Keira McArthur

Stories that want to be told come in through the eastern window in the morning, or sometimes down onto the roof with the rain. There’s a beautiful one that follows me everywhere I go now, about the water that washes the eastern shore on Georgian Bay and how that is like, and also not like […]

What happens when we don’t take responsibility for healing our own lives, and instead project our buried trauma out onto other people – our children, our families, our friends, our colleagues?  What happens when we use all our energy in criticism and complaint, when we use charity and judgement as a way of maintaining privilege […]

To draw a line. A simple line can identify both home and trespasser. Political lines describe differences, places of meeting:  here and there, you and me, us and them. Natural lines are always clear, but changing.  Shoreline, treeline, river, snake, stick, shadow. Lines can protect the sacred, the private, the personal from the public.  Open, […]

Aggression is the other side of green. As a 14-year-old downhill racer I was trained to attack the hill, to ski not just on top of it, but in it. At the same age I was also developing my approach to cello. My first teacher – a passionate violinist who adored Kreisler, who played always from inside the music […]

I have a little time to say some things that are important to say about my dad, now 81. There are some people who are reliable in their ‘rightness’, who – if asked a genuinely perplexing question about human complexity and what to do next – will listen, consider and then dig deeply for an […]

I’ve known many…. The trick with the key, the turn of the doorknob, the double beat of the door closing – like permission to lay the day’s burden down.  I’ve had hollers from the back room, running tackles from the dog, slow blink from the cat – but always the awareness that time moves more […]

These days the greater part of my awareness is below the ground amid the roots of plants I’ve put there  – encouraging them to reach down, to spread through the warm rich mix of compost, loam and peat moss I’ve made for them  – drink drink, feed, grow. Above ground the signs are good – […]

The studio is dark. I am entirely at peace in this space – made small and comfortable by the light of one candle.  Muffled, intermittent cars drive north or south through slush outside and I stare out my big, arched third floor window at headlights, streetlights, house lights.  The clock ticks like a slow walk. […]

In my mind I see heavy ropes as thick as my leg, one end of each securely tied to My Ship, the other attached to an immense anchor, to a wharf – strong ropes for whatever the need – this is my father, to me. As captain, it’s up to me to make good use […]

One of my best teachers gave us a good daily practice.  This came out of a discussion about the idea of when one is truly ‘finished’ with something – in this case a painting – but it could be a poem, a novel,  practise or rehearsal of a piece, a song, a cleaning project, a […]