These Early Spring Days, slowly Gathering …
I’ve been writing this since the last week of January, when the birds started their daily dawn melodies again, establishing their territory. And though I have journaled about these inspirations, now what I am reflecting on is why I have written little and publicly shared even less …
And the clue is there in that first sentence …
I have been sharing my voice more - through video and learning this craft that expresses the shifts I’m feeling within my mental processing. And like those birds I am establishing the sovereign territory of my being, honouring my time, creating priorities as my work expands into different expressions.
There is less of a gap between a thought arising and an action, less delay, like the line from the Walt Whitman preface to Leaves of Grass ‘and your very flesh shall be a great poem’, my flesh is becoming my word, my actions are my poetry.
Feeling that I miss the time spent with words exploring structural concepts, the meditative times of flowing poetry … yet as I sit here tuning into this I find the distance between me and the flow that words once bridged is not so vast …
This time last year I was in Hawaii, where I completed integration of (at least) the previous years expansive adventures, made a deep commitment with the Mother Tree, Ohia Lehua, and the Dragons
… and I have been living so close to this land ever since - it has been a deeply solitary, profoundly magical time … which has tested that commitment, honing me and still does.
Less words mean less visibility… so how can you see the fluidity of embodied and lived poetry in motion? This is something that requires presence. And one reason why my videos will remain ‘amateurish’ and authentic while finding the balance of making a valuable contribution through this format, while I find my voice in a new way.
Willow, who’s confidence in being able to root anywhere, has also been my teacher …and already her catkins are bursting open readying for their early summer flight into freedom exploring new ways, before settling into place to root for an unknown future.
This is a time of visiting ancient roots, so as to discover new ones.
The tree I watch out of my window, each morning shows me a new dance … and I start to feel what is like to inhabit the cracks that philosopher Bayo Akomolafe talks about in his work.
Cracks form where the old systems don’t reach and this is where the new nourishes and roots into the barren land
… just like Ohia Lehua does to grow on the recently cooled lava flows - directly connecting to the nitrogen pockets in the cracks there, with no need for alchemical composting to provide it for her.
And this is the power of being strongly rooted, confidently, into the truth of direct experience. And this, I feel, is my work now … to allow my roots to fully inhabit those cracks.
with much Love,
from my Heart to yours,
Tania Aurora White Crow