environment – Page 7 – Feminism and Religion

May Day Celebration by Sara Wright

Warms spring rain. The flooding fractured a poorly built bridge, rising waters overflowed moss covered banks – roads disappeared under the deluge, and I was out transplanting the last of my perennials! Working in the rain is a sensual experience – the scent of sweet earth grounds me, the sound of rushing waters not only stills inner chatter but reminds me that this is the time of year that every tribal culture used to celebrate the coming of the rains, the rising of the waters, and the blessing of wildflowers. Today, I know of no one that celebrates May Day but me, although some still honor this day as a Turning of the Wheel of the Year. And how can the latter not be?

After transplanting, moving stones, and feeding the tadpoles in my frog pond, I check on the progress of all the wild bee loving violets around the house. No flowers yet. I visit the brook to peer down at budded trillium and marsh marigolds. One golden blossom greets me in the rain; Mary incarnates! The first delicate trumpets of trailing arbutus glow like pearls. Too late for frog breeding, vernal pools are now overflowing.

Feeding the Birds by Sara Wright

In most cultures white is the color of death. No wonder brides wear white.

When I finally stepped into my life at 39, I entered a mythic world. I married myself to the serpent of life, a creature who is now wrapping itself (both male and female) around the earth four times and squeezing the life out of Her, according to Mythologist Martin Shaw (see Emergence magazine). The serpent, once life bringer for feminists now courts death.

I will always remember Marion Woodman, a Jungian analyst (and personal friend), who stated that every symbol carries both light and dark, and one side of the symbol will always shift into the other… She was speaking metaphorically but my mythic education and life experience as a naturalist have taught me/and continue to teach me that symbols like the serpent that were once holy beings are also living beings that were worshipped by Pre-Christian cultures, and then demonized by Christianity, recovered, and reverenced by feminists. Until now. Today the dark side of serpent has risen again and is swallowing us whole.

Windigo Winter Rolls On by Sara Wright

Preface: Yesterday someone asked me to contribute an academic article that had to be cited to be included in a book. I said no because my academic years are over. My life experience has taught me that education is simply not enough to shift perception, and that Story may be equally/ or more important because story taps into the creative side of us, moving us through our childhood senses which include our feelings. Although not specifically feminist in content, I believe the underlying messages belong to feminism. The first highlights the destructive greedy ‘head’ without a body. The second addresses the complicated situation we find ourselves in – offering us a way through. The second story also highlights the primary difference between an exchange economy and a gift giving one.

The Crow’s Nest by Sara Wright

Bare tree

shadowy veil

old snow

won’t let go.

Beaded Judges

shift

spring tides

hide

predators

with eyes.

Crows

reveal

old bones…

March is the month when crows scream, screeching and mobbing as they soar through indigo skies – their harsh declarations hurt my ears though I know they are mating and nesting.

Mayflower Memories by Sara Wright

Introduction to MAYFLOWER MEMORIES (‘Blood – Root’)

For the past two weeks I have been obsessed by the thought of emerging bloodroot, a wildflower I have loved since childhood that grows just outside my door (among other places). This obsession, and I take each one seriously, always provokes the same question: what’s really going on here? Bloodroot does not bloom under four feet of snow, and my guess is that this year one of my favorite wildflowers won’t burst with white stars until June.

Today, I also remembered with astonishment that in the old ways, Mother’s Day occurred on March 25^th, the time when ‘Becoming’ begins, long before the snow recedes. I’m struck by the difference between the two mothers’ days, this one seems so much more authentic, no room for sentimentality when we face this messy, muddy turning from winter to spring (at least in the Northeast).

Resurrection by Sara Wright

Experts quiped
you would
not rise
Too old
they said
Abandoned
Pink and Rose
No one
imagined
resilience,
pattern
birthing
form
to vine.
Gray green
veins
swell,
pulse,
pump
sugars
skyward,
powered
by a
single root.
Bowed blade
circles
round to
Beginning
Buried deep.
Spiral loosens,
ascends
seeking sun
star heat.

From the Archives: Who Owns the Sacred? A Personal Search beyond (European) Indigenous Knowledge by Eline Kieft

This was originally posted on Jan 17, 2020

For almost 35 years nature has been my sacred place. As an 8-year old, I started to pray to Mother Earth even though the protestant tradition in which I grew up only recognised ‘God the Father’. I went outside in my inflatable rowing boat to seek solitude (as an only child in a quiet family!) on a small island in the lake of our local park. I practised rowing and walking quietly to not break the sacred silence. I collected herbs to brew infusions in my little thermos flask with boiled water brought from home. I sung to the moon, and danced my love for all creation back through my moving body. Over the last 15 or so years, I spent many days and nights at Neolithic monuments, dreaming in ancestral burial mounds, time traveling in stone circles in Cornwall, Wales, Scotland, England, Ireland and Brittany. This nature-based practice evolved naturally, and later incorporated my training with the Scandinavian Centre for Shamanic Studies and the School of Movement Medicine. Nature is where I reconnect most easily with the Sacred, and listen to the whispers on the great web of life in which all of nature is a great teacher. Nature, for me, is a strong place of prayer, solace, awe, reverence, gratitude, joy, guidance, reconnection, healing and transformation.

Magic Seed Moon Meanderings by Sara Wright

Without thinking I threw the old seed into a bag of moist liverworts that I would be looking at under a powerful microscope with my scientist friend Al in a couple of days. I have no idea why I added the seed. The scarlet runner was one I kept in a winter bouquet that I had recently dismantled. The purple and rose bean had to be four or five years old. It would not germinate now …

Imagine my astonishment when I opened the bag in the lab. The bean had sprouted! The fat twisted root was hunting for earth. Carefully I re – wrapped the bean and put it in a little container until I could get home and plant it, but not before we looked at it under the microscope. More about that later.

The Mighty Oak or Acorn? by Sara Wright

Most of us are familiar with the mythology around oak trees. They are considered oracular beings in many traditions. The Druids considered them to be sacred, the Greeks associated oaks with Zeus –( patriarchy strikes as the ‘ king’ of trees). In Britain there was a goddess of oak trees….but in general oaks are considered to be male beings though they bear seeds and flowers on one tree.

Mighty male trees ? Nothing could be further from the truth in terms of behavior because oaks are found all over the world and in this country they are what is considered to be a keystone species. What this means is that oaks support and nurture an incredible amount of animals, insects and birds. A ‘ Mother ‘Tree in every way. We have four species in this country, one of which clones itself and behaves like a bush. It is believed to be about 1300 years old ( found in the west).Throughout the world oaks are also considered to be keystone species.

Aging and Kinship by Sara Wright

When I moved to the mountains my children were grown and gone…

Finally I had land of ‘my’ own with a brook and mountains that was surrounded by forests. I felt protected by something I could not name. I was living on the edge of wilderness and a hunger I had been carrying for all of my adult life was finally appeased.

Although I had a vegetable and flower garden I felt a deep reluctance to cut trees and eventually lost most of my field to pines. When I finally built my log cabin, I did plant fruit trees, but every action was predicated on my need to give back to nature what she had given to me.