FOURTEEN TWENTY-TWO AND BEYOND (NATURE WALKING NARRATIVES)

Dreams where something had struck or happened and there was a catastrophe. Yet, many people lived and the water was surrounding cities, - brown and ugly water as some kind of walls had broken and the world’s water came rushing in from places. There was a man with a phone, and there was still phone reception, in parts, for then, for a time, for some reason. What other odd dreams were there? Hard to remember. In real life as they call it, the fox still wanders the townships. The fox is not red and brown but rather looks dark brown. He has come far too far up from his home, - more than just being a bit adventurous in the night to look in a few garbage bins. No, he doesn’t belong up here, - though perhaps it is us that really should not have belonged. Because of a thumb and a big brain and some other things we have managed to all take over. If the dream was real, maybe the water will take us and our abodes and infrastructure and leave somehow again the fox. The fox is a few fee...

They had cut down the tall grasses and wildflowers that grow in the fields. I suppose it is usually cut once or twice in the summer by the farmer. Much was left, but perhaps five acres was cut. Of maybe ten acres out there, five was cut, and the dogs anyhow loved it because they sprinted right away and began running then in circles and circles, then jumping and talking and being generally free and joyous. A lot of spiders and insects must have lost their homes though as those or that tractor went through. Well, there were less mosquitoes trying to get at me, - in fact I only remember fighting off one deer fly or something now that I think upon it. How wonderful to arrive there and have nobody around,- to have the entire forest to ourselves,- just unbelievable,-and I am each time sort of awestruck by it,- almost like the first day,- over four years ago. I think more people go in the mornings, and then the early afternoons are left for others.  The normal t...

When the night cools, the wind breezes in and the electrical lights flicker and dance and most are yet still. Walkers and dogs, strange foxes and feral creatures alike, skirt around the edges of townships. The infrastructure is well wrought and the humans have encroached far and wide. Oh deer, oh coyote, oh wildflower still blooming and hoping for a longer summer sun and run and fun. How many insects and bees, lady bugs and ants, wander the dark countryside? I saw an old man today, walking, weathered, alive, slow, looking in the grass by the sides of one lane highways. What was he looking for? Hard to know. There are chickens and wild cats, - rocks and so on. I remember the old men of the beach with their metal finding machines, - looking for small treasures on the beach. He reminded me of something like that. Bearded, grey, nicely dishevelled down by tractors and bales of hay, - our eyes briefly met. Where is a rainbow in the sky? Where is the karmic-twin-other? Her eyes have...

Going off the trodden path and heading into the larger forest, I came to a space that was quiet and still, undisturbed and practically undiscovered. There were on the forest floor one million brown pine needs discarded by the branches and this made for a carpet soft and welcoming. The temperature had dropped and it was cool and comfortable whist the sun still let out shards that reached down here and there and illuminated spiders, mushrooms, birch bark, and other. The dogs, joyous, safe, and content, sought to run ‘round in circles, explore, talk in their own way amongst themselves, sniff the woodland floor and the bases of trees. I went up a large hill and at the summit expected to find a path but I did not. I could have circled or cut back right away or soon, but I went on and we had a little adventure. Little mounds of dirt, large trees strewn with moss and small growths, berries, and even birds awaited us. Soon I could not find a path though, and was thick in the middle of quite...

MASTERS MOUNTAINS AND MOMENTS OF SUPREME MASTERS AND OTHER SIGNS Strange. There was a Pepsi truck stalled in the road. In fact there were two accidents before that. Well, one accident up the way from a forest entrance and many police cars and such had the highway closed off and their lights flashing in the overcast day, a day that mixed with the lights somehow felt akin to or something more like, night. The other truck had veered off the way on a side road and people were trying to fix it. Not a day for trucks. Not really a day for travel. I slowed down far behind the Pepsi truck and there was a woman there who was not ugly or beautiful she was just a female woman, a person, but she reminded me of the old renderings of what people used to call ‘Gypsy’. Then, at that moment rather the radio was playing a song about a Gypsy woman and it kept saying, ...sign of the Gypsy Queen.... I thought it odd, but auspicious, though I didn’t and don’t know what it all meant. I was just...

SUPERSTITION MOUNTAIN, AN OIL PAINTING BY MARY HYMERS, 1968 authors note: due to technical difficulties, I cannot include in this article the picture of the painting. but on the facebook fan page I shall be able to upload a photograph of it and include it before and after the link to this article. ------------------ Without looking, without checking, I think that I have heard Superstition Mountain was or is said to contain much mystery. Someone once told me that her grandfather, among others, used to go on sojourns there looking for the gold that was said to have been hidden in the rocks. Did men actually wrest gold out of Superstition Mountain? I don’t know. And why was it called Superstition Mountain? Though I can see paintings and stories in my mind’s eye about men of old who might have set out look around and possibly in the mountain, it does not matter for our purpose here will be to describe the painting for one and the feelings it evokes in this viewer. But first a quic...

There is a large root system that has been turned over by a storm. Its green on the outside waits in the quiet sun that filters through the forest tops. A bumble bee skirts around the edges of these roots and looks for its opening. Little moss grows everywhere. Frogs hide in the little river edges that pass through, - near mud, inside of the water, - their eyes looking out on the larger world. The tall Pines watch also. Sometimes the old farmer walks through their, surveying this or that. The path leading up is steep. Slowly we shall go to the top of the valley wall, to the ridge. But first, the floor and the water and the tree as if living in a secreted world wait. Its quiet save for the water, and the water bubbles over in some places and comes quite gently amongst the good river rocks,- rocks that are tumbled and still then,- smooth and safe, and something else. The ‘else’ is that that they are cold to the touch, - and if you were touch then gently and respectfully with your hand...

We go towards the regular way but for some reason decide to cut right. There is nobody around, - so there are no crowds to avoid. There is the homeless guy in his car back there, and I like him so much and helped tow him and I don’t lock my doors for him or anyone else. If they want whets there, - which are a shop rag, some insect repellent, and the ownership papers and the vehicle itself, - they can go ahead. I can hitch a ride somehow, - and have the same van in a different color waiting for me to pick up quite literally anyhow. Plus, you would be hard pressed to find bad people there, though there have been a few break ins before during a few weeks last summer. Well, - cutting right we see again some interesting insects and flowers and hear some nice sounds but mostly as they say, - as Paul Simon says, the sounds of silence, - though his silence is not good. I see a boulder, - and it’s nice because there are hardly any boulders there. We look out at the vast valley, another one...

Distant was the darkening sky. I thought of Paul Bowles and the book I never read but what a title, The Sheltering Sky. If I can find it I might read it one day. In any event, though I don’t know what The Sheltering Sky is even about,- and only that Bowles lived in Algeria and was vaguely associated with Kerouac and those guys,- the blue sky, darkened as I said, was slowly approaching. And I knew that it was a storm. It was way beyond the fields, past the feed corn stalks that live along the purlieu, and miles and miles out further than the old farmer’s house and barn and tractors. But…it was coming. I think I wanted to feel its rain drops a bit, in order to cool off. I began to leave, but went slowly. There was no thunder or lightning. What was there? A Monarch butterfly, imperial, majestic, solitary, swaying up and down by the Queen’s Lace flowers, - flowers in the hundreds, maybe thousands. I watched the butterfly and slowly approached but it sensed me and went o...

There were several vehicles at the beginning of the different pathways, but Hayden began to think that these were really just people using the place for car-pooling. Convenient. Mid way between the country and the city. And nobody could ever ‘call’ one on it when it came to by-law or owners and so on- as nobody would be able to tell a dog walker or joggers car from someone who just parked and left. The fields, being fields, are open.  Hundreds of little insects, - red and grey and all other assortments, work in the air and around flowers. The main beginning curves into a long sort of causeway and it’s like the beginning part of a jog or run. To the right, far away, can be heard the reports of a shooting range, and these sound like thunder. There is a wild cat that calls out, and a bird also,- plus the sight of a farmers crops that wait patiently in summer under the sun and heat, and sleep deeply I suppose in the winter under ice and snow and what feels moreso ...

It’s shaded on the valley ridge and the old birches have fallen across the one another like soldiers who still wear their bright white uniforms proudly. In the distance some bird calls and one would think the bird is large by the power and prowess of its sound. This voice echoes across the valley and then comes again and again. He or she is calling a friend, a brother, a lover, or possibly just warning someone of something. There is a part near the end were large deer cross, but they are incredibly fast and appear as shape shifters, as something more akin to visions, when they at seen at all. Up there, fewer insects appear because it is dryer and there are not a lot of places for them to reproduce. There are areas within the larger area where dragonflies stay, where butterflies glide, where grasshoppers seem to be the thing, where only a few ants roam, where snakes seem to gather and hunt and watch and be, and all in all, though all these environs intersect, there seems to be a ...

Sometimes before the sun goes down there is nobody there save for the birds overhead and the frogs that hide near the ponds and the other flora and fauna. The walkers and the riders and even the nature enthusiasts have come earlier, and think of things like dinner at that time. That is a good time to go far out past the edge of the forest where the sandpit waits in the late and falling sun, a sun that will disperse itself and fall down soon enough over horizon lines and meadows, going to slumber behind trees and rocks and ridge ways. The little insects are hard at work, and the berries, not yet in full bloom or color, are waiting, poised, just being still in the air and the shards of sun that are left to mingle with the grasses and other feral plants. Breezes and winds have ceased. The sand is soft, the water tumbled rocks friendly. Dogs run and race, play and explore. The world there is a fine mix of golden and green, of silence and quiet song. It begins to tuck itself in under the...

The little creek would have to wait. A storm was coming, and I wanted to get out there, have a walk, and make it home. Over dry patches we went, and some wet ones also. Rain water, sitting there in a hole in a log, and I peaked in to see that there were already little creatures that had used the water environs to sprout themselves up and swim around. We have seen ice and snow, valley and field, rainstorm and parched dry days so bright and hot and bleached out that you felt you were in some weird scene from an independent film. On our drives we have listened to classical, to other things as varied as Tom Waits, Bob Dylan, Bob Marley, AC/DC, Natalie Merchant, and even Marina and the Diamonds. But, mostly we listen to nothing, which is everything. The sound of the wind, the buzz of the bees and the patter patter of rain falling on the windshield. We listen and listen and listen some more. Sometimes they snooze, tired, spent, quietly happy, having exercised their bones and blood and min...

It’s been ages since I have seen that old farmer. But…he may appear yet. I liken him sometimes to a phoenix, though I am not familiar with his ashes. People say he is old and doesn’t come around much to tend the forest and fields. Maybe in a way, in a secular way, they are not incorrect. But the farmer has to live, you see. He is part and parcel there. Just when long stretches without him in sight finish announcing themselves, like a drought, like something, - there is calm. Then, - he reappears, like a vision or a phantom (though that he is not). And he is cutting a fallen tree that has blocked the path, or else riding a small tractor (that is small to him but not small to me) - through the forests in order to find such trees. I don’t know.  There are paths that wind up and are secretive, - they house in certain places, almost unknown, the raspberry bushes feral and honest and wonderful. Some of those branches have black and red berries on the same tree, and others have...

THE MAGICIAN In the Magician's right hand is a  wand  raised toward  heaven , the sky or the element  æther , while his left hand is pointing to the earth. This iconographic  gesture  has multiple meanings, but is endemic to the  Mysteries  and symbolizes divine  immanence , the ability of the magician to bridge the gap between heaven and earth. On the table in front of the Magician the symbols of the four Tarot suits signify the  Classical elements  of earth, air, fire and water. Beneath are  roses  and lilies, the  flos campi  and  lilium convallium , [a]  changed into garden flowers, to show the culture of aspiration. -        Wiki. Pink is the world and the air cooled from the rain. The clouds in the distance race quietly across their backdrop, dispersing, forming, and falling apart in increments. Gone are the snow and the ice laden valley. Gone is the ...

There were eight of them, and it seemed six or seven were taking a good root and beginning to thrive. He had traded a piece of Chaga mushroom from a Silver Birch for the sunflowers. He thought the other barterer, a nice man with the same choice of shoes for some reason, had mentioned that they were not regular sunflowers but the darker ones, with more textured and deeply wrought hues and designs. Hayden was happy at the thought of these different sunflowers, these things that were a first not much more than seedlings, but might one day, with the proper care, grow tall and proud, succinct and curtly yes, but a little wild, yes wild enough. He planted them in the front, near the sun itself, but not close enough to the wall for support. He could always move them. They were small enough yet, about a foot high. But instead, for the time being, he put a piece of bric-a-brac kitsch but at least wooden small fence that he had found somewhere and painted a dark and wonderful blue col...

Now I drink the Cherry Coke from a stolen Captain Morgan class. After the humidity and the flies, mosquitoes, and a hike, the Cherry Coke is like some kind of manna from heaven. It was in the new forest when I started dreaming of the drink and thinking about the cold cans wait in the fridge. They were waiting there due to the kind lady that found them and sent them. May good karma and fortune return two fold to her for her selfless and thoughtful and helpful gesture. As for the glass, I wish I had room, opportunity, and more cargo pants pockets to have taken more. That’s for two reasons. The first being that the eatery we were patronizing at that time was so rude, uncaring, and such, that it leaves a sour taste. Second, it is a great glass, strong, sturdy, actual glass, with a totem pole face to denote something carved from hand; - it has an interesting shape all around, holds a full can of Cherry Coke, and is perhaps my favorite of all glasses currently anyways. P...

In the first phase, as I read in an Osho discourse, and I agree with, one is ruled by the planets. Osho said that those who believe least in the stars, are destined to be completely controlled by them. In the second phase (my term), he mentions somewhere else about the transcendence of the stars or their said influence. When his chart was cast at birth, the astrologer said he would face death every seven years, and would not live past the age of 14 or 21 if he did not live away from his immediate birth family. After enlightenment, he told someone, something to the effect of, Go notify the astrologer. Tell him to come. I have awakened, and therefore astrology will not work on my anymore. I am my own. (I paraphrase a bit). (though I believe this to the extent that it is beyond, say, Gurddieff, or some fourth or fifth stage realization where there is self-actualization, realization, a large amount of awareness, how can it be completely true that there is no influence for some per...