Touching the Sky

The grass at its feet is but so little to a tree  . . . the shrubs at its knees are so little to a tree . . . and though the ocean is in alignment with the spirit of the trees, it is the sky for which the trees outstretch their limbs as they sway with its breezes . . . and endure its rainy moods . . . and bow reverently under the weight of its crystal snows . . . and as they balance in this way, through movement and touch, the trees and skies exchange . . . day in and day out . . . year after year . . . the essence of their hearts. 

Migrating with the Butterflies

I hear the roar of the ocean as it pours over the tops of the trees in the butterfly grove as I listen intently to the hummingbird clicks and the scrub jay calls . . . I would walk silently to obscure my presence but that is difficult to do on a sandy path hardened by the footsteps of the many who come to stop and feel this place, a small stand of trees where the Monarch butterflies have sought winter sanctuary for centuries . . .

There are no butterflies here today . . . they are long gone northward in their four-generations a year journey . . . the first generation commencing the migration and the last generation, those with the longest lifespans, tasked with finding their way back to their winter home, one they have never seen and that only their tiny hearts ‘know’ exists. 

Last fall, I was among them as I arrived at the grove in November, something that was randomly planned yet somehow meaningfully concluded with an arrival on the day I turned sixty.   Did I feel some generational pull to return this place and to cling to the mild California winter along with them?  And have I come here seeking sanctuary . . . or regeneration . . . or both? 

I am feeling the call of the North again and I am wondering if I am part of the Monarchs’ journey too . . . with my northerly journey whose lapsed departure somehow balances the southern flow of their arrival?  I did not plan this balancing act, though something about it feels true . . .

Sometimes life is just that . . . to and fro . . . to and fro . . . to and fro . . .  in some personal ancient pattern that we inherently ‘know’ exists . . . our hearts silently pulling us along to our destinies.

Dolores

Sipping my morning camellia tea

while the garden shadows flicker about me,

reflecting on my deep San Francisco roots,

and pondering why love remains so aloof.

 

This day I shall walk to the Dolores school

to saunter in the vapor trails of my mother’s young shoes,

and I shall trace the ghost of the Dolores Creek

that vanished with its lagoon into mystery.

 

Soul repaired by the loving airs that silent tears share,

I shall leave all of my worries and my sorrows there.

T. Gramercy

theresegramercy.com

Blue Leaf

The blue leaf awakened,

when stained by rain,

now one with the stone,

for such was its fate,

full of conundrum,

it asked of me on this day.

   

Do the cold winds blow

true love from above?

Do the twilight stars shine

above the notes of a song?

Do the crying doves sing

a song of true love?

   

Does the love from above

touch the trees by the sea?

Does the song float above

the sea in love’s dream?

Does the love in the song

light the dreams of the trees?

   

Do the trees by the seas

want the cold winds to blow?

Do the seas of love’s dream

light the stars’ shine at twilight?

Do the dreams of the trees

make the singing doves cry?

   

I asked the blue leaf,

in a soft, whispered plea,

heart to heart with the leaf,

why would it ask about these,

circular questions that sing

of the conundrums of trees?

   

The dreams of the trees

are held in me, the blue leaf,

the leaf that felt blue,

when it fell from a tree,

for stone I might as well be,

no longer held by a tree.

T. Gramercy
theresegramercy.com

Lavender Sky

My heart wants to live in the lavender sky,

in the infinity zone of striated cloud lines, 

where peace and love are forever first,

unlike the way it is where our feet touch the earth.

T. Gramercy

theresegramercy.com

She Waits

And she waits,

and the shells pearl,

and she waits,

and the seeds whorl,

and she waits,

and the waves curl,

and she waits,

and the clouds swirl,

and she waits,

and the sun burns,

and she waits,

and the sea churns,

and she waits,

and the earth turns,

and she waits,

and the heart learns.

T. Gramercy

theresegramercy.com

Two Oceans

A woman and her child walked along the seashore.  They came to a rocky knoll and climbed up until they reached a platform of flat rocks where they could sit and look around them as far as the eye could see.  After gazing at the ocean in silence, the child asked her mother to tell her the story of the ocean again.

 

She told her child that the world was once a very different place.  Trash lined the highways.  The rivers poured chemicals into the sea. The rain forests were cut down and burned.  The sky was brown with pollution.  Bigger and bigger oil spills occurred in the oceans of the world.  Life continued on as if all of this was normal, but it became harder and harder for the people to fool themselves into believing the lie, that their way of living was healthy and the world would be fine.  When the animals and the sea creatures began dying, the people become sad, then really worried, and they started to fear what their future would bring.  They were told there was a woman in the north who could tell them and they sent their most sincere young man to learn what he could of their destiny. 

 

He traveled far north to the land that was known at that time as Alaska.  He asked where he could find the woman who was known as Sky Love.  He found her just as they said he would, outside in nature, tending her garden as she smiled at the sky, her long gray hair blowing in the breeze.  He introduced himself and told her that he knew she was one who could see the visions and that he had come to learn the destiny of the earth.  She told him that she had been waiting for his visit.  They sat down together on a stone bench in her peaceful garden.  They continued to sit quietly together while she gathered her thoughts, then she began to tell him her vision.  

 

The ocean was dying from the continuous fouling of its waters.  The chain of life would stop at the beginning.  The smaller life forms would be the first to go, along with those species that were few in number.  As the oceans died, so would the land, for the rains would dump the poisons of the ocean waters onto the soils of their farmlands.  The desert would spread around the world.  The animals and the people would die and the dead earth with its stagnant black ocean would become a silent place in the universe.

 

The young man was sad and told her that he feared it would be so.  He thanked her and got up to leave.  She smiled at him and told him that she had an alternate vision, but that this vision of the future was still possible for only a short time, and would he like to know that vision too.  He sat back down and begged her to proceed.  She allowed them to settle back into their quiet state again, then she told him the second vision.

 

She warned him that this vision had only a sliver of hope remaining, for the world would have to act quickly and act together as one, and time was running out to begin all the work that had to be done.  If they could work together, pool their resources, share the guilt and responsibility, believe in the good inside of each other, then the oceans would recover.  The rains would become clean again and the farmlands would prosper.  The oceans and the skies would again be blue, a most heavenly blue.  They would have to act without delay and tirelessly at first to accomplish this, for the oceans were almost beyond repair.  They would have to change their ways for good this time and truly learn to respect the earth.  It could no longer be left to another generation.  If this generation would not make these urgent changes now then the first vision would become their future.  The choice of which ocean, black or blue, was their destiny to decide.

 

He thanked her again for her time and told her that he had to leave right away, that the oceans were counting on him.  She smiled as she told him that she believed in his spirit.  She kissed his cheek, and turned back to walk in her garden and she gazed into the sky as she loved to do.

 

The mother placed her arm around her child as they continued to stare at the ocean together.  Her child looked up at her and thanked her for explaining to her once again why the ocean was so blue, but she still wanted to know what became of Sky Love.  Her mother told her, that like all people, she returned to the sky.  The legend says that when she was returning, that huge iridescent halibut jumped out of the ocean and applauded as she passed by.  The legend also says that whenever you do a kind thing to help the earth or the sky or the ocean, that you will feel her kiss upon your cheek to thank you as her spirit passes by on the breeze and that you will come to know the meaning of sky love.

T. Gramercy

theresegramercy.com