1, Wedding Quilt or, Rape and Three Miracles, Queen Size, 2023

Gun violence is not just mass shootings. It’s not just accidental family shootings and suicides. Guns give people a temporary feeling of power. The power over life or death. I was 16 years old when I was surrounded by four or five guys, one had a gun. I don’t really remember if there was someone right behind me. I think so. They were evenly spaced around me. I left my body pretty quickly. Sometimes when I remember this I want to say “No! You decide if you want to kill me, I won’t do what you want me to do.” When someone has your life in their hands, it is pretty hard to say no to them. It is pretty hard to give up some sort of power over continuing to live.

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First Miracle: When I was six I lost my baby blanket. I searched everywhere, even places it never could have wandered off to. I searched for a month. My father helped me. I sat down to meditate on my bed for my slightly torturous, but required, six minutes of contemplative time. I prayed to all the female dieties I could remember, and to Ganesha because, he is so cute, right? He seemed like he would help! I asked for my blanket back. When I laid down after meditation I swept my arm under the blanket, cozying around. There it was. I knew right then that my prayers were answered and I would have to take them very seriously. I placed the small fabric I have left, from that tattered blanket, in the lining. I put it along the the edge of the moon where the pearl necklace broke open. I hope that baby blanket would protect me.

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I wasn’t ready for this rough cement world. I nearly died. I blocked it out. Blocking things out may be helpful and normal initially but, it leaves us with a blind spot. I think that the darkness of others pours into the places we refuse to tend to. Broken hearts invite worse partners. The memory of an accident seems to attract other injuries to the same place. I married a man who seemed perfect. He was spiritual too. I didn’t know I had this tool in my kit that allowed me to forget big things. I thought it was all perfect. I started to journal and realized why I was so sad. I was so sad I wanted to die. I didn’t believe in divorce, so that seemed like the next best option. I wasn’t thinking clearly. I knew this wasn’t like me.

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Second Miracle: I called my friend. She is a brilliant person. She is a psychiatrist and more open-minded than I can imagine being. She can hold space for very dark souls. She said it sounded miserable. She said suicide was an option but, that for me, she thought I had better choices I could make. Get of there, she said. I looked at the moon. The full moon had a rainbow around it. I could do it. I could get a divorce. I could choose to live.

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Do the people who hurt us, who rape us and use guns and threats to get their way, do they forget too? Or, do they think it is okay? Do they think it’s good because that is how they were taught to be men or to be in control?

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Third Miracle: When I was in my early 20’s I was having PTSD. I didn’t remember why, I just couldn’t kiss people and I had bad feelings and a bad flavor in my mouth. I had considerable anxiety. I was doing meh. I was better than a few years earlier but, not doing good enough. I learned about Mother Meera and prayed to her. I asked her to please relieve me of the PTSD. A few days later I was in the library browsing the yoga section. I found an exercise in, A Woman’s Book of Yoga, by Hari Kaur Khalsa and Machelle M Seibel, M.D., Ob/Gyn, the kirtan kriya, laying down version. It said it was the best meditation for all women and to do it for a minimum of 40 consecutive days. I practiced it for 3 minutes a day. I didn’t think it would help with my problem but, I did it. My PSTD stopped. Later when memories surfaced from my abusive marriage and my family was torn apart, I did it again. It helped so much in such a short time. It has reconnected me with feminine core dignity. It made it possible to navigate a torturous situation for years. I wondered what would happen if I did it longer. I have been doing it every day for a few years now. It has given me much more compassion for relating. This is such a small thing to say but, it feels like lifetimes of awareness have become clearer to me.

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I call this the wedding quilt because of the way that trauma stays with us. Even if we heal up. Those young men with their gun really impacted a lot of lives. I wonder how long they thought about that day. I wonder how many days there were like that for them. I wonder why our country, our world, can’t get behind ending rape, behind ending gun violence. What are we holding onto but our own purgatory?

5, Voice of Fire, fabrics on canvas (including three generations girl’s dress) 2023

The name my teacher gave me is an offering of fire to the divine. The story from my lineage that I can’t stand also involve fire. Goddess of abundance incarnate is marriage to the incarnation of the sustaining god. She is kidnapped by a demon. When she is finally recovered, her purity is in question. The townspeople pressure her into sitting on a fire to prove her innocence. She does so. Her husband is supposedly “supportive”. I think true support would have been supporting not investigating the victim of kidnapping. She does not burn. She is pure. Her husband exiles her. She is pregnant (presumably with his children, since she is inflamable). This led to wife burning and pressuring women into self-emolation throughout the history of India.

I ask that women, and compassionate men, raise our voices against 10,000 years of patriarchal rule that treats the Goddess of Abundance with suspicion instead of turning ALL efforts towards eliminating the demon who definitely kidnapped her, even if he did not rape her. Let our voices be a fire for them to sit on. This is my offering for oppressive men, government, religion, spiritual leaders, etc. This is my offering of fire. If they are innocent they will not burn. Or, they will burn until they are innocent again. They are not innocent yet.