Walk In Beauty

.Reading time 2 minutes.

Many years ago I was on a road trip through the American southwest and in a bookstore somewhere, stumbled across a small square book titled: Navajo, Walking in Beauty. It was then that I was first introduced to the Navajo word hózhó. Roughly translated into English as “beauty”, hózhó encompasses the concepts of harmony, balance, and reciprocal relations. Instantly, I fell in love. I was deeply moved by the possibility that beauty is an expression of harmony and profound spiritual realization—a perception that understands beauty to be both embodied aesthetic expression, as well as ineffable and transcendent sensibility.

Hózhó is realized by aligning one’s self with the forces of nature. It is a dynamic and ongoing process of harmonizing the self with the world and the entirety of the universe and existence. To “walk in beauty” is in essence, to live a life of harmony and peace.  

Following is the concluding refrain from a Navajo ceremonial song:

Beauty before me, I walk with.
Beauty behind me, I walk with.
Beauty above me, I walk with.
Beauty below me, I walk with.
Beauty all around me, I walk with.
In old age, the beautiful trail, I walk with.
It is I, I walk with.

Not only is one blessed to walk in a world of beauty, but in the end one becomes beauty itself. Hózhó. It is with this understanding of beauty by which I am most inspired to express myself in the world. Through my writing, photography, dance and poetry, I hope to invoke this world of hózhó. Whether on this website and blog, my social media pages or publications, I hope you will find inspiration and hózhó for your own journey through life. May you walk in beauty.

if today i die
may beauty be my only 
footprints in the sand

止め石 tomeishi

.Reading time less than 1 minute.

And then she stumbled
into an enchanted garden
where
just ahead on the path
sat a little wild rabbit, cute and captivating
stone-still
but unlike Alice she flew
up into worlds
with endless sunlight
and fields of flowers for as far as
she could see
Her rabbit,
being sometimes a stag or a dragon or a jaguar
an angel or
polaris itself,
holds her hand
and together they venture further out and beyond and further still
into this garden
into this deep well of light
where
all the paths converge, and where
only love itself
shines
in the darkness

(this is something of a sequel to my last post, “rolling stone”)

    rolling stone

    .Reading time 1 minute.

    *photo credit: Kanenori on Pixabay
    (I slightly altered photo color and light.)

    i am
    a rolling stone
    mossy
    messy
    and
    deep emerald green

    Have you ever tried writing the story of your life in six to ten words? I tried this recently with some of my students, and came up with the following:
    a rolling stone, mossy, messy, deep emerald green
    After reflecting on it for a bit, I was pleasantly surprised by how much of me unpacked within just eight words! What story do you read in these words? To me they describe a character who is a little unconventional, even a bit rebellious at times, possibly hard-headed and stubborn, but on the other hand original and unique. She has a deep love and reverence for nature. Like a rolling stone, she is adventurous and has lived in many different places—not however, resulting in loss but in an ever deepening and enriching, moss-gathering journey through life. The journey is sometimes messy and most certainly not without many a mishap, but it is also all together magical, enchanting, and beautiful.

    What is your life story in ten words?

    ground

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    i want to break open
    my heart
    at dawn, and
    at dusk
    with the flight of a thousand birds
    rising
    wind streaming over my body—skin bare, like bones,
    i feel the shadows trailing wingtips
    of ravens
    and their silent caress across the bleached stones below

    i want to dissolve
    the day
    into these rushing waves as they run
    up onto this sandy shore
    kissing my toes and
    pulling earth from underneath my feet
    i fall into their sea
    sinking and drowning
    all the heaviness of my heart

    and in the glimmering darkness of night
    i want to dance
    here in the secret garden of wild roses
    together
    with my love
    with sweetness and with honey, and with
    a belly full of dreams
    i want to plant each one in this soil
    in this soft sacred ground
    growing worlds

    of beauty

    Seréin

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    here
    and
    now
    sailing this river
    with you
    silence is serene
    like
    the warm sun traveling over my skin
    like silk
    and the darkness is sanctuary
    is peace
    is free from every day cataclysm
    from the deluge of chaos and turmoil
    here
    with you
    this river is wide and deep and gold
    and sailing underneath a canopy of sparkling stars
    i find myself
    home
    in your enveloping arms
    home
    in your everywhere love

    now
    the sun is rising
    in your eyes

    sacré

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    i want to worship here
    in this temple
    of the body
    where love is the altar
    and where dance is the prayer

    All life is sacred. Every-body is an embodiment of the divine. We are how the divine knows itself. We are divinity realizing itself. And what is “the divine”? What is the “divinity” of which we speak? Why, it is love—nothing less and nothing more.

    Maybe this is it… This is the awakening… to know this not as conjecture, conviction, philosophy or belief… but to experience this as reality—the same way in which we experience the rain, sunshine, wind and soil. The same way in which we know who we are and in which we know our own names.

    So… let us dance, you & i, together.

    a cup of coffee

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    steaming bright and bold
    i am black bitter coffee
    with the sun, rising

    In this crazy world of ours… I want to be peace and to be love—and a little bit of whimsy. Anything else simply hurts too much. Aren’t we all beyond tired of the violence by now? Exhausted, really. We’ve seen world wars traumatize generations and we’ve watched empires rise and fall like storm systems shifting across the globe.
    Where does it all come from? I do not understand its fuel nor this pathology of self-destruction. I am not sold on a superficial history defined by battles between so-called heroes and villains, saviors and sinners, the haves and the have-nots, and the blessed and the damned. All life is sacred. We are all worthy and beautiful.

    I sit in the morning. Groggy, with recalled terrors from yesterday’s news—these persistent, ongoing nightmares of abductions, starvation, theft, genocide… and the suffering of children. Mania of distorted powers. And i try to just breathe and sip my hot, black coffee. We are steaming. With the sun, we rise again for a new day.

    an invitation

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    somewhere
    there is an ocean of beyond
    an ocean beyond good & bad
    beyond light & dark and love & hate
    and black & white
    beyond, there is an ocean of rising and falling
    breathing
    in and out
    an inhale and an exhale threaded, soft, and
    connected
    together
    inseparable actually, and
    one

    this ocean of beyond is beautiful—wide and deep and infinite
    will you meet me there?

    Whoever you are and wherever you are, I hope that your path and your days are grounded in peace. I hope you find in the outer world around you, beauty that brings solace to your heart… and in your heart, an inexhaustible wellspring of joy.

    Six Suns

    .Reading time less than 1 minute.

    walking along the seashore
    i heard my dragon
    breathing
    wave after wave after endless wave
    of love
    timeless and boundless
    infinite
    like every sun in the dancing blue
    dazzling its light
    and there too i saw him
    in a threaded flight of swans
    homebound, and, one thousand strong
    singing all his ballads
    to me
    and just waiting for my soul to fly
    together
    hand in hand with his
    all throughout this numinous sky

    flow

    .Reading time less than 1 minute.

    like water
    i want to know all life
    to seep into the soil and soften stones
    and under even scorching suns
    rise
    into a sky where
    i billow
    buoyant all throughout the light blue

    and like water
    i will fall, steadfast, and
    surrendered to gravity
    give in to fate
    to this unknown yet inevitable destiny

    streaming and rushing
    i will run, i will run like the water
    to my sea
    to my beautiful dragon
    calling me
    calling me to come home



    The Flower of Forever Love 🌸

    .Reading time 1 minute.

    in this garden where
    you and i meet
    one mysterious flower grows
    quietly, and unseen in bright broad daylight
    more fragrant and far sweeter, more velvet than
    all these colorful
    flowers
    pink and yellow
    that come and go with a cyclical sun

    this flower is a rarity
    it is the sun’s flower, and it is called—
    The Flower of Forever Love
    it blossoms
    in this garden where
    storm clouds dance and calm seas steep
    the light, where
    rain, busy in the skies, forgets to fall and
    fires sometimes fail to spark…..

    this one mysteriously flowering forever love
    grows
    in this garden where
    rainbows are red, and
    white roses scatter upon the beach
    while dolphins swim along my shore side strolls
    even hawks gift their feathers to me
    and hearts write themselves into a vivid blue sky…..
    all because, and, just because
    here in this garden
    you are together with me

    …p.s.
    it is said that
    the sun, the moon, Saturn, and every single star aligns
    whenever and wherever
    The Flower of Forever Love
    blossoms
    Have you ever seen the flower of forever love?