The Feathered Ancestors
The Feathered Ancestors began arriving in the early 2020s, during a time of rapid change, fear, and collective unrest. In those years, these beings came through one by one — birds in human form, humans in bird form — speaking from a place old, bone-deep and beyond language. Each flew in carrying knowledge, companionship, and guidance for the thresholds being crossed.
These Ancestors are intimately connected to the land on which I live in Australia — the Country of the Wangerriburra people of the Yugambeh Nation. Some of these birds I see every day, some visit seasonally, and all hold a deep-time presence here. Their teachings move through me in the way I draw them, collage them, and write for them. I felt honoured that they chose to come through me, asking to be remembered.
Each ancestor began as a hand-drawn figure in charcoal, pencil, or pen. Later, I wove them with digital imagery to create new landscapes and stories — custom pieces for those who felt drawn to a particular bird-being or who needed a specific guide for their own passage. Every commissioned ancestor is paired with a personalised poem, a small ritual of remembrance.
Below, you are invited to explore the Feathered Ancestors and their stories. Selected custom prints are also showcased, each accompanied by its own poem and the guidance it carries.
The First. and. the Last
A digital art and poetry series remembering and restoring the female body and form as the first and forgotten symbol of creation itself.
Featuring roses tended to and gathered from my garden — offered to the Goddess and carried as living emblems of creation, cycles, beauty, and the Deep Feminine.
The First God
The Cosmic Rose,rose with the morning dawnspilling light from the heavens onto what was to come forth,to be born,And She,gathered herself from the dark womb of the living ground,the ancient loamthe first boneswaking,assembling their shape to a sound older than timeprimordial,territorialforging through skin made of molten rock and firea thousand years rumbling,tumbling,deep thunder hummingShe emerges!with her breasts in her handsher thighsher hipsshifting and siftingmountains of sandShe rises!with the moon in her wombbirthing waters opencarving the land and filling the oceansdreaming the wild earth into beingHer scripture is written inthe riverbeds,the tree roots, the wild fruitsthe oak bark and the meadowlarkthe hills crest and robin’s nestEagle’s cry and the Open Sky!the fox’s trail and the autumn harvest galesOh! smell the sweet pine cone and the winds that moanin whale song,She belongs,We belong,to HerWoman of the EarthShe is CreatorShe is the First and Final MotherThe Original BodyThe First God
The First Supper
It was the Goddess who sat at the first table
Above her, the red rose opened from the heavenly stars,
its petals and blood falling into the golden chalice,
the Grail, the First Womb, the sacred vessel from which all Life would come
Serpent, rose behind it, shedding blessings,
Keeper of the Mysteries,
Guardian of the ancient covenant between death and rebirth
It was the Goddess who broke the first bread,
Opened the pomegranate and blessed the feast
She drank from her own chalice and received the sacrament of creation itself
Rose became Blood. Blood became Life. Womb became World.
This was the First Supper
And all who came after ate in remembrance of the Goddess,
who made of her body,
a Grail,
and of her Grail,
a Universe!
The First Eucharist
For the First Eucharist was not bread upon a table
but the moon in the hands of the Goddess.
Beneath the silver chalice of night
the Dark Moon unfurled,
black velvet rose dripping with the wet force of life,
the breath held in the lungs of The Great Vastness,
the cosmic amniotic sea where all things get born and return too
Red Moon of blood and memory,
petals heavy with the ancient tide
singing the rhythm of infinite thresholds crossed,
Keeper of the Cycles!
She is the living covenant between body and cosmos
She who creates without demand!
She who bleeds without dying..
..and so White Moon of resurrection,
the vow that what falls will rise again,
that what breaks will be remade
She who offers her self again and again.
She who is consumed yet never diminished!
She who is whole even in her breaking
And so the moons turn in her muddied and bloodied hands
black, red, white
each a face of the same eternal mystery
Each a Eucharist older than the scriptures we have been told,
older than fire
It is the Goddess, The Mother, The First God
and to worship Her is to remember that we, too,
embody tides and roses,
darkness and dawn,
death and return
We are the fragments she breaks
and the wholeness she restores
She is the Eucharist,
in which we eat and remember
the ever turning, endless star-studded circle,
with the moon in our hands.
Yeshua and Miriam (Mary) Magdalene
This artwork and poetry series is an invitation to meet Yeshua and Miriam, as humans of the earth — wanderers, lovers, activists, truth-seekers, shaped by land, by struggle, and by the holiness of being alive.
Guided by two feathered ancestors who came forward to speak for Yeshua and Miriam- Diamond Dove and Whistling Kite/Green Man, each piece is hand-drawn with charcoal, pencil, pen and water colour and later woven with digital imagery.
These artworks hope to bring Yeshua and Miriam back into their humanness — their flesh, their breath. They were people living under an oppressive empire, navigating rising violence, scarcity, and fear. I longed to return to their flesh‑and‑earth story: the dirt between their toes, their wanderings through olive groves, forests, riverbanks and ocean lines. For me, a story far more human and believable than the versions later shaped and forced upon by a few in powerful places.
These pieces and accompanying poems honour Yeshua and Miriam as humans of the earth, carrying the word of love in their bodies, their voices and in the land they walked.
-
They say, He is the Son of Man
The Son of God
Born from the Light
The Saviour!
Our Messiah!
Thy Kingdom Come!
Hosannah in the Highest!
They say, He raised people from the dead
Healed the blind
and walked over water
The Saviour!
Our Messiah!
Thy Kingdom Come!
Hosannah in the Highest!
But my heart calls out
and catches the wings of Whistling Kite
She Knows
She Knows,
when His story began
The Original Tale
of a boy
birthed from the forest
grown from the knobbled and buckled roots
His body
entangled,
with mycelium and mushrooms shoots
and the ferns and feathered kin
Raised in Love
from the trees who let him climb
Raised in Love
from the dirt that let him run wild and free
through time
through the grove, and into the clearing,
where the ocean met his gaze
and welcomed him,
and bathed him
and baptized him
and drunk his moonlit tears
And the years and years
passed
A Man, now
A barefoot rebel
flying against a rising Empire
journeying along ancient ridge lines
Carrying comfort in his cloak
to drink and break bread
with those who have ears to listen
to stories of myth and wild
Stories of old and new
gathered from vigils
where he camped in the wilderness of his own heart
kneeling in the sand and soil
bowing before the dawn light
between the sea and sacred trees
well into the star hung night
Oh! The Storyteller
The Rabbi!
The Lover!
and Magician!
He, who’s laugh thundered through valleys
His presence cradled mountains
He danced and played and sung,
the children, caterpillars
crawling over his shoulders
the joker,
the father
He is the beholder…
of the Wild and Green
He smells of cedar, of salt and campfire smoke
Furred chin
and river stone eyes
His hands, rough bark of old tree oak
Layers of dirt on his orche skin
and He prays, and speaks his Holy words
to the birds,
to the stream,
and asks it,
to tumbled them
into a dream
And Whistling Kite, She dives down
and whispers to the wind
Yeshua
Yeshua
A journeyman
Yeshua
Yeshua
A carpenter of the Heart
They say, He is born from the light
Yes! He can be felt in the warmth on the sun!
They say, He healed the blind
Yes! His stories hold visions for all to see!
The Son of God
The Son of the Earth
Yeshua
Yeshua
The forest
The mountains
The sea
The hills
The streams
He is these places
The sand
The wood
The dirt
And roots
He holds this wisdom
This is the Kingdom
This is the Kingdom
-
Come meet me in the forest, she calls
Past the sloping stone ledges
the olive grove
down by the wild rosemary hedges
Her ruby red robe
trailing behind,
the wind caressing her diamond dove wings
She flies
and she runs
with mud between her toes
into the forest of the old growth birch
This is her place of worship
Her Sacred Heart
Her Holy church
Come sit with me in the forest, she calls
Sweep a spot with your palm
on this hallowed ground
Take your place, Beloved, amongst the rotting leaves
and roots beneath your knees
This dirt is our prayer mat, she says
The place where you and I were birthed
And one day
be beckoned to lay down our bones
To gift back what was given
Back to the Earth
Back to the Mother
of another, and another, and another……
Come pray with me in the forest, she says
Her hands cupped, like a honey hive
full of golden nectar,
warm and humming
her hands, her heart
combine
She is the Divine Connector
of Love.
Of Love.
The Love that runs red rivers in her womb
her tides pulling between the full and new moons
She is Daughter
She is Maiden
She is Lover
She is Mother
Midwife
Priestess
Crone
And Healer
The fragrant Rose Medicine
flows from her womb
Watch as it forever unfurls
It is never empty,
It is never empty
always flowing
Her womb contains the world
She is Diamond Dove Magdalene
Yes! The stories are true!
She is unclean!
She is Anthropos!
Fully human and divine!
Both the dark and murky stream
and the blinding supreme sunbeam
She is Diamond Dove Magdalene
Coo ca-hoo, Coo ca-hoo
Come with me, beloved women, into the forest, she calls
Coo ca-hoo, Coo ca-hoo
We will sit
We will pray
We will remember
We. Will. Remember
The ancient red thread that binds our blood
to the grandmothers and great grandmothers who came before us
and the mushrooms
the moss
our furred and feathered kin
the unseen
mother moon
father sky
and the mountains in between
In sacred Union, we will gather
Embodying the Love
that radiates from our centre
This place of warmth
This place called Home
Encircled by these trees
that stand green and so serene
Come, Come remember, she says
She rests
in her nest
of eternal blooming roses
Coo ca-hoo, Coo ca-hoo
Her hands on her heart
She dreams
And dreams
She is Diamond Dove Magdalene