Moving On

I've finally migrated my blog over to Substack; it allows subscribers, which Blogger no longer does.  You can find my posts at Hanging Out with Hecate.

Thanks for stopping by.

When the Caravan Leaves

We were fortunate to be able to bring Rumi's Caravan to two places this month, Berkeley and Redding.  Soul nourishing for us, and hopefully for the audiences.  We had our largest audience ever in Berkeley, and stayed with good friends in Redding, so both were wonderful.

This little poem arrived after we returned home.

When the caravan leaves,

all that remains are the story

and some leftover poems.

We sit around the lavish breakfast table

and tell the story, intone the orphan poems,

feast, laugh, and bask in the memories.

The tent is packed up and stowed away,

the instruments are in their cases,

the lavish garments folded and stored,

but the afterglow of good company and good words

lingers, as everyone departs for home

or the next oasis.

Photo by Larry Robinson, set by Larry Robinson and Rebecca Evert

The Woman of the Woods

SoulCollage® card - The Woman of the Woods

She instructed me

to come to her,

told me that if I did,

she would train me.

When I asked how to find her,

she said to come to the woods,

and I would be found.

So, I followed a path through

dense redwoods, and arrived at

a cottage in a clearing.

She stood outside, as gaunt

and skeletal as I remembered.

In front of her stood a fire pit.

 

"The first thing you have to do,"

she said, "is to learn to sit

with the fire."

 

"What kind of training is that?"

I thought.

But I sat down near the fire.

And do you know,

I could not stay with it?

Either I got up,

or I wandered off

in my mind.

 

She shook her bowed head at me.

straight white locks swinging side to side.

"I am an old woman, not a child,"

I snapped at her.

"You have no idea

what old is," she said.

 

"I tell you, you must be with the fire.

Once you can attend,

once you can carry it with you at all times,

once you are incandescent,

then we can begin."

A New Poem: Psalm

In the dream,

she was repeating

the opening lines

of the 23rd psalm,

over and over.

 

But King James's

language

was not her own.

She wanted to

keep the words

as a prayer,

as a mantra,

as a call.

And so she

re-wrote it:

 

Spirit is my guide.

I need nothing else.

It has me rest

in the peace of

the green world.

It leads me to

calm waters.

It restores my soul.

 

The dream was

a healing dream.

And so she kept it

as a gift.

 

SoulCollage® card - Healing Dream

She Put Down the Stone

A new poem....

Exactly one year ago,

she heard the words

Begin with the stones.

Not understanding how,

she moved on.

Forgot.

Dropped the matter.

 

Today, a year later,

she heard the words

She put down the stone.

Well, she had no cause

to keep carrying it.

Its weight was a burden

unfulfilled.

She would never

have thrown it.

She had no idea

what to do with it.

So, she put the stone down.

 

The words today

arrived not as a rebuke,

not even as acknowledgement

of her actions.

She realized they came

as new instruction.

 

So, this time

she put down the stone

as a prayer.

Her prayer was meant

to sink down

into the earth.

Unlike fire or air prayers,

it was not meant

to ascend to

the heavens.

It was a deep

and solemn prayer,

a story, meant

to descend

into the soil,

to be carried by

roots and mycelium,

down into and through

the body of

the Great Mother.

 

After she put down the stone,

she picked up another

to hold, to carry,

and to put down.

More stones,

more prayers,

more healing.

She finally did begin

with the stones,

only a year late,

understanding now

what the words meant,

what these carriers

of slow stories,

offered and gave.

SoulCollage® card - Priestess of Stones

A New Poem: How Beauty Saved Me

When I thought

there was nothing left,

she showed up.

Not to teach me

a lesson, no,

not to reprimand

or preach,

but to lead me

to the door.

She didn't say, 

"Get your butt outside,"

the way I might have.

She wrapped a red shawl

around my shoulders

against the chill

of the wintry wind

on the spring day.

The sun was so bright,

I wanted to close

my eyes, but she

demanded in her

soft voice - "Look." 

And I looked.

And my eyes and heart

were flooded with spring's 

flowering renewal.

Still here.

Beauty and I.

Still here.

Womb Talk, Conclusion

Here is the last piece of my musings on the loss of my womb. 

Hysteria 

To the ancient Egyptians,

it was caused by a displaced

or wandering womb.

To the Greeks,

it also stemmed from

the inability to bear children,

or the unwillingness to marry

(for surely, if you refused to marry,

you must have been hysterical).

They named it for the word

for womb, hystera.

Augustine called it

satanic possession.

Later, its definition mutated

into any mental disturbance 

in women. Men? 

No womb, no hysteria.

When psychology arrived,

diagnoses of anxiety and depression.

eclipsed those of hysteria.

Hmm...

Perhaps women were always

anxious and depressed.

Now, women are called

hysterical when they express

"out of control" emotion.

 

Is it time that we reclaim

the word, the way we did

with "witch" and "crone"?

Let's stop letting them

demean us.

Do we not, in this world,

have so much to

get riled about?

If a woman expresses big feelings,

she is either "shrill" at best,

or "hysterical" at worst.

 

My sisters, we have the right

to our righteous hysteria.

Do our hysterics scare them?

Let's stop apologizing for

our fury, our fear, and distress.

Let's let tears flow in our rage.

Then let us move on to do

what we know how to do -

Caretake the earth, the children,

and each other.

SoulCollage card

Facing the Unknown

Womb Talk, Part 5

I tried several times to listen for a message from my uterus.  I wanted to give it a voice. After all, I called this writing Womb Talk. I attempted to write a poem or two in its voice, but they felt contrived, forced.  The only aspect that resonated was the sense of my womb as an integral, integrated part of a whole working system.  It had a part to play, and it did its job.

Suddenly, while writing one morning, I heard the words, Make of me an offering.

 

Without my striving or forcing the conversation, I understood that my womb had finally spoken to me.  I had asked, and a message came, in its own way and time.

 

Womb Talk

 

Make of me an offering.

Find something round -

         a pomegranate,

         a grapefruit,

         a gourd.

Hollow it out, and fill it

         with berries,

         with seeds,

         with tiny flowers.

Take it in both hands,

and bless it, bless me.

Let it stand for what you cannot hold,

what you willingly surrender.

Place it in the receiving earth.

Cover it gently but firmly.

Say - I release you now,

with my thanks and my sadness.

May Persephone welcome you

into Her underworld home.

 

I have served you well,

filled and emptied,

all in the proper times.

I have rested.

Now I will go into

a deeper rest, knowing

that my work is done,

that I will no longer be knit

into the fabric of

my body's community.

You will go on without me,

and I will leave you

with my blessing.

Farewell.

Fare well.

I followed the directions of the poem, and with the help of some friends, I made my offering. Tomorrow I go to Stanford for my surgery.

SoulCollage® card of an offering

after my first surgery