Tattoos and poetry…

contentment

Although I try to live in the moment every single day, I have had a strange, ominous feeling looming over me for a little while now. I believe it is because I have not been present or aware, but instead letting myself float through each day, never fully coming down from the clouds. While it is important to let the mind go sometimes into a dreamer state, it’s also very important to remain grounded as we stretch into the sky. I think the ominous cloud has moved past me and I see sunny skies ahead. Contentment is replacing it. Diving back into daily yoga will help me come back to the ground while allowing my wings to spread, that I know for certain.

I recently decided to get a tattoo. I’ve wanted this tattoo (of a flower- a violet) since I was eleven years old (also when I wanted to wear only black and have a hoop nose ring) and when I turned seventeen I got my nose ring (and took it out, and got it again, and took it out…etc.) and I have waited until the ripe (ha) age of twenty eight to finally ink myself for life. A tattoo is not something I take lightly- it’s there forever. Or, it is supposed to be, at least. So, I did it. Flowers have always been something I love for what they represent, to me: uniqueness, upward growth and change, renewal, life force and energy, strength, and delicate beauty. Each flower is different, and each flower is beautiful in its own way. They can be flawed, different shapes and sizes, and there are so many types of flowers, something for everyone, yet they are all magical and beautiful and they are even sort of serendipitous, as you might find them in a garden, or maybe behind a rock, or the side of the road. I think of the quiet beauty of nature when I look at flowers, and how intricate and simple something can be at the same time. Violet flowers, especially, pop up many different places, a pleasant surprise. Violet’s are traditionally associated with beauty, modesty, power or strength, spirituality, harmony, and individuality. I happened to name my daughter Violet, and I think it’s quite fitting. I am pretty happy with my new “ink” and I am really reminded of life’s simple pleasures and to be grateful each time I look at it. I am just a small, small piece of this giant, mysterious and wonderful world.

allswellthatendswhole.wordpress.com my flower

my other flower, blueberry picking

This has gone hand in hand with the poetry I have been  losing myself in lately. One of my favorite poets is Mary Oliver. What tremendous writing. Again, staying on par with the nature theme, she just poses the most wonderful questions and illustrates the yin and yang of nature so perfectly. A top contender, in my book, is a poem called: Wild Geese, by Mary Oliver:

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting 

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

I wonder if there is an e-book I could download and listen to as I take walks with Violet. I will leave you with my absolute favorite poem:

 

 

The Journey

Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice–

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

“Mend my life!”

each voice cried.

But you didn’t stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do–

determined to save

the only life you could save.

the (my) journey

 

 

“Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel which has crushed it.” – mark twain