Face of Love. {Poetry}

By Tracie Nichols

I feel, in my bones, that everything on this glorious planet has a soul—stones, trees, rivers, animals, people. So I struggle with what feels like my complicity in using parts of the green world as “resources.” I wonder about the sacred life we remove from it’s original home and consume in our everyday lives.

This poem is a collision of two trains of thought:

1) I have long, heartfelt conversations with stones and trees and other beings in the green world, and often wonder how they feel when we remove them from where they grew;

2) Does the purpose for which we remove them have any impact on their thoughts?

When I stumbled across a fascinating image of a stone Buddha head entwined in tree roots at the temple of Wat Mahathat, my heart skittered and my spirit ears perked up. This stone had something to tell us. So, I listened, and flowed his/its words onto the page…

**********

I lie here

part stone part wood

all earth

with the face

of compassion

(so you say).

It was not always my face.

Long ago

I looked

with face broad and smooth

over splashing

valleys.

Water

sculpting her joy

along my arms

into my thighs

hollowing

soft, dark spaces

for the fish to live.

Long ago

wind sang

and took the

gritty gifts I

offered

whisking

my consciousness

skyward and raining

it down

everywhere.

Perhaps that

is how

you knew.

Perhaps that is why

I became

your face

of compassion

today.

I was once

so much to

so many.

Perhaps that

is why

I can be

the face of love

now.

Tracie Nichols, M.A. has scrawled poetry in all sorts of odd places since her 7th grade art teacher made the class write poems to accompany an art assignment. While most of her early works are gone (this is probably a good thing) she continues to scribble about everything from spelunking the depths of her soul to the avian community at her bird feeder. Her wild heart most truly belongs to our beloved, fiercely sacred, earth. When she isn’t playing with words she’s listening to the whispers of the green world, making alchemy with plants and stones and moonlight wildness.

Tracie blogs, shares resources and generally nurtures at her website, Wildly Fiercely Flourishing. You can sometimes find her work on the Journey of the Heart blog. She’d also love it if you connected with her on Twitter, Pinterest, or Facebook.