Vision

Today I walked home from the eye doctor, grateful for my vision. This is what I saw:

 

Work - Creative Non-Fiction by Gillian Cornwall

Work

The head volunteer for the silent auction was the least silent creature I'd encountered in ages. She entered the hotel lobby like a comet entering the earth's atmosphere - impossible to ignore and inciting fear amid the mere earthlings. Yes, she was an asteroid (emphasis on the "ass") made of Lucy Ricardo instead of stone and mean instead of funny. She terrified me at first but I quickly learned that while her trajectory was inevitable, I could choose to react to the circumstances in any way I pleased. My shoulders dropped from their position about my ears and my usual smile of contentment returned to my quiet face. 

It astounds me when I see volunteers engaged in a humanitarian effort, raising money for a nation that has been through earthquake and tsunami, vying for power and control.; particularly since they are not even being paid for the effort. As I said, I spent the day veering from the course of this Lucy asteroid and expending my energy on tasks such as skirting tables and making jokes about being unfit for such a task, not having put a skirt on my own body for at least a decade. 

I stood back and let the asteroid sputter and spit as needed, responding calmly and kindly to her spark and shrapnel with the hope that an infinitesimal ripple of calm might slow her path to a self-destructive heart attack. Perhaps my tactic worked. After she barked "You have to get past me first!" upon announcement of my imminent departure, she actually hugged me upon leaving. This left me gob-smacked. 

What does each person with whom we interact carry away with them and what do they leave behind with us? Millions and billions and trillions of energy exchanges occurring in each fleeting moment, changing the story of the world each and every time. Still, we speak of chaos as though it were something separate from ourselves , something for which we aren't, in fact, completely responsible. A large part, if not all, of this chaos we fear, this chaos we are trying to  align, is a direct result of our own words and actions. 

Are we simply creating the mess in order to give ourselves something to do, something to clean up? If so, it's not so much chaos as it is job creation.    

-Gillian Cornwall   c2011

Patience

   If I had known earlier in my life that I would be so inclined to waiting, I may have saved myself some grief. For the longest while, I believed that others kept me waiting. Now I know that I choose to wait, choose to teach myself patience. This realization has reduced my level of internal turmoil as I breathe right though the universe rather than self-destruct in frustration and impatience. Perhaps, in fact, there is no waiting, there is only being, in every breathe, in every moment.


Gillian Cornwall, February 2012

There are days when it is so simple to be kind, so simple to love well and to be gentle. These days are akin to summer, all sweet, soft and slow-moving. They are the sweet scent of golden grasses and salty, dune-protected beaches. These days are sun-bleached and tanned. They are popsicle days with screened-in porches and long, lazy dinners with friends. 

Thank you for these days.

-Gillian Cornwall, c 25 January 2012

Time

Parts. Pieces. Breath. One by one, we count it all off subconsciously. Where is it we believe we are going? Here I am. Here I am, trying to get with the present, trying not to wish the bus would get going so I can get to work and get to work so I can get through the day and get home again. Stupid. Daft. Pushing through life like it's one big, crowded shopping mall.

I become engrossed in the colours and texture of the coat on the woman in front of me. The pattern takes me to a simpler time, a time where comfort was found in time itself, in the time it took to do things, in the "manual" of it all. I remember the clear-bodied coloured pen and the clear cogs of the Spirograph, the straight pins and paper - the potential. I loved this, the act of it as much as the complicated final drawing. It all amazed me. How did someone figure this out?

Cartoon colours were vivid and the characters were simple and bold in design. They were huge and hilarious in personality - from the meep meep of the roadrunner to the misguided antics of Yogi Bear searching out his pic-i-nic baskets with his anxious and steadfast pal, Boo-Boo.

Breathe. Stop. Rest here in this moment.

Connected

The wonder and greatness of all that is, all that can be imagined and beyond flows through me. I find wonder in all things and beauty in the most simple. I am in awe. Life and love abound and in the giving I am made full. Nothing is held within so there is no loss. Life is eternal in the light of freedom. 

What shall I choose next on my path, each footfall a fresh breath and a re-connection to the changing universe? I am engaged in the chaos, autonomous yet connected. What is external is internal, each cell a microcosm of the greatness of everything. There is peace here amid the knock and grind of the human engine. I purr with life. 

-Gillian Cornwall, c31May2011

Vancouver 2010

"I walked through the city as though you were with me, anticipating you picking me up at the ferry in just two days. I was bursting with excitement and love. I photographed Vancouver with these feelings in my heart. This is just one of the ways you light my candle." -Gillian Cornwall

Ink Drawings and a Pencil Drawing 1990s

Salt Spring Calves - Gillian Cornwall, c1994

Print - Ink on Paper

A Fallen Brick Home - Near Saxe Point, Victoria

Gillian Cornwall, c1998

Original - Ink on Paper

A Fallen Brick Home 2 - Near Saxe Point, Victoria

Gillian Cornwall, c1998

Original - Ink on Paper 

A Manhole Cover

Gillian Cornwall, c1998 

Original - Ink on Paper

Autumn Leaves

Gillian Cornwall, c1996

Original - Pencil and Graphite on Paper

>> Please note: Clicking on images will allow you to see them in a larger format. You will likely need to click the back button afterward to return to this page. I hope you enjoy my drawings. 

Happy New Year to all of you.<<

Aspen Branches, Utah 

by

Gillian Cornwall

ink on paper

c2009

A Poem

I have expanded with love

Burst forth from the cement of the city sidewalk

the rogue flower

I learn and I shift

my perception

I engage in the moment that is

and leave the moment that will be

to its own devices

I have no animosity in my heart

no blame

I have expanded with love

I learn

I do my best

I share the gift of love

worship the living temple of my self

Love is a story of the world

in which 

we all belong

-Gillian Cornwall

Seek to enjoy, not to possess. -Nana Veary

My Online Heroes

This year I have been met with such great warmth and kindness from those of you that I have never met in person. I have built phenomenal relationships through social networking. Some of you have warmed my heart through your openness - expressing your fears and joys and kindness - restoring my faith in the human spirit. 
   Is it true that this kind of emotional intimacy is, at times, easier with strangers? Is the risk less and thus the willingness increased? I don't suppose it matters in the long run.
   My own ego tells me that it is, in part, down to my own openness of heart and spirit, that I create a space that is safe to join and to share your truth.
   This Christmas, as the year winds down, I want to ensure that all of you know that I am grateful to you for joining me in the moments we share online and that I see you, I hear you and what you say means something to me. I will do my best to honour your time and effort with my own truth and kindness. 
   I wish each of you every joy and blessing for the coming year and that you have every opportunity to live fully in the precious moments of your lives. 
   So very sincerely,
   -Gillian

Camp - Part Three

I know where I am drawn. There is peace in this as I walk on. It feels further in the dark than in the light, fewer distractions I suppose, but before long the woods open up to the upper level seating of the council ring and a lone star shoots across the open sky through the thick lick of the milky way. I sit, shoving my fists into the pouch of my hoodie and I sigh heavily into the night. I am a child, an animal with senses sharp and alive, nose to the cool air, eyes darting and adjusting to the light. 


In this ring, some eternal part of who I am, something I have yet to comprehend, releases and I know I have not come here to be alone as I originally thought. I have come to connect to something, to connect to everything, to belong. My young, taut, clean body breathes in the power of the love of all. I hold this cool night air in my lungs, eyes closed, connected; full. As I release this breathe, my self mingled with the universal soul into the one. I open my eyes wide to see the mother wolf staring at me from across the ring. Her two cubs are in tow, wrestling each other and the mother sits, our eyes locked. I gasp. I stay. I feel the hot tears on my cheeks. I understand the journey from longing to belonging. Purity. Comprehension. Love. 


Gillian Cornwall, copyright December 22, 2011

New Story "Camp" - Part Deux

   I make my way down the chip trail and across the bridge as the stream below gurgles its greetings, the water on its ceaseless path to bigger bodies. Ahead, the entrance to the cedar wood looms dark and wide and I shiver a little in this moon and star-filled summer night, briefly considering the consequences if caught mid-adventure by a concerned grown-up. My consideration does not outweigh my desire and I carry on down the path and into my beloved cedar wood. While my heart thumps time to this song of escape, it is more excitement than fear as I have walked the trails of this camp and lingered in these woods since age four. I have crunched through the crisp-top winter snows and lazed at the foot of these trees in the dog days of summer. I am comfortable here and more safe on these grounds at any time of day than I ever have been or ever will be at home. I walk here at peace and rest here in the palm of my maker, my nature.
   
   The scent of living cedar is my mother's milk and the branches sway in a trance with the whisper of the night time breeze. I tread upon the bouncing carpet of cedar fronds and the net of roots beneath my feet. This is a place of magic. This is a place of rope swings and tree forts. It is Peter Pan and Captain Hook and everything wild and good about being a kid. I maintain a ninja silence knowing the boys tribes, including my own brother, sleep in the tree forts overhead. I smile at my courage and, quite frankly, my gall; I will not stop here. I know where I must go. 


-Gillian Cornwall, copyright December 19, 2011

New Creative Non-Fiction - "Camp" by Gillian Cornwall

  Here is a taste from a new story in the works:
  "There is a particular scent to the canvas tent with its pine platform floor, replete with eight 9 year old girls, the counsellor-in-training, Cathy, and our revered leader, Liz. After three years of these overnights, I can quite confidently say that, while the scent is unique to these circumstances, it varies little from camp session to camp session and from year to year and tent to tent. I can not fully describe it but I will try to lead you by the nose and give you some idea because it's beautiful and peculiar and, for me, both inviting and petrifying. If one were to mix brown sugar with sweet summer sweat, dry pine and sun-warmed canvas and blend it with stale peanut butter and jam sandwiches from lunches gone by, you'd have a reasonable facsimile of what I'm trying to get at.  


I already know I like girls. I lay among them and I barely understand how it is I am an interloper in their midst. I have no idea how it is I am different or why I am the only one who feels like this. I am the only one awake though thousands of crickets and frogs trill beyond our fabric home. They call me, incessant as the sirens of Greek mythology. One more call, this time from the loon, and I silently slide from my sleeping bag placed purposefully by the zippered net door flap. My stealthy exit goes unnoticed or without comment as it is not uncommon for a young girl to require a night time trip to the outhouse; however, this is not my planned destination. I am equipped in my Keds, sweatpants, and hooded sweatshirt having planned my adventure earlier in the evening. I am restless and intense and night time sojourns both feed my sense of adventure and calm my troubled young soul."


-Gillian Cornwall,  copyright December 18, 2011

You

The stars in the sky would stand aside for you
with fascination and adoration.
This is how you light up a room.

Cowichan Winter Forest

Cowichan Winter Forest

Ink and coloured pencil

Gillian Cornwall

copyright 2011

From the Deep Blue Sea

Where from come I?

From a deep, dark place

Where from come I?

From the silt of the deep blue sea

Flowing and forming

and spanked to the shore

to open a mouth

and fill the lungs

with air I feed this life

with feet I fled the sea

with fire I made the food

for the ceaseless belly

Upon the earth I dwell

From mother to mother to mother

all-a-one

-Gillian Cornwall,

copyright August 8, 2010

Buy Art?

Oil Pastel on Paper.
- Gillian Cornwall
$1000
Click on the pic to see it big.
c 2005
22"x30"

Address to my Students - UNI 201 Spoken Word Event

What an incredible journey it has been. We, as a group, have defined education as a holistic process, not merely the relaying of information from one to others.

In our Spoken Word class, we combined the use of our minds, bodies and spirits to address the very basis of our ability and right to human interaction.

As a result of our interconnection, our dreams and desires, our trust, and our capacity to examine and share our fears, we created an environment in which we were ultimately able to access our truth and our capacity to learn and teach each other from a place where fear has not held us at bay.

This fluidity is perfection. Learning, like love, is about openness; it is about sharing information and thought. You are gaining a mastery in this and it is a rarity in contemporary education.

Your desire and willingness are a much greater measure of success than a letter or percentage grade.

Knowledge and learning are shared gifts and for this I thank you.

I will take this opportunity to address a question we examined in class: "Why write?"

-if for no other reason than to share the story of your beautiful life, to take the reader or listener by the hand and walk them through the sights, sounds, smells, tastes and touches of your real or imaginary worlds. For through a multiplicity of perspectives, so shall we know ourselves better.

I look forward to the many journeys we will take through your hearts and minds this evening. Love and blessings to all.

-Gillian Cornwall, November 15, 2011

Autumn on the Island

"I let myself go into the passing landscape as the Greyhound races over the Malahat. Raindrops tear across the window pane and the forest blurs a golden green red rust perfection. From this warm, dry seat I traverse this wilderness of fog and mystery in relative coach comfort.

I place myself in these woods, down paths over spongy undergrowth and through a thousand stories waiting patiently for my arrival, each one held in the gem drops of moisture on the tips of the fragrant pine needles. I can smell the tales and taste them in this silty, salty, coastal soil. I am here and here again and at once with the past and future colliding in the big bang of the present.

There are fireplaces and books and peaceful moments with your head in my lap as I read you the story you have always wanted to hear, the one you never knew existed but it has always been right here in our shared cellular structure, in this peaceful place of perfection.

It is autumn, my love. You can rest easy here with a lullaby of golden leaves dancing down from these ancient trees."

-Gillian Cornwall, October 22, 2011.

Walking the Path Inside and Out

What transpires in our hearts as we traverse our life paths all intertwined, running parallel and doubling back? Our motions as open thermodynamic units, mirroring the minutia of our own atoms and molecules, we careen through chaotic space and time where everything is happening all at once.

Brave and crazy, we remain in motion, all in a million directions, each with a different map, yet, all with the same destination. Through the traps and blockades of fear we march on, heading towards pure love.

- Gillian Cornwall, 21May 2011

Some Photos by Gillian Cornwall

Vancouver Trees

Vancouver Fog

Victorian Sunset

Downtown Victoria

My Radio Interview with CFUV in Victoria, BC

Have a listen while I tell you my story, "The Kid", read a piece on writing and have a chat with Lynne Super of CFUV.

Let me know what you think.

Thanks,

Gillian

Wendy Welch - Cell Ruminations

Please check out these beautiful new works by: Wendy Welch, Executive Director of The Vancouver Island School of Art.

Fluidity

"The wonder and greatness of all that is, all that can be imagined and beyond flows through me. I find wonder in all things and beauty in the most simple. I am in awe. Life and love abound and in the giving I am made full. Nothing is held within so there is no loss. Life is eternal in the light of freedom. What shall I choose next on my path, each footfall a fresh breath and a re-connection to the changing universe? I am engaged in the chaos, autonomous, yet completely connected. What is external is internal, each cell a microcosm of the greatness of everything. There is peace here amid the knock and grind of the human engine. I purr with life."

- Gillian Cornwall, 31May2011