Bedtime Gallop

 

 Starlight     wrested from its mooring of day. 

Night-weary cloak upon me

                    the leaden weight    

                                        of joy

                                weighs heavy with the knowledge

                                the scales tip as deep 

           in the other direction.

Sleep        a diamond mine trawled through

    longing for relief

                a thousand points of light.

The sullen waning Moon        running rough-trod through my fears.

With each settling

the words

they come

insistent on my recording.

My hand     furious     in attempt at catching

                                                        the mind's flight of fancy

                                                        the heart's embrace

                                                            of a moment    undone.

Vine and bracken        scrawled across the page

    painstaking indulgence

    stirred by cricket hymn.

Spring's unfolding

    redemption and torment

                        a banquet    laden with fruits

            soon enough to rot.

Not every bird caught in hand,

not every stone cast,

    we set out.

Full and empty.

Clutching at pearls

    of loss and longing

words slip by

    many lost to the night...

(Photos:  Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker Holes in a decades-old landscape Holly)

Chop Water

 The first birdsong breaks the call of night

    freeing me from the churning of its depths,

           
gratefully released from the tumult of waiting 

                                                                         for the day    

                                                                         to break.

                                                            Night already having broken itself     

                                                                                                    upon me.

                                                            Taking me, despite its starry silence,

                                                                into the noise of pain past

                                                                                           pain future.



No thunder marked these heaving internal crests, but I was

    struck

    all the same by the rumbling.

The day before, though punctuated by long sought, abiding gratifications,

    was one of those that had to be put out of its misery                         - destruction hard to bear.

    

    on the tail of several seasons that have each and every triggered

    

    in the midst of years of societal growing pains.

We make do

    and we do make

        and it is done.

Life goes on

    with or without us

    I go on

    with Life    

        all of it                                                                                             - creation will take its turn.

'Tumultuous Acquisition'

 

 "The sign of a soul awake is outrage."

 - James Hillman

~

Light from Darkness - A New Moon Solstice

It's that time of year again.  :)

"To yield is to be preserved whole.

To be bent is to become straight.

To be empty is to be full.

To be worn out is to be renewed.

To have little is to possess."

 - Lao Tzu

...and when you go into the Darkness, you can find Light.  Today, the Winter Solstice, is the shortest day of the year lightwise, and the longest night.  Take this opportunity to go within, to be quiet, to be present with what is, even in the dark corners.  To rest.

Our ancestors who didn't have electricity would have spent this time being less active out of necessity - spending more time around the fire, more time sleeping, more time in quiet and stillness.  But they knew the wheel of the year turned and that this severe Yin Darkness marked the Yang Birth of the Sun.  Because when you go to an extreme of Yin, you get Yang, and an extreme of Yang, you get Yin.  That is the paradox of living within dichotomy.  For however dark it is, the light is always within that darkness, waiting...

And this is a special Solstice, for it is also the New Moon.  So we have the increasing energies of the Moon waxing, becoming Full.  Even the Yin Moon is moving toward being Yang, Full.  Use this time and potential energies wisely, what will you birth?

Speaking of birth, today is also my Birthday; I'm going into my forties which is a trip in itself, but a whole other blog post.  :)  I was born at high noon on the day of the longest night.  When I think about this and how it influences me... I see it as my being able to be with the Dark, residing there, but also being able to shine out with what is Light within that Darkness.  I can see how my life has followed this path.  I've never shied away from difficulty or unpleasantries, wanting to see what they too had to offer.  And in so doing, I have found that Darkness holds the brightest Light.

In this vein, my collagework has reflected this regard for both the Light and the Dark; the fullness of experience.  Collage has helped me through dark times and I have been doing workshops sharing this ability of collage to facilitate transition, presence, transformation...
If you are local, I will be offering more workshops at Mountain Mystic in Front Royal, VA.
See this group on Facebook for more details and updates:

Renew and Release:  Collage as part of the Healing Process

Here is my latest collage work, finished this morning:

Eternal AutoPsychoNautica

Under morning light coming in the window:

Yin

 Outdoors under daylight:

Yang

This collage showcasing the merging of the macrocosm with the mircocosm, with its scenes of the Universe, electron microscope pictures of plants, seemingly alien underwater creatures, the meandering waterway, the reptilian eye, the spider weaving, and other various compatriots, including the man stirring his way down the river with a boat full of cut flowers for sale,...   serves to represent the exploration within and the brightness to be found there; a brightness the world so needs right now.

Consciousness is Life knowing itself, ALL interconnected, 

ALL integral aspects the the whole gloriousness that is HERE NOW.

Eternal AutoPsychoNautica

~~~