vulnerability_photo_project

Finally got some time to post some images from a few weekends ago… i-naturalist had the city challenge and was going hardcore on her sightings…. This great horned owl@was one of the highlights!

In English we say, keep going

in poetry we say,

Do not let the weight of this season still your stride,
for every storm, however fierce, must one day bow to silence.
Even as the night wraps itself tightly around your soul,
know that dawn is already gathering light behind the hills.

Walk on, even when your feet tremble, for the road remembers every step of the weary traveler.
The earth has seen countless burdens carried before you,
and yet it has also seen countless spirits rise, bruised but unbroken, scarred but shining.

Hold fast, for you are not a candle flickering out,
but a fire learning to burn against the wind.
You are not lost in the dark, you are the dark sky waiting for stars.

So lift your face to tomorrow,
take one more step, and then another,
and let the rhythm of your courage sing louder than the whispers of despair.

Keep walking, even through the storm, for dawn is already rising beyond the clouds.
Your scars are not signs of defeat, but proof that you are stronger than the night.

LONG WAY
(Antje Duvekot)

We bid our friends goodbye
We promised we would write them
And headed north up 95 Into the great unknown
We turned up our stereo
i felt so reckless and alive
We didn’t know who we would be
We didn’t know where we would end up
When we headed down that road
A little food and our guitars
In the backseat and that old cello
The one that would get stolen
In a town in Idaho

And it’s a long way to Michigan and back
And it’s a long way
yes it’s a long way, the clouds upon our backs
And it’s a long, long, long, long way

And I have never seen
Reflections of the cleanest
Of blue as in Minnesota lakes
Those were the longest nights
Of wood smoke and Northern Lights
As we talked until the morning came
The light of glowing embers
As sweet as I remember
Among the rustling of the trees
The legend of the harvest moon
And sweet ballad of the loon
I felt as ancient as I was meant to be

And it’s a long way to Tennessee and back
And it’s a long way
yes it’s a long way, the clouds upon our backs
And it’s a long, long, long, long way

I called you from a payphone
In windy, cold Missoula
And then from Midland in the rain
no place as proud and sad as
The South Dakota badlands
they touched me more than I could explain
a dirt poor reservation
Where the oglala nation
Tries to hang on to its ways
a feather and Pe**te pipe
A six pack of Miller Light
Sits on the dashboard of a beat up Chevrolet

And it’s a long way to Washington and back
And it’s a long way
yes it’s a long way on the worn out heels of Kerouac
And it’s a long, long, long, long way

Out in California
We touched the other ocean
And I still have that jar of sand
In the Arizona desert
The sky goes on forever
You’ve never seen a thing as grand
North Montana was cold
She keeps her secrets frozen
Under glaciers way up north
People have got lost up there
In the home of the grizzly bear
you can ask the mountain
But the mountain doesn’t care

And it’s a long way to Delaware and back
And it’s a long way
yes it’s a long way, the clouds up on our backs
And it’s a long, long, long, long way
it’s a long way on the worn out heels of Kerouac
And it’s a long, long, long, long way

There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.

— Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, 1994

🌎

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