If I were to say the way of nourishing life, then wouldn’t it be this—to eat well, eat enough, eat of laden boughs, to sleep soundly, to drink deeply of limpid springs, to breathe sweetly of mountain wind? And if someone were to speak out against the nourishing of life, then what should I say—where do you come from but from the milk that you drank as a little babe, to what end the corn porridge that fed you, the mushrooms your mother picked, your father gathered up, to what end the ramps of the forest, the parsnips and apples sweetly drank from meadows laden, the lovely woods that you strolled unaware, a little royal child supported underneath by a tower of ancestors both human & wild, yet never looking down to exclaim, not exclaiming wondrously at the love of ten thousand deities, the love of Earth and Heaven that breathed life into you, until you stopped and saw, until you wandered too far and fell down, down to hard earth, down to the dusty ground, where the Great Mother would not let you fall further, like any good parent would do. And when you let your breath cease, when you thought you’d see how long you’d hold it didn’t Wind gently open your throat again and fill your lungs with sweetness, the sweetness of pure air, of wondrous Heaven? So thought I, friend, so thought I!
A time ago I didn’t know what it was to be well. The harsh winds, the cold winds had blown and my heart was with ice, my brain was filled up with snow and frost. I didn’t know right from left, up from down, now from then; tomorrow was yesterday and yesterday was never. And I didn’t remember how it was that I came to be or where I lost my way. I knew that things had been good, then I became very afraid. When I became very afraid I could not think about tomorrow, only today. I could not think of yesterday, only food. And I could not think of good food or enough, just little nibbles here and there to keep my energy up while I ran around in a panic over how tired I was. The Devil, like a cat, took my mind and tugged at it, just a little at a time, just a little more, until I became too scattered to form a strategy. He tugged a little more, and then I became too tired to do much of anything. I bit and chewed my own tail, thinking, “My tail’s the problem! Let’s do away with my tail!”
What, my friend, is a little mouse without a tail? A clumsy one, that’s for sure. But I’m not dead, not dismembered or chewed-off. It’s not the tail that’s the problem, it’s the cat’s paw sitting on top of it. You don’t chop off your head just because you have a concussion. That’s not the way of things! Just like that, you don’t chop off your feelings just because you feel despondent and terrified.
Only when I felt the teeth of Death upon me did I realize what was up. I ran!—I pulled!—I slipped away!—
There is a time for running, a time for eating, a time for sleeping, a time for gathering up, a time for scattering forth, a time for drinking deeply of limpid springs, for drinking sweetly of the laden boughs of the hobble-berry, of twisted-stalk, of the leaves of curly-dock. A little nibble isn’t good to last the day; a little nap isn’t good to last the night. Thus said Zhuangzi—that a little walk needs no food, but for a great journey you’d better prepare months in advance. That gets to the root of it. A dribble isn’t enough to fill a river; a mountain isn’t just a few pebbles. The wolves and the coyotes can’t live on gnats and flies. Drink well of black-meadows, of deep-earth woods—of mushrooms pluming up from rotting wood, of lovely nuts falling from the laden oaks, of the ten thousand gifts of the lovely deities, your mothers, your fathers upon good earth, upon broad beloved earths the manifold sweetnesses springing up, springing forth from the blacknesses, from the deep black meadow earth, lovely moist forest earth!
Under a mighty hemlock, a person might erect a little house to live in. The cold winds might blow, but, down in the earth, thatched well with tight thatching, thickly walled and well carpeted, with wood a-plenty for to make a fire, one needn’t curl up with a bear for the harshness, needn’t huddle in darkness for the cold. Out in the open air stands a little hut, well made, a little shelter for the weary, refuge for the poor and tired, the haggard traveller to sleep well, sleep deeply and dream well under a starry sky, under a thatch thickly laid with snow and meosh, thickly thatched so as to nourish and protect, huddled beneath, the weary ones, the ones eating little dried things gathered up in warmer days, drinking boiled water dear-fetched of frozen streams fragrantly, singing songs, dreaming again the lovely times, the first coltsfoot flowers as lovely they bloom, upon lovely first earth’s river-sand, first grass growing green beneath the snow, melting away, up in the sky the Pointer-Out climbing down, winding back down below the earth, no longer to harass the haggard soul, to bring fear and terror to the haggard one. The reason we eat and run around, of course, is to sleep. And isn’t that the root of life, sleeping and dreaming, being renewed, coming back from the dead, splendid, a digesting, ruminating of the world into itself, a turning, churning around in this lovely valley Under-the-Willows, betwixt these lovely mountains, The Three, Cloudy-head, Flat-head, Sunny-head and the rest? Isn’t that why we are here—to gestate and give birth to the light of all things, to be the mothers of this Light—mothers of God, aren’t we?—say God is the father—of whom but himself?—and every one of us a lovely Mary, blessed one, mother of God! Is it not so? What would the world be without this whirling turning madness, this twistedness of how things seem to be, how things are? I say, it’s good to be here, good to be upon blessed earth, upon grey stone in the valley where the Qinapaye is lovely flowing, where Luye is blooming in the spring and the goldenrod flames and sparks in the autumn-days, where gravel-root grows in the gravelly places and yarrow up in the high places, where this lovely earth is turning, below and above, light and darkness, fertile darkness and shimmering splendor of light. May it be so! May it be so! May it be!
Fall 2025
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