The Writing Life

Out there.

/ Gin Getz / 1 Comment

Open the door and dive in, out there.

Into morning fog so thick it leaves sheen of droplets covering your heavy coat and the dogs’ coarse fur.

Turn to close the door to the comfort of the woodstove and Christmas lights and a still half filled cup of coffee behind you.

Suddenly engulfed in wet whitewashed morning air, you feel as if you’re swimming, trying to stay afloat on solid ground, your head above water, somehow struggling to breathe.

Step out into it, shrouded as if in a daze, a dream, an altered state, as the season spirals around you like sufi whirling, almost a madness to dance the year to an end. Heading into new moon, as even the night sky darkens before solstice this year. A powerful dark presence stirring within, feeling somehow more so than most years, or is this how you selectively forget each year?

And all around you, defused energy washed over in morning fog and sparkling frost as if waking from a dream while the sun finally clears the hill to the east and you watch horses stand like sundials, flat side to the sun; a heron sitting stoic in the tree in need of the warmth it brings.

And the day begins, beautifully.

Back in where the wood stove hums and Christmas lights twinkle and that coffee is still warm in my favorite cup.

And my mind is haunted by places I have been and am reliving in words alone.

My stomach bunches up in a twisted knot as I write along with where we rode along.

It’s scary to tell you what I did, how it happened.

But scarier, of course, having done it.

A Long Quiet Ride.

Tangled in the isolation of writing, as it was in the isolation of riding.

Writing about it takes me there and my breathing becomes tight and shallow; nostrils flare, jaw tightens, teeth clench and my heart feels like it weighs as much as the saddle I hoisted up on the horse each day.

It was the loneliness I have ever been. I don’t want to be alone now. I want to take you with me, sharing the smell of damp leather, fresh sweat, horse hair when I brush them each morning or better yet at the end of day as I slip off the damp saddle blanket that will be the pad upon which I sleep that night, and the horses heads are down in some place lush with field grass, tangled barbed wire off to the side, and the primordial call between a pair of nesting sand hill cranes like a beacon, leading the way, for where they nest, we always find tall greenery and fresh water and a safe place for the horses, and me.

And just out of reach, just beyond the thread of searching for a sense of belonging, that ever and continuous theme for me as it is for some many of us, I thought that journey was going to be about inner strength and independence. Prove to myself (and everyone else) that I was strong and capable. Beyond badass.

Found out I wasn’t and don’t need to be.

See, I set out expecting some solo trial for me and my horses out on the open road.

No people, please.

People scared me more than all the bears, bulls and bugs I slept beside; barbed wire gates and snow banks that stopped me cold in my tracks, as well as maps and apps I never could figure out.  

I just wanted to be alone.

And then I was, and no longer wanted to be.

Funny thing is, people turned out to be what the trip was about.

I’ve had a lifetime trying to perfect the art of being the outcast, outlaw, outsider, off gridder, misfit, black sheep, stray cat and/or rebel without a cause. I daresay I’ve done rather well.

People were not my thing.

That journey turned me around.

Rather than it be an adventure based on independence, something I’d always known, I had to learn about interdependence. That was new to me. And it was force fed. Trial by fire, thrown under the bus, sink or swim – call it what you will.

This is what it taught me.

People are good.

Yes, you heard me right.

Never thought I’d say that.

If you know me at all, you never thought I’d say that too.

It’s hard to relive it. Though of course not as hard as it was to do it.

But now the challenge is in sharing it. Writing the real story.

And my fears are no longer about finding good grass, fresh water and a safe place to rest my horses.

It’s finding the right words. It’s wondering if I can write this story well.

Humbly I bow my head as my fingers get work.

No longer gripping well worn reins, lifting packs or pulling cinches tight. Now dancing freely across the keyboard, watching stories come to life.

Looking within for a different kind of strength.

The strength to share.

May it be a good story.

And may I share it well.

Until next time,

With love, always love,

Gin

Waiting for the moon to rise.

/ Gin Getz / Leave a comment

Tonight I sit out on the deck wrapped in the well worn poncho as I have found myself held in this heavy wool so many times before this night. My feet are on the railing; my head tilts back. Behind the now leafless old oak that shades the deck in summer appears the waning moon. She glows silver across the night pasture where fog spreads thick as sea foam. I can hear the gentle shifting of the horses in the barn, and the ever present hum of the inky river just a stone’s throw below. The dogs are beside me. Silent and attentive, staring out into the black beyond, waiting. The bears have been keeping them busy with the warm weather and bright moon.

Overhead, through lace of slender branches of this sprawling tree, few stars glint like Christmas ornaments hanging in the sky.

The ever present sound of the river blends into the darkness and becomes a noise you forget you’re hearing.

There is only a simple silence.

Time and space to breathe.

We settle into the season of long shadows, long nights.

Like the bear. That’s what this season of slowing and settling calls for.

Here in the far north of California in the land of big trees, big rain, big swaths of blackberries and poison oak, the bear does not necessarily hibernate so much as simply slow down. From the recent barking of the dogs, I don’t know how much they’ve even done that. It’s been a mild season so far. Garden roses still bloom. Stores remain plentiful after a bountiful season of lush grass, mushrooms, madrone berries and acorns. It’s easy to see what they’ve been eating by the scat they plainly leave randomly along our quiet dirt road.

With two big dogs, I don’t get to see those bears much. Usually just a big blob of a bear butt running up a hill. Sometimes up a tree.

Still, I feel it, and I’m sure the bears do too. Now is not the season of plenty, but of holing up. Slowing down. And turning within.

The rooster does not crow until some time past six in the morning and the horses come in for the night around five. That makes for long evenings, time for baking, reading, writing, board games, enjoying long lingering dinners lit by candles and twinkle lights, snuggling on the sofa with a couple of cats, reading aloud together, soaking in hot baths… these are winter pleasures.

In spite of the mild weather we’ve been having, we heed the call of the natural exhale after spring/summer/harvest/fall running around full speed in what feels like endless daylight. For those of us who work outside as long as the sun shines, winter is the time to transform into an indoor cat, at least during those long nights. Winter is a reprieve. A blessing. I long for it by the end of summer every year. Time to breathe. To let out a long, full, deep exhale. Before the anxious inhale of spring begins anew.

Garden roses still abloom…
… in December.

Seasons, like emotions, these ever flowing, passing states, one folding into the next like whipped eggs whites or cream.

When what I want sometimes is to hold onto forever. Something solid. Never changing.

As futile as clinging to ocean waves.

Rather than accept and appreciate the inevitable.

Ebbs and flows, tides and moons, the occasional passing storm.

Tonight the tide is low. I feel melancholy.

I want a drink. Come on, you say. Go ahead. Just one.

Alas, for some of us, it doesn’t work that way. Maybe this time it would. This time I could. I’d be okay. Holding the firm stem in my fingers as I swirl the familiar luring fragrance emanating from the liquid red velvet lit from the glow of the kitchen lamp behind me. And then let it roll across my lips and linger on my tongue like nectar – silky, rich and smoky.  

No.

It’s nearly seven years since I went sober, yet some days (usually nights) I can imagine drinking so vividly as if it were just yesterday. Some days it feels like it’s not getting easier. Tonight is one of those nights.

I’ll get over it. There’s power in reminding myself I made it this far. I can keep on keeping on.

Use your grit, gal.

And grit, well, that much I got.

Things change.

Today, tomorrow, yesterday.

Every day is different. Even on those days when what I feel is so familiar. When what I feel is that “ground hog day” replaying over and over and over again.

Wake in the dark. Tuck the blankets back around Bob. Pet (and step over) the still sleeping pups. Get the fire going, the coffee on, roll out the yoga mat and get down on it, stretch, meditate, light a candle to write, then as gray daylight waxes across the meadow of chalky fog, head out to let the chickens out, feed the horses, walk the dogs.  Return…

Grounding in the familiar. This simple life. A life though maybe a little different than yours, so similar in so far as both of us probably turn in each night thinking we didn’t get half as much done as we planned to do.

There are books and poems to write, horses to teach and dogs to train, bread to bake, wood to split, roses to prune and a compost pile to turn, a barn wall to rebuild and basement walls to trim out, rocks to stack and dirt to move and the damn floor needs to be swept again.

I want more time. Or maybe more energy. But that to-do list never seems to go away, just flows from one set of priorities to the next. It’s that ebb and flow thing once again. And at the end of each day, we hope we made a little headway, though how often do we feel we’re drowning.

Today.

Grounded, not because of the place, the view before me, but because of the feeling within me.

And under me. Crow, my old faithful horse. Beside me, Bob and the dogs and the last of autumn’s sweet air that allows us to feel the sun on ungloved hands and my graying hair still free from the confinement of a winter cap.

Sometimes you find yourself…. Exactly where you belong. It’s not a place, but a feeling, something inside.

For me, it’s a wild place, sounded by wind through leafless trees and the cadence of hard hooves on soft dirt.

It’s finding myself on the back of my dear horse where I’ve found myself for thousands of miles before this one.

And time stops, or no longer matters.

And I’m just there, the bones of my pelvis padded by Crow’s warm winter coat.

The sound of my breath, his breath, the rhythm of his footfall.

It’s watching my horse’s mane shift and sway as he walks, like ripples in the river into which my open hand reaches, sinks in, and already knows the softness it will touch as my fingers intertwine with his black mane.  So familiar, the feel of bare hands in soft hair, deep into the comfort of the back of his neck. The familiar fragrance of freshly cut fir trees and wild mint as the horses cross the creek, mingling with their sweet musky sweat in the oddly mild air where my legs are wrapped around a familiar warm back, without a saddle between us to sever the connection.

It’s turning to see Bob in his own world beside me, comfortable and content on the back of the new horse, Jesse. He’s perched in a place where he’s been holding space since long before I was born, and I smile. He may not see it. I’m riding in front. But he knows it. He always knows it. If he wants me to just let go, to relax, to forget about all the should-woulda-couldas, to just be, and to smile, get the gal on her horse.

This feels like home. On the back of the horse. With my husband and dogs close by and the soft sun and leafless trees and the smell of those leaves, now grounded, brown and brittle, through which the horses walk. Today there’s no need to train or work or get somewhere or get something done, just be with the horses, the land, one another. Where we belong.

It is a return to center.

Coming back home, within.

Until next time,

With love,

Always love,

Gin

Stripped. Bare.

/ Gin Getz / 2 Comments

Lit from a window with dark and drama as if a Vermeer farm house woman painted on old canvas, weathered and worn with time. Where is my pitcher, my cup, a book held just so, or an open letter draped in my perfectly poised hand?

Instead, I loom mighty over a laptop, screen cold blue and buzzing, surreal, unimaginable back in baroque days. Both the computer and me.

The window is open. Damp air thick, smelling of wood smoke wafting from another clean up fire Bob is burning. And the sound of roosters competing in a crowing match, one on the river side, one by the garden. Diligent guards, knowing the hawks are close by. Allowing their ladies to peck and scratch through the fresh layer of damp decay.

And always, over and through it all, here has an ever present thrum of river. The sound a ubiquitous murmur, something that’s always there though so familiar you don’t always hear. Similar to that of traffic I was once used to in other days and feeling far away lands. This is what I hear, here and now.

A gray day. Ancient oaks with spindly outstretched arms like old woman’s fingers, gnarled and swollen from too many years gripping the shovel, the hoe, the broom, the wooden spoon; stand silent over ground matted with leaves still a robust brown covering ever green grass and rich black earth.

The writing desk, before which I’m perched, and upon which my lap top resides, this week brings me out beyond this familiar view to strange places on the open road where I once was. It’s that vibrant green and lush of late spring. The sound is of horses walking in unison, clip clop on some unnamed logging road or alongside a foreboding highway where cars and trucks zip by without meeting eyes or noticing the oddity of a woman riding along miles and miles of barbed wire fences, locked gates and “no trespassing” signs, still somewhere in the north of California.

A Long Quiet Ride, coming back to life in words. It’s not always easy to share. Of course it was harder to do. How does one share what happened out there? How do I bring you with me?

Conserving my words as I sit and stare out the window above my desk.

Wanting them to flow forth for the work at hand.

The book that’s stirring, simmering and working its way out of me now.

Yet poems are what mess around in my mind.

And what can a gal do but play with them, with a mischievous smile and twinkling, rolling gray eyes?

Evening now, leaning back with bent knees.

The familiar feel of warm worn leather holding the bones of my back.

I’m on one side of the sofa.

You are on the other.

Your feet are bare, broad, firm and warm.

While mine look half your size, wrapped in striped wool socks, holes in the toes worn through from wet leather boots left by the door beneath a dripping slicker.

Feet entangled, intertwined. An easy touch. Mindless and comforting as toes play with one another, finding familiar places to be.

While rain pounds down outside onto saturated deck shiny with water coating each old wood board, shimmering alive with pounding rain. And inside the old wood cook stove crackles and casts an amber glow into the half lit room smelling of the last of this seasons roses, rubbed down dogs drying by the fire, and chicken soup simmering on the stove.

We’re quiet.

You are softly spoken.

Teaching me to conserve my words.

A challenge for this rambling mind.

Lost in thought as silent phrases spill across pages of the notebook pressed against my thighs.

As I look up to meet your eyes, looking into, through you and back into me.

Entangled.

With words.

Sitting alone with my muse.

This weekend was rich with poems, poets and a coffee buzz. It’s hard not to succumb to the words that dance in my mind and twirl along my tongue as I read them aloud.

But now is time for story-telling.

So back to work I go.

Until next time,

With love, always love,

Gin

Up close and personal.

/ Gin Getz / Leave a comment

This is me.

Real. Raw. A little rough around the edges. No frills and nothing fancy.

Some days unsettled in shifting clouds, stirred by wild winds within and around me.

Other days grounded in terra firma, pummeled by fall rains, nourishing dormant seeds, creative seeds, growing enough to give a part the self to others. Because what is life without something to share?

The other day, I had this revelation. A big one. It hit me:

I’m happy.

A year away from 60 and finally having grown into my skin. (Notice I still won’t say grown up.)

That skin’s a little loose and wrinkled, now weathered like driftwood and aged like well worn levi jeans. It is familiar; it fits me well. Finally at home in my skin, here or there, or someplace yet to be. But always a wild place. A quiet place. With plenty of room to roam.

And today at least, there is no place I would rather be. No time I would rather return to. No life I would rather have than mine. In all its imperfections, complications, confusions, and curiosities.

I am as happy as I’ve never been.

I have never felt more whole.

Not despite flaws, fuck-ups, wrinkles, wrong doings and imperfections. But perhaps because of them all.

The road map of my life so far, etched across my face.

The woman as seasons. Each of us a leaf on a big beautiful tree.

Here and now as I watch those leaves fall and trees left bare and my skin weathers and hair grays, this is where I am.

Our lives are each a work of art.

This is what I created. So far.

Already an ocean of wondrous waves that somehow I managed to ride. Some that lifted me high, others pulled me down, yet mostly there is floating, out there on the open sea with the big blue or black above, open and seemingly endless, holding me as I rest, nourishing for whatever wave comes next.

The highs are based on love. Birthing, mothering, parenting and evolving into adult friends with my son. Forming a strong, supporting and enduring equal partnership with my lover – something I never felt worthy of. Dogs and horses and learning to commit with courageous heart in this ever changing world, with ever evolving relations. Being true to my calling, creative expression, the art of of writing, and crafting a quiet, wild life. Somehow I managed to build my own box, yet not get stuck inside it. Remaining true to being the outdoor cat, somewhat feral, fleeting and self sufficient.

And the downs, to date, admittedly there have been a few. All the challenges, from poverty and placelessness, loneliness and single parenting, drinking and depression – these were part of the picture too. These have been my teachers, the wise ones gifting compassion, empathy, understanding, and true wisdom based on the balance of heart and mind, first hand. And grit. Definitely a lot of grit. Without much for formal education, I was not formed. Instead I learned to dig in the ground with bare hands, find raw clay and form my life myself. Inspired by the natural worlds where I found myself, I have tried to make it beautiful, wild and free, full of creativity and curiosity, passion and peace, respect and responsibility, and above all, love.

Of course there are things I regret. The hardest was wishing I was more present for my son rather than struggling to make ends meet and prove my worth to others who didn’t matter near as much as he did. And things I wish I had learned earlier. Going sober tops that list.

At times I wish I had a crystal ball to portend my future and lead me the right way. Instead time is the wise one and will share her wisdom with me as she unfurls in seasons yet to come. And all I can do is accept what she brings me, hopefully with grit and grace and gratitude. All the while, remaining a little wild and holding onto a childlike mind that finds beauty and magic and wonder and awe every day.

How long will this wave last?

I have lived enough to know that nothing lasts forever.

And with each passing wave, we learn about balance and flow.

For now, I am here.

This morning I sit out in diffused sun beneath a waving veil of high clouds. Eyes closed. Lulled by the song of the river, blending high notes from flickers and phoebes, chatter from dippers and jays, and a light wind softly trembling through the last holding leaves on these ancient sprawling oaks. And ever the refrain of the river harmonizing wild and free as the blood that flows through me, inspires me, fires me, and keeps me afloat.

I walk the trail paved with fallen leaves and emerging mushrooms and lingering thoughts I cannot shake free from my mind. Big leaves, oaks orange and brown, vibrant aspen gold of maples leaves the size of dinner plates, and dogwoods’ delicate reds, ranging from rich crimson to a dreamy peachy pink like water color spilled across the page.

The season inspires poetic words I long to master of emotions tamed like circus lions, emotions that pass by as quickly as these leaves are stripped from tree by rousing wind in which my soul surges, and my heart feels very very warm, somehow settled, an unusual feeling for me.

We run to catch the leaves. Yet our rapid movements make the leaves dance in a maddening unpredictability we cannot control nor capture.

Instead we sit on the deck beneath the old trees, where silent and still, a leaf gently falls into outstretched, opened hands.

It is a good place to be.

A pause between rains.

One day the river rages, thick and silty. The next, a calm clear flow.

But the pathway remains the same. Banks like skin, like soul, containing, confining, defining.

Somehow through it all, though every moment brings different waters, the river remains.

Changing, and yet, unchanged.

And I wonder, are we not the same? Though parts may soften, as water to stone, slowly over time, chiseling away coarse edges, washing away the ever altered surface into grains of sand, softening with time and age. A sandbar moves from here to there. Banks scoured. Rocks tumble and settle anew. Fish battle their way upwards as entire trees are swept away and brought out to sea.

That is my course.

That is where and I how I flow. At least for now.

Some days wild and raging, brown and turbulent, roaring like thunder in steel gray skies.

Other days gentle, buoyant, holding soft and quiet as a trickle as I sit here alone, sun burning golden through closed eyelids.

Mystery prevails the process.

Edges blur. Sides merge. Like oil on canvas as the brush takes another stroke.

Finding beauty both in the creating and the creation and all the wonders of this imperfect life.

Until next time,

With love, always love,

Gin

After Equinox.

/ Gin Getz / 4 Comments

looking closely

The agitation of the wind creates unrest among naked branches. Beneath an unsettled sky, the monotone of a thawing land broken only by the continual call of the river reverberating against still frozen cliffs, while mud caked boots poke through remaining snow drifts and blistered hands touch sunburned noses and the brown back of the neck – bits of exposed flesh found uncovered from a down jacket that remains adorned though now unzipped.

forrests birthday

Another winter sheds her white skin. The peeling of the snake reveals that which is real, raw, delicate in its renewal. The season begins showing herself subtly in sepia tones. Like an old worn photo looked at time and again, we hold to the past in a futile gesture but the present is always new. Look around. See it. Feel it. Hear it. Celebrate it. Join in and dance with it.

above geod beds

Spring is late to unfurl here in the high country and her early song is soft, hard to hear, often hidden beneath late season snow storms and the howl of the changeable winds. In a land where winter claims half a year, the other three seasons come and go quickly in the shared space of the other half. Savored, appreciated; nothing is taken for granted.

Tenderly she reveals the simplicity of the wilds. We see her new breath in the everchanging motion of the unsettled sky, the unrest in the wind, the thawing of the earth, the swelling of the river, the return of wildlife, the luxury of longer days, shorter shadows, an open road, and the tenacity of simple nameless yellow flowers emerging through the snow.

And the silent assumption that within the swiftness of the season stirs the lure and excitement of change…  Into what, she whispers? And the wind shares a response I do not yet understand.

tres and co

Interwoven in the web of life awakens questions more than answers if we listen solely with reason. How else can we hear? With our hearts, not our minds. With our senses, like the wilds that surround us, knowing not because they read it, heard it, were told to believe. Or are we so different we forgot how to feel? Let go of that, she tells us. Her answers are in the soft shades of brown and grey of the newly opened hillsides.

Do we just let it go? What we had last season? The assurance of the assumed. Today, I tell myself here for half the year, it will be cold and white. What will tomorrow bring? Plans? Expectations? Hopes and dreams? What would we be without them? Shed them and be free, she tells me. But I too feel naked without. Such is the time of awakening, allowing the season to bloom means starting with a seemingly barren hillside.

blue castles

The land calls. I speak to her. With her. She answers with a whisper veiled in translation I try hard to decipher. Words, ideas, passions still remain. From within this tangled tapestry can we see the bigger picture? Can we see the fine lines into which we are tightly woven or the space in between? Perhaps in the early morning when dew catches silken threads and pale pink air is still but for the rousing of the robins unintentionally sharing their sweet song from beneath the leafless trees, and stirring of distant geese down by the expanding open waters of the full to bursting reservoir.

It’s mostly space, I am reminded again. But we choose to see the little bits of matter within the big wide expanse.

Morning’s stillness shares silence of the mountain in a slow gentle outbreath before the awakening of the day, the season, the beginning of change. This is a time of both reflection found in glassy ponds of melting winter, and planning for something we don’t fully understand. Oh but the leaves will unfurl and the grass will green and the summer homes will be lit and the road will be abuzz. And so it goes, no matter what I do and you say.

that unsettled sky

Going Nowhere.

/ Gin Getz / 7 Comments

As the leaves turn full and fat and green

and wilds swell moist and plump and prolific

and views enshrouded in cool grey veils

and mornings frost and afternoons wash us away

 

As flowers burst forth and fruit attempts to ripen

and seeds within are scattered without

so far yet from fruition but emerging

coming to a life not yet realized

 

River voice speaks loudly

monotone and constant

And I vaguely remember the in and out

pulse and surge of waves

 

But we do not have that here.

 

Pale silver morning dew

frosted on tall green grass

already turned to seed

that this year may wash away

rather than scatter in the winds

 

Waving silky laden pregnant with promise

I do not know their names

any  more than I know the names of flowers or birds

as they know them not and care not too

 

Only appreciate my recognition:

the blue one, the dear one,

the silly one that lights atop the outhouse,

the yellow one that blooms beside the door.

 

Geese grow their young and feathers of flight

and coyotes are wisely silent

and crow sits on the rock watching her mate

feeding her child now the same size as she

 

And the river barely lowers her voice on this year

that the snow gathers energy to return early

on this lush ephemeral season

which I will watch pass

 

And through which I will remain

now apart of where I tried to leave

finding roots sinking spreading taking strong hold

through bedrock without my blessings

 

Ah yes, and now they got me.

 

And here I am

and shall remain

beside nameless flowers

and familiar songs of birds and wind

and grasses bursting with next year’s life.

old mans beard

 

elephant heads

 

penstimon

 

The season is short.  How long until the winter coat begins to grow again?

Time to get to work.

Got a house to build, a business to run, school to study, bellies to fill, another move to make… and another book to complete and the next one softly raps against the door, waiting for room to come in.

A tremendous time of change.

Time to turn within and focus at the work at hand.

Spilling over, now is the time of bounty.

Expansion in retreat.

And though the writing room is being built and new books are spilling into fruition, for now I am taking a rest from sharing articles for a while.

I’ll touch base from time to time, a way to keep grounded and connected and remind you I care, because I hope you know I do.  In the meanwhile, please keep in touch if you’d like – write me directly or via this web site (sorry, I no longer use other social media and prefer to keep it personal instead).

Until the next time we meet…

norman

 

on pasture

 

On Death, Dying and Depression: Dealing with our Darkest Days.

/ Gin Getz / 17 Comments

~

Finding a bright side to a dark situation.

Going with it. Allowing it.  Honoring it.  Moving beyond not in spite of, but because of.

Because we can learn the greatest lessons from our darkest days.

This is the natural cycle of life. And death.

~

This is not what I meant to write about this week.  A whole essay on another topic open on my desk top ready to share with you.  It can wait.  This came up. And so we go with it. Ride the waves of life. For to miss out is to lose those greatest lessons.  This is living.

~

Here in the high country, rain and hail continue. Clear mornings bring heavy frost. Clouds amass by mid day and the sky is awash in striations of deep grey by afternoon. Maybe in evening after a good downpour, the sun will break through far to the west and illuminate the tops of the snow covered peaks, glowing like stars on top a Christmas tree.

Leaves challenge the elements and slowly emerge, blending hillsides of the most vibrant greens into bands of waving white above tree line. Dandelions are quick to open their sunny faces in fleeting moments of sunny skies, and tuck themselves in with a sense of self preservation and practicality when the clouds wash over again.

Now is the time of rebirth, yet what I feel is the oppression of loss.

No one I know has recently died, nothing has changed, nothing is really wrong.

And yet, I feel I have lost something.

Something deep and primal and personal and essential.

A part of myself.

And for that part, that something I can not fully define, I find myself in mourning.

Amazing we can feel this way, so strongly, when on the outside it appears everything in our lives is “just fine.”

~

I need to rant.  Please bear with me. I think you can take this, and maybe, just maybe, you’ve felt this way too.

Winter was hard.  It’s a long story; I won’t bore you with it now.  But the season on one hand left me empowered and with new focus; and on the other left me tired, empty, something in me missing, hurt, off, wrong.  The wind got me.  That sounds weird and I don’t really understand how and I can’t explain it better than that, and believe me, it doesn’t make much sense to me either.  But I think that’s what it was. The wind.

I thought I was strong.  Impenetrable.  (At times we may find we are weaker than we think, and the lesson may be in finding the beauty in that softness which only weakness allows.)  Well, I don’t particularly want to be weak, so I went to a Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor and she noticed the wind right away.  She said my chi was weakened and the wind got in me and got me bad.  Believe what you wish, think what you want, this really made sense to me.  It just felt right.  Something deep inside was off and needed to get grounded.

So, I’ve been working to balance my chi again, and thought I was doing well… but then suddenly… WHAM.

Suddenly I am sad, angry and depressed.

What triggered this? Where does this stuff come from?  I thought I was doing great… everything was fine.

I walk down to my beloved bridge – my way to get away – and the river is so crazy high with spring melt off from the warm temperatures mixed with the abundance of rain, swirling café au lait colored brown and raging, loud, wild, powerful and intense like I have never felt her run before… and I just sit there, legs dangling off the bridge in the middle of all this powerful water… and I cry.  Hard.  I have visions of falling into that water. I think how easy it would be. Just let go, slip away. No more problems, confusion, hurt… But I don’t want to end my life or miss out on what will be or cause pain to others.

What then, can I do to end this suffering?

Don’t worry, I won’t kill myself. I’m not suicidal.  I’m just really sick of life today.

~

The next day, I walk back down to the river, that bridge, and stand there over the mighty river and smile. The sun shines warm on my face and my husband holds me and says just the right things, and my dog sits by my side as I stop and listen to the strong white noise and I can’t imagine a better life.

~
Nuts, you may say.

Maybe so.

Or maybe, just maybe, this is living life, wild and free.

And what can we do but go with it, and make the most of it?

~

Considering balance.  Our life is fuller if we allow the cycle of life to ebb and flow and even over flow at times. Remaining in balance at all times denies us this vast array of human emotions, creative expression, wild adventures, amazing acts of beautiful passion and tremendous bravery, and ultimately, great achievements.  Balance is an over-touted safety net by which we can remain level, in line.  Mediocrity, if you ask me. And missing out.  It’s not easy, riding the pendulum, but it’s a wild ride, and well worthwhile. And I’m just starting to get it: this is what living life fully means.

(More on this can be found in the fabulous excerpts from this week’s Brain Pickings.)

What can I say?  Don’t say a thing.  Instead, let’s hold on to our hats and stand out in the wind and pouring rain, raise our heads back and howl!

Because remember this too:  What about love?  What is level and balanced about love? Would you be willing to miss out on love in order to keep your cool and maintain control and live your life well balanced?

~

And yes, that means risking a broken heart.

A little bit of death every time.

Would you have it any other way?
~

And so we must die. Leave the past behind.

What does it mean to die and remain among the living?

Is this not an intense part of the spiritual journey, and like all experiences, unique to each of us?

Giving everything, going to the ends, letting go, a complete release, and opening up to that which is absolutely new.

Or do we prefer to let go of those extremes, find center, be steady and stable and secure, and live life only from that balance point?

There is no one right way.

What way do you choose?

I won’t tell you your way is wrong if you won’t tell me mine is.

~

Suddenly in meditation it all makes sense.  Fleeting glimpses of great wisdom and the Divine.  The intensity is intoxicating, though it does not last long.  I don’t have the answers, but the questions become more clear, and I can’t help but want to know more…

~

There is such comfort in knowing we are not the only one. And so I share this, with you.  Maybe you’ll think I’m nuts, and prefer to remain safe and stable. Or maybe you’ll feel this way too.

~

Dear Amy of SoulDipper shares the following wisdom:

We do have to die before we are reborn.  One book used in my study of the mystical principles in Sufism (borne from the wisdom of the Desert Fathers) contains a chapter titled “Die Before You Die”.    

…Rumi, the poet who was a devout Sufi, is also quoted in the chapter.  He wrote:  

The mystery of “Die before you die” is this:
that the gifts come after your dying, and not before.
Except for dying, you artful schemer,
no other skill impressed God.  One Divine gift
is better than a hundred kinds of exertion.
Your efforts are assailed from a hundred sides,
and the favor depends on your dying.
The trustworthy have already put this to the test.
(Mathnawi, VI, 3837-40)

(Amy is a wonderful friend, well known resource, powerful guide, and fellow soul searcher along this journey.  She offers two invaluable services for the awakening mind. First is her Operation Blind Spot, helping you help yourself in understanding, accepting and healing your past.  Second are her Intuitive Sessions, channeled readings bringing insight and wisdom into the Self through spirit guides, and ultimately, through the Divine.)

~

Can we call it depression in the literary sense, not the clinical:  low, slow, down, dull?

Finding a bright side to a dark situation… for is not depression a little bit of our soul dying and being reborn with every wave?

I think those of us who think a lot about things like… say… life… are going to have our spells.  How could we not?

We are not taught to treat ourselves, to trust ourselves and even to understand ourselves.

I am challenging you to begin. With me.  Let’s give it a try.

To clarify depression, I do not mean the clinical term but the emotional state.  As in sad, down, low, dull (for none of us can be up, high, bright and light all the time!).

The label of Depression for disease, chemical imbalance, mental illness are of separate concern and beyond my realm.  Not that I don’t want to give this matter value, but I don’t deal with labels (nor the medical model).  I deal with life, and hope to share my little glimpses with you, not take on medical assumptions.

What I speak of here is the inner turmoil of the eternal seeker.  The natural part of life for those living fully.  The low on the waves, the ebb of the tide, and dark cycle of the changing moon.  To avoid darkness is to deny half of our life.

As we are all unique, so are our maladies, and so are our treatments.  Listen to yourself; trust yourself; know that you are your own best excerpt – no one knows you better than you know yourself. And yes, sometimes knowing our selves means knowing when to turn to others for help…

For those of us for whom depression is but a dark spot to dive into, it serves as an opening to the light on the other side.  Maybe a cliché.  But you get what I mean.

~

Because there must be death before new life.

Leaves will wither and fall before new buds emerge.

Which promise then new blossoms, fragrant and bright and wild.

~

My husband tells me he was told you haven’t really lived if you never thought of dying.

~

Does the cycle ever end?

What would the alternative be?  Balance?

Missing out on the lows would mean missing out on the highs.

Am I willing to forgo all that to remain somewhere safe?

~

At times I am tempted, but these times do not remain for long.

I return to life with a childlike zeal and curiosity and passion.

Lost as the young women I try to help.

How can I help when I don’t know the answers?

Somehow just being there, reminding others they are not alone, you are not the only one and this is not wrong… in fact, within this is something very beautiful indeed.

I am still on the path.

Walking beside.

Some days wildly wandering.

~

I don’t know where I am going with my writing.

I don’t know where I am going with my life.

Saying that at nearly fifty seems wrong.

I want to know. I think.

Some days I don’t want to be searching still.

I want to have found the answers.

Truth.

Maybe we never do.

So, I write.

Words come.

I can’t keep up though I try, and have no idea where these words will lead me, will lead you, if you will even read.  And somehow this matters, not for vanity so much as sanity, and just the same, I must write.

I want to reach people, help people, that’s why I write, I think that’s why words come to me, through me.

Some days I just don’t know.

Maybe today is one of those days.

Tomorrow will be different.

~

After nearly fifty years of asking questions, suddenly I find myself being asked the very questions I have asked a hundred times. Although I still feel so often like a child in body, heart and mind, what others see must be different:  graying hair and spreading wrinkles like hoar frost on a winter morning.

The natural progression of things. I’m not sure I understand, but go along with it. What else can I do?

This is the curious order of awakening minds.

And the random wisdom we share,

as both the asker and teller

Receive.

~

Widen your gaze!

Embrace all of life.

The light and the dark.

My world is wild, and natural, and trusting and nurturing.  It’s cruel, harsh and raw and real at times, and more beautiful than anything I could dream up other times.  I don’t want to refute, refuse or change my world, only make the most of it, be fully connected, and do my best to understand, integrate, and be one with it all.

I want to live.

As fully as I can.

~

Working in the high country yesterday, along the Continental Divide.  Pouring rain, soaked through slickers and boots well packed with mud and I’m just grateful it’s not snowing.  We’re wet and chilled and working with saw, shovel and ax until we feel we can’t do more and then of course we do a little more because really it just feels so good to be out there in the elements and giving our all and this is living, and that’s how I feel so alive.

~

Once again, I am re-born.

~ ~ ~

 

Creating Connection: Finding Balance Between Nature and Man.

/ Gin Getz / 7 Comments

gunnar on walk

~

Random thoughts on awakening where we are.

~

We are all connected.

Then why too often do we feel so alone?

~

Within us all is a universal need to find our sense of community, of belonging within this big beautiful world; to find the special place where we belong, the special few to whom we belong.

~

I want to belong.

(Don’t we all?)

And yet, here I am.

Hiding in the trees.

Is not, then, here

where I belong?

~

Here, it is all around.
Surrounding, encompassing, embracing.

My community, where I belong, where I find myself, allow myself to be.

Nature and the wilds.

 

For half of the year, a white, still, silence shared between the trees and me.

Now, a passing motion, stirred by the heavy rains on raw spring soil.  Rocks shifting in loose dirt, river roaring brown. Trees holding vigil as the seasons come and go and come again.

Slowly the mountain livens not with her accord but for the elk, deer, hummingbirds and humans that begin to migrate upwards.

~

And still, I reach for more.

The challenge of finding our place and space.

Becoming or creating a community to which we can be apart.

Expansive and inclusive.

Challenging and creative.

When it’s too easy to fall for same, similar, safe, close, closed.

 

Community can be that which awakens us, or that which suppresses us.

The choice is ours.

 

Community can be the pillow of protection, surrounding us with assurance.

Or it can be a matter of contention, rebellion.

The comfort of connection, or the battle to define one’s self.

Seal ones position or deny one’s place.

Surrounded by like minds, or contrary minds.

Absorbed in a similar reality, or forced to defend your views, define your truths.

What are your challenges in finding where we are meant to be?

~

Being a part, or being apart.

As we can not be all places at all times, or all things to all people, how do we realize the Self and place of Self within our world?

~

Here in the high country, spring is late to come. The leaves are only now opening and will remain attached for merely four months, at which point the trees release and we begin the big slumber that remains here for half the year, while the other three season share the other half.

Spring is a time of adjustments when I go from being the happy hermit to becoming the social misfit.

It is happening now.

~

Some days

I feel

closed in

Today

People in four directions

When what I reach for is

air earth water trees

 

Naked branches suddenly

thickening with leaves

views enclosed and narrowing

Silenced is the rushing river

 

Tonight in moist and mild spring air

I see lights in strange cabins

Brighter than the big spring moon

Dancing silver on winding river

 

I lose touch

With  her

With me

 

Now is the time

I hole up

Withdraw

Turtle retreats to his shell

 

Is that where he belongs?

~

So, we’re coming out of the Wilderness. My dog and me.  I am armed with my camera. Nothing more.  Perhaps a half eaten granola bar in one pocket, a bandana in another, and chapstick in the third. What more do I need for a day hike?

 

What should I really fear our here that I cannot handle? What are we told?  Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!  Yes, we have those.  But it’s not them I have learned to look out for.

 

We’ve been hiking for how many hours, how many miles, on a trail that has not been used since the hunters were run off the mountain in last November’s snows.  Tracks of elk, moose, deer, coyote. And my dog and me.

 

We’re almost back to the trailhead, and it feels like returning to civilization. This is often a strange and bittersweet place to find myself.  My dog is ahead of me.  I see movement just past the trees, so quite calmly I say, “Gunnar, wait.”  He stops in his tracks and waits.  Good boy.

Two more steps reveal a woman in day-glow colors and day pack, and odder  to me still, a man with a big stick in both hands, held over his head, shaking it at my dog, who reads people well enough to know not to get close to this one.

 

Maybe it was Bear Phobia. Here he is, going into the Wilderness, and you know what he thinks he’ll see.  Not some little wild woman and her friendly dog.

 

Is he friendly, the man asks, still shaking the big stick.  Yes, I reply, he is.  I call my pup and continue on, growling beneath my breath something about how I’m the one he should watch out for, not my dog…

 

See, it’s not the bears I’m afraid of up here.  It’s the people.

 

This was my first chance encounter with the human race on this mountain this year.

Is it any wonder why I long for the return of winter?

~

Take a deep breath.

Don’t go there, I remind myself.

Open up.

What matters more than connection?

We are all connected.

Then why do I feel so detached?

~

Here I watch people come, people go. At times my heart sings when they leave; other times it aches as they vanish like a passing storm that left the soil soft and ripe.

With each chance encounter, we have the opportunity to learn, laugh, love.

Upon fertile grounds of compassion, we open, expose our souls, and though we risk being left empty when they take what they want or need and leave, we also chance a great awakening, or a simple story, or something beautiful shared.

Passing though, they come and go, unlike the certainty of the seasons, but with the season.

~

For years I fought to leave

Time and again, she pulled me back

(kicking and screaming at times)

And tied me down

Only now do I see here is where I belong

Not because I have given up, but because I have opened up.

~

My community, I found in the trees.

~

Here we learn the natural adjustment to the seasons.

The cycle of life

To which we are a part

Neither above nor beyond.

~

As the leaves emerge bright and shiny and as suddenly the size of squirrels’ ears, only to fill out and wash the hills in a lush green wave, until the brilliant gold of late September in long shadows lays the land back to rest, and under the white we remain.

~

Expand into this world

Like breathing…

~

There is neither right nor wrong

There just is.

Along with our need to find our place

Within some precast mold to which we may not fit.

And when we learn to let go

And be

We may find ourselves

Way out here.

And still

Fully connected

A part of it all.

~

Still…

I sit with the evening sun on my face

Bound by the lull of a rushing stream

Dandelions aglow on the moist hill on which we rest

Leaning on and into each other, wordless now, my husband and I

The dog on vigil behind us

And…

For one beautiful moment

This is exactly where I belong.

Where I want to be, without wanting more

It feels so right to say that, to know that, to feel that,

to finally believe that,

until the wind reminds us to leave.

The adventure of standing still.

~

Am I wrong to say this is where I belong

This is my community

And find connection, wisdom, soul

In wind, water, bark and branches?

~

Do trees have soul?

The collective soul.

These are the old wise ones.

~

A walk deep in the woods with a small glass jar in one hand, sticky fingers in the other, gathering pitch from my beloved once blue spruce. The old ones, the big ones, are now long gone; their sap dried and brushed into the earth by elements and time. Now it is the smaller ones putting out their last liquid essence in a vain attempt to hold life, when what they are doing is dying.  I am collecting the blood and tears of their wounds to create a healing salve. To honor my neighbors, my friends.

As I reach into the dried bare branches once green and lush and flexible, snapping them off with no more than the weight of my extended arm, stretching towards the last of their golden, glowing life oozing through their wounds, my flesh is scored by a broken branch. My tears and blood blend with theirs.  Different colors, mine warm and red, and yet all the same, is it not?

 

Their souls remain after the needles fall.  Perhaps a secret stillness remaining in their roots for a year or more in the silent soil.

And then they are silent.

Where do their souls move onto?

~

In  winter

I bloom

Fragrant and bright and wild

 

Where am I going,

you ask

And I tell you

I do not know.

~

alyssa 2

~

A Meditation on Simplicity

/ Gin Getz / 4 Comments

~

sweet alyssa 2

~

We live in the daze of busy-ness.

We’ve got one hand swiping the big screen trying to keep up with the latest greatest, and a phone (yes, we still call these things “phones”)  in the other with a text coming in, post going out, photo being shared, a meeting coming up, appointments overlapping, multi-tasking, yet, sorry, we’ve been crazy busy and we don’t have time and got to go ‘cause we’re running late for what we’re not so sure but we know it’s the thing, think it’s important, are certain it matters and we don’t want to miss out.

We’re caught up in this epidemic of busy-ness.  The social norm. Self created.  Self inflicted.  Some days we feel sucked in, stuck and see no way out of this powerful spinning spiral. This is just how it is.

It’s all about accomplishment, achievement, goals and success…

Or is it?  For who defines your success?

As if busy-ness might bring us self worth and social status, help us understand where we are in the bigger picture, and what we’re all about.

Does it?

We’re usually too busy to be certain.

On the other end, there is stillness, silence, just being.

Nice as that sounds, really, we don’t have time for those things.

We don’t take the time. We’re completely caught up in this cycle. Too much else going on.  Big stuff.  Important stuff.  And really, we’re pretty important people. You know how it is.

Simplicity seems so far away.

But if we stop for just a second and take a serious look, we’ll see it’s pretty darned close.  It’s just a matter of choice.  If you’re ready, you can choose it. Just for a minute. Try it. The world will go on just fine without you.

And if you’re not, that’s okay too.  Keep on going as you were.  If that’s working for you, great.  No need to read on.  Keep on with what you were doing, because chances are, it’s a Very Important Thing.

~

Simplicity.  Sounds so simple.  Maybe it is.  Maybe we just make it complicated. By choice.  Just a thought, if we choose to take the time to think about it…

Busy-ness has become our comfort zone, our identity, our understanding around which everything else revolves.

What happens if we let go?

Will the bottom fall out and we find ourselves floating, out of control, without the safety of social identity, title, label, status and involvement?

The emperor without his clothes.

What do you think would happen if we release that stigma and allow ourselves to be.

Be what? If you ask that, you’re missing the point.  Just be.  Nothing more.  No strings attached.

Maybe we’ll go through a period of unrest. We’ll get fidgety, restless, look around, at our watch, at someone else, surely we should be doing something.

Because, we are told, something is always better than nothing.

Fill ‘er up, stuff the holes, fill in the cracks, don’t leave yourself with empty space, free time, and certainly not silence.

Free time is frowned upon, unless is snuck in, scheduled or under the disguise of Something Very Important. (Like the number of hours spent at our desk keeping up with Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest when everyone thinks we’re working… we hope.)

Silence, well, few of us know what that is.  Maybe it’s the wind. Flowing water.  A singing robin or rain on the roof. The usual traffic we hear come and go without attachment, or judgment. It just moves like waves, never ending. Silence is without the busy-ness in our head filling up and masking over those background sounds that just are.

Do we think busy-ness will make us more important?  Does being important matter? Why?  And who is to judge?

Of course one might stop to question in all this busy-ness, how much are we actually getting done?  What are we actually accomplishing, and how much does it all really matter?  But I don’t mean to be going there now. (Would you believe I don’t have the time?)  That’s a whole ‘nuther can o’ worms. You can think about that on your own sometime, if you have the time. (or should I say:  if you choose to take the time).

~

Okay, so, now… let it go. All of it.  The phone. The big screen.  The text coming in.  The appointment coming up. The work to be done.  The things you need to do and say, places you need to go… Leave it.

It’s not going anywhere.  It will be there when you’re done.  The world will manage okay for a minute without your help.

Try it.  Just for a second.  And just be.

Do we even know what that means?

We’re told this is idle time.

We catch ourselves scoffing at those sitting around not keeping themselves busy.

We praising the movers and shakers and high powered and popular faces with a thousand friends.

Society is not big on us just being.

Nor do we support it in ourselves.

In nothingness arises the frank confrontation of reality,

Seeing ourselves.

Unadorned by important people, deadlines, pressures, responsibilities, titles and rank.

These things are not you,

They are only what you cling to.

Let them go.

For just a minute.

Let me see the real you.

Unadorned.

Real and raw.

That is the real you.

~

Let’s try it.

Together.

Let’s start by letting go. Slowing down.

Just for a few seconds.

No deadlines, no pressures, no electronic devices.

Nothing we need to do or say, no where we need to go.

Relax your body and clear your mind.

Let thoughts come and go, without holding on, allow them to pass like leaves in the wind or sticks floating down stream

And you remain.

Still, silent.

Nothing.

Is the minute up yet?

Why am I doing this when I should be doing that?

It’s harder than you thought, isn’t it?

I know.

Let’s try again.

A whole minute this time.

Let’s go down to the river, or where ever it is you find your inspiration, and just sit for one minute, breathe, and listen…

Now what?

I dare you to do nothing!

I won’t guide you through the steps.

Maybe there aren’t any.

Maybe that’s the point.

Doing nothing.

Be.

That’s something.

That’s all you have to do, and it’s not as easy as it sounds.

I will only remind you, and you can go yourself.

In your time.

Take your time.

Nothing else matters.

Let go.

Do nothing.

Listen to your breath.

Count on the inhales.

Hold it.

Release on the exhales.

Feel your pulse, your heart, your moving blood.

Flowing like the river.

Watch the world around you.

You are not separate from it.

You are a part of it.

You are the river.

Flow.

Connect.

Go with it.

Let go of self, schedules, deadlines, social status, demands.

Be.

Become.

Think of nothing.

Allow thoughts to come and go, floating down the stream…

What matters more

than the sound of geese

congregating on wet pasture

in cool morning

Or the rising sun

Magenta

striking snow covered ridges

The reflection of clear sky

On a small pond

Mirror images of still leafless trees

Dancing in silky ripples

My  skin

My thoughts

My fears

Let them go.

All the he said

She said

What they think of me

I said too much

Too little

The wrong thing

Let them all go.

How can I hold onto what is gone?

The vibration does not continue

anywhere but in my

Emotive mind when I cling to it.

Let it go.

I am not this hurt

That wound

I am not a word

A story

Or language or sound

I am not what I say

Or what you say

These things come through me

And leave

When they leave my tongue

They are not me, they are not you,

they just are as I just am.

Let the rest go.

And I am what?

What am I left with?

The rock worn smooth

Solid and unmoving

Over which the water flows?

Or am I the water

A part of it

Moving or staying.

Can you tell what it does, where it goes,

What part leaves and what remains,

Or is it all just what it is,

Part of the river, flowing water?

And does that matter anyway?

What matters more

Than the air

Can I say I breathe

As if it were mine

Do I take it

Own it

Use it

Control it

Am I controlled by it

Or am I of it

In it

It

I am none of it

All of it.

Being, Connecting.  Letting the rest go.

Being in the wind, of the sun, a part of the rich damp soil.

Even for just a minute.

~

This is not about going anywhere.

Doing anything.

Accomplishing something

Picturing or focusing on becoming

It’s just about being

Still and silent

Letting it come and go

Without holding on

Without attachment

Or expectations

And yes it is hard

And yes, you can do it.

And so can I.

If we so choose.

A meditation in simplicity.

I cannot sit here and tell you what to do.

I can only encourage you to be your best

While I try to figure out mine

And sometimes our best is nothing.

Just being.

The hardest thing to do.

The hardest thing to be.

~

sweet alyssa 4

~

Shared today on Conscious Life News.

And thanks again to my beautiful model, Sweet, sweet Alyssa.

Seven Poems in Seven Days.

/ Gin Getz / 5 Comments

Actually there were ten, but some of them aren’t worth sharing.

 

After feeling “too busy” and having “too much” else going on (right, join the crowd – I’ll share more on this next week)… my heart returns to poetry.  Like nature, this is where I find my grounding, my uplifting. The first thing I ever remember writing.  I wonder if it will be the last.

 

The following is the result of a ten-day personal challenge taken on with Carrie of The Shady Tree.

It turned out to be a prolific enlightening to my inner passion.

Perhaps it may just look like lot of words.

With these, I hope you may find something that touches your heart too.

Read a paragraph, a stanza, a poem as you like.

 

Gratitude for a dear friend, fellow poet, artist, and lover of family, nature and life.

Gratitude for words, creativity, and inspiration – all of which abound in this beautiful world.

(Please stop by Carrie’s site over the next few days, too, to see how the same photo can inspire such different words.)

~

Photo by Carrie of The Shady Tree

 

~

You can only get

Here

by wet foot

Cool and soft and

 

squishing deep brown

between bare toes

Over slick rocks

 

The sweet moist scent of earth and

Decay

Last years dreams fermenting in

 

Never drying soil

Like a festering open wound

Where the branches bend low overhead

 

Heavy and wet and untouched

By daylight

which in turn is obscured

 

By an endless

swath of fog

 

Dampened desires

Laying heavy on moist flesh

Suppressed by sunlessness

 

Do you remember what

burning feels like

Warm and gold on

 

Exposed flesh

 

Instead in this succulence

Each drop a tiny window into the soul

An eternal pool

 

That will evaporate

and turn to steam

Should the sun burn

 

through the fog

~

Photo by Gin

 

~

Barren are last year’s

blossoms

now Hard and brittle

Spent and sallow

having been bent over

By the weight of

last season’s snow

Their seeds scattered

in the spring rains

Brown dust

to brown earth

And so it should be

 

I lean over

as not to disturb

That which managed

against the elements

And marvel

at the simplicity

And complete

complexity and pure beauty

Preserved by the wind like

An embalmed queen

 

What inner

secrets do you reveal

Spilling forth promises

of eternity

That few may

bend close to hear

Before the bright easy days

of new growth

Consume us

~

Photo by Carrie of The Shady Tree

 

~

On Wednesday

The midwife soars

Grounded

 

Taking flight

Because she is called

And though it appears

 

She has no control

And just moves

Out of action or reaction

 

of spreading her wings

And rising effortlessly

gracefully naturally into the stirring air

 

This remains

the most self controlled act

she may ever manage

 

Of leaving a ground

And returning

While remaining where she was.

~

Photo by Gin

 

~

Last year’s leaves

Next year’s soil

Compressed under this morning’s snow

 

Elk tracks across pasture

Revealing delicate chartreuse

Of spring grass

 

Seeds

Transforming

A quiet awakening

 

Beneath the consuming

unassuming white shelter

The robin is silent this morning.

 

How can I see something new

In the same old landscape

Like looking into the eyes of a lover

 

You have wrapped your body

around for over a dozen years

And still find beauty and shiver.

 

now in static essence of early morning

Upon brown damp soil

robin sings in the cold grey light.

~

Photo by Gin

 

~

Boots by the door

coated with clay

Brought in from out there,

Damp coats and wool hats

 

hang to dry.

What’s the point

You ask me

And I don’t have

 

a good reply.

We both know

they will only

be wet again.

 

Somehow starting out

dry

seems like

the thing to do.

 

The dog comes in

indifferent to wet fur and

Brown tracks behind him

With no boots to

 

leave by the door.

 

Out there

Where the bark of aspen

is soaked  to green grey.

Silver tips

 

on bare branches where

water pools in

tiny glass beads,

and brown water

 

flowing through

brown soil, saturated.

creeks cutting new paths.

old paths.

 

it will all be washed away

we say

if this keeps up.

Heavy skies

 

in stratum,

the movement of

silky flowing veils.

What secrets do they reveal

 

As an entire mountain

Obscured

And does it matter anyway

That the horizon has changed,

 

Is no longer

Peaks and ridges

But soft simple close

White?

 

The view, the future, awareness

Lost

In the sound on the metal roof

That comes in waves,

Strong and steady like

 

deep breathing

As wet as the ocean

And as far away

Above me

~

Photo by Carrie of The Shady Tree

 

~

In my dreams

I am flying

Downward

 

Into secret places

Of mountain

And mind

 

Of my soul

Where even in winter

It is lush and green

 

Places no one else

can touch

Or see

 

And maybe I won’t share

Not even with you

Unless I feel certain

 

You need to know

I keep them for

Myself

 

I become Crow

Seeing from above

A  mountain in

 

parts of a whole

 

Its steep slopes

And jagged rocks

And soft spring grasses

 

And the course of

the cutting river

From so high

 

As if I were

in the wind

blowing

 

across the open flats

and navigating the

rugged bluffs

 

in and out of

tall timber

until at last I light

 

upon the highest snag

 

above it all

the voyeur of my soul

seeing across the big air

 

and down into that

hidden oasis

no one else is meant to see

 

stealing a glimpse

detached

in this vast entirety

 

absorb my world

open my eyes

and find myself still

 

flying

~

Photo by Gin

 

~

On the surface

She shines

Simple and radiant

Easy going like

the afternoon breeze

On a good spring day

 

Idyllic

Tranquility

Stillness of soul

 

Waiting for

the coming unrest

 

~