The Wild Call of Water
On the Shores of Lake Ontario
The water is lapping at the shore, eroding the pathway, toppling the trees on the edge including the shallow-rooted evergreens as I visit the area with five other women. We are asking this landscape: What can you teach me about being with the wounds in us and in the world? I address my question to the voice of the water and begin listening…
I bring life, I take it away. I cleanse and I nourish. I resist your concrete riverbanks and dams… I need to meet and mingle freely with the land, the creatures…
I meet you today in my role as cleanser. You fear destruction, a sense of loss at your shorelines, but your boundaries were, at best, artificially constructed to accommodate your will and desires separate from my full and necessary aliveness.
Listen. Hear the underbelly of my roar. Feel the force of my waves rearranging the shore.
You cannot even begin to see what is being cleansed by my rising tides. A new bargain is being struck, not all in your human favour. But I am essential the same – life-giver, nourisher and cleanser. I am taking back my own vitality – through storms, through melting ice (which holds ancient memories, fresh salt and minerals.) I need to feed myself; my organs (bodies of water) are exhausted, depleted, toxic, stagnant. I am taking back what is mine. You must reclaim what is yours and no longer rob what is not gifted freely and generously.
You ask about wounds. You cannot begin to fathom the depths and breadth of my woundedness. Your paltry discomfort is but as irritating as an insect on your toe. Being open and able to feel my anguish, my devastation, puts things into emotional proportion. If you truly feel and understand my suffering, you may begin to have a glimmer of understanding about the face of my power. You tend to look at each element separately – wind, winter, fire and earth, but it is in these times that you are witnessing the holy conspiracy of all these elements mustered toward creating a new design. Any element will speak to you of what is happening. It will serve as a window, but remember to open your heart’s gaze to the mutability of everything deemed solid.
When you narrow your gaze prematurely, you lose the sense of how all the elements are rapidly re-arranging (rapid in earth-time) to a configuration that will not bend and obey human will in its separateness any longer.
As these rising tides alter the plants and weather, even re-arrange the stones, you can listen and bow to the forces in deep humility and respect for what is being cleansed and carved anew, or you can waste precious breath fighting the inevitable. It is your choice, but none of our concern. The cleansing is going on and must continue… The question is: Will you be present to the immense power of change or will you shrink in separate fear and self-protection?
From this perspective, where are the wounds?