Everything Is Going To Be Alright, Martin Creed

In the span of a few hours yesterday I was twice in the presence of this line and familiar saying. With its multiple meanings dependent on the context and content in which it finds itself and the observer or listener taking it in, I was struck by my repeated encounter in two very different scenarios.  The first – with Martin Creed’s installation on the roof of the Rennie Gallery in Vancouver, BC.  It seems perfectly placed there overlooking Vancouver’s eastside and Canada’s notoriously poorest neighbourhood.

My second meeting was in the company of a friend who just received the good news that she is cancer-free.  The line came to her prior to the news, in the form of a Derek Mahon poem with this title.  She ‘happened’ to come across it the evening before she received her result.  She shared it with me as we sipped a glass of champagne in celebration.

How should I not be glad to contemplate
the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window
and a high tide reflected on the ceiling?
There will be dying, there will be dying,
but there is no need to go into that.
The poems flow from the hand unbidden
and the hidden source is the watchful heart.
The sun rises in spite of everything
and the far cities are beautiful and bright.
I lie here in a riot of sunlight
watching the day break and the clouds flying.
Everything is going to be all right.

I have nothing to add, perhaps only something to take away:

Everything Is All Right.