BEFRIENDING DARKNESS #4: Let the Season Season You

Poem-share for sinking into the energies of the season & #BefriendingDarkness, slowness, silence, & shadows.
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Don’t jump over the season
like an escapee.

You can’t jump over winter—
you may dream of spring
on the solstice
and try for eternal vernal
at the first frost

but you can’t jump over winter.

Slow down and let the season season you.

There is much that is not true
until the darkness gets its due
yet, there is hope in truth

and dark’s your better ally
than unseasonal false friends.

So don’t jump over the season
like an escapee.

Tell me, what are you fleeing from?

Can you flee from the season within you?

Don’t be tempted by the empty calories
of bittersweet fruit too easily procured—
an early ripening causing indigestion.

Let the season season you.

Let the cold crack that hard bark
of yours—open your meadow
to feel it all.

Open your earthbody and feel
even the worst of it—
where it hurts the most.

Oh Be still and let the season season you!

Let darkness fall in you
like a sword of truth
and you will find a deeper root
than you ever knew.

Then—at the ripening hour,
your branches will know
how to celebrate the sky

and your sun will be the true sun
the world is needing most.

Do you understand
these are the kindest words
you’ve yet heard?

#ryanvanlenning
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Included in the new collection ‘Within the Cave Something Pulses.’ #withinthecavesomethingpulses

WITHIN THE CAVE SOMETHING PULSES COURSE (Starting Dec. 15)

DEEP BELONGING FOR THE GREAT TURNING COURSE (Starting January 12)

1:1 EARTH-ROOTED MENTORING & ECOTHERAPY

CUSTOM WILDERNESS CEREMONIES/RITES-OF-PASSAGE (for individuals or small groups up to 4)

BY INVITATION ONLY

Everybody is here by invitation only.

In these parts she’s the host.

The Great River, whose ears
are never closed,
hears autumn knock gently
with mottled wings of crimson-gold
on her front porch.

But I find myself on the back porch
and fall doesn’t even notice me.

Here at the party,
there are no mutters or stutters
though when I’ve filled myself
with all the wrong things
that’s all I can manage.

I’m no good at small talk,
but I can’t abide my own snapping shut,
my own slinking away—
so I’ll sit and listen, I say….I plead…
to somebody who has ears
and eyes, but no face.

Or rather, infinite faces.

Now I’m in it for good, I promise.

I’ve made the promises
it’ll kill me not to keep,
but it nearly kills me to keep them

the way season nearly sinks the sun
and green
in its fabulous dream.

I fall asleep.

But this time, THIS time, I’ll open everything,
I whisper to myself,
braving the light
streaming through the door.

I’ll open everything. (Did I say that out loud?)

Yes, even the bolts rusting
on the hinges of my hidden doors
will come out.

Because she hears everything
she just grins her welcome grin
and carries on,
the life of the party.

And I step in to join.

I’m in it for good, I promise.

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Included in the new collection ‘One Bright and Real Caress’ out in 2021. #onebrightandrealcaress

DEAR MUD

Dear mud,

This is a hard letter to write.

You know how there is a season for everything? I feel
we were meant to be a season
for each other,
not a lifetime.

I do love you. You were
such an important
part of my journey.

But I can’t choose you. I’m sorry our paths aren’t aligned
any longer.

I so appreciate you
and what you bring to the world.

You are such a phenomenal force of nature!

You taught me so much,
about the trail of life
and about the trail of myself.

You showed me how
to slow down.

To really be with things.

You showed me where I’d been.

To
be
careful
where
I
step.

But also how not to be afraid
of really getting in there
and getting dirty.

Oh I’ll always remember the way we mucked each other!

So slow and sensual,
so earthy and juicy,
so alive.

You showed me the texture
of my sacred shining wounds.

Where I was stuck, but also
how to let the words ‘I’m stuck’
fall from my lips
and it be ok.

Yet you also showed
me how to get out.

It starts with saying the truth.
And doesn’t Everything come back to that?

And the truth is
I can’t do this anymore—
There’s a path ahead
I need to explore
on my own.

So I have to say goodbye now.

I’m sorry. Please forgive me.
I forgive you for everything.

I know we did the best we could with the boots and tools we had.

So I’m grabbing the ladder
of my own brave ribs
and with a gigantic sucking heave
pulling myself upward
towards the new sun.

I honor you.
I love you.
Goodbye.

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Kneel for Your Mugwort Blessing

Here’s the final installment of my winter Haiku series! (technically a few days overdue, as Spring Equinox was Tuesday). My goal was a total of 107 Forest Haikus. I achieved it and added one more for a total of 108. Some of you may know the significance of the number. (See the others haikus in the series: Plum Blossom Blankets, Skinny Dipping Water, Fiddlehead Fern Plays an Early Note, Cricket’s Eye Point-of-View, Being Stalked By A Forest, Wings Like Boomerangs, My Tent is Leaking Haikus, Always Coming and Going, and Dancing Naked In the Rain)
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Me and Ms. Otter
surprising one another
in the morning fog
_________________________

Sunday morning church:
kneel for mugwort blessings
as turkeys sing hymns
_________________________

Jackrabbits jumping
during their morning commute
no time for hellos
___________________________

A pair of mule deer
eating the forest buffet
from sunrise to dusk
___________________________

Egret flying by
when I open my tent door—
sure beats traffic jams
_________________________

Final winter rain
spiders think my bed’s a raft
to float into spring
_________________________

Last day of winter
an island in the river
sweet swallows swerving
_________________________

Water’s edge at dawn
the fog and great blue heron
sipping life slowly
_________________________

Hummingbird hovers
in a cerulean sky
chirping for the moon
_________________________

Because words are food
chew on them and let them roll
around in your mouth
_________________________

Spring arrives with rain
someone left their antlers out—
their head must be cold
_________________________

Nearby faraway—
where the seasons still dance for
all our relatives
________________________

Last day of winter
geese are honking up a storm
for a midnight snack
_______________________

From first light to dusk
back and forth and back again
geese fly the river
_______________________

When Quiet is Queen
Winter speaks undying love
in her holy ear
_______________________

Water’s edge at dawn
a river otter splashes
cold spring on his face

—Ryan Van Lenning

Resurrecting the Language of the Earth

After my grandparents died many years ago, I spent a week going through the old farmhouse. Among the cast iron pots, old magazines, and toys from two generations ago, I discovered fragments of old letters that were from my grandfather’s grandmother. Her name was Atalier, and she apparently spoke neither Dutch or English. Growing up playing on the farm, I never heard anything about Atalier, but occasionally I would hear strange words emerge from my grandpa as we ‘walked the beans’ together in the early morning….Ajana minoet a’lan…(the Ulaba song) or from my grandmother when she was picking strawberries in her garden as a light rain fell…patepete arila a’lan….

It was Aduana, the language my grandmother called “language of the earth.” And even they only knew a few words here and there and some lines of songs. The letter fragments of my great-great-great grandmother, along with consulting elders from the old country and listening deeply to the land, have helped me excavate and resurrect it, this rich and endlessly versatile language, with deep roots in the earth and flowing water.

This is the beginning of the Aduana-English Translation Project, perhaps a dictionary for a new era. The translation difficulties are immense, in part because English simply has no one-word equivalencies to Aduana words. The specificity of Aduana to complex natural phenomena is astounding.
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Aduana – 1)the name of an ancient earth language, 2)the force that draws things back to the earth (as in leaves falling to the ground. It is like a combination of the concepts of gravity, spirit, and longing)

A’ndula – The force that draws things in circulations through time (blood, water cycle, etc. When emphasized in an ascending-descending tone (or capitalized) refers to that at the largest scale, which has been translated as “Great Circulation”

nuomi – Season. Each season has its own word for the way something is and looks and feels. There are two words signifying rainy and dry season (iji, uti)
but then 8 further words signifying early fall, deep fall, early winter, deep winter, etc. (nuj, anuj, ota, aota, etc.)

Within those almost endless variations which can be identified by syllables inserted in the middle of the word. They are commonly used adjectively to describe someone’s mood, clothes, stage of life (and someone includes non-humans). It is extremely versatile and specific. For example, “You look deep winter with sunny sky and light mist” can be captured by one word (aotahonariki).

j’anwika – 1)The transition between seasons,  2)Turning the wheel,  3)Life changes (from root wek = change, and a’jan = turning/movement)

wooni or uni – The force that brings a group of animals together (as in when ladybugs clump, bees swarm, humans gather for council, ravens congregate)

awikry – When the weather changes in rapid succession, alternating between sun, rain, hail, etc. (from root wek, meaning change)

lotanna – The force that decays wood

owa – The force that draws things up

hihilan’lan – When worms come out after a rain

patepete – A steady, light rain. With variations: (apatete – A steady, medium rain, opatete – A steady, hard rain, patepet – An unsteady, sproradic rain, patepeni – A warm rain)

loyo-oto – The experience of time-space from a tree’s perspective. Trees experience movement of most animals as time-space jumpers

sono-oto – The experience of time-space from a rock’s perspective. Rocks experience even tree movement as rapid.

o a’lan – The in-between moments just before dawn

ish’a’ish – The sound of lichen growing. said to be heard only by the elders

arduaka – The condition of being muddy, wet, and decaying. Used to refer to seasonal condition or cultural

unche – The sipping of roots, especially by trees (with very soft, barely heard n)

unche-unche – The sound the sipping of roots makes

Apparently, there are no Aduana words for weed, fence, or lie.