I Am So Small

“I am so small I can barely be seen.
How can this great love be inside me?
Look at your eyes: they are small,
but they see enormous things.”

Sean Rush’s painting captures the paradox at the heart of this Rumi quatrain: physical insignificance paired with boundless inner love. A young child monk’s contemplative face, rendered in soft earth tones, is overlaid with the poem’s calligraphy-melding image and verse into a single meditational form.

Rush subtly contrasts humility with vision: though the figure is small and simple in scale, its gaze-anchored in the poem-reveals immense spiritual depth. The translucent brushstrokes and weathered textures evoke ancient manuscripts, while the clarity of the eyes underscores the soul’s capacity to perceive the vast.

“I Am So Small” invites quiet reflection: it suggests that humility need not diminish, but rather open us to recognize the enormity within.