A plant with nine small blooming flowers grows just behind Francis.

I draw it quickly and then draw the wooden trellis to the right of the plant,

the jug that stands in front of it,

and the inclined desk behind it on which rests a skull with no jawbone in a book.

As I draw, I feel as if I am touching each thing, tracing its outlines with my hand. I look up

and think to myself that the Bible is the color of dried blood. Then I spot the monk's sandals

lying under his desk. He's left his cane or walking stick behind him too.

It rests at an angle on one of the trellis rungs. The sandals and the stick are poignant. As I continue to look at them,

I have a keen sense of ordinary life and ordinary death.

Everything that is alive will die.

Our things often outlive us.

Expectation can prevent us from seeing what's right in front of us.

Our assumptions colour what's really there.

Novelist, the neuroscience scholar Siri Hustvet, is known for standing in front of a painting for hours at a time and discovering elements that others don't see.

In this series, we blend immersive first-person stories with mindfulness prompts to help

you recharge at any moment of the day. I'm Rohan and I'll be your guide for a meditative story. in today's story. In today's story, Siri allows you to experience what it feels like to step inside a masterpiece and discover its hidden mysteries without prejudgments or expectations.

One way of understanding Siri's story is that it's about attention.

More specifically, it's about what can

happen when we allow our attention, allow ourselves to become immersed into one thing and what

can be revealed when that happens. But before we can immerse our attention, we first need to

gather it up, so let's do that. Asking yourself the question, where in the body feels most steady right now?

For me, it's my breath, it's gravity and its rhythm.

...