November 12, 2010

Part seven of a seven-day meditation, this final installment a fairy tale for you, about waking up the light within . . .

I choose a fairy tale to end this week of writings from my time at the ocean.  I wrote this in response to an unusual prompt from Sarah.  On Friday morning of our retreat, Sarah took out her singing bowl, struck it with the accompanying wooden stick and invited us to do a free write out of the reverberations.

And what follows here, what the bowl sang to me and through me happened to be a fairy tale, which I offer to you this Friday, in hopes that today is a day in which you, too, rise up into the light within yourself.

I wake this morning singing, the vibrations thrumming through me on the million harp strings that make up and wake up my insides.  All of them are plucked.  I wake this morning singing and stringing and winging, like the birds so present overhead and on the sand and perched on the water faucet, waiting for drops and crumbs and bits.  I know how that feels:  to be thin and bony and waiting somewhere for scraps.

To feel my beak severe and my eyes beady, to feel judged, mostly by myself, but maybe too by those who toss scraps quickly out a window or door and then slam it shut, not wanting to have to really look at me.

But one day, there’s someone else, an old woman with full hips and bosom and a smile that makes the sun come up.  She opens the front door of her cottage and walks out, her apron flapping.  Doesn’t even shut the door behind her.  She’s got a basket with a red cloth overflowing from it, and I smell the cinnamon and butter before I see it.

And then I see it, them:  whole cinnamon rolls tossed out onto the path.  I hop over towards them a little.    My wings are still damp from the long storm, and it’s hard to fly this day, so I hop instead, feeling spindly and fragile and sad.  My beak is so dirty from the old fountain water in the park, but it smells so good, this big steaming bun before me, so sweet and yeasty that I forget about how I could be cleaner or more loved, and I just plunge right in.

Then I feel her before I see her, know she’s right there, standing over me, and I get ready to run or hop as far as I can get.  I flap my wings a little, hoping to dry them out and give me at least a chance to fly, and I cast my little eyes up, but she’s not shooing me.

Instead, she’s smiling.  At me.  And wouldn’t you know it?  The sun.  She’s making the sun come up in me, inside me.  I always thought it was just out there, but this morning, I feel it in my belly, this ball of light rising now in my throat over cinnamon and sugar and dough.  Then she sings to me, this woman.  With her sweet full mouth, she smiles and sings.

And as the sun rises up in me, so does a song, a one that knows the sun, that rises with light and stretches me out of this frail body.  As I stretch and grow taller, dropping feathers and filling with light and flesh and hot blood instead of cold and as song meets song and note meets note and chords resonate, I remember who I am.  Who I was.  Who I am.

I stand in the fullness of myself, my own hips and breasts and lips, eye to eye with this woman, still smiling at me, and I flex the fingers on my hands, half expecting them to flap, half expecting myself to shrink again, but not really.  Now that’s not possible.  I am white hot, red hot, orange hot light woman standing and greeting the dawn in me.

I wake,

I wake,

I wake up singing.

Thank you so much for reading. You might notice that I don’t have a space for comments, but I’m certainly open to conversation about what’s written here. If you’re so inspired, feel free to start a conversation with me via the contact form on the homepage of this site.