The House of Wildness

I go for a late afternoon walk. I think -- I’ll just walk around the edge of the cliff and back; but the silence and the wildness of the wind have other plans. I walk to my regular spot where the wooden framed swing is swaying in the gusty breeze, overlooking the Zin Canyon. I love this swing, situated a few meters down an incline. Swinging, you feel as if you might lift off, joining the birds to soar above the vast moonlike formations.

The light is playing across the landscape, dappling the body of the world. I turn to walk back, and as I walk I keep stopping. I keep stopping and looking and sensing and stopping and looking again. My mind wants to know how to get this into my body, how to let the wind pierce through, to feel, really feel, I am here! I am alive! Everything is alive… The trees, rocks and sunlight...
 

A song comes to me, a chant I once learned from a healer woman:

Whirlwind, whirlwind,

Dance around me spirit wind...

Speak to me what I must know…

Carry me where I must go…

Carry me across the earth…

Sew the seeds of my rebirth…

I begin singing and as I sing, I am called in return, to venture off the path down a stone strewn hill, descending into the canyon. I am calling to the wind, and the wind and the land are calling to me… Whirlwind, whirlwind… The lyrics race out of me; stop and start; flow and blow like the wind, dancing. I find a large smooth rock… I kneel, taking in the landscape, the flora dancing in the wind just like my hair… I sit for a few minutes, singing, praying to the wind, talking to her as she races around me… Stealing warmth, teasing… Wilding me… And as I talk to her, my attention is suddenly pulled to a vision, another rock, further afield.

She is dark, almost golden. She is radiant earth, sitting atop a pile of rocks the colour of dry bone. As if marking something: a tomb, or a sacred spot… She calls, and I answer… I walk down the hill, deeper now toward the valley… She is surrounded by daisies, and slim grasses, pushing up through the sandy soil… Next to her, I find a smoother white rock, who invites me to sit on her… I do… I sing… I am singing all this time… Variations on a theme… Letting my voice flow outwards like the wind: Whirlwind, whirlwind, dance around me spirit wind...

I am drawn to touch this dark golden beauty, to hold her in my hands, to stroke her – and I do, with reverence. I don’t dare move her from her spot – that would be like taking the head off a spine... She is in her place, looking out, calling to me. And as I sit next to her now, I am in her house, her apprentice. I am being shown something, though I cannot say it in words. I only know I am in the proper spot, her houseguest, resting upon the seat she offered me…

This rock is like wisdom. She reminds me of a rock I dreamt of, though it was darker and a different shape, which represented wisdom. My wisdom… In the dream, this rock had been a wisdom tooth, that was removed, and I was exhilarated to discover her – She is so big and heavy! I exclaimed in the dream. I could not believe that this rock, this wisdom tooth, had been a part of my body all this time!

 
This golden brown rock emanates her own wisdom, and she teaches me by her pride, her knowing her place, her leadership, unabashed, holding herself up, yet deeply penetrating. She calls me into her. I gaze at all the patterns of gold and black, light brown and darker brown… I feel I must encircle her, and I do. I walk around her slowly, taking in all her dimensions, and then sit again as her apprentice, sitting and singing. Looking out, I bend my knees up like a frog, and take my sandals off to feel the stone beneath my feet.

This land turns you around, soaks you into her dry body, sings you and swirls you in the arms of the wind. There is no wildness like this. There is nowhere else to go or to belong, and if there is, the wind will take me there.

The green bushes that are in full bloom were completely barren six months ago, at the end of summer. I thought they were dead, and now they dance their emerald dance as if to laugh at me – You thought we were dead!

Yes, I thought… But my body and my being know otherwise. As I sit and gaze my eyes start to see the land in a different way. All the details slowly reveal themselves. I see the small wonder of lichen, spreading spotted fingers across each rock. Even if you were to imagine for one moment that rocks were dead matter, you cannot deny that lichen, the lichen that covers them is alive! Here, in this house of wildness, I know the rocks are alive too, their molecules dancing with energy.

The sensation of distance pulsates as the light retreats across the valley. The cliffs ahead are enlightened with the setting sun; their presence, omnipotent as gods. I stare across the space, sensing my body is wrapped in this vastness, this landscape of space and light and wind… I am That, I say to myself, but even those words cannot bring the meaning to life. My mind is forever trying to give me an experience that is already there, already living its life out, like the rock, standing atop its pile of small boulders, glowing gold in the setting sun.

The Zin Valley, Sede Boker, Israel, 2010