I am standing on top of a mountain looking over a landscape of unspeakable wild natural beauty that stretches as far as I can see. This is the ‘long view’ the dream -maker tells me. The trees are stretching out their lush green needles to the sky as if in prayer, and they are whole. The forests, clear waters, the animals, birds, insects. All of Nature has been returned to a State of Grace.
An Old red skinned Indian Man appears. He is a Grandfather. He is on the mountain with me but also stands below (both and). He speaks to me.
“Sit, listen, this is the Song of Life”.
A finely crafted flowing red clay seat appears below (it flows like a wave) although it is situated a few inches above the earth. Almost hovering. I also see a drum made from deerskin and red clay sitting on the ground. There is a four directional equilateral black cross on the skin of the drum. The cross is thick and around the cross an intricate design is etched/inked into its skin also highlighted in black.
The Grandfather speaks again.
“Sit and play this drum”.
I protest mightily.
“I don’t know how. I know nothing, I say.”
He replies: “Play! It is the song of life”.
My life? Life? I am still protesting, but I know I will play the drum. I will do as he says, though I don’t know how. The drum is a prayer. Now, I am sitting below in front of the drum that is situated on the ground. I wake up.
I will play the drum.
It’s critically important to recognize that dreams/ visions are always filtered through personal experience and need to be understood in this context. Each of us may hold an infinitely small piece of the bigger picture…
For Indigenous peoples the drum is the Heartbeat of the Universe and for some Red Earth is sacred. Indigenous peoples have been crucified since the European invasion that has destroyed the beauty of this beloved country. Indigenous peoples are our continent’s intergenerational seed savers, prophesiers, and story tellers.
This is, I believe, the second dream that I have that reveals that Earth has been restored to a Peace that is beyond our present understanding.
The first dream/vision of this kind I had in New Mexico about six years ago when I held a miniature blue green earth in my hand. Lush green vegetation, and trees of all kinds were present. Wild animals roamed free. There were no people. The most disturbing element for me was not the lack of humans but the fact that the planet was encased in clear plastic.
When I have discussed these two dreams with a few others it has been suggested to me that I didn’t see any humans because the people that survived lived in small bands that were hidden by lush forests. I think of Indigenous myths that indicate that some humans will survive these times.
I wonder what our readers think.
Either way, the edge of hope in these troubled times may lie in ‘Deep Time’, a period that spans millions and millions of years.
Robin Wall Kimmerer, an Indigenous elder and author of Braiding Sweetgrass does not take a position with respect to the survival of the human species.
However, Robin who is also a scholar, scientist, and botanist gives us a hopeful version of earth’s renewal:
“Mosses are the coral reefs of the forest. I have faith in photosynthesis. The plants know what to do. They know how to sequester carbon. They know how to cool the air. They know how to build capacity for ecosystem services and biodiversity. Will the world be different? It will. Will there be tremendous losses? There will. Heartbreaking losses. But the evolutionary creativity of the plant world will renew itself. Plants will figure out how to come back to a homeostatic relationship with the planet.”
I would add that mycelial networks add an even more ancient dimension because their origins stretch back even further than plants taking us back to the beginning of all life as we know it. These underground roots crochet their inconceivably complex fungal webs (hyphae) that transport carbon, water phosphorous and other nutrients below the earth’s surface today. These underground highways are all interconnected and communicating any place that still retains viable soil.
Before that, blue green algae (cyanobacteria) floated on warm shallow waters until they met their first fungal partners. One ate light, the other ate rock and together they oxygenated the earth creating an atmosphere to support all future life on land.
Even in the worst scenario it’s important to remember that this planet has already survived five extinctions.
Life in some form will rise again.
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Your dreams move me to tears and hope. Thank you for sharing such soul-sacred visions, Sara Wright.
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Wow, I am grateful to you for this comment – and yes I too can feel these flickers of hope – they come and go – I take no credit for this kind of dream since at best I am a filter – but I am a dreamer by nature and over the course of a lifetime I have learned that dreams do weave the personal into deep time – note my extreme reluctance to play this drum – clearly I do NOT want to live this story, nor do I feel I have the strength to do so – but it is being required of me – living the unknown just feels totally beyond my ability most days – everything is changing around me and I want it to stop – a foolish old woman – yes? but an honest one… maybe that’s something – and I so believe in what Kimmerer says – the plants will guide….
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PS I think tears and hope for a more sustainable earth – may help us move through this time
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This morning, as I read the parts about the plants renewing and coming back into alignment with Mother Earth and their knowledge of just what to do, my entire body shivered from the inside out.
Iâm connected to all plant life both house plants and outdoor, as well as the wild things, and it was as if I could hear them whispering, âYes. Yes. Thatâs right. Weâre survivors.â
When plants are cut without mercy or care, I can hear them screaming.
Once I lived in a home with a huge Bradford pear tree who told me her name was Grandmother Tree and when she had to be cut after sheâd been struck by lightning, I could hear her screaming.
When I had to move away from there, I was very sad but over the years Iâve met trees who would talk to me and even met one who knew of Grandmother tree. Did you know they talk to one another via way of their root system?
Iâm sorry for such a long comment. This really excited me.
Patty L. Fletcher
About Patty L. Fletcher
Updated November 2024
Patty L. Fletcher is a woman of passion and exploration.
She studies the art of manifestation and is a seeker of knowledge and the wisdom to know what to do with it when itâs learned.
To learn more visit: https://pattysworlds.com/about/ https://pattysworlds.com/about/
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Yes, trees and plants have been teaching me my whole life long before I knew it -and like you I have this YES that bubbles up – the planet will live on… trees and plants are the backbone of life – and yes, trees and plants communicate both above and below ground through mycelial networks – read Merlin Sheldrake’s Entangled Life to get an idea of the power of this mystery that lies beneath our feet and sustains us all.
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Hello, thanks so much for the book recommendation.
It is quite amazing to hear their voices.
Patty L. Fletcher
About Patty L. Fletcher
Updated November 2024
Patty L. Fletcher is a woman of passion and exploration.
She studies the art of manifestation and is a seeker of knowledge and the wisdom to know what to do with it when itâs learned.
To learn more visit: https://pattysworlds.com/about/ https://pattysworlds.com/about/
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You know some of us hear the plants scream – I feel the grief – and sometimes there’s a pungent scent – or a word or sense that is being transmitted…. I never know but I try to pay attention
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I’ve heard plants sing. My house plant Sammy who is a piece Lili blooms all the time year-round and when she blooms, she sings. Her voice is small yet clear like a Pixi and I love hearing her. Grandmother tree had a deep melodious voice, and grandfather tree’s voice was old, cracked, and rough like his bark
And when I am amongst bushes or grasses which are low to the ground, I hear whispering.
Sometimes if I sit very still and touch the plant, I’m listening for I get better connected and can hear more.
Grandmother tree gave me warnings twice which saved my life.
Patty L. Fletcher
About Patty L. Fletcher
Updated November 2024
Patty L. Fletcher is a woman of passion and exploration.
She studies the art of manifestation and is a seeker of knowledge and the wisdom to know what to do with it when it’s learned.
To learn more visit: https://pattysworlds.com/about/ https://pattysworlds.com/about/
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I love the recurrence of the sacred red color in your vision, Sara- the skin, the seat, the drum. When I lived and gardened around red earth, I grew wonderful sweet potatoes! It is more and more vital to me to meditate in deep time, ‘way before and after this short, destructive blip we’re living in. Thank you so much for your encouraging vision, even in all the uncertainties.
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Interesting – red everything and I missed all of it – thanks – not sure what this means besides Indigenous to me because I lived so close to the pueblos…
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This is very moving piece, Sara. I am struck by your dream images as visions for self and society. I am thinking of a talk I went to recently by Elinor Dickson, friend and colleague of Marion Woodman, co-author or Dancing in the Flames, where she recounted a pivotal dream. She was trying to drive up an incline in her father’s car but there was a man with a shot gun at the peak that shot her through her left brain and she thought, “I will never be able to think the same way again.” Then, she got out of the car and saw there was another incline made of red clay. She began to dig her hands into the earth and scramble up.
Red Clay=Earth=Great Goddess (?)
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wow, thanks for this comment – I don’t think there is any question regarding the identity of the goddess – of course – she is red earth and Indigenous too. Or we might say Neolithic.
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What a beautiful, resplendent dream and I loved your insightful, revealing writing and analysis. Maybe you didn’t see any people in the dream because the emphasis of the dream was the survival and resurgence of nature, but I think, yes, pockets of humans will surely survive the coming cataclysm which will undoubtedly destroy “civilization” (it’s hard to call it that these days) in the process. I think that some communities are preparing for this kind future now, more identified with a new world that honors nature than the current one that destroys it. It’s hard to know how to prepare beyond an educated guess because we don’t know what or how it will happen. None the less, there’s a hopefulness to it.
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sometimes I wish I was not a naturalist because I am so worried about the onslaught of polluted air water and soil that is worsening every day… even small bands of people cannot survive if they can no longer breathe – just this morning i woke up to a bleeding orange sun in a dull yellow sky – air pollution is on it’s way….
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Thank you for sharing your dreams, visions, vulnerability and wisdom. The plants, and the mysterious mycelia, awe and humble me, reminding me of the vitality of the earth, her capacity for surprise.
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Yes, surprise and resurrection of the body of the earth still to come though we won’t see it
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