Changing Times

The last few months have seen a number of changes. Now we can at least invite people back into our homes – so long as we remember not to get too close. We no longer have to meet folk in the garden or hold a conversation in the street. It is rather less surreal than it seemed at first, but it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see how our lives will be different for some time to come.

BC – Before Covid and Beyond

Remember when

we sat close to friends,

laughed and blethered over

coffee or a dram?

 

Now we have

Covid 19 perhaps

minds focus more

on things that matter –

 

health of the planet,

health of friends and family,

toxicity of capitalism, this

another virus spread world-wide.

 

CG images of Covid19 show

a delicate floral beauty,

almost psychedelic appeal, yet

this virus can’t be scrubbed,

 

can’t be rubbed away like

turquoise-greens of verdigris

that adds aged colour to

copper and brass heirlooms.

 

This latest virus hides

from view, threatens unwary

victims. Its political twin sickens

the economy, also takes lives.

 

Now, we look with changed eyes

we see, we hear, we love

differently; appreciate things

we took for granted BC.

 

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Mothering

Reading Robin Wall Kimmerer’s book Braiding Sweetgrass, I came across a word that was new to me. ‘Eutropic’.

She wrote  A good mother grows into a richly eutropic old woman, knowing that her work doesn’t end until she creates a home where all life’s beings can flourish.

She quotes Paula Gunn Allen, in her book  Grandmothers of the Light. In this book she comments that the phases of a woman’s life spiral through phases like those of the moon – as we begin our lives gathering the experiences in the shelter of our parents, move on to being self-reliant and then reach a time when our own spiritual knowledge and values are needed in the bringing up of our own children.

Paula Gunn Allen wrote about how the spiral widens as we age and our sphere of influence goes beyond the family into the human community and we embrace the needs of our mother earth.

Now we are living in a time when everyone, not just those who have got beyond the time of mothering children, but also children and the childless need to think about how they can be more concerned about the future of this fragile planet and not just think but do something to improve things. We need to preserve this beautiful land, not trash it.