the kind of quiet that comes after some great struggle sets in

 i go about my business and read and knit and sit in front of a flick now and then

i try to heed my own advice, and am satisfied with the effect

listen to the songs your soul sings while youre sleeping

keeping open to all thats beautiful and unexpected

gentle with yourself, just sit there, a few sweet seeds in an open, outstretched hand,

and something will rise to its own brave occasion

and come to be called companion

 the nights are still full of chirps and whirring

i listened to a troika of some unfamiliar insect triangulated in the trees

each speaking in perfect turn of their Being

the stars are bright and of such a density it is as if they spilled

from some celestial silo across the fallow field of night

the thick river of The Holy Road and the rest in augured constellations

Orion rises now at dawn, and will appear
familiar and encouraging companion of winters long dark contemplations

  by the next Turning of the Wheel.

ladies in the waiting room
clucking out farm tales in hushed tones
grandfathers chased around the barn by freshly beheaded turkeys
hypoallergenic alpaca wool
the many virtues of barn cats and the problem of grandchildren
becoming attached to beef cattle
 its this, and the old men in greasy plastic gimme caps set high on sun-leathered heads
holding court at the feed store counter with their coffee and packets of crackers
discussing with the self assurance of men who have worked in slow, patient unison
with the very Earth herself for their somehow suddenly failing entireties
the price of corn, the quality of hay, the auction
the antics of grandchildren
the damnable exploits of livestock
its this, and the mist in the lowlands in the morning, the rolling luxury of true Earth
where every moment something is different and beautiful
a bird, a flower, a quality of light
everything a story of something it took a million years to make

that called me here

and keeps me, as close to Home as im likely to be.

 Autumn comes to Middle Earth.

the pack and i follow our noses down new paths

the afternoon sun is strong, but dew beads a spiders web

slung across the low green grass of the path and i know

if i try to capture its jewelry with my camera

the dogs will sense my focus and trample the miraculous installation

in that wild abandon of impulse and curiosity

they seem to exhibit most in these threshold seasons

so i stand close while they snuffle the edge of the wood and whine at my dawdling

while i marvel at having intersected with such a

fleeting, fragile manifestation of the magick inherent

in the natural world.

 red Rosehips, purple Asters, Fir babies and Oaklings

all the glorious flora in a

chromatically harmonious, loosely knitted mass

singing Hosannas to the newborn Fall,

shining in sun and glowing in shadow.

 i have felt bereft of late, and knew the only cure was to realign

remember myself as a welcome member of the woods and hills

my face kissed by the low, strong Sun, the Wind running its fingers through my hair

the energy of the Earth rising up through my bootsoles

my blood full of oxygen and wonder

the pure joy of the Dogs, the flash and cry of a Jay

the smell of pinesap and crushed Juniper,

the Land and the Lake and the Sky

and as an omen find a scrap of Coyote fur, to assure me.

 i am so renewed even the Asters in their profusion are miraculous.

Dogwood with their ghostberries and red coral bronchioles

Virginia Creeper a sudden, marvelous scarlet against the yet unyielding green of Buckthorn and Foxgrape

the Sky above just an illusion of blue, that dims and fades after

dinner into apricot and lavender and the imperceptible procession of 

the Stars

from which ive come to bear witness.

 Autumn.

threshold season, receding

i gave him away and the world received him gladly

hawk reunited with the sky

and to me my familiar internal obscurities returned

 paths edged in ivy and briar

lit only by what Lights inside me

the sight of a Turkey Buzzard brings me hope

the sound of the Crows gives me strength

and all the little birds that ease the ache just by their Being

last night i begged for dreams and got deep, blind rest instead

 

 did the Dump Wizard slip a tiny Wild Card into my change?

 

 some good advice i gave that i could really use myself, written here to remind me:

When we maintain a Vision it creates a space in the Field over time in that shape.  The more detailed the Vision, the more finely etched the shape whose outline resonates with an amplified frequency.  From the Chaos, from which springs the Ten Thousand Things, rises the External Manifestation of an intentional shift in Internal Reality, into a space made and waiting for it.