I won’t say much now. Maybe I will say more later when more words come, when it is time. I write in a hurry. Scrawling. Rushing. Devolving the deeper I go. I love to write. Why rush? Why haste like it all might get away? My words, the day, myself?
I live in haste. A good American. Born and bred productive.
But, hisses Snake, you were made from a different fire.
Slow the burn. Slow.
As I sink into body, where all good messages go these days, I hear an echo of what sounds like truth so simple, so ancient. Retain the burn. The fire. The energy. The passion. Feed it to me, your body, your being. Let it charge up inside, coursing through arms and legs. Bulding and alive.
We take everything and give everything. Pure chaos and depletion. Of everyone. We are all left hallow.
I am hallow. Sort of.
I am life. Of Earth. Of magic.
Searching and finding my way. A journey I can’t help. A story as old as Earth. Earth’s story, living and breathing and carving in me. A piece of the many.
I have a memory. One of those fine ones that make you remember you are something. Two years back in Colorado. My first hike of a sweet trip, just Fern and me. We scrambled up some rocks off the trail and sat on the creamy mountain. On that stone I looked out at a piney forest. Undulating, rocky and yellow with sun. Blue as the sky and of the sky filling all empty space above. There I realized I was a piece of many. I was Earth. An expression, one of a multitude. All that is here and alive and sedentary, a collection of Earth’s life turning and exploring, all one. Maybe Earth wanted humans as a way to see itself. An overrun multiplication of eyes and brains to look and marvel. Not the only or the best way to experience the magic of Earth’s ownself, but a way, our way. So I sat with Fern, brown and gold, a hiking down, a mountain dog at heart, and I marveled at ourself.
A sweet memory as I learn to retain my burn. To not discharge. Always, and this is one of those rare times I think always is appropriate, I have discharged my energy and passion. My body so low on my priorities. My value solely in achieving, producing, becoming.
A flaming feather fell into my lap. Maybe the normal thing to do would be to dust it away and jump. Maybe I would of if the feather fell any other day.
But sometimes things comes when we are ready for them. Soaked by Dolphin last month. Spider and heron and raven and more before and before. Teachers and forward steps all to this point.
Flaming feather falling. My eyes dazzled as it floated down. Earth must burn to grow anew. I was ready to be set aflame.
The choice was mine.
I could take my time.
The fire wouldn’t be wild and unfettered.
To burn I would have to feed it.
Reciprocity, our truest magic, deepest selves.
To give, to receive.
Flaming feather on my lap,
I picked you up from where you sat.
I tucked you snug into my soul,
protecting and blowing on your glow.
I watched you crackle and flit.
I let myself be transfixed.
I heard you call and felt you burn.
I fed you fuel so I could learn.
And now I see me.
Oh I see.
Cracked and leaking, my light pouring out.
Power lost and out of bounds.
Emptying, emptying, empty.
Snake and heron mix,
a dose of both.
A dash of poison,
feather blue of deep waters.
The trees may burn and I may see,
myself the forest,
incomplete.
To stop the leaks and heal the cracks.
To not roam my energy seeking, always seeking an external home.
Retain, contain, the fire is mine.
Now I know the power inside.
And here is the funniest thing of all. To be who I was meant to be, who I yearn for – I just have to do nothing at all. Truly, I just need to sit here and let the fire rage. Let the energy build. Don’t clean. Don’t type. Don’t plan. Or prepare or maintain or create, just be. Sit and feel it concentrate and roam my forearms. Flash in my chest to belly to vulva. Lick the top of my head. All of this energy contained for the first time ever. I want to scream, bounce off the walls, do something, anything, everything, give me a thing.
I want to sit right here. See that candle burn. Feel those waves, just the same jumping inside of me. To find my power, to be empowered I must keep and collect my power. I am a leaky shell. Cracks all over. If I stay here, the flames will melt me back together, healing the cracks leaving beautiful, fertile land. Where water is retained and nutrients stay. Where I can give when there is bounty and receive when there is not. My energy, mine.
All mine, all mine.
I will be all my energy.
-El An Gilman-