Have you ever tried to enter the long black branches of other lives --
tried to imagine what the crisp fringes, full of honey, hanging
from the branches of the young locust trees, in early morning, feel like?
Do you think this world was only an entertainment for you?
Never to enter the sea and notice how the water divides
with perfect courtesy, to let you in!
Never to lie down on the grass, as though you were the grass!
Never to leap to the air as you open your wings over the dark acorn of your heart!
...
Who can open the door who does not reach for the latch?
Who can travel the miles who does not put one foot
in front of the other, all attentive to what presents itself
continually?
Who will behold the inner chamber who has not observed
with admiration, even with rapture, the outer stone?
Well, there is time left --
fields everywhere invite you into them.
And who will care, who will chide you if you wander away
from wherever you are, to look for your soul?
Quickly, then, get up, put on your coat, leave your desk!
To put one's foot into the door of the grass, which is
the mystery, which is death as well as life, and
not be afraid!
To set one's foot in the door of death, and be overcome
with amazement!
...
To sit down, like a weed among weeds, and rustle in the wind!
Listen, are you breathing just a little, and calling it a life?
While the soul, after all, is only a window,
and the opening of the window no more difficult
than the wakening from a little sleep...
Mary Oliver
from "West Wind: Poems and Prose"
Today's dance practice was inspired by the desire to dance with the wind as partner. Earlier in the day I was remembering Mary Oliver's poem above, and was looking forward to wandering "away to look for my soul" while rustling in the wind with the weeds and the grasses...
Between rain squalls today, I was happy to have a few minutes to dance among last summer's grasses and be buffeted by the wind, which was reported to be gusting up to 45 miles per hour.
It had been an emotionally challenging week and I looked forward to letting the wind wash through me and to let go of tension, stress and fears from my being... Although to some degree I did feel cleansed, I also felt somewhat MORE rattled from this wind dance and longed for a deep connection with Mama Earth, to feel more grounded and settled within...
Perhaps tomorrow's dance practice???
Technical note: one of the challenges of using the small tripod set on the earth in the wind is the camera gets buffeted, too :~) Also, it is widescreen camera, so you have to get low and close and while far away from the camera, I never really know what the camera is filming :~)
Feeling grateful for this practice that allows for an opportunity to drop into the body and open to the gifts of the Earth through the exchange or connection with 'other' - today in the form of wind...
Thank you for viewing / reading... I always appreciate comments :~)
Music: Deuter
Visit my butoh mentor's inspiring blog here: Maureen 'Momo' Freehill
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