Media: Avocado pit on paper
ABOUT THE INK
I harvested avocados from the land where I'm living, Art Monastery Hawai'i, on the ancestral & current day homeland of the Kanaka Maoli, birthplace of King Kamehameha, Big Island, Hawai'i. I cooked down the pits to create this ink, which has a living, breathing quality. This ink will shift over time in unpredictable ways, just like any other living thing. It may darken, fade, or change color. We shall see!
ABOUT THE SERIES
My partner, Qayyum Johnson, and I have been honoring the moon cycle since the summer of 2019. Each new moon and full moon Qayyum writes a poem and I create a painting. Sometimes Qayyum writes the poem and I make a painting in response to that. Sometimes the other way around. Sometimes we both create from the inspiration of the moon.
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If you'd like to receive the moon poems & paintings in your inbox each month, you can sign up to receive them for free at artmonastery.org/subscribe.
The poem that Qayyum wrote in response to this painting is below. We were both responding to the full moon on June 3, 2023.
Slow Unquantifiable Moon
Full Moon June 3, 2023
The cats that live here
in our house that isn’t ours
have been killing this spring—
a limp mongoose this morning under hibiscus
unblemished but for dark red blood
staged on the earthward mouth, otherwise
every lash, every fang, perfect.
Have perspective
& set yourself free
(we all need help).
Still, we love them.
It is too much,
even for a bodhisattva.
Happy birthdays, happy graduations,
condolences, congratulations
keep going, root down
feel it, move on.
In our culture
we are open
to everyone.
At sunset tonight
long spring light
with Venus bright
one hundred thousand pure white egrets take flight.
