This started as a painting which I digitized and changed the colors. Then I added the poem, which was made for the artwork. The poem and artwork are connected with the idea of the cultivation of consciousness. The poem invokes images, rhythms, and sounds like the painting to develop the sense of coordination between inner awareness and our place in the universe. Here's the poem:

Song of the Silver Pool
By
Charles Riley

We are married to the earth
Down to the core of creation.
Once more, we are the earth’s
Composite death to Spring Resurrection.
Why then do we chase after
Shadows that fly through woods?
Our bodies are hung in closets crammed,
While the uber-mind undulates a universe
Not understood.

The tree named Search screams in silence
As the vine named Speech slowly strangles.
Hence the dream to live on is sheared
Until screams in silence are heard.

Listen to the pluck of strings.
A chorus begins.

Let go the vine tangled rot feared.
Jump into the silver pool unpinned.
Leave the wreck for open water cleared.

Sing not the sounds that rhyme and capture.
Sing the songs of silent release and rapture.
Capture the missing knot undone.
Release the monkeys to burden no one.
There we are at last when mirrors shatter.
The shards swept away in a whisper.
The final swift swipe of polish done.

Is it fear of strangled dreams
That sucks the air out of screams?

Let go the vine tangled rot feared.
Jump into the silver pool unpinned.
Leave the wreck for open water cleared.

Sing not the sounds that rhyme and capture.
Sing the songs of silent release and rapture.
Capture the missing knot undone.
Release the monkeys to burden no one.
There we are at last when mirrors shatter.
The shards swept away in a whisper.
The final swift swipe of polish done.

Added Oct 26, 2020

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