“Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress. Water is not a solid wall, it will not stop you. But water always goes where it wants to go, and nothing in the end can stand against it. Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water. If you can’t go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does.”
― Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad
~Leonard Cohen
What an adventure hidden near downtown SLC! You have to know what you are looking for to find it. I have seen lots of photos of the sculptures in this garden but was fascinated by the scriptures, songs, poems, etc etched in stone around the sculptures. They more completely tell the story of how the sculptures came to be, and the thought processes by Child (the creator) that contributed to his faith/spiritual journey. It is one eclectic Mormon journey. It isn’t every block that reveals a Joseph Smith sphinx. I loved the symbolism of stars (aka Masonic symboism).
Child named the garden Gilgal after the Biblical location where Joshua ordered the Israelistes to place twelve stones as a memorial. The name ‘Gilgal’ is sometimes translate to mean ‘circle of standing stones,’ an appropriate appellation for a sculpture garden. Gilgal is also the name of a city and a valley in The Book of Mormon, a sacred scripture in Mormonism.
Because I am a rock lover and a storyteller, I’m including a lot of these stone verses that enhance the meaning behind the actual sculptures.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin. ~William Shakespeare
I’ve compiled a brief slideshow of some of my favorite photos. I hope you will enjoy them. Sometimes in this world reminders are needed that life can truly be an amazing experience.
“…I keep looking for one more teacher, only to find that fish learn from the water and birds learn from the sky.”
― Mark Nepo, Facing the Lion, Being the Lion: Finding Inner Courage Where It Lives
“Dusk is just an illusion because the sun is either above the horizon or below it. And that means that day and night are linked in a way that few things are there cannot be one without the other yet they cannot exist at the same time. How would it feel I remember wondering to be always together yet forever apart?”
― Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook
The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.
~Bruce Lee
I am a poor wayfaring stranger
Traveling through all these highs and lows
I heard there was no sickness
And no toil or danger
Just mercy and plenty
Where peaceful waters flow
Where peaceful waters flow
Come all you fair and tender school girls
Be careful now–when you court young men
They are like the stars
On a summer morning
They sparkle up the night
And they’re gone again
Daybreak, gone again
If I’d only seen through the silky veils of ardor
What a killing crime this love can be
I would have locked up my heart
In a golden sheath of armor
And kept its crazy beating
Under strictest secrecy
High security
I wish I had the wings
Of Noah’s pretty little white dove
So I could fly this raging river
To reach the one I love
But I have no wings
And the water is so wide
We’ll have to row a little harder
It’s just in dreams we fly
In my dreams we fly!
~Joni Mitchell
“It’s so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone.”
~John Steinbeck, The Winter of our Discontent
