"Grace"

acrylic on canvas, museum wrap, 48" x 48"

I carried this image around in me for a long time before I painted it. I had seen a dove's nest in a palm outside the porch of a beach house our family stayed in one summer. The female was so still when we were near. I could not get over the enormous power she exuded asshe sat on her eggs and watched our every move.

I think it was the silent watchfulness that stirred me and the way the male would simply swoop into the nest from out of nowhere. The flash of wings, the hovering urgency so close to the nest stayed with me for a long time. The doves reminded me of how grace often enters our life--in a sudden unexpected burst or in te quiet brooding of our inner lives--both providing an opportunity to deepen and transform who we are.

"Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
world broods with warm breast and
with ah! bright wings."
Gerard Manley Hopkins