Project 16/50 is a creative project to help me consider the threshold of turning 50 years old.  15 friends joined with me, so there were a total of 16  considering the creative prompt: Old Growth Reaching, New Growth Rooting (See Feeling Fifty – for a more complete explanation)

In this eighth post I will highlight two more participants, Kevin and Deb.

1. Poet, Kevin Ewaskow

Here is what Kevin said about his creative process:  As I thought about the invitation to write a piece and the prompts that were given, a couple things emerged.  One of them was the beauty of paradox and complementary contradiction.  The understanding that old growth and new rooting / stability and transformation are but two sides of the same coin, they are necessary unto each other.  And some images started forming in my head from the walks that I had taken in the woods and around town recently. 

The thoughts and images kept coming back to “resurrection” and when God lays before us each day in the paradoxes of life the opportunity to see his hand at work, even in the hard things.  As I kept writing, and this often happens, a frustration arose in me in regards to how little I receive and understand those paradoxes or contradictions; I miss the revelation that the Lord puts before me each day.   So I have tried to hold that tension in the poem and honor life as I happen upon it, spurred on by the prophetic insights of the poet of old.  

Simply before us.

While walking
I stumble upon
one small sapling
growing from a bed of decay.
Century old stump whom long ago
connected heaven and earth
now sits as sentinel
watching this formation of death to life;
this resurrection.
Surely this is holy ground.

Yet I am struck sore at being
such a clumsy pilgrim
having to trip over the obvious
when it comes to Revelation and realization.

Teach me more, dear Lord
Wipe the sleep from my eyes.
Catalyze my atrophied imagination
that I may see and play with the many
Children of wisdom and wonder
who reach out their hand
to lead me down paths
where I am surrounded
with world charged and bush burning.

Then, even the arrogant dandelion
creeping through the crack in concrete
is known to me for more than nuisance,
now I may marvel at its taproot
venturing well below the compounds
into deep darkness
to find the nutrients for life;
flowering bright in bold blooming,
sharing its sunshine unto the world.

© 2017 – Kevin Ewaskow (all rights reserved)
poem and inset photos

 

2. Creative Artist, Deb

Deb writes about her response to the prompt:  There is a circular, cyclical, all encompassing holding that captures my attention in this prompt.  There is a posture of both/and. Both reaching and resting. Both rooting deeply and moving outward effortlessly. Both heartache and joy in the journey. Both acquiescence and expectant hope in what’s to come.

© 2017 – Deb Ash (all rights reserved)