So my body is ready for Autumn

So we roast the root vegetables.
Carefully, we sharpen the knife.
Carefully, we are still the sacrifice
keeping that wolf’s blood at bay.

How can we ever protect and model,
be the balance we are born to bring forth?
How can we be?

What must we do to be who we are meant to be?

The mornings will be cool soon.
I take care to pack the pan with the right amount of delight.
I take a step that side of abundance to remind myself I am ready. 

How?

Depends on your intention.

Corvid – Crossing – Centring

I don’t know your name
and I don’t know your game
Precisely who you are
Nor exactly why you came
And taught me how to claim
The space that has has no name
And the cars don’t see your games
Nor the people standing by
We’ve lost our sense of joy
Though we all can hear your caw
…calling all of us…

There’s a half-eaten, glazed donut, with pink squiggles, resting on the fire hydrant. It’s been there since yesterday afternoon.

I think about various things while I wait for the lights to change; how the adjacent tram-stop and the randomness of it’s actual versus proposed schedule – how that, in some kind of convergence with the mask-wearing rules, and perhaps not enough unoccupied time to bring it all together, might have delivered this scenario.

However it came about – the crows can see the donut.

That was last week, the donut episode. This morning, I hear the birds who don’t have much to say, indeed many are silent. So I reckon it’s probably going to be overcast this morning with a pleasant afternoon. I learned that much during the long lockdown of 2020. The birds know weather.

They know other things too, as the donut episode proved.

This morning however, we see an hour later that the sun has risen and it is overcast. Apart from the odd flare-up, everyone, including the birds are silent. Probably a couple more hours until the sky is clear of clouds.

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There was a loud cawing that startled people. We all looked around — it came from up there, above the street light. Then the fast-click of the green man, we are focussed on crossing the road. I am looking out for cars turning left and right and preparing for this and that possibility. There’s no time to check what’s going on with the crows who are now shouting to the heavens, in sequence, from three different points above the intersection.

All immediate calamities averted, as the slow-click of the flashing red man begins and the pedestrians exit the crossing, I calmly return to my place on the kerb.

My eyes are drawn to the top of the fire hydrant. It is bare. I look up. Right and left. I spy a large black bird on the light-pole above me, munching on half a donut. A quiet explosion of joy erupts in my heart.

My goodness, that was slick work. Nobody saw the crow get the donut, nobody even saw it move. I’m pretty impressed! I’m thinking they’ve been at this caper a while, as I nod my head.

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They stayed around for a few days, the crows. Their presence began to feel important to me. I remember saying out loud, I can’t see any food this time, I wonder what is happening? So I asked my mother about them.

There are no crows in Australia, only jackdaws and ravens. Crow is also sacred law. Raven is magic. This is good. There is also Waa the protector, and Waang the trickster, and so many other stories of crow from the culture that has always cared for the land I walk with, this is Boon Wurrung and Woi Wurrung country, each side of the river. I think about these things often.

I was influenced by this video that I’ve now watched several times. No question, I love hearing this story.

“””””
Something happened. In the shower, which I think is a good place for these kinds of moments.

Pondering the nature of the yin/yang symbol as it arose in my mind’s eye for no particular reason, it occurred to me quite suddenly… the centre is not round. At least, it doesn’t need to be. Looking inwards, going deeper when one imagines the centre, what does it look like? How do we perceive it? I will tell you right now, for me it’s black, and my perspective of the proper way to use light is to explore that which is not already lit.

Before the shower I had been thinking over the idea that all change happens at the edge, between knowledge and confusion, between chaos and order, on the borders. In a moment I understood that the shape of the unknown is not geometric, it can’t be a circle or sphere with equal force in all directions, because, what of conditions, weather and cycles and the hunt for food, like the way bird songs are influenced? It must be fractal, as in nature. How do I explain (to myself) that these were feelings or experiences, not ideas, which are frequently a half-step-to-twenty-seven-thousand-steps behind.

I tell you, what surprised me the most was an image of Bundjil, the creator, from the video, being thrown up in my mind’s eye as a representation or image of the centre. It was an entirely new feeling. Take a look at the way it is drawn, and then tell me this is not the truth from yet another perspective. Our centre is shaped exactly like the Self. To access it is to embody it. External layers are as relevant as seasons.

For several seconds I was all things and nothing. Unlimited potential without desire, like I understood the end-to-end, iteration-by-iteration, process of creation while it was happening within me. Afterwards I kept thinking of the primordial mass – not that I have much idea what it’s all about, just the impression that the centre is not empty, it’s just made of different stuff, the stuff of infinite possibility, the stuff that precedes life. Like space or air is not empty – or where the hell are we? None of our ideas have any power in this realm which is both before and after existence, before and after time, before and after me. They don’t belong here, they are just passing through.

From within the infinite depths of the unknown, life springs forth in joyous profusion.

Self

Now those birds have gone back down the road a bit to where they usually reside. I spent ages trying to identify them until it got boring and I just smiled at them with all my joy and gratitude for the adventure that trying to see into their world took me on.

Allegiance

I don’t seek your power
I can’t eat your hate _
It’s tasting kind of sour
The way you’ve sealed my fate
But I’m a new beginning
A mix of all that’s true
I am one that’s ending
The pain we all go through
When we divide and conquer
The lovers and the land
Have you stopped to wonder
What you don’t understand
Is maybe the beginnings
Of cracks between our worlds?
Dance into the middle
Where you can glimpse these curls
Won’t you come and join me?
So we can celebrate
That time in our history
Where we’ve wrought right from hate
Nodding to the future
As lives that we might like
Unity’s our culture
And I don’t want to fight
Instead I want to grow us
Right out into the light
Life is gonna show us
Those stars shine bright at night

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Bip

A special memory I would like to share with you…

He was truly delightful and made me giggle a lot, but mostly I was awestruck by his performance, watching from the wings. His old mate Rudolf was there too and I met him, but I did not understand the significance of that until this whole event was a distant memory.

I sometimes tell people I grew up on the stage, but they can’t picture what I mean until I share with them the odd memory such as this. It is possible to be both very open with people and deeply secretive. I am.

Obviously he inspired my blog photo. More importantly this memory represents something about me that I have never let anyone mess with. It is elusive, it is not “on-call” nor greatly on display, but it points to my very essence, to what has proved consistent throughout the years. It lives at the wellspring of my joy.

As a small child, I discovered one of the best ways to guard something intangible is to never let it descend into the realm of language, whether it be spoken, written or thoughts/mental dialogue. I can mention this now because, like a tree that has already grown, I have already taken form.

Everything about me that deviates from this natural course is merely a performance in some way related to survival. Do not judge your inconsistencies. After a couple of years of investigating “the shadow” and allowing it to come into the light, as it were, I can honestly say that it was/is chock full of really good stuff. After the initial shock and displeasure, I find it is the place where so many wonderful, unique and heartfelt aspects of me are born, live and die, only to be reborn again.

If, even for one minute, you’ve ever thought you have spare parts to who you are, things that could be improved about your basic nature, I beg to differ. You only have things that could be discovered and embraced about your basic nature. Everything else is just a performance.

Obviously I am not composing a Dummies Guide to Being A Conformist in this life.

Bizarre notions in polarity

It’s bright, so glaringly bright! Winter’s slipped
as day tumbles forth from night. Creatures dipped
in bronze melt all through my sight. Myna skipped
the fresh-cut grass, catching flight, as clouds wisped
past swathes of blue-tinted light. Ice-wind crisped
breaths healed by Ra’s molten might! Three ants nipped
across the page I’d soon write, darted, tripped
and fell to earth: a great height. Moods have flipped
from tight-clenched fists to delight. Beings tipped
from low to high, wrong to right. Minds equipped
with nature’s gift for insight.  Honey-dripped
days, praise! Loop this bliss-tinged plight with no script.

Cue: the wind

The wild weather
And the wild woman
Have boarded the same train

I am spirit
I am here, deal with it
I’ve kept things gentle for too long now

Everything rests
Everything is supported
Everything continues, each to it’s own nature

The whispering sounds
The roar and rhythm
The drawing of breath, embodiment of truth

I know, it can be a bit too much
A bit too powerful
A bit too chunky, bless their hearts

The forgivers
The aligners
The deniers. Let them flounder.

The sun shines
Water is wet
I am here, be with it.

 

Treasure

The child-goddess and the sage
Are looking through wide-open eyes
Everywhere they see treasure!
Everything in the cosmos has value
Therefore all things are valuable
No experience is lost on them
Nothing of value passes them by

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