The experiences which have broken me open, torn open the veil and pushed me through, have always been about the land.
Like feeling that you’re risking death each day, flying in a single-engined tin can in the bone-shattering afternoon turbulence of an empty New Mexico desert. (We’re not here to be safe. We’re here to risk everything. Until you’ve looked Death in the face, and smiled, and kept on flying anyway, how can you ever really live? How can you ever imagine you have anything to say?)
Four years on a croft at the farthest, remotest, westernmost edge of Europe, sandwiched between sea and mountain, battered by prevailing winds in two directions. Nothing but you and sea and stone. No quarter. No tree will grow there; can you? What you become, amidst this beauty-ridden extremity, is an apprentice to the land itself: to the deep imagination of this beautiful, animate Earth. You’ve learned how to fall before (if you want to learn how to fly, you have to be prepared to fall) so you close your eyes and open your arms and break your own heart and fall into the land’s deep dreaming.
A few more years, and what goes around comes around, and there you are in a New Mexico desert again, this time feet firmly planted on the ground. On a third long sojourn into that deep white canyon, the land makes love to you. (No, you don’t need to know any more than that.) You gaze into the heart of rock and understand the wisdom of the ashes of ancient volcanoes. There is something inside you that is other-than-human. In the middle of that long night, coyotes cackle and yip under your borrowed bedroom window. Funny guys, coyotes.
It’s deep, this apprenticeship – it’s deep. You walk out into the wild each day, and you start talking. Or singing, or dancing. Waltz with the wild western wind, and what a partner you’ll find. Screech your heart out to a scald crow, and she’ll out-Trickster you anyway. So laugh – above all, always laugh, and wherever possible, at yourself – and sit, then, and just listen. Never mind your stories: listen to the land’s.
It’s a long apprenticeship; you can’t just blunder in. You have to make the full journey to know the land’s stories, to decode the land’s language, and the price of tickets is steep. You have to make the full journey to know the stories and tell them true; you can’t just steal in like a thief in the night and squeeze them on like borrowed clothes. They’ll never really fit. You have to earn the land’s stories. And you earn them by showing up. By putting the time in. Become a supplicant, not a conqueror – for god knows, enough has been pillaged from these lands over the years by men who bring their foreign dogma to compete with our home-grown – land-grown – wisdom.
Dive deep, and when your lungs start to explode, dive deeper still. Deeper and deeper, till all your fine certainties drift away, till everything you ever thought you valued is lost, till there’s nothing left but you and the mother of the sea, you and the father of tides, you and the wild wave. Let your crown go, cast off your costumes and contraptions. Let it be. Let it be.
There you are, cast up, washed out – but still breathing. Cast aside your sea-longings and set foot on terra firma again. Now you’re ready to listen. Now you’re ready to begin.
Reading this gave me shivers of wanting. Wanting to experience fully the same measure of belonging to the Earth, of appreciating to the fullest, the beauty of creation and being in it. I am somewhere past the middle ground of understanding the reality of my existence in communion with the earthly power and grandeur. I journey on and learn from your experiences and understandings of the ancient wisdoms, of the soul’s patterns and connections of the earthly realms and feel companioned on my way. Thank you.
Wow, beautifully said Gail, as was this article of Sharons?
You put exactly into words how I feel.exactly that!
Every word is my heart’s feeling when I merge with the land. The sweetest ecstasy I have ever tasted and the most profound experience.
Powerful and beautiful! Thank you, Sharon
Thank you Sharon for putting words to my heart’s love and appreciation for this deep relationship with land and place. Earth is sacred and in order to be good stewards we must first listen with all our senses to her wisdom and guidance. Your beautiful words brought this remembrance back to me in a powerful way and I am grateful.
Thank you, this rocked me deep to my soul’s foundations. It created a yearning in me to meld with this landscape here in Wales that l am only just scratching the surface. I saw an otter here last week on my first visit to an ancient river, dipping, spiralling, welcoming. Joyous times ahead.
Thank you Sharon, this is a wonderful post. I can resonate with all you say. I am Anglo Irish and came here from England twenty three years ago, meaning only to stay for a while. I loved the raw wildness and spirit of this Isle, like nothing else to be compared to. A neighbour here said that people come to fix their Karma, what a strange thing that would be, but from my first contact with the spirit and soul of this land, I have had to learn many lessons, to end at the beginning, a place of belonging, whether it be here in Ireland or Wales, the place of my birth.
I believe it is simply letting go of all I thought I knew and embraced all that is, in whatever shape or form, and to me, that will always be the wild places, untouched and true to what they are. Somewhere deep inside ourselves, this is who we are.
I enjoyed reading your address to the landscape, as ever!
It was cool last evening. Two russet headed, black and white checked woodpeckers were in the persimmon tree.They were talking loudly and making a plan. Then one of them attacked a persimmon, just as though she were pecking a tree trunk. She seemed to enjoy it. Her partner followed suit.
In the butterfly garden were two Monarchs, drifting among the milkweed, blooming orange.
I picked most of the persimmons this morning, but left a few for my beautiful friends.
Now, the rain is falling, and we need it. The cool and clear will return soon.
Sharon, Thank you for your expressions of the power of sacred place. A year ago, my husband and I moved to Taos, New Mexico, shall I say on a whim? Or rather a deep inner impulse to be on this enchanted land that has called to so many. If Women Rose Rooted was a significant catalyst for this impulsive, but grounded move. The power of this place still calls to us. It is not at easy place to call home, but home it has become.
Julian; I just moved to Abiquiu NM a year ago with my honey. Interesting to just find “If women rose rooted,” started reading it and loving it, searched for her on FB, immediately see her blog about the wild NM landscape, and then see your post. 😉
I’ve lived in NM for most of my life but left it (I thought for good) for CA , until a year ago. The red rocks called me back (now I’ve also fallen in love with the nearby white rocks).
Indeed, it may call but it doesn’t make things easy.
Sharon- Thank you for your work. Reading your book is medicine for me right now.
There is much that is fierce about south Louisiana weather. The heat is the number one thing that is relentless. To be attached to the land in summer means getting out very early to walk and observe, This is why we are so excited about fall, which comes about now.
Summer thunderstorms are amazing and leave us abashed. The thunder rocks the skies and the rain comes down in opaque sheets. Hurricanes are a threat. Wasps must be respected; they seem to attack from nowhere.
And so, this is home. Right now there is a deep green lushness everywhere. The gingers and other tropicals have reached their peak. Will there be a freeze that kills? We never know from year to year. Each day, an unfolding.
Lyn, I know Louisiana too and love the land as you do. Thanks for this!
Stephanie
Thank you, Stephanie!
There is nothing like the land making love to you! Even when its tough love it quakes the bones!!
I love your writing Sharon
There is a quote, attributed to Pompey by Plutarch, which I have used as a guideline. It seems to echo what you are saying. “To sail is necessary, to live is not.”
Oh, perfect! Thank you for that. I’ll remember it.
The earth has always been my best teacher and supportive healer and its tangible sacredness always inspiring to me x reflects back my true nature and creative expressions as it does to all who connect so profoundly xxx love your books sharon that remind me and just been gifted your foxfire, wolfskin book whilst still reading the enchanted life, so some wonderful autumn/winter reading to look forward to!xxx
This is a deep and beautiful and also terrifying call.
I have found my marriage to the land that surrounds me through decades of slowly walking it, and also through my art. Over the past while I’ve been feeling a longing for more. Almost like many many threads are being woven into something I can’t quite see yet. It’s a time of discovery and also gestation. A time to deeply listen and wait. I often watch the blue herons at my pond poised and patiently waiting… they know what can’t be hurried. I feel this truth, too. I’m so glad to have made my way here as one thread in my tapestry of discoveries.