Nancy Lankston
“My silences had not protected me. Your silences will not protect you.
What are the words you do not yet have?
What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day
and attempt to make your own,
until you sicken and die of them,
still in silence?
… And at last you’ll know with surpassing certainty
that only one thing is more frightening than speaking your truth.
And that is not speaking.”
~Audre Lorde
feminist poet
Image by Henry Percy
“Crow is a symbol of solitude, spiritual strength, and the secret magic of the creative life. Black is the colour of creation, the dark womb out of which the new is born. The three crows were the messengers, reminding me of my intuitive, creative nature, waiting to emerge. Three crows, three sisters, three fates, three witches. They are the triple goddess in her dark, shadowy form.
The Dark Goddess reigns in the space without borders or boundaries. She is the dark side of the moon. She is the creative space, the womb space, the feminine blood mysteries. She is guardian of the life/death/re-birth cycles, and the mistress of transformation and change.
She is Pele, destroying everything that is not useful on our path; she is Lilith, reminding us of our deepest yearning and sexual desires; she is Kali, slaying the demons of our past; she is Sekhmet, showing us how to unlock our anger and our rage. She is the shadow side of our personality – what we try to hide, what we are ashamed of,
what we fear within ourselves, what we have been told to lock away.”
~Kristen Roderick
☾☽
As the nights lengthen
Dark Goddess whispers in the stillness,
waiting to initiate us into
a time of deep dreaming and seeing.
she pulls away the veils, and we are ushered into
a sacred dark space where we can remember, release, and recharge.
In this season of change and letting go
Meditate or call on the archetypal energies of
The Dark Goddess
Learn to release all that is complete, all that longer serves you.
Old woman is watching Watching over you in the darkness of the storm she is watching watching over you weave and mend weave and mend Old Woman is watching watching over you with her bones become a loom she is weaving watching over us weave and mend golden circle weave and mend sacred sisters weave and mend I have been searching lost alone I have been searching for many years I have ben searching Old Woman and I find her in myself
excerpt from “The Face of Old Women” by Anne Cameron
“Women’s stories are as powerful, inspiring, and terrifying as the goddess herself.
And in fact, these are the stories of the goddess.
As women, we know her because we are she.
Each woman, no matter how powerless she might feel,
is a cell within her vast form, an embodiment of her essence,
and each woman’s story is a chapter in the
biography of the sacred feminine.”
☾☽
Every part of Mama Earth is alive and has a spirit; each blade of grass, pine tree, fox, flower, stone and drop of water is infused and flowing with spiritual essence and consciousness. Our Earth is a pulsing, flowing sacred system. And we are completely interwoven and interdependent with every other form of life in this system. All of life is interconnected; the idea that human beings are separate from other life forms is simply an illusion.
Our human actions have a huge effect on our Earth Mother. The history of human life is physically and energetically imprinted into the elements of Mama Earth. Her elemental structures hold our human stories of war and violence, love and connection, loss and pain; our Mother stores our history within her water, soil and stones. Like a great elemental library, the sacred body of Gaia “remembers” the entire history of life on this planet.
“Human history is a Gaian dream.”
~Terence McKenna
Although humans may have long forgotten the stories, Mama Earth continues to hold the history of all those who lived here before us. These traumatic imprints were created through human neglect and ignorance, and they can continue to haunt us for generations. When a piece of land holds a story of human aggression, loss, disconnection, trauma or suffering, those energies continue to impact the animals and people who live, work and interact with that place years later.
Without some form of balancing or clearing process, a traumatic event may continue to negatively impact the land and the people who live on the land years later. Mother Earth can stay ‘stuck’ in a state of imbalance for generations. But each of us can help our mother release old traumas and heal.
Whenever we consciously treat our Earth Mama with the love and respect she deserves, we actually help her restore balance and heal. And we heal our own relationship with this beautiful blue planet in the process.
Carl Sagan once asked, “Who speaks for planet Earth?” I believe it is time for each of us to speak out for Mama Earth.
“There are a thousand ways to kneel and kiss the earth.”
~Rumi
You are always praying; thought itself is prayer.
Whatever you focus your mind on, increases.
To change the world, change your thoughts about the world.
If you want to experience peace—become peace.
Peace is always present, though sometimes hidden.
Love is the only force in the universe.
The world is already healed.
I attended a writer’s workshop near Seattle last week. I camped in a little tent in the middle of a beautiful forest. I was camping alone, but I didn’t feel lonely. The frogs of the nearby pond serenaded me nightly. I would lie each night in my tent beneath two huge old spruce trees and revel in their chorus. Here’s what I learned about frogs…
Frog timing is impeccable. Each night, one or two tiny frogs begin the frog chant and then another 2 or 3 will join in echoing the melody of the first perfectly. Then a third group joins, echoing the same melody. They join their voices and build a master symphony piece by piece, until their ultimate harmony rises and falls, undulating and echoing off the pond. Each masterpiece only lasts for one moment, maybe two. And then silence. Each serenade abruptly stops as if a maestro has cut the air with his baton to signal cease! Yet there is no maestro conductor on this pond. Only a few tiny green frogs magically harmonizing together.
At times, the nightly frog serenade would get so loud that I would literally have trouble thinking. But I was actually ok with that. Witnessing their creation up close was my compensation. It was fascinating to me that each frog sang out his piece of the symphony so loud and proud. I sensed zero hesitation and not an ounce of shame. One night as I listened to the symphony, I wondered to myself what I might learn from these little frogs. There had to be a reason my tent was positioned on the front row at this frog concert. It was too serendipitous to be an accident.
On my third night in the front row at frog symphony hall, I finally received the lesson frog was offering. I realized that I had been lying in my tent each night, debating with myself about how much of my story to write. I had been debating how much of me it was safe to share with the world. Meanwhile just outside, a tiny little frog sat on the muddy bank of a tiny little pond and bellowed out his song. He bellowed out his offering to the Gods with joy and gusto, night after night with little hesitation, Frog refused to be silent. He just belted out his creations for all the world to hear.
Frog didn’t waste time worrying about who was listening. He didn’t worry about what his audience would think of his song. He just sang his song night after night. He sang it with gusto. Maybe, just maybe I was lying there in a tent next to frog’s pond to receive a lesson in the art of expressing myself with joyful abandon?
Joyful abandon… I love the sound of that. Juicy green joyful abandon! I could definitely use more of that in my life. 🙂
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A·ban·don əˈbandən/
noun – complete lack of inhibition or restraint