Curious collectors

The walls of our Quonset are bare bones except for a line of clothespins collecting curious things

... 'word crumbs everywhere'

Wild ain't easy. But who planted easy in there with the nature of things anyway? All around me I see the ruckus evidence of life coming on. From the compost or the unruly jumble of ferns and leaf lace that die upon themselves in no order or arrangement, the wild unfolds. 

My friend, the one I have called Gypsy Woman, who calls herself 'crow woman, soft and tender, curious collector of stories, words crumbs everywhere ...' she mourns the loss of a storyteller on the anniversary of her death. The storyteller stirred the wild patience within her. She was not alone the inspiratrix, Adrienne Rich, did so for thousands. 

Wild ain't easy just ask the dandelion as it pushes against the asphalt or breathes in spite of that Roundup applicator just doing his job. Or say something into the mic about the panic in the free-ranging hen when the sky turns black from the wings of a hungry hawk.

Bracken ferns send themselves snake-like through the slots of the vardo decking

We live such short lives when we live the straight line time story. Once we did this, and then we lived here. We made a bunch of money doing this, and lost the keys to paradise when we did this. Then we died. There's food for thought at Myth and Moor today as Terri Windling collects stories for the wild time giving us grist for the wildness within us if only we recognized there is more than one kind of time. 

My kupuna, my ancestors put that message about time into our stories, the chants, the mele 'ike knowledge or floating knowing which might plant itself in you and become mana'o 'i'o or integrated knowing -- you don't just talk about how beautiful is the flower; you become the flower. As the word roots in your gut meaning cracks the hard pan of your being. 'Eli'eli kau mau Dig deep, and what you find, is yours.

If by some Jupiter-inspired stroke of luck we dreamed up a journey where wild patience made it possible to breath like dandelions or remain curious about sparkly things; or maybe it's the memory of that kind hand who leaves French fries at the boat dock. Maybe then being a curious collector would be a genetic and applied knowing that we breath deeply into through our noses. We are wild time things. There is time to breath slowly and deeply.

I don't know for sure but maybe wild is what I am when I pop a rib reaching for something just out of reach. Damn, impatient at first. But when that doesn't work, patiently I wait (again) till I heal and the rib moves where it can do me some good. And then ... I reach (again) and it was worth it. Damn. Yes. It was worth it.