Today is more gray than blue, wind cold and sharp, skies heavy with the promise of rain.
It’s fitting, on this day, as we sit a watch for the eldest of our dogs, not yet ready to depart on his journey, but soon to have the decision made by his failing body. He is not in pain, merely very tired; he is still made happy and engaged by treats and bones and soft words and scratched ears. But like gravity, some forces will win in the end, and this is one.
And so we go about our days now without our usual focus, distracted by the need to ensure his comfort, to assure him that he is loved and need have nothing to fear from these final days. The pending loss has created a preemptive void in our own spirits, too, as our hearts begin to make room for a new loss, for a hole in the soul in the shape of a big black brindle dog named for the brilliant black spirits of flight.
Raven.
And the ravens have returned, in recent days; they always have, when their namesake has had need of them. They spend much of their time on the new-green earth these days, finding sustenance and nesting material alike. Occasionally, one will ascend to the upper branches of the weeping willows, the better to observe, to strategize, to plan. For the corvids are nothing if not strategic; they plot and conspire and analyze and execute. And they remind us that there is far more to the world around us than the little we are taught in school, which accounts for nothing more than what can be observed in the most superficial of glances.
The willows make a good temporary perch: Even at this early stage, they provide good cover, yet branches and leaves are not so dense as to prevent close observation of conditions on the ground. And while the willows weep, they also reach — trunks planted firmly on a sprawling root base, branches extending up and out as though to touch the sky. They remind us that gravity will win, yes, but also that we are not bound, whole and entire, to its will; we, too, can stretch and reach and occasionally, momentarily, touch something much higher than ourselves before we are perforce bent back to earth.
It’s a bit like Raven himself, a creature entirely of the earth, yet named for those who soar upon the winds and the light — and it has always been fully in character for his spirit to embody both.
At times such as this, we are focused disproportionately on the earth. We would be anyway; it’s spring, nearly at its midpoint, and ready the ground for planting is on everyone’s mind now, especially in light of our small reprieve from last year’s deadly intensified drought. We would already be clearing ditches, tilling ground, resetting fenceposts, and otherwise making ready for irrigation and the first seeding of the soil. But now, on a deeply personal level, we are reminded of the “dust to dust” aspect of the earth beneath our feet.
At such times, it’s easy to get caught up both in the work and the worry, in the labor and the loss. We find ourselves looking downward, literally — as though it is beyond our capabilities now or even our rights to look up, to reach for the sky or to seek the light when so much commands our attention down here. But the trees are instructive; they manage both simultaneously, constantly, consistently. After all, their survival depends both on being firmly rooted and in drawing in the light.
The same is true of us. There’s an old adage about the importance of our reach always exceeding our grasp, and while it’s not one from our own cultures, it’s easy to see the point of it: If we can grab whatever we need or want on the first try, there’s no point to trying for anything more. In our ways, the analogues would no doubt be ones of perception, of teaching, of what is granted to us to know in the ordinary way versus what we are permitted to perceive only via visions and dreams, through the work of prayer and fasting and medicine and ceremony.
It’s an apt lesson for times of loss, too, and again, the willows know this well. There are times to bow our bodies in prayer, in mourning and in seeking. There are also times to stand up, to look up, to reach for what we know to be beyond our reach, and to do the work needed to put it in our hands.
Yes, the willows weep. But the willows’ reach is bold, enough for the rain and the light and the sky itself.
Sometimes, they grasp it.
Sometimes, we do, too.
~ Aji
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