The Ancient Teachers

An ode to the wind, the trees, and the light

Forest Trail, Mill Valley, CA

The Ancient Teachers

I walk the mountain paths, searching for something lost –
Not a thing I can name, but something once felt.
The shape of it hovers at the edge of thought,
just beyond the reach of remembering.

I wonder what I might become, who I will be, what I will do –
a part of me waits for a calling in order to be called whole.
The questions rise to my lips, exhaled in a soft whisper,
“Where do I go from here? Who must I become?”
It lingers without reply, quiet, waiting,
listening, patient… still, no response.
I listen deeper to something, faint,
the breeze begins to stir.

Wind moving through the same air that shaped ancient trilobites,
drifted through whalesong, warmed the first firelight.
Breath now in my lungs that had once passed 
through fern and feather, stirred the grasses 
that fed my ancestors long ago.
Playful in its movement, 
free of demand, inviting, 
and carrying the memory
of everything that ever 
learned to breathe.

Limbs of the bay tree extend – a constellation of green,
each hue drawn from memory older than names.
Lineage stretching back through seed and spore,
through photosynthesis born of ancient light.
Transforming, changing, as all things must.
Its presence radiating from trunk and leaf,
as an unspoken language,
yet wholly understood.

Light flitters through branches, falling on the forest floor – 
a photon’s journey from the belly of a star
ending here, with a gentle unveiling
of what was always ready
to be noticed.

The silence remained beside me, not as absence, but as witness.
Wind, tree, light – each one an elder in disguise,
a mirror asking nothing in return,
and reflecting back everything.
Somewhere nearby, the laugh
of a crow lost in the wind,
as if in on the joke of it all.
A breath slowly exhaled
that had been held 
for eons.

Sitting again, the body recognized
a shape older than choice – 
a way of settling that said: 
“you need not be whole
to be welcome.
The unfinished 
is sacred, too.”

A final sacred bow of gratitude, a parting gift.
And in that simple act, a nod of recognition:
It’s not where you go, or what you do,
but how you move along the way.

Perhaps this place was seeking you.
Not because of its perfection.
But because it holds
the entirety of what 
you are becoming.

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Note: This piece was written, recorded, and scheduled ahead of time. I’m currently on a silent retreat without access to technology, so I won’t see your comments right away. However, I look forward to reading and responding when I am back in the first week of May.

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Background music in audio by Clem Leek