Photo Credit: Kent Shiraishi
The Breath of Winter
The wilderness and miracle of birth surrounds us,
Darkness calling like a womb:
Warm, nutrient rich, thick with meaning and mystery.
It is the annual exhale.
To return again, is the call.
To bare ourselves open and steep in the truth and fullness
Of this moment as it is:
A flurry of activity projects and plans;
A wash of exhaustion and despair for the world;
The unrelenting passing of day into night and night into day;
The whisper of enchantment and miraculous being,
As green urges upward – through rock and earth,
To pulsate with sun, air, rain and wind.
Simple magnificence.
Can we answer the call to bare ourselves open?
To receive the wild wisdom of winter?
To participate with the blessing of birth, the holiness of withering?
To allow our lives to break into song openly and unexpectedly?
Winter is calling:
“Rest like bear.
Sink into the softness of the time.
Drench yourself in the dark,
Opening to what is gestating in your bones.
Let your heart soften as you rest,
Exhale…
And let your heart be enchanted by your life.”
December 15th, 2004