The Heart of The Arts

Heart felt gratitude on Valentine's day to dear Vivi Sojorhn for including my work and photographs in the Heart issue of The Arts. The way she placed the pictures of Ladies who Labyrinth captures the fun we had on the inaugural outing of the 8' x 10' rainbow labyrinth I finished last spring equinox, three months before I knew my heart was disabled since birth.

May the dream of The Arts live on to materialise in an even better home <3

Interstitial Moment in the Electronic File

By Brid Wyldearth, Wales, UK •

 

August 1, 2013

Photograph by Brid Wyldearth 

I really had to face that I am not Super Woman this week. It was almost as though I had not recently been admitted to hospital with heart failure, when I tried to hoover my entire cottage and van prior to spraying it with heavy duty chemicals because my poor dog has flea allergy. It really did come as a shock to me that I cannot physically do this, despite not having been able to do this for some years now. It also felt like climbing Everest to ask my friend to give me a lift to her birthday treat when I had promised her one, and, if I could have physically loaded the dishwasher before she came back the next day to do it for me, I would have. Every fiber of my being wanted to, wanted to say "no" to her kind offer. I am still weeping on and off with the memory of how this incredibly busy woman made a few hours of helping me have some fun.

I would never have expected to feel so unwilling to be disabled or to ask for help and I have been miserable. But last night, instead of bemoaning how short a walk I am now able to do, I found a pair of swans at the mouth of the river and just sat with them, hugging my dog and being. This was the second time I had seen them and not had a camera - so this picture is of a lone swan from another time and place in my photo library - but the gift of not having a camera and the gift of being disabled and slow is that I had all the time in the world to let these beautiful creatures begin to teach me how to just be.

Ladies who Labyrinth, Frances Mowat, Amanda Laugharne, Cheryl Beer, Linda Udin and Brid Wyldearth in March 2013

Excepted from her Poem "Heart's Labyrinth"

In my paintings

she becomes

a spiralling

folding

layered heart

of energetic

spirit

wheel

chakras 

a rainbow labyrinth

Editor's Note: Brid Wyldearth is an experiential artist who participates in drumming, singing, dancing and more. She created this labyrinth from a dream, and in the central photo is showing off her self-designed labyrinth tattoo.