'a field guide to getting lost'

"“Emptiness is the track on which the centered person moves,” said a Tibetan sage six hundred years ago, and the book where I found this edict followed it with an explanation of the word “track” in Tibetan: shul, “a mark that remains after that which made it has passed by—a footprint, for example. In other contexts, shul is used to describe the scarred hollow in the ground where a house once stood, the channel worn through rock where a river runs in flood, the indentation in the grass where an animal slept last night. All of these are shul: the impression of something that used to be there. In this case, such an impression is formed by the indentations, hollows, marks, and scars left by the turbulence of selfish craving.” In Yiddish, shul means a synagogue, but I was trying to send this missing ancestor not to temple but to a path through an uninhabited expanse where heaven seems to come all the way down to your feet." (rebecca solnit, “a field guide to getting lost,” 50-51)

Emil Ludwig, The Nile

The light has broken the silence. A few geese cackle, flying up from a dune to the east above the lake-head, but the white egrets sit motionless in the ambatch. Yonder a solitary grey heron, who has spent the night standing on one leg, makes the first move, draws in his long neck, stretches out his pointed beak, spreads his wings, and flies away low over the water. Soon there is movement everywhere. Sideways-twisted horns sway slowly on a few black heads, suspicious eyes peer into the new light, while a few tufts of hair twitch behind them-- it is a buffalo family, velvety dark, broad-browed, and threatening. (50)

james salter

We dash the black river, its flats smooth as stone. Not a ship, not a dinghy, not one cry of white. The water lies broken, cracked from the wind. This great estuary is wide, endless. The river is brackish, blue with the cold. It passes beneath us blurring. The sea birds hang above it, they wheel, disappear. We flash the wide river, a dream of the past. The deeps fall behind, the bottom is paling the surface, we rush by the shallows, boats beached for winter, desolate piers. And on wings like the gulls, soar up, turn, look back. (light years, not as good as having someone read it aloud to you..........)

Descending eastward, the highland meadows are a stairway to the plain. In July the inland scope of the Rockies is luxuriant with flax and buckwheat, stonecrop and larkspur. The earth unfolds and the limit of the land recedes. Clusters of trees, and animals grazing far into the distance, cause the vision to reach away and wonder to build upon the mind. (N. Scott Momaday, The Way to Rainy Mountain, 1968)

I woke up this morning feeling so refreshed and clear-- I keep thinking to myself--'I am so excited to see what happens'-- when I say this I mean excited about my life! I am trying to cultivate a new perspective, silly as it may sound, whenever I feel fear about the future I asm trying to trick myself and turn it around--

Here's my beautiful wild and (dark!) horoscope for the day. Lately I have been so drawn to birds, have been identifying with them for some reason. Alas, have been thinking about New Mexico this morning, and books. I can't wait for a long cold winter-- staying inside warmly surrounded by books and soft light of my beautiful home.

August 31, 2007
Penetrating The Darkness
Wisdom Of The Owl
For as long as humankind has recognized animals as teachers, wise men and women have recognized traits worthy of respect in both wild and domestic creatures. The cultural and spiritual significance of certain animals transcends geographical boundaries, unifying disparate peoples. Not so the majestic and mysterious owl, which has over many millennia served as the focal point of numerous contradictory beliefs. Though owls have been regarded with awe and fascination, they have also inadvertently served as agents of fear. Since owls are nocturnal, human-owl encounters tended to occur at night and likely when the bird was swooping silently down to earth to grapple with prey. Yet even as some shied away from the owl, calling it an agent of darkness, others recognized the depths of awareness in beautiful owl’s eyes.

In the classical Greek tradition, an owl could often be found perched on the shoulder of Athena, goddess of wisdom, while owls could ward off bad luck in Roman lore. It is in Native American mythos, however, that the owl attains its own unique identity. Owls are patient messengers, bringers of information and the holders of wisdom, and they are capable of seeing the unseen. With their keen eyesight, they can glance into the soul to discern meaning and motive, and they are totems of truth. Unlike our distant forebears, we may never encounter an owl in the wild, but we can nonetheless internalize the wisdom of the owl by attuning ourselves to its most venerable qualities. Fully integrating the medicine of the owl into spiritual existence is a matter of considering how we might open ourselves more fully to the wisdom that can be found in the larger universe.

Should you find your efforts blocked as you commune with the owl, remember that it was not always revered as an icon of wisdom. This denizen of the nighttime has overcome many prejudices in its long association with humankind. To reveal those hidden elements of the self that impact your life for better or for worse, you must often make your way through the darkest parts of your soul as if you yourself are the nocturnal hunter. There is indeed darkness both inside the self and outside the self, but like the owl you can transcend it by drawing nourishment from the insights you receive when you penetrate it. (DailyOm)

the sea

Maui beach rocky black rock and white coral interstitial liminal meeting place between land and sea.
August 24, 2007