Ah to be alive

Ah to be alive
on a mid-September morn
fording a stream
barefoot, pants rolled up
holding boots, pack on,
sunshine, ice in the shallows,
northern rockies.
Rustle and shimmer of icy creek waters
stones turn underfoot, small and hard on toes
cold nose dripping
singing inside
creek music, heart music,
smell of sun on gravel.
I pledge allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the soil
of Turtle Island
one eco system
in diversity
under the sun -
With joyful interpenetration for all.

~Gary Snyder

Mountain Spirit Speaks

Oh my children, how I weep for you.
I send my tears down the Esophus Creek, down Panther Creek, off the snowy slopes of Slide Mountain.
For a hundred years my tears have flowed through the aqueduct to nourish the children of all races.
It fills my heart with joy to have a newborn infant washed in my tears.
It fills my heart with joy to slake the thirst of a bowery bum.
It fills my heart with joy to merge with the onions in an onion soup.
It fills my heart with joy to become a hot shower flowing over a human body.
And from this joy I send more tears to create more joy.

But little by little the Circle is being broken.
I send my joy but I do not hear the joy of my beloved in return.
I do not hear sincere gratitude from the other end of the aqueduct.
I am starving for the Spiritual Support I need to express my joy.
I, the Spirit of the Mountain, am as alive and real as the Brooklyn Bridge.
You pay a toll to cross the bridge, because you understand the relationship between bridge and toll.
Yet I hear no prayers, I receive no bundles of fragrant flowers on my mountain tops.
I feel no tears of human gratitude splashing into the Catskill Creeks.
I don’t smell the sweet sage offerings drifting through my forests of pine.
I understand your ignorance; but I can not live outside the boundaries of the Sacred Laws.
Your ignorance of the Sacred Spiritual is killing me.
You can live outside the Sacred Circle for only a finite drop of time.
The Sacred is Infinite and waits for you to wake up into this World beyond Worlds.

~Medicine Bear, Spring, 2006

A bit of background on this work. There are several reservoirs in the Catskill Mountains that feed the water system of New York City with some of the best drinking water in the world. This prose refers to the Spirit of the Catskill Mountains and the unthanked used of these sacred waters. Image is from Kaatskill Falls in the Catskill Mountains.

~via Mandala Madness