Water Calling

The Atlantic Ocean at Ogunquit, Maine. Certainly not an ocean I’ve ever wanted to swim in — COLD — although her magnificence is mesmerizing.

Following are pieces that streamed at various times during the past week …

Dreaming daylight images of swimming in the ocean … when I have never been much of a ‘water person,’ preferring earth and solid ground and dark caves of retreat in solitude. And yet, since deciding to go to Crete, I find myself beset by yearnings to swim in the ocean — to be renewed. And I am called to the Yemaya Assessu chant strongly, mysteriously … as if She is siren and I am helpless to resist. Not that I want to.

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Swim within my own Divine current and allow the wisdom to emerge. It is easier sometimes to grab hold of the tailings of other swimmers as they stroke past in color and speed, but I can never be them, I can only be me. And so the practice is to admire and honor their fluidity while reaching deep within to find the spark that has been born within that makes me unique. The spark that was lit within me that no one else has in quite the same way. To create from that spark of soul and heart, to transform … to welcome the transformation of all my experiences and learning into something to share with others. Truly, I listen to amazing people with determination and drive and my knee-jerk reaction is to follow along because how could I possibly have anything to offer compared to them? And learning from others is fine and beautiful as long as I don’t lose myself or think less of what qualities I bring into the world … my contribution. And it doesn’t need to be grand or to create a big splash. As I flow along within the Divine current, perhaps I create a little eddy or an inlet or I carry a twig upon which rests the creature that will feed the one who creates the big splash that brings all of us into harmony? That would be lovely. So when I get snared by the pull of someone else’s energy, ask … what is the gift here to accept and move on? Where can this insight lift me or cause me to wonder … what now? It can be hard sometimes to be a little fish.

It seems funny to be so captivated by water images floating in my mind these days now that I am living in a desert. But perhaps that is Her secret gift — that now I need to reach my hands into the reservoir that has been filling up during the past years. To experience the arid land and light air that stimulates creative secretions. To release all that has been building up inside and allow the healing I have known to flow out into the river like the artery of red wisdom that no longer manifests physically. To simply open, release, allow, and welcome whatever the expression needs to be in any given moment. To broaden my brush and not try to control or restrict that which flows for it will find its own way out into the world … get out of my egoic desire to control and simply allow. Let it all flow, as I am in the third phase and it is not my place to inhibit the wisdom within me that is a gift of the Divine. Gaia knows where it all needs to flow.

My body is releasing the fat of hibernation-years as I let go of the weight of hand-crafted quilt-skins needed for my own healing. I am grateful for this move, for the challenges that re-awaken me to possibility and potential that seemed stuck in Maine. Much thinking and I feel more fire though I don’t yet know where to direct its heat. The weight of contemplative writing that flowed with such flooding ease has become lighter for now, like feathers that drift upon wind and water … they sink into neither and do not remain still for long. Perhaps the ‘voice’ I heard years ago is now ready to be born? “Wear the gypsy feathers well.” A portent? The message came, I think, before we ever conceived our move, but Gaia knew and was trying to let me know that it’s okay … I can do this … my wings have grown strong once more and I don’t need to let the fears of the past hold me down/back. I keep feeling nervous as if the lack of grounding is ‘bad’ but it’s not … I can become lighter and move more where heart calls and vision beckons. I can flow with the changing current of my journey.

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As I reflect once more upon water, during another monsoon downpour, my thoughts first turn to Crete as an island. Is this part of why I keep feeling the water element calling? Further, is it that I am to bring the water element to the desert in my own small way? And yet, we are all living on islands big or small that rest within the ocean of our planet. Am I an island? Yes, I am an island, and an entity resting — or hurrying — within an engulfing over-culture. And yet, I am no more alone or separate than the earth-islands are for the ocean connects us all.

What might it mean for me to “bring water to the desert?” Healing? Love? Spirit? Inspiring creativity? Wisdom? What is missing here and how can I fill the empty cups of the beings living here? how can we tap into the planetary soul-well, the reservoir that will nourish all of us into an era of peace and joy? How can I nourish myself, my partner, the animals in my care who rely upon me? Is this ocean-within the reason that I am drawn to water now?

Many years ago, I knew the correlations of elements and qualities intimately … I valued and honored those interwoven ropes that created the net of the world. I fell away into a space of self-renewal — became the caterpillar in its cocoon. Now I have emerged and ritual is singing through me to be revealed, unveiled. “Goddess is alive, magic is afoot.” Change is here and transformation calls out to Goddess who calls to me. For we exist within this space as One.

Sadhana spontaneous and different this morning, shifting — waking to rain-laden cloud cover, the air pregnant with water, the memory of torrential downpour fresh from last night, I was swimming in the ocean yet on land! And I knew that the only appropriate music for contemplation was …

“We all come from the Goddess,

and to Her we shall return

like a drop of rain

flowing to the ocean.”

Symbolism everywhere … that I am called to the isle of Crete, to swim in Her cauldron of birthing liquid at the ending of monsoon in a desert where rain has blessed the parched earth for a brief season and led me gently into reconnection with sharing healing however that may manifest.

I have missed ritual and symbols of Divine Mother/Earth Goddess and the Divine Trinity — maiden, mother/queen, crone — and now once more wear upon my ankle the red/white and black braided cord made many years ago in Her honor. Back then, worn only in ritual; now, worn in life as on-going rite of renewal.

My life is now my practice, my spiritual path, they are not separate and can no longer hide the purpose as I begin to glimpse it’s face and form. I cannot decorate it in unbecoming colors or a traditional uniform because it and I have become our true selves and continue to evolve within Her ocean of birthing and becoming.

In The Sea

free photo © Wojciech Plonka | Dreamstime.com

I see the magic key

opening for me

a door into the sea 

of love wherein we

share all life.

I see me 

in the sea

born anew

fresh and full

of purpose.

The sea gives birth to a new me and I open my mouth to drink her in, feeling her flow through ears and eyes and throat and cells refreshed by immersion in her birthing waters. For a moment, I am no more, I disappear and we are here, together, Goddess and me. I laugh and submerge, rising in the foamy waves that wash away all preconceptions and notions of inferior status because of a past that no longer matters as it is pulled apart by the gentle tugging of current and seaweed, an ebb and flow that cannot be resisted — not that I want to, instead I float within the rhythmic rocking of renewal. All the stories coalesce inside and spill out into the sea to be changed, infused with the vibrations of Gaia’s healing tears, and then reabsorbed through skin soft and supple, no longer resistant or hesitant. 

I feel the sea of change, sweeping in her dramatic blue and white gown, reflecting green and orange scarves within her depths until I can see all the colors in me. Transformation pours out of my body, all of its orifices releasing their hold upon the illusion of who I was or should be until only the pure purpose of this form is whole and swimming free. 

I see the magic key for it is me. I am the key to my own life and everything else that stands in my way is swept aside by the powerful sway of the undulating ocean of life expressing her Divine love through this one droplet. Me. I ride upon her waves to the sands of time so warm and glowing with an inner light of sun and moon held from eons past, the tiny granules scrubbing the last bit of old scurf from my heels so I may walk with silken step upon the path that is before me and has always been here though obscured by layers of moldy shoulds and decaying negatory comments that I now see for what they are — the past in transformation, being destroyed to be birthed in her tears, flowing free and full as joy in presence and love in Self. 

Her ocean depths between the worlds are set to bring exploration of ancient glory and remarkable awareness that skimmed the surface of all existence like a shooting star across the sky, light and dark in rowdy play. Disappear and rise, the key always me, shined and polished, tumbled among oceanic trembles and sandy bars where reefs pristine only barriers now to what used to be in the sea. Swept away by the mesmerizing play of images through my mind from memory that is mine yet not. 

A sudden surge of boiling bubbles rise from the deep earth crust, a crack releasing pressure from within and then meeting air continuing to rise as steam … higher than I can see until drifting among the stardust of space and galaxy. Rising. Within my chest there is a mirrored lift, a bubbling to become — from the gentle gurgle of a newborn soul among the tired body form of existence but not new, only newly revealed, all along she has been dancing, treading water with infinite patience while I scrapped and fell and hid and tried not to be who I was. Isn’t she delightful now? She splashes water toward my face and I sputter with laughter that bubbles out of the once-was-drowning gurgle. And crystalline droplets flash in the air that is clear and blue, non-existent yet present as she breathes through me as air and moisture, filling my lungs and cells with renewal.

She is the sea and the sea is me.