Constellation

Heart constellation, seen from below. (Imagine you're looking up.)

A closer view (with a funny green glow from my chartreuse walls)...

and a closest view.

This was the final arts assignment for my Practice of Expressive Arts Therapy class: "Using any modality or weaving of modalities, create an image of yourself as an expressive arts therapist, or your image of the field of EXA."

I made a constellation of objects as an image of myself – who I am/who I'm becoming as an expressive arts therapist. This poem is part of the piece:

this is what you’ll see
if you look in my heart –
a constellation of
experience and identity

I’m searching for meaning
among these symbols
as my ancestors
searched the sky
for pictures
and guidance
in the stars

but I’m too nearsighted
to see the whole story
and the tears in my eyes
are blurring my vision

but I’m learning
gathering
growing
in the presence
of all the elements,
and not alone

I know I want to hold
and be held
like this

some vessels in my heart
hold blood and oxygen –
others hold feeling and space
because I know
the soul
is shaped like a bowl

I have a pocket
full of stars
and rocks from home
and a bottle
full of messages

each object is small enough
and big enough
to carry with me
in my heart

March 25, 2011
Berkeley, CA