May Sentences
may-hem
Greetings friends and family. Welcome to this edition of Wild Leaf, where poetry and practice meld into a new leaf of life.
Below are my May Sentences, based on Chris La Tray’s single sentence writing practice. About the practice he writes:
It’s a simple practice and fulfilling … and also maybe not so simple as it may seem. Regardless, the practice is excellent training for paying attention to the small moments of my life, and I enjoy sharing those moments here. This remains the best and most consistent aspect of my writing efforts, and something within the reach of anyone who simply wants to be a more attentive participant in their own life.
“We do not try to hurry things up. We let them follow their natural course like the seasons. We watch the moon in each of its phases. We wait for the rain to fill our rivers and water the thirsty earth. When twilight comes we prepare for the night. At dawn we rise with the sun…We wait for our young people as they grow, stage by stage, through their initiation ceremonies. When a relation dies we wait a long time with the sorrow. We own our grief and allow it to heal slowly.”
~ Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr
May
1. The small herd of horses came close as we entered their pasture - one even nibbled Amara’s ear and hair as I held her in my arms.
2. Pushing myself too hard shoveling dirt and moving water, I hear the blessed sound of two women down at the yurt, cackling and whistling for me to come down.
3. The German woman shows me her freshly potted raspberry bushes, and give me one.
4. With my daughter back, I return to a sense of humane slowness, and stop moving mountains for the day.
5. I drive ridiculously slow up the mountain road, in hopes Amara will fall asleep, and I let the tears flow.
6. The three of us sat out on the front porch, where no one has sat in years I’m sure, and practiced hymns.
7. I collapse on the bed with my dear friend and her new baby, and we catch each other up on all the things as fast as we can until the children wake up.
8. At the dinner table, my friend tells us of some of the long history of our lineage and it’s many flowering branches.
9. After the birthday boy honors me, I sing the butterfly song and people weep.
10. Jay holds the baby, Melissa and I hold baby bunnies, Amara sucks her homemade popsicle and the boys eat their grilled cheese sandwiches.
11. We find a hummingbird all glued to a feeder from the heavy sugar water - it was stuck beneath the plastic, feathers cemented to the plate - as we gently extract her and pour water over her to clean all the hardened sugar water from her feathers, she shivers rapidly and I realize she might die.
12. Amara sat on the irrigation pipe in her new favorite sparkly rainbow unicorn dress while I scattered bales of hay over the young seedlings.
13. I stop and wait with the enormous gurgling orchard mower, as the lady bug flies off the blade of grass.
14. Up in the forest where I’m moving water, I find a plant I’ve never seen before - tall, slender and about to bloom.
15. Finally time stops in the lodge and the way the light and steam surround the rocks, I decide I could live here forever.
16. Transforming on the land, Amara loads the golden buddha, the tiger and polar bear into her wagon, all tied together with a rope and rolls it across the bridge.
17. The thunder stomps all around us as we pour water over the hot stones.
18. Sitting at the edge of the pool, making dandelion soup in the mud water, Amara says to me, “Mama, you need to be gentle with yourself.”
19. I wake up, much too early, after a dream of abundant glittering water flowing down my land.
20. We pull over to the hidden little river spot and Amara jumps out of the car saying, I want to give a gift to Mother Earth!
21. The lilacs, lined up along the fence line, await me as I push and pull the levers of the mini excavator.
22. Cedar smoke filling the yurt, I sweep her feet and chest and arms.
23. We sit at the edge of the waterfall and give up all our used aluna to the spirits there.
24. Aligned, swaddled and well rested, she meets me at the fire to close this significant sunset ceremony.
25. I surrender completely in his arms, in the hot water, and let him sway me back and forth, back and forth.
26. Half of our items are packed up in the truck and Subaru, and we get in bed with no lights on, but somehow I see more with the lights off than I can with my eyes open.
27. Crushed beneath the weight of my child’s wailing preference to be with her papa, I scrub the bathroom floor.
28. I light the beeswax candle in the center of a little yarrow patch, grab a pinch of cedar, and open the space with an offering to the east.
29. The sound of chopping wood echoes through the quiet valley.
30. Cooking on the outdoor wood stove, I thoughtfully add the spices - cayenne, paprika, turmeric - to the slow simmering chicken, and I think to myself, “everything is medicine.”
31. The steam and herbal smoke pour out of the lodge as I carried the stones in, barefoot, facing the mountain.
Everything is medicine - food, water, wind.
Thank you for reading this edition of Wild Leaf, an undulating landscape of meaning, poetry and what it seems to be a mother in these times. Please click the little ❤️ at the bottom of the page here so more readers can find this publication. Paid subscriptions support these works in a big way, thank you. You can also always: Buy Me A Coffee.