lift and joy

mr. solly, the arabian boy

to the fox who wandered through my tiny town backyard,

to the orioles who came back and sing resplendent songs through my window,

and to mr. solly who made me unafraid of horses today with his gentle, gentle ways,

i thank you all for giving me lift and joy

by simply being your magnificent selves.

cardinal rules

retablo, mala beads, male cardinal

These are the cardinal rules~

I am always learning. Emotions are not to be feared even when they terrify me. I have purpose even if I can't for the life of me remember what it is. Purpose shifts and transforms. Death is an end, but more so a beginning. Every moment is sacred because in the midst of everything there are mind-blowing miracles taking place. Broken hearts can be healed with effort. Nothing is a burden unless I decide it is. I can decide differently. The ability to see color is like winning the lottery every day. Silence is golden and birdsong is platinum. Beauty keeps my Soul inflated. Tea is Holy. Nature is my Church and my answer. If Love is the only reality, and it is, then I am always and forever going to be okay.

Mother's Day

 May, 2011~ Bremen, Germany/ My Mutti and me

We went back to her homeland for Mother's Day

I did not realize this first Mother's day without her would trip me up to the extent it has. I am one kind word or inquiry away from a public irruption of tears that is the stuff of nightmares. I had no idea people would send messages, call and approach me at work to tell me they are thinking of me or to discuss my Mother.

I thought I was doing fine.

Until I realized I am not.

When do I stop automatically saying to myself. "Oh, I can't wait for her to see this one" when I press the shutter button on my camera? When do I understand she is not coming back? 

A wise woman once told me, long before my Mother left, it takes at least 2 years to recover from the loss of one's Mother because, good or bad, it is the most significant relationship of a lifetime. I never forgot her words.

I no longer wear the black leather coat. I wear her green one instead.

late bloomers

Spring came late. But it finally arrived with blue skies and no humidity and the most ravishing burst of scented blooms.

My great hope is the metaphor.

Bounty and sweetness for all.

rejoice

magnolia

"If the sight of blue skies fills you with joy,

if a blade of grass springing up in the fields has power to move you,

if the simple things in nature have a message you understand,

Rejoice, for your soul is alive."

Eleanora Duse

I am alive.

coming down

trout lily

i am waiting, still, for the spark to return. i am used to a project, a cause, a lurch toward something. But all things within and without remain quiet.

there are so many layers to this coming down and coming down from pointed focus and casualty.

i carry on.

i am seen.

but i am not the same and i have yet to discover all the ways in which that is true.

i do find i am able to see my habits and defenses more clearly in all this quiet. my tactics for self-preservation make me laugh and wince.

in this ongoing beginning disguised as an end, i am coming to know myself better. in that knowing, more choices present themselves. even if i feel smaller than ever before, a promise of great renewal has infused itself in the layers of coming down.

in the soft light of spring, the only important question is how well do i mother myself.

the sensitive soul

brooklyn botanical gardens

sakura

an ode to the sensitive soul~ stop watching the news. especially during disastrous times. the over-played images of fear and loss will coat you like a thin slime. this slime, invisible, will draw unwanted people into your wakefulness rendering you unable to sleep. it will set the stage for small difficulties repeating themselves endlessly or so it will seem. you will unwittingly focus on what is wrong and have difficulty seeing what is right.

turn away from the agitation and despair.

seek, instead, the bounty of the season. roll in its succulence. lift ear and eye to the sky.

nature is the cleanse and the cure for the troubles of sensitive souls.

Fluent

Unexpectedly, in the month of April, the trees froze. There was no sunlight to glint off the water-encased branches, but still, under stone grey skies, the affect of rows and clusters and miles of glass trees was one of an uneasy wonderland.

Then, the wind came, less than softly, and a new language was born. The trees, at the mercy of everything, spoke to each other through the rustle and clink of their frozen fingers. It was a sound I had never heard before, a sound that could vaguely be described as plastic bags being crinkled.

I wondered if the trees were using the portal of unexpected climatic convergence to tell secrets in earnest to each other. To rise quickly to the occasion of muteness reprieved to comfort each other, to whisper hello, to wave, to warn, to say to their neighbors 2 streets away, "I stand with you."

I have noticed in unexpected circumstances, new languages beg to rise and become known.

I have noticed and I have lived, am living, the subtle nuances of openness coupled with boundaries. The particular dialect of letting go and letting go again. The foundation and certainty of a Universal energy, ancient and ever new, that vibrates to the heartbeat of a mouse, the silent, circulating rivers of my blood, and speaks of truth and only truth.

It is all the language and layers of love.

It will take more than one lifetime to become fluent.