just in case you had other ideas….

one of the big grays who look more like lynx than the usual smaller bobcats here

i love them all but especially these

As a totem symbol bobcats represent not having boundaries. Fine by me, be welcome, but don’t test who owns the little cats here. It has been 11 years of co-existing we seem to be fine.

Raven flight

two lovers paired
in
spiral dance

a flow of patterns
wingtip to wingtip
grace and symmetry
dizzying in the sky

:::

my heart escapes

for just a moment
from this
earthbound form

:::

::

Namnsdag : Göta
(John, Jack, Jane)

the wellspring
pourers of water, of wisdom etched on the runestone

]]> http://www.tseka.com/2008/05/03/the-ravens-dance/feed/ http://www.tseka.com/2008/04/30/may-day-valborg/ http://www.tseka.com/2008/04/30/may-day-valborg/#comments Thu, 01 May 2008 01:30:25 +0000 Ellen Songs of the Northwind a small life http://www.tseka.com/2008/04/30/may-day-valborg/ 1 May / 8 sumars dag
Valborg / May day

Happy May day

When I was a child we celebrated May day by making small baskets out of paper, twine, twigs, they were rustic not meant to last. A handle was the important part and they had to have enough integrity to hold a bouquet of flowers. We went around the woods and into our mother’s gardens collecting a little of everything. When the baskets were full we hung them on the “grannies” doors, knocked, then ran like hell to hide in the bushes to watch her surprise.

Traveling in Italy when I was twenty we met some college kids and fell in with each other since we were all going in the same direction. It was May first, I wished them happy Mayday and shocked them with my political astuteness as they were communists and this was completely unexpected from an American. Ha! I was more shocked when I discovered how my simple “good morning” had been interpreted.

So let me be clear, when I wish you happy Mayday I am wishing that the electro-magnetic energies of the season ignite the fires within you in the most blessed and creative ways. I am thinking not of politics but communion with the Earth and especially showing respect and affection for our “grannies”

from my garden; Graham Thomas rose, Indigo Spires Salvia, French Lavender.

Valborgsmässoafton - tonight the bonfires are lit .

This last night of April celebrates Spring’s arrival, cattle are moved to the paturelands, bonfires are lit, young men and women join hands, we relax into the outward breath of life.

Ignites the fire within us

Laugh and call of spring is splashing down from the mountains a gold and silver music threading through the forest.

can you hear

the creek running

in your veins?

Sunlight in water washes over the land carrying the message everywhere….

Today is the namnsdag of my brother. He arrived in the world three years ahead of me and several weeks ahead of a body that was ready to receive him. In 1949 this premature entry had consequences, which today technology has mostly eliminated. Shortly after birth he suffered an apnea, that is he stopped breathing. He was resuscitated but damage was done. He has lived his life with Cerebral Palsy. Simple tasks and everyday living are anything but simple, swallowing for example is sometimes very difficult.

When I arrived babyhood was short, by three I was second mom helping Mark remove leg braces and clothes after the inevitable “accident” which required clean-up. A very different life for all of us and yet there were amazing rewards. My brother is also deaf. He has taught me much about hearing, seeing, sensing beyond the normal. From him I have learned to be more patient. He has an exceptional IQ yet spent early years in classes with groups of very disabled children of all natures. This childhood community was as diverse as one can imagine spanning April who was in a persistent vegetative state to Mark and a full gamut between. Communication, connecting, I assure you can happen in a multitude of ways.

Mark went on to graduate from Gallaudet College for the Deaf in Washington DC. He was an independent guy flying around the US lobbying for Americans with Disabilities, a real political activist. Several times his Cerebral Palsy took a downturn but between us and homeopathy he always managed to regain lost ground.

Until, two years ago when we were plunged back into the drama of the early days.

My mother and I again put our shoulders together and tried our best to give good care, hoping for the crisis to pass. Unfortunately, age catches us all and our best efforts did not take us where we intended. Mark slipped from being ambulatory to triplegic (loss of legs and one arm) very quickly.

Sometimes life feels like you are jumping from floating log to floating log, they only work well as a raft when tethered together. We found a wonderful assisted living center for the Deaf in Oregon. Mark now resides there. It has been a time of surgeries and sustained effort. We are all entering a new pattern and learning how to appreciate what we still have.

For the astrologers among us. Mark was born in the final moments of Capricorn and is experiencing his Saturn return. While Saturn is rolling back and forth it is catching my SN conjunct my descendant on one side and will slide over my moon/vertex (7th) on the other….pretty much says it all.

Happy Namnsdag Mark, you are beloved, wishing you a smoother path and a shiny new motorized wheelchair to match you.

24 April
Namnsdag Vega Viveka
mend what is broken,

We mend fences both literally and figuratively, so we may move into the next cycle caring for earth, planting, tending, mending in a nicely balanced life.

Tomorrow is the first day of Harpa, the first month of sumar. Harpa is determined by the first Thursday which falls between 19 and 25 of our Gregorian calendar. There are several ways of counting and they all matter. The start point of the year is the midwinter; the solstice when the pole is placed into the earth and directed toward the polestar and all the days are marked on the staff - the runestafa.

Harpa is the modern Swedish word for harp. It is more likely that the word refers to an older meaning - the hag, the old wise woman - a survivor of the harsh winter. She was the counterpart to “old man winter” of January. Today this month is dedicated to youth, expanding, exploring.
The names of the months tie the people to the land, the meanings behind the words illustrate the cycles of life in the far north.

The half division of the year represents the inward breath (winter) and the outward breath (summer). Same for the Northwest Coast Indians. The peoples changed their names to match the season once again. With Bakoos they celebrated flowing outward, moving with the sun on the land into a greening world filled with sound of creeks and birdsong.

A little note, in the old Scandinavian language, the word for breath and soul are the same. We remind ourselves that we are in a union with the Earth, Sky, Wind and Water.