67\u00a0 bar rises 30.17\u00a0 0mph NNE dew-point 58\u00a0 sunrises 6:15\u00a0 sunset 8:19<\/p>\n
Whole Corn Moon<\/p>\n
“We are reformers in spring and summer; in autumn and winter, we stand by the old; reformers in the morning, conservers at night.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson<\/p>\n
One of the beauties of Emerson is his immersion in the rhythms of the natural world.\u00a0\u00a0 Any farmer, any gardener, even any denizen of the farmer’s markets has a visceral sense of the way human activity changes with the seasons, at least in temperate latitudes.\u00a0 Once the growing season begins, and for a bit before it does, our attention begins to move outside.\u00a0 At first we watch temperatures, frost dates and the warming of the soil.\u00a0 Then, we begin to watch for plant emergence, the ephemerals.\u00a0 Once spring is in full gear with last frost date past, the growing season begins in earnest.\u00a0 This means we are outside, working.\u00a0 In this work we express, as Emerson subtly suggests,\u00a0 our confidence as changers of the world.\u00a0 We plant corn here and corn grows.\u00a0 We plant tulips there and color blossoms.<\/p>\n
Then, when the all the plants save the ancient firs and pines have begun to die back and the vegetables have given their harvest, we turn back toward the inside, reading and crafts and puttering in the workshop perhaps, or focusing on our work for pay.\u00a0 As the nights grow longer, as they do even now, we light our fires and gather in our modern caves, lights on against the dark.<\/p>\n
Still, I part company with Emerson a bit at the end of this quote.\u00a0 The night, as it grows longer and deeper, heading toward the winter solstice, the heart of mid-winter, encourages creativity.\u00a0 The metaphor of the day goes from verdant field to fecund womb.\u00a0 As we slow, pull in our senses and live more in our interior, seeds planted long ago begin to sprout.\u00a0 The novel we muttered about while weeding the tomatoes begins to demand a place in our lives.\u00a0 The child we wondered about in the spring begins to insist, pushing us toward family.\u00a0 The painting influenced by the play of light on brown and withering plants takes on shape and color.<\/p>\n
Hecate. Persephone. Jesus in the tomb.\u00a0 Osiris scattered among the reeds.\u00a0 The rebel angel in Pandemonium.\u00a0 The shadow within our own psyche.\u00a0 All these are night time, dark energy forces.\u00a0 Their energy often sublimates when the external world draws us; but when winter or melancholy strikes,\u00a0 they can draft upward, burst out into full awareness and with their explosive power drive us either toward self-destruction or acts of creation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
67\u00a0 bar rises 30.17\u00a0 0mph NNE dew-point 58\u00a0 sunrises 6:15\u00a0 sunset 8:19 Whole Corn Moon “We are reformers in spring and summer; in autumn and winter, we stand by the old; reformers in the morning, conservers at night.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson One of the beauties of Emerson is his immersion in the rhythms of … Continue reading Dark Energy<\/span>