crackling

i walked home from yoga tonight in a flurry of white flakes, and the crackling sound of fresh snow under my feet. winter is no longer 'on its way'.

gifts

the gifts of autumn: tears, sadness, loss, space, peace, connection, quiet, intimacy, strength, rootedness, grounding, compassion, kindness, joy, tenderness, faith, magic, inspiration, the ability to let go, music, colour, commitment. serenity, trust, gentleness, a glimpse of the road ahead. and gratitude.

cold

impossible to photograph: the first snowflakes of the year.
the sea is almost too cold for my feet.
winter is on its way.

mist

new song

to practice on my accordion. as soon as i play it as well as this gentleman, i'll post a soundbite. don't hold your breath though, it might be a while...

fall

i sat with my back against a tree, and watched the leaves fall. no two of them fell in quite the same way: some plummeted straight to the ground, as if weighed down with lead (or worries), some floated slowly, some drifted away on the wind, some flipped, some turned, some procrastinated, some hurried, some danced, some sank, some loved it, some clearly didn't, some were graceful, and some clumsy-looking.

they all had one thing in common, though. with each other and with me. they had all recently (very recently) learned to let go.

the two-headed monster...

... that's what toini calls us. bare feet in front, whooping cough at the back.

(and not much sleep for anyone in the last ten days, so the monster thing is not that far off...)

frozen november roses

blue moon

thank you.

day 38

'there is a crack, a crack
in everything
that's how the light gets in,
that's how the light gets in...'

Leonard Cohen

day 37

there was a photograph this summer, that i wanted to take but didn't, of a field of ripe wheat (or was it oats?), bleached white by the sun, straining up towards a blue blue sky. there was a dragon-fly in that photograph too, and the warm fresh smell of morning.

and now, now there is corn in november.

day 36

today i left you behind. in the woods. on the bridge. near the place where those huge mushrooms grow. so that you could watch the pale sun reflected in the water. and i could walk on for a while, by myself.

day 35

little girls do grow up. and yet, years and years down the line, their hair still keeps the shine and the scent of the autumn leaves they once ran through.

day 34

the holly is teaching me about boundaries. below three metres, her leaves are hard and spiky. above three metres they are soft and round. what a wise teacher.

day 33

days 31 and 32

sleepless nights, sandwiched between coughing miserable children. long long days indoors, tending to coughing miserable children. in between all that, meditating on the energy of the flood, on traps and blind spots, on how i get in my own way.

day 30

in a panic. no way to get ground under my feet. at least not right now. am having trouble sitting with the panic. that being the thing about panic. that it's hard to sit with...

day 29

outside my window, the storm is raging. inside, a small orange spider is quietly, dilligently spinning its web. and so it is with me. part storm. part calm work. until i stumble on the perfect remedy for that which is no disease. a poem by Hafiz.

Absolutely Clear

Don't surrender your loneliness
So quickly.
Let it cut more deep.

Let it ferment and season you
As few human
Or even divine ingredients can.

Something missing in my heart tonight
Has made my eyes so soft,
My voice
So tender,

My need of God
Absolutely
Clear.

Shams al-Din Hafiz

day 28

day 27

beyond the tideline. lost my footing. powerful undercurrents. the narrow dramatic one, anna karenina style drowning. the broad, nourishing one, from the lap of my foremothers, learning to make kitchen soup.

day 26

day 25

what the tree said to me. 'as it is above, so it must be below'. and the bear snorted contentedly.

day 24

new moon, hunter's moon, bear energy, making choices, meeting resistance, formulating intention

day 23

day 22

sad, soft, open, full of tears, scared, moved by the wind

day 21

samhain

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