A path that once was

A path that once was January 2021

The winter of 2021 started off cold. A breeze existed that morning that seemed to exacerbate the loneliness that had hovered for so long. Loneliness first made her presence known in the Spring, and some more in the summer, and then abundantly  in the fall overstaying her welcome. By the winter, loneliness took up residence in our home, with our loved ones, in our community, and in the country. 

We found ourselves in awe of a path to the water that once was. Who took care of this path? What happened that it no longer has a purpose? Where did it originally lead? When did it stop being cared for? Why are the unwavering pillars still so strongly fixed in the bay? 

The path that once was and is no more gonged inside my being. 

I felt as if I was looking at me. 

A path that once was but is no more. 

The questions continued as we tried to glimpse through the fog and still continue months later. In the midst of the fog with those friends that never know when the party's over. Perhaps you know them; Loneliness and Lost? 

In that same midst I am reminded of this poem:

WELCOME HOME
By Joel McKerrow
www.joelmckerrow.com/

 
To the Artist.
To those chasers of beauty.
To the ones who cannot stop themselves.
To the curious, to the inquisitive.
To the artist.
 
To those seekers of stories, pens poised on the edges of paper,
To the messy ones.
To those who go to birthday parties, fleck of paint still plastered through curly hair.
To the hopeful. To the determined.
 
To those few who look through lenses to capture moments.
See glimpses of what could be.
The seagull scavengers stealing what others leave behind to put the left-overs of humanity back together.
To the artist.
 
To the 3am writer scribbling words down on paper everynight, everynight, 10000 hours, every night,
To the singer with a sore throat, bloodied fingers of the guitarist,
To piano keys worn down to ivory bone, to those who are worn down to ivory bone,
To the artist we say…
Welcome Home.
 
To the artist and to those who have forgotten that they are so.
The child who put away their paint brush, ballet shoes left dusty in the back bits of attics.
To the cartoon scribbler in the margins of maths books.
To the memory of crayons and drawings pinned up on fridges.
To the childhood actors performing in loungeroom, backyard, front verandah theatres.
To the students whose teachers took their own failures and transposed them upon you.
To the burdened shoulders and the clipped wings and to those have never tried again.
To the artist, and to those who have forgotten that they are so…
Welcome Home.
 
To those who have never belonged,
The odd angle of the straight family, the misunderstood,
The coloured paintbrush in a black and white world,
To the misread and the lonely.
To the artist.
 
To those who see what lies on the underside sighs of humanity.
To the ones who choose to feel, though at times it may tear them apart,
Feel the things that everyone else is afraid to feel.
To those who paint the darkness so that the darkness does not paint them,
To the discarded and disregarded,
To the Kurt Cobain singer, Van Gogh painter,
Robin Williams actor and Sylvia Plath poet.
To the tortured soul, to the blistered feet,
To the clay hands, to the artist and to those who have never belonged, we say…
Welcome Home.
 
I bid you to stay a while.
Take your shoes off, lay down your sword.
There is hope in these walls.
A bed to find rest.
Weary soul, find rest.
Welcome home.
 
You do not need to look over your shoulder here.
You do not need to compare.
No measurement. No success. No failure.
Just create. Never give up.
 
Enough with the talking, talking heads of the critics.
Critics are only cynics.
You start listening only to you.
You come home to yourself.
Take charge of the dreams you once thought too far past the horizon.
The simple joy of being here.
The art of creating when you no longer need an audience.
 
Create cause it makes your bones move.
Create cause it stirs the belly fire.
Create cause you dream.
Create because you see.
Create because the world needs you.
Create because it fills the sails, then let's go fly a kite.
 
Create, cause this is what we do here.
Create, cause this is who we are here.
Welcome home.
Welcome, welcome, welcome home.