<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><div><span></span></div><div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;">Invocation to the Seed</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><br></div><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">We have not existed apart from you. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">We would not exist without you. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">We will not <i>survive</i> without you.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You are the germ. You are the grain.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You wait in the darkness of black earth many, many times longer than you might live above ground. What are you doing down there? What are you dreaming down there?</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You are so many brilliant ideas waiting to happen, wanting to happen, all the while holding the memory of your old stories.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have been beckoned by the Moon, invigorated by showers, warmed and lit by the sun and sung by our Tribes into being.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have been scarred and split open into birth by scarification, frozen in permafrost, sparked by the wildest of fires.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have survived the hostile acids of the gut and the ferment of the moldering mother fruit.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You are the kernel of our food and medicine, dye and fiber. You sprout, rise up and unfold into our shade and shelter. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You are the germ of the blossoms gathered into our most beautiful bouquets that hold the germs of the blossoms of our most beautiful bouquets.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You float the lightest breeze and fly the Jetstreams. You have stuck-tight to the nap of the backs of the furriest ones and hitch-hiked on feathers. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have floated from source to mouth of the great rivers and fallen over seething waterfalls. You have been held inside bladders rafting round the wide oceans.</span></div><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have been released in clouds, parachuted and helicoptered to safe landings, exploded from splitting legumes, catapulted from capsules. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have been shucked and threshed from your mother’s ovaries and been winnowed by the wind and human breath. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have been folded into cuffs and carried lovingly to new lands. You’ve been smuggled across borders. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have circulated as currency.</span></div><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You have been grateful in our long marriage with your impossible generosity.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You offer hope and give us Faith even in these Dark Times. </span></div><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">You are embedded in our history and we are inseparable from yours.</span></div><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">We would not exist without you! </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">And you would not exist without us!</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">We will not survive without you. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">We must honor you for who you are.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">Bless the seeds and bless us.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">Make them a part of your story and may you be a part of theirs. </span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"><span style="font-kerning: none">And remember when you harvest the seeds, you have a responsibility to love them deeply for who they are.</span></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; min-height: 14px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal; min-height: 14px;"><span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"></span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; white-space: pre;"> </span>- Doug Gosling</div></div></body></html>