DE PONDERINGS by Kevin Kessler

We need art to live fully and to grow healthy. Without it we are dry husks drifting aimlessly on every ill wind, our futures are without promise and our present without grace. —Maya Angelou

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live... —Deuteronomy 30:19 (NRSV)

As at all Annual Conferences, this summer I parted with some of my hard earned money (Hard earned? My interpretation; yours may be different.) at the Brethren Press bookstore. One of the items I purchased was a small devotional book entitled “40-Day Journey with Maya Angelou.” It contains 40 daily meditations that include excerpts from Angelou’s writings and a scripture reference to reflect on silently, questions pertaining to the readings on which to ponder, a reading from the Psalms, a few more questions for which to journal responses, suggestions for prayer, and then a sentence prayer for closing. Now that I’m several days into this journey, it is proving to be a rich experience.

Angelou’s writing for Day 9 begins “Great art belongs to all people...” She then speaks about art as the medium that allows oppressed people to “stand erect.” Art for Angelou’s grandmother, especially poetry, was what “put starch in your backbone.”

In my journaling for this day, I pondered the question, “What is art?” My personal definition based on insights from Angelou is that art is an opportunity to create anew something that gives voice to my being that otherwise would have been kept silent. With art, I am able to unleash my emotions, my feelings, my thoughts, which likely, in my case, would otherwise go unsaid. Art gives me more “backbone” to express the inner me, that which I believe is true and just for the good of humanity, for the good of creation.

However, such freedom of expression needs a check to ensure that it doesn’t digress into narcissistic individualism and control. Angelou’s writing for day 10 provides a means for keeping the artist humble. She states that we need art to “show us images of ourselves” even “those we dislike.” Profoundly, she then writes, “In some way that is very important to us we need to see those we dislike even more than those we like because somehow we need at least glancing visions of how we look ‘as in a mirror darkly’.”

Simultaneously, art should give us “backbone” to express our deepest beliefs and understandings, and it should also give us opportunity to see our dark side. The expressions I make to change the darkness of my surroundings will also speak to me, as the artist, that I need to change the similar darkness within me. Such a humbling effect is the corrective measure that ensures my art is a benefit for all.

Angelou has helped me to realize the artist within me. Art is painting, sculpting, music, dance, all things I lack talent in. But art is also writing, poetry, speaking, listening, all things I endeavor to do. With what I’ve learned about art from Maya Angelou, I hope I use the freedom to be expressive in ways that are helpful to all, being sure this artistic expression speaks to me while concurrently changing me for the better.