Eagle Man, Buffalo Dreamer, and the Dead Cow
Spirits against Fracking

Often in the series called "Blue Coyote & Friends" images arise first as titles. As I emerged from sleep one early morning, this title was my first waking thought: "Eagle Man, Buffalo Dreamer, and the Dead Cow." Weird, I thought, what can it mean?

I trust this process, and after breakfast started a sketch. Eagle Man and Buffalo Dreamer are familiar characters, but how exactly does a dead cow look? I went to my computer and googled "dead cows." Before I even finished typing, the menu showed "dead cows fracking."

Omigod. No wonder I trust this process! Here is spirit, feeding me the title of a protest piece about something I didn't know to protest.  Of course, I oppose fracking. I knew about devastation to land, water, people's homes. I knew about nosebleeds, rashes, kidney damage. But I hadn't known that cows were dropping dead on their farms.

Well, cows are dropping dead on their farms. And this watercolor and collage piece is a witness to our need to recognize their danger as our danger. Two powerful spirit guides—and attendant vultures—remind us that the health of every being is tied to our own health. 

Eagle Man and Buffalo Dreamer love this earth.  So does Hybla, the small figure pasted over the back of the cow in the lower left. Hybla is a Sicilian earth goddess, out to block our destructive habits and restore health to all beings. 

I often feel the presence of many beings—plants, animals, and spirits—all fervently wishing us to wise up and take our respectful place in the community of life. This little painting is one expression of their great wish.

Changing Woman & Blue Coyote Coming Out of Darkness

This watercolor (11 x 12") was painted in 2008, several months before I was diagnosed with cancer. We might consider it a favorable prognosis. I might see it as about me, about that one crisis in my life.

But I think it is more meaningful. When I look at it now, it gives me hope that I can emerge from ongoing financial difficulties into a prosperity based on deep inner change. It gives me hope that as a people we can emerge from ignorance & greed into a rich harmony with all beings. It gives me hope that an alcoholic friend can emerge from denial & concealment into full health & honesty.

There are many kinds of darkness in the life of an individual, in the life of the world. The expressions on the faces of Changing Woman & Blue Coyote remind us that the light into which we so desire to emerge can be startling & formidable. 

May their simple voyage give courage to us all, to stop clinging to familiar darkness & emerge into the bright unknown.

Thunder Woman at the Ocean

watercolor, 12.5 x 13

Thunder Woman is mysterious to me. I'm sure she represents the spirit of Native uprising, not in the sense of violence, but in the sense of resurgence. I don't think she limits her support to genetic descendants of the original inhabitants of Turtle Island. I think she calls everyone to re-perceive in a Native way. It's the perception of all beings as family that she empowers, & the love & kindness that follow that perception.

These must be hard times for such a spirit, when so much is at odds with this way of seeing & behaving. I think she has gone to the ocean to recharge. The ocean is so powerful, so replete with awareness of the tiny nature of human life. Then there are the gulls, with their own humorous slant on everything from garbage to wind.

How wonderful to see this Great One, refreshing herself knee deep in waves, playing with bird friends. It's a good day.

Thunder Woman & Great Jay

Thunder Woman has appeared many times now, but Great Jay is new. I think he's showed up at the urging of the scrub jays who keep me as their pet.


I first painted him talking to Snow Kachina, which I'll post when winter returns. Here he & Thunder Woman seem to be reaching some kind of agreement while the swans head north for spring. About halfway into painting this image, I got upset with it. I hated it. Just too tame! I ached for something wilder & messier.


So I took out a bigger piece of paper & painted a closer view, bending spatial reality & flinging paint about. Aaaaaah. Much better.


Then I was able to go back to the first image & very happily complete it.


I'm fascinated by people's reactions to the two paintings.  Some people really like the first image & others love the second. Their reasons revealing aspects of the paintings I didn't see consciously--and themselves! 


Both paintings are on display at Sebastopol Gallery until June 12.

Bats As Ecosystem Messengers

Today a man visiting Sebastopol Gallery admired this watercolor painting of Changing Woman & the Blue Bats. He'd been looking intently at the seven mushroom watercolors I have displayed here, noting that his son is a mushroom enthusiast who also quotes Paul Stamets.

When he moved his attention from mushrooms to bats, I remarked that as an ecology nut, I often celebrate the essential beings that people tend to forget.

Bats may not be as essential to the health of all life as mushrooms, but they're high on the list of neighbors who benefit the rest of us. I'm always delighted when I see one, & wish I could see hundreds, as I walk along the Laguna de Santa Rosa in the evening light. The irony of losing bats (& swallows!) in the process of chemical "mosquito control" coils anger & sadness in my belly.

In this painting, Changing Woman sits on a rock that divides a river curing away into the distance. Two blue bats approach: are they bringing a message from the dark beyond?

I certainly believe that the presence, abundance or absence of bats is a good indicator of the health of an ecosystem, especially any habitat with a significant water feature.

Bats are also associated with the death & rebirth needed for shamanic consciousness. We may need to die to many "needs," to be reborn to generous love, willing to share "resources" with other species. You could imagine bats as ecosystem messengers, intimate with the consciousness we need to comprehend & value the complexity of life around us.

Guided by their echolocation, we may sound out in the darkness the path to what really sustains us, & how to sustain it in return.

Bird Women in Watercolor & Archaeomythology

Last night I had the great pleasure of attending a talk by Joan Marler, "The Body of Woman As Sacred Metaphor."

Joan is the founder of the Institute for Archaeomythology, and was the special guest of the Sonoma County Pagan Network.

Her talk was a delicious feast of images & information about goddess statues, mainly from about 37,000 BCE to 3000 BCE, from central Turkey to southeastern Europe.

She described voluptuous female imagery invoking & expressing the source of animal & plant abundance & domestication. Her account was simply the most satisfying version of this rich history I've encountered. I awoke this morning with a new sense of moving within a continuous, unbroken, ancient flow.

Two smaller themes were particularly poignant for me: statues of women & children with bird heads, & owl statues & vessels. These so vividly convey how communion between human & bird was once taken for granted, I feel affirmed in the communion I experience with birds today.

With excitement, I recognize the animal spirits I paint as legitimate actors in the long, ongoing drama of human life playing in company with all sorts of fellow beings. I savor in a new way the work of creating these images.

This one is Bird Grandmother in the Redwood Grove, which flew out of me after a visit to Armstrong Woods. She is a watercolor, about 11" square. After Joan's talk, I feel how she expresses the happiness of being briefly among great beings who endure thousands of years. She is a messenger of our joy among trees.

Changing Woman & the Buffalo Ghost

Changing Woman & the Buffalo Ghost, watercolor, 9 x 10.5", was the second image in the Blue Coyote series, painted in July, 2008.

Last year I watched Dances with Wolves for the first time since 1991. I had thought the buffalo hunt was filmed with a few buffalo, with special effects to make them seem like a huge herd. From the dvd, I learned they filmed that sequence on a ranch with a real herd of 3000 buffalo.

3000 buffalo. I wept.

Not a lot compared to the millions that once swept across the plains, but a miraculous multitude compared to "now the buffalo are gone."

The buffalo are not gone, nor are the buffalo secure in healthy numbers. There are still a lot of ghosts to answer to.

Thunder Woman & Bird Grandmother

I painted this image in a time of severe difficulty. I didn't intend to depict a rock & a hard place, but there it is.

The story that this Blue Coyote series illustrates often gives the sense that spirit & animal guides are all around, ready & willing to help us.

In this 15 x 11" watercolor, Thunder Woman looks stunned, maybe overwhelmed by challenges whose solution eludes her. Bird Grandmother steadies her, brings her endurance to see a way.

A small plant & many birds connect her to life & happiness, even in this barren place.

Buffalo Dreamer & Thunder Woman

Thunder Woman first appeared while I was recovering from major surgery. Months passed before I recognized her as the spirit of Native uprising--the reemergence of Native values & paradigms in diverse circumstances.

Buffalo Dreamer leapt off the page while I was preparing for a featured artist show at Sebastopol Gallery. He seemed iconic in himself. But then he started showing up in the company of other characters from the series.

In this watercolor, 15 x 12", Buffalo Dreamer & Thunder Woman are crossing a river. Maybe he is helping her, maybe she is giving him courage. Some unknown is before them, some transition occurring.

A mature psychotherapist with a deep spiritual practice burst into tears when he saw this painting. Felt like a miracle to me....

Old Man of Mosquito Lake

You can see that this character has a very different relationship to Yellow Moose than our impetuous Coyote. Old Man of Mosquito Lake is--so far--the only character in this series based on a real person. When I was 9 I saw an Indian outside a campground in Maine. I've told the story of how our 10 minute encounter changed my life at Aqus in Petaluma & at Sebastopol Gallery.

Whoever this man was, he had power to awaken a little girl. In this series he is calm, grounded, shamanic, & playful. This painting, Old Man of Mosquito Lake & Yellow Moose, is watercolor, 10 x 8.75".

Who exactly Yellow Moose is, what she represents...I'm waiting for you to tell me.

Blue Coyote & Yellow Moose

This watercolor, 10 1/2 x 16", shows Blue Coyote biting off more than she can chew. I think we all know this feeling--starting off jaunty & full of energy, sure we can do it. At some point our Yellow Moose turns around. By the end of the day we're run ragged.

But tomorrow is a new game....

Blue Coyote Says

Below are the words playing hide & seek on this 24 x 24" canvas. They came to me from mystery as I worked on my first large painting after a big cancer surgery, like a get-well card sent from coyote. A great reminder of how to be healthy. I played with the letters, with deep, rough texture, with splatters & wild color. Some people hate this painting. Some people love it. When it was hanging at Sebastopol Gallery, some people took one look & laughed out loud. I love those moments, & the happiness this crazy painting continues to bring.

coyote is the trickster

blue is the loyalty

blue coyote is loyal

to our need for humor

to take ourselves lightly

offer lightness & paradox

to our overburdened sisters

& brothers over & over

invite play as the cure

both internal & external

in meeting difficult challenges

which can open as an oyster

of opportunity & good

Changing Woman & Blue Coyote

One summer day I sat at my drawing table asking to paint an image of deep integrity. Imagine my surprise when this primitive & unexplainable watercolor emerged! I called it Changing Woman & Blue Coyote, & wondered who they might be.

This first image soon became a series. There are now about 20 of them, & they're still coming. They seem to illustrate a story, but what story? It's not my story.

The way I work is by opening in a focused way to what nature spirits might want me to paint. These pictures come from that source.

Imagine living in a world where everybody is respectful & in love with all forms of life. Reverent & excited by the cycles that make life possible. A world of ecological peace & happiness.

For a few months I puzzled over these paintings. I listened to amazing things people saw in them. Now I think the nature spirits are telling us a story of how we grope our way back to harmony. A story whose words are different for each person looking at them.

Always there’s a sense of challenge. Always there is help being given by ancient spirits, animal companions, and sometimes plants.

I'm no longer embarrassed by their cartoon-like character. This is way too serious a story to approach without humor. The playfulness is a gift.

I’m grateful.