Tag: faerie

Finding Your Wings

Posted on by Beth Weaver-Kreider in Gratitudes, Musings

Gratitude List:
1. Feeling my wings
2. Grades are ready to submit for Quarter 1. How have we gotten here already?
3. Breath. It’s always there when I need it, and more effective than sugar or coffee for a quick lift.
4. Keeping the resolve
5. The tunnel to Faerie up in the orchard, between the pear and cherry trees.

May we walk in Beauty! Breathe.

Sit in a quiet place, calm and undisturbed. Shift yourself into place. Let your upper body fidget a bit.  Shrug and stretch, stretch your spine upwards, making little breathing spaces between all the bone. Sigh. Yawn. Sigh audibly. Settle your bones, making sure your ribcage is straight, your shoulders are restful, your hips are aligned.

Now begin to notice your breath as it enters and leaves the space of your body. Notice where your body rests on the chair, the floor, the earth. As you hold your awareness on your points of contact with earth, begin to draw the breath into your whole body. Breathe not only into your lungs, but into your stomach.

Feel the breath enliven your ribs and your gut. Breathe into the muscles and bones of your arms. Draw it down over your shoulders, swirling down your arms and down to your fingertips. As you breathe out, feel the breath flow out the tips of your fingers.

Draw breath down your spine. Let it flow out the base of your spine. Breathe it into your thighs and down your legs. Wiggle your toes and ankles as the breath fills your feet and trickles out the soles of your feet into the earth.

Breathe. And breathe. And breathe

Now shuffle your upper body once again, like a bird re-adjusting its feathers, and find your way to stillness, letting the breath continue to circulate through you.

Bring your attention to your back. Sit up a little straighter and pull your shoulders back. Can you sense your shoulder blades back there? These are your wingbuds. Breathe into them and out through them. Shift your shoulders as you need to, to maintain your awareness of them.

Feel or imagine them beginning to itch, to swell, to pulse with life. Feel the moment when a small, folded pair of wings bursts through the surface, like the tiny curl of a plant breaking through soil, or a small bird breaking out of an egg. As they grow larger with each breath, notice their color, their texture. Don’t rush to unfold them. Let them develop. Feel them in the space behind you. Roll your shoulders forward. Shrug. Give them space.

Then, when you are ready, on a breath, lift them upward and out. Feel their strength. Feel the way they lift you. Practice opening them and folding them. Notice how they become invisible when you fold them up, how you will be able to go about your normal life with your wings folded against your shoulders and back, and only those who Know will know.

Now when you need them, to give you strength, to help you move from one stuck place to a new open field—when you need to escape—when you need to see something from a distance, to change your perspective—now they will be there for you. All you have to do is to breathe into them, hear them rustle in the space behind you, stretch, and open.

Most Days

Posted on by Beth Weaver-Kreider in Gratitudes, Musings

  

Thursday Thoughts:
“You can learn to be lucky. It’s not a mystical force you’re born with, but a habit you can develop. How? For starters, be open to new experiences, trust your gut wisdom, expect good fortune, see the bright side of challenging events, and master the art of maximizing serendipitous opportunities.” —Rob Brezsny
***
“There is a way that nature speaks, that land speaks. Most of the time we are simply not patient enough, quiet enough to pay attention to the story.” —Linda Hogan
***
“You choose to be a novelist, but you’re chosen to be a poet. This is a gift and it’s a tremendous responsibility. You have to be willing to give something terribly intimate and secret of yourself to the world and not care, because you have to believe that what you have to say is important enough.” —May Sarton
***
“There is indeed a fire burning over the earth, taking with it plants and animals, cultures, languages, ancient skills, and visionary wisdom. Quelling this flame and reinventing the poetry of diversity is perhaps the most important challenge of our time.” —Wade Davis, The Wayfinders
***
“. . .war against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it. . . . [E]very war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defence against a homicidal maniac. . . .

The essential job is to get people to recognise war propaganda when they see it, especially when it is disguised as peace propaganda.” —George Orwell

 

Gulls, Crows and Wild Geese

Posted on by Beth Weaver-Kreider in Gratitudes

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Gratitude List:
1.  The life and influence of Grace Lefever, herbalist, peace and justice advocate, wise woman, compassionate heart, teacher
2.  Wild chamomile feathering up through the brown grass and dead leaves
3.  Hundreds of wild geese flying over the farm in the mist this morning: “You do not have to be good.”
And crows and gulls flying and calling through the rain above the farm this afternoon: “Be here.  Let your wild self fly free.”
4.  The faerie worlds and magic that my friend Heather sees and offers in her photographs
5.  Rainy day art projects: “Hey Mom, can we do that thing that we do?  Where we draw and then trade?”

May we walk in Beauty!

Prepositions and Polarities

Posted on by Beth Weaver-Kreider in Gratitudes, Poems

Gratitude List:
1. So many faerie diamonds a-dazzle in the sunlight on the ice on the River in the morning.
2. Prepositions
3. Holding the polarities
4. Valuing my work
5. This poem by Rilke:
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
I’ve been circling for thousands of years
and I still don’t know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?

May we walk in Beauty.

Last year, I read something by Rob Brezsny, in which he challenged people to look at that Rilke poem and use it as a template for their own poem.  Here’s mine for today:
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across time and space.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

I circle around the Mystery, around that ancient tor.
I have been circling all my many lives
and I still don’t know: am I a the dancer,
the crone, or the ineffable fool?