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bluegreen aesthetic

There is an aesthetic that calls to me like it is itself alive, echoing in me the bluegreen longing for trees and rivers and vines, and skies clear or storming or starlit. I want to sing the songs, to drum out the rhythms, to dance and run, wild. I want to participate in rituals of the Great Deep Green and the windblown hilltop and the curling river. I want to ingest sacraments that teach me of plants and places near and far, and I want to sit in meditation beneath old trees and side by side with new saplings, and I want to practice tai chi forms in clearings on dewy mornings. I want to meet the gods, I want to laugh and cry with imperfect people, I want to track animals to watch them watch me in return, and I want to forage for herbs and roots and mushrooms that just might be medicines or maybe food. I want to stare into the fire until my thoughts flash with its stories, and I want to puff on pipe smoke to invite the kindred spirits ‘round to listen and tell tales both new and old. I want to fall in love daily as I meet each person like for the first time, and ever and more deeply with my wife and lover in my arms each night as we fall asleep. I want to wake up every morning with joy in my purpose as a healer. I want to wake up each moment, to each moment, more fully, more deeply, with more clarity and compassion. I want to be tattooed with whorls and rings that remind of vines and branches. I want to wear flowing clothes that move in easy time with my steps on the ground. I want to wear nothing at all, under the moonlight, my beard too long and my eyes crazed with a sacred madness. I want the deep bluegreen of the leaves and shadowed places to hum in time with my own heartbeat, and I want the clear sky overhead and the blaze of sunlight pouring down on my face. I want to be alive.

I know what I am (so clearly and gently she shows me).

The world of bluegreen tree leaves and splashes of sunlight in the grass.

The toss of a cluster of green in tangles of vines all flashing with the breeze.

In the light and in the dark of it, the golden yellows and deep blues and greens

and the smell of decaying browns from the compost

she shows me.

I am just this.

Brought forth just as the shoot from the soil, growing up and out, unfolding.

Not for myself, not alone, but the same as, in the same breath as, with the same matter of,

the ground

the trees

the grass and vines and bushes and birds and cats and squirrels in the yard.

I am alive.

I have a purpose.

I am alive, bluegreen with the tree leaves

and decaying brown with the dirt

and golden in the sun

and silver beneath the moon.

She brought me forth like she does all the rest, but she is not other than the rest, she is us, me.

I have a purpose and my purpose is this very living moment. Unfolding. Already perfect.

And all the little things that have brought themselves together as me

the thoughts and memories

ideas and skills and behaviors and

frailties and strengths

were never meant to be tangled over

to become distressed over what I am or who I should be or how I should be

identity only a song

with a shifting and dynamic melody

changing.

And my purpose like every purpose of every living thing

to reach out a hand

to give out everything there is to give

without limit

because there is only all of this, of us, growing and living and becoming and dying.

I saw life and death passing by one another reaching out hands to caress, gently,

as old familiar lovers

without haste or suspicion or doubt

knowing they are forever and perfectly

intimate

and they let their gaze pass between them and through me

this brief space, where I am both of them

living and dying.

And my only purpose to be

living and dying

with all I have, withholding nothing

giving out to every other in every moment

for their own living and dying

just a hand a smile a touch a word

we are together

you are not alone

I am just you looking back, at you, me at me

known and safe and loved

to hold and to heal.