Sounds

I apologized for the sound of thunder and the fire gently crackling and offered to turn it off — canned noises which I had turned on for comfort.

The friends gathered electronically into my one-room cabin from across the globe said, “No! Please leave it on! We like it.”

We like feeling cozy by the fireside and we like knowing the rumbly storm is out there. It’s the perfect condition for cuddling up with a story,

even the blank page kind.

So very fine

I cannot remember seeing the moon so very fine and slender a sickle, though I must have done.

It is dark later and later, though, and there is always tomorrow. Let us hope the clouds stay away.

Tonight

Is this what the holy women on sister paths feel as the moment approaches?
All others fall away to their much-loved rightful places,
but tonight!
Tonight!

Tonight is for the one to whom my spirit turns
in exactly this way
on exactly this night
at exactly the edge of the wild.

Hoofbeats, heartbeats,
Power,
Freedom,
Passion.

Tonight.

Not that complicated

I managed to sort out some of the tangle in my head.
I’ve accumulated tools over time:

A speaking stone, so that each thought knows when it is their turn to speak — a stone smooth and spherical and a deep plum color which rests in an amethyst geode atop a stone plinth;

A coffee station, a sandwich station, and a dessert station which distracts the thoughts enough to spread them out a bit (sometimes all they want is some warmth or nourishment or sweetness. don’t we all?);

A comb, mother-of-pearl (mother-of-moonlight?), with the magical property of smoothness to untangle the thoughts as they lie sleep-mussed in my mind. I have noticed that the simple act of combing the thoughts can quiet them and give them peace.

Echoes

I have stories in my head
and words
and I don’t know which ones to write
and which ones to simply enjoy as they flit through my head
and which ones to let go
and which ones to share.

Sunrise

Last night’s rain drips still from the living roof onto the front step.
Sgiobalta is woofing in her sleep.
Max dozes between my feet.
Coffee drips.
Sky lightens.

A return to ordinary time

Val rustles,
Grace gets up briefly and stumbles back to bed.

The heat comes on briefly, and the fridge, and now the coffee maker is hissing its way to life.

The fog is thick enough to hold the colors of leaves as daylight seeps its way in.
Soon enough.
Soon enough.

Hermitage time — gratitude

I am grateful for this time of stillness and isolation.
I am grateful for peace and plenty.
I am grateful for the companionship of good dogs.

I am grateful to the Great Spirit of Love and Mystery
and the gods of my ancestors.

All woods are One Wood
from the first.