t breathing deeply and my feet weren’t connected to the ground. Like a black cloth on a sunny day, I soaked up the fear and anger you projected. I was penetrable. Vulnerable. Unboundaried. I believed the fear and anger were mine, even though they were as foreign to me as a third and fourth arm. I believed that I had forgotten how to be with people, how to be whole, how to hold a friend in the light. And in that state of instability, I wanted your bravado, your energy, your seeming sureness to refresh me, to give me strength and encouragement to be how I wanted to be. I wanted your love to coat me in resolve, in knowledge, in grace. But it didn’t. It brought me down. Brought us both down. Because it wasn’t real. It was a mask you use to cover over your insecurities, a way of hiding from yourself, a way of shifting responsibility for your unhappiness onto others. Rupi Kaur says, “How you love yourself is how you teach others to love you.” And so, I’m learning to love myself fully, unconditionally and with a soft gentleness that both rocks me to sleep and ignites the wildest fires!

— heidi kalyani, 2017 
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line

Published

labels not required

I’m not an illustrator, a graphic designer, or a dancer. I’m not an planner, a writer, or a hiker. I’m not a seeker, a yogi, or a lover. Yes, I like to draw, design and dance. I like to think, write and walk. I like going beyond the edges of my known experience, exploring my mind-body-soul, sharing intimacy with people. I am me. Fully, completely, unabashedly. And when I meet you, I’m not seeing your occupation, your religion, your ethnicity, your gender. I’m seeing your eyes and the way they burn like lanterns on a moonless night. I’m hearing your voice and how it fills the tiny room we’re standing in, or floats up to the tops of the trees and becomes the wind. I’m feeling your energy and noticing how this connection both excites and calms every cell in my body. I’m witnessing your presence, your compassion, your tenderness. I’m aware of your breath, your heartbeat, your electromagnetic field — your aliveness. And I’m delighted by the miracle that is you, no matter what your past or future story is, no matter what you call yourself or what others call you, no matter what fascinates and obsesses you, what repels or engages you. And I hope that, in the same way, you are delighted by the miracle that is me, without naming it or labelling it or squaring it off to make me fit better into the little tick boxes our culture is so fond of.

— heidi kalyani, 2017 
from the *nothing is black and white* project: illustration created out of meditation with a single unbroken line