by David Baum, Ph.D.

Done during a five day Touch Drawing Class as part of the Doctor of Ministry program at Mathew Fox’s University of Creation Spirituality in Oakland, California.

David’s words:
Of all the painful images of 9-11, I was most profoundly affected by seeing people jumping to their deaths. I inwardly shuddered afterwards for weeks, imagining the unimaginable, the choosing of death by burning or jumping. For weeks afterwards this thought evoked deep sobbing. It was pain I could not move beyond.

Four months later in Touch Drawing, I found these unconscious images emerging. And when I lay them together, in one long storyboard, this poem emerged. By sharing the poem and images with my class, a deep and valuable healing occurred. I felt that a place inside had been released, a place that no amount of talking or therapy could ever reach. Touch Drawing, somehow, soothed much of the trauma of that horrible day.

click on thumbnails for larger view

There is this great power	The Poem There is this great power of deep connection but when forgotten, we crumble our balance turning black conflicts the heart and people fall from the sky eyes open to death their spirits traveling back to the great mother.	conflicts the heart
of deep connection		and people fall from the sky
but when forgotten, we crumble		eyes open to death
our balance		their spirits traveling
turning black		back to the great mother.