March 30, 2024

I sat by the river several times, and sang, and felt my bare feet on the ground, listening to every sound. In the morning, I thought I could hear the Earth's own sound or music. On one visit, I wrote down words that spoke to me from river tending, as a form of listening. 

Something about this circle of women, and circle of the year and circle of the Earth all felt like a giant embrace today that kept reappearing, with open arms. Love felt palpable in birds' movement, and in flowing river water. 

I felt so aware of Earth as a planet, as a presence in the stillness. And the role of tending to the stillness and to the world called up joy and essentialness in me. Several visits with time by the river to sit and be present to the birds and ripples as water moves connected me to a slow embodied shared sense across everything here. The river, I noticed, feels hemmed in by farmlands, steep banks, and inabilities to meander. Magpies, doves, and small chickadee-like birds shared the spot. Eating dinner, I realized that being in the tending role gave a different flavor to foods, acknowledging all life that makes this possible. 

I feel a deep sense of connection to this mother to us all today, and a flowing sense of honoring all beings and all land and water, and all movements of wind and water. And a breaking heart for the beauty here, with ash and willow and silver birch.