mortal down

By Kimberly Madura
In heaven’s crying room
which is deep blue like the ocean
and is scented with parma violets and jasmine
where angels cry
and the lady made of moon-foam
sits between Artemis and Athena

They gaze upon the mortal woman below, lovingly, sadly,
who goes down into the river
in desperation beneath the moon

Have pity on this mortal woman
She is drowning from pain and love.
And the wind roars.

Kimberly Madura has been a social worker for the past 20 years. She lives and writes from a cabin in the woods in Vermont.

Art can illuminate even the most elusive and difficult to comprehend ideas. Visual rules and tightly codified visual metaphors help scientists communicate complex ideas mostly amongst themselves, but they can also become barriers to new ideas and insights. Dr. Regina Valluzzi’s images are abstracted and diverged from the typical rules and symbols of scientific illustration and visualization; they provide an accessible window into the world of science for both scientists and non-scientists.