Today is Earth day, and a reverence for our blue planet is something I try to be cultivate all year long, not just once annually. In honor of the day, I spent some time in my garden after coming home from work. I took my dogs out into our woods for a romp. I made a dinner with fresh produce. All these things tie me to the rhythms and cycles of nature. The perennials in my garden come back as if on cue, heralding the arrival of spring and the progression of seasons. The trees in the woods are leafing out now, their barren silouhettes just a faded memory. Each year I spend a few weeks in awe of all the green around me. It is so thick it permeates my entire being. I am lucky to live in a part of the world that is so lush with plant life, and thus animal life. Every evening the barred owls in our woods call to one another in a warbly tongue. Tonight a gentle rain is falling, nourishing all life. As darkness falls, my thoughts become still. This poem from Mary Oliver strikes a chord:
Sleeping in the Forest
I thought the earth
remembered me, she
took me back so tenderly, arranging
her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds. I slept
as never before, a stone
on the riverbed, nothing
between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated
light as moths among branches
of the perfect trees. All night
I heard the small kingdoms breathing
around me, the insects, and the birds
who do their work in the darkness. All night
I rose and fell, as if in water, grappling
with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.
Happy Earth Day, Everyone.
Until next time...
Anne
