9×12″ charcoal and pastels on paper
July 18, 2012
Inspired by the following passage from The Golden Key by George MacDonald:
As evening drew on, the shadows fell deeper and rose higher. At length they reached a place where they rose above their heads, and made all dark around them. Then they took hold of each other’s hand, and walked on in silence and in some dismay. They felt the gathering darkness, and something strangely solemn besides, and the beauty of the shadows ceased to delight them.
11×14″ oil on canvas
July 18, 2012
Inspired by the following poem, “God, Not Gift,” by George MacDonald:
Gray clouds my heaven have covered o’er;
My sea ebbs fast, no more to flow;
Ghastly and dry, my desert shore
Parched, bare, unsightly things doth show.
’Tis thou, Lord, cloudest up my sky;
Stillest the heart-throb of my sea;
Tellest the sad wind not to sigh,
Yea, life itself to wait for thee!
Lord, here I am, empty enough!
My music but a soundless moan!
Blind hope, of all my household stuff,
Leaves me, blind hope, not quite alone!
Shall hope too go, that I may trust
Purely in thee, and spite of all?
Then turn my very heart to dust—
On thee, on thee, I yet will call.
List! list! his wind among the pines
Hark! hark! that rushing is his sea’s!
O Father, these are but thy signs!—
For thee I hunger, not for these!
Not joy itself, though pure and high—
No gift will do instead of thee!
Let but my spirit know thee nigh,
And all the world may sleep for me!
5×7″ watercolor on paper
December 25, 2012
Inspired by the following passage from the Magnificat, Mary’s hymn of praise to God:
My soul magnifies the Lord
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior;
Because he has regarded the lowliness of his handmaid…
Luke 1:46-48
8×10″ pastels on paper
December 26, 2012
Inspired by the following passage from Phantastes by George MacDonald:
Lo! fair sweeps, white surges, twining
Up and outward fearlessly!
Temple columns, close combining,
Lift a holy mystery.
Heart of mine! what strange surprises
Mount aloft on such a stair!
Some great vision upward rises,
Curving, bending, floating fair.
9×12″ watercolor on paper
July 19, 2012
This one comes from two passages and one scripture:
And here I lay, the child of changeful Time
Shut in the weary, changeless Evermore,
A dull, eternal, fadeless clime!…
“Alas,” I cried, “I am no living man!
Better were darkness and the leave to grope
Than light that builds its own drear prison! Can
This be the folding of the wings of Hope?”
Somnium Mystici: A Microcosm in Terza Rima, MacDonald
Oh lift the burdened gloom that chokes my soul
With dews of darkness; smite the lean winds of death
That run with howls around the ruined temples,
Blowing the souls of men about like leaves.
“A Broken Prayer,” MacDonald
“My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me!” -Christ
