The seeded one,
who all this time has been feeling its way
down into the earth,
up through the earth,
Emerges.
And for the first time
exposes its vulnerable green
to the wind and skies.
And on this particular day, it happens to be raining.
A lot.
“Is this the world now?
Gray and pelting and wet?”
Wearing its own seed,
the vessel of its life,
atop its first leaves
as useful and useless amidst all this air
as a hat.
The next day bright and hot…
“Is this the world now?
Bright and scorching and dry?”
And the next day cold,
“ah, I see, this is the world now…”
I'm not so sure plants don't feel anxiety. Maybe the tree is freaking out to lose its leaves! Maybe the maple is stressed in midsummer heat. Maybe the naked cherry blossom is jealous of the flowering one over on the sunny side of the street. Maybe the dandelions are afraid when they feel the stomp of human boots in the forest.
While I learn loads from our plant companions, I am always hesitant to directly apply their path to our own, despite how many t-shirts and stickers tell me to “bloom where I am planted” or what have you (perhaps more on this gripe later).
But one thing I am watching in this part of the cycle, this spring season of the year is budding and emergence. Across the board of natural life - Nature is good at living in season.
Emergence in the past for me has felt one directional - forward, or maybe out, or up. Ignorant of most everything except the human narrative of “do, go, get.”
But what if…?
What if emergence were more like emptying? Like a seed emerging through, emptying into the earth, at once all its contents of itself exist, including some necessary material that it will soon outgrow.
I’m curious - what if this spring I empty myself of myself?
I’m not sure garlic knows its garlic. Maybe it learns who it is through encountering all it is not: “I am not sky. I am not soil or worm. I am closer to but still not onion. I am me.”
What if…?
What if more essential than knowing where I am going is trusting that internal sense of ‘I am that I am’?
What might that look like? Maybe like coaxing the feeling parts of myself out, getting curious about what is already here? Maybe like first emptying out in ritual or in practice or in sacred spaces, places, pauses, where I can listen to, be with what is here?
What if emergence isn't to go after, but to grow in all the directions and gather in all the resources and listen deeply enough to be in relationship to the world around me?
I'm not saying any of this for surety, but as a curious journeyer looking for new ways to begin, step into herself, and emerge.
P.S. physical postcards are on their way to those who responded to the call <3
Full Circle | Emerging