Description: the poem of the same title below inspired this painting whose creation brought me the utmost joy: it’s about the swirling inner Sky that unfolds within when we’re not afraid to embrace our true nature: egolessness.
Year of Creation: 2006.

~ On Becoming Sky: Dervisha ~

I met your pure eyes
and I became myself,
your sight behind mine
looking at lights’ dance.

With such remote music
lingering on that close,
the human heart softens.

Look at my new weakness,
it’s crawling by your feet!

Being is that vast union,
that grace, that quietness.

Some secret Conversation
curls around us like locks
around Prophets’ earlobes.

Bless me, make speech go!
How many more will join

this love-community
of generous ears inside?
Let us beg them my love:

Be true beingness.
realize your exuberance,
embrace the Essence and
watch all generous hearts
become your companions.
Remember in one, many!
Struggle to be vulnerable,
touch the grace of femininity,
drown in the empty,
swim that deeply,
know Surrender;
fight to be that weak
so you can sense
what true strength is.

Then we fall back within,
inertia buoyantly begins
for the Sky leaps in …
Lo, we all are feminine!

2007 copyrights Aida Toure

(from the book Nocturnal Light)

Scented Tambourine (c) 2005 Aida Toure. 16" x 20" acrylic on canvas panel

Description: “Scented Tambourine” was a short poem about a spiritual station where the lover is completely submerged with Sound, he prostrates to The Beloved as he experiences this ecstatic Sound which is color, command vibration and movement. Year of Creation: 2005.

~ Scented Tambourine ~

I pretend to have understanding
but everything you do is

such a mystery to me,
I get lost between spaces

that whisper “just be quiet
and listen to this

Scented Tambourine,
one day it will all make sense …”

2007 copyrights Aida Toure.

Deep Waters (c) 2005 Aida Toure. 16"x20" acrylic on canvas panel

>Description: The creation of “Deep Waters” was triggered by my sister, she suggested the title and the painting evolved from there; it seemed to come in many languages, it spoke a whole lot so I painted it with a sense of urgency! Here, water symbolises the soul’s luxurious universes, their interactions and movements in praise of The Beloved. The atmospheres of the painting find their source in verses of the Holy Qur’an which teaches scientific facts about water as well as the ocean and its invisible separations and such similar signs. “He has let free the two seas meeting together. There is a barrier between them. They do not transgress.” (~Quran, 55:19-20)
“Deep Waters” the poem may be read below.
~in private collection. Year of Creation: 2005.

~ Deep Waters ~

Sometimes my paint brushes
play hide and seek as if stars,
they vanish and reappear!

“It can’t get better than this”
I smile at the playful moves
because I often get lost too!

A revolving canvas, beads on
the floor, senses crazed, tides
animate our inner undulating seas.

Sometimes I no longer know
where is center, left nor right,
what is black or white

no more notion of peace or war,
just us learning how to swim
the deep waters of Longing.

copyrights 2006 Aida Toure.

Description: “Satellite” view of the Mapanes. Mapanes is a Gabonese expression that could be translated as “the Ghetto”. This painting evokes the uncelebrated dimension of the Mapanes, dwelling place to many noble souls… (read on)

~In private collection. Year of creation: 2005.

Description: This piece is in protest of ritual crimes  oftentimes committed on children by cruel  adults who  commit these heinous murders. This painting is dedicated to the memory of all children who have been mutilated and sacrificed.
Year of Creation: 2005.

~ Martyred Children Lament ~

Child, O child,
you are a gift
from the Divine!

They coveted your light
with their ambition
for obscure ascension.

Atrociously, they preyed
on you: there is no power
to gain in such sacrifice,

One who unjustly takes a life
kills all of humankind.
Child, O child,

now bodiless, weightless,
you circle around
the sublime Throne;

soul singing His praises
as Djibreel wipes
your tears away.

2007 copyrights Aida Toure

~ Paradise Is … ~

Paradise is here, now!
We take walks in it
constantly mingling

with the Presence
that pours Its light
in our secret lamps

to extinguish the self
of its dire poverty:
we are those lit receptacles

Ruh imparts luminescence to.
This love-transfusion
pulls us to the Garden,

singing in our veins
with the spheres,
“Paradise is here, now!”

Bewildered, we throw
ourselves to the ground,
rolling by turn in laughter

like children,
we kiss that divine wildness
that began when Allah said

“And know that
you are to meet Me.”

(from Nocturnal Light)

2007 copyrights Aida Toure

Description: this painting symbolizes the dissolution of the ego with the inner ambrosia that follows… the poem that inspired it can be read below. Year of Creation: 2005

~ Honey-Existence ~

In the presence
of the Friend,
be quiet.

Should you know
of His eloquence,
assume a death:

the one which has
countless resurrections,
you know, the sunlit one!

Those who deeply are
in Love do that, they
open the seven windows

inside their being and in
the waiting, they die, silently
till the mystic wind begins

to circulate, lo! They bask
in the exquisite exchange,
it rocks them like the Word

rocks the heavenly stars;
in that sacredness,
their souls exude a cry

“al hamdulillah!
We are sanctified.”

Then some passers-by
intrigued by the joyful sobs
approach, to inquire about

the cause of that high
and the lovers ever-kind,
whisper through the ether,

“become complete now
before the Friend,
Separate not your will
from His. Surrender as
if you don’t mind being
killed by a softness,
by a wandering tenderness,
this way, you shall know
the same honey-existence.”

(from Nocturnal Light)

THE BELOVED 16″x 20″ acrylic on canvas (no longer available)

Description: the Majestic Name.