<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div dir="auto" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab c1et5uql ii04i59q kvgmc6g5 hcukyx3x" style="overflow-wrap: break-word; margin: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div dir="auto" class="">How the Land Talks</div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab ii04i59q o9v6fnle c1et5uql hcukyx3x" style="overflow-wrap: break-word; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div dir="auto" class="">I am the Keeper of the Mysteries.</div><div dir="auto" class="">What I know is only understood in the imaginal realms, hence I often keep still.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I know why the seasons turn and how truth is not fathomed in clean, neat prose.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I have held the mysteries in myself. I contain multitudes.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I embrace opposites.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I am formed from paradox.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I rein in the mysteries.</div><div dir="auto" class="">Life, death, and rebirth are the steps of my dance.</div><div dir="auto" class="">Metaphor is my landscape.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I am the vast canvas maintaining the space where beings offer themselves to each other.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I clasp all the dry trees of my chaparral savannah in its red, crusty soil.</div><div dir="auto" class="">Madrone and manzanita ruled among knob cone pine, luxurious in youth, scraggly with age.</div><div dir="auto" class="">The tan oaks scatter acorns all over the rolling hills.</div><div dir="auto" class="">Under me is where the deep water flows. It is hard water, packed with minerals.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I am the One whose forms receive the fire and rain, the earthquake and plague.</div><div dir="auto" class="">My depths take in ash pits, smoldering leaves, and embers falling from the forest’s canopy.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I am the One who charts the Great Migrations.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I open with the Sun, who radiates on the trees of life the beauty that captivates all beings.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I am the One whose meadows uphold slender legs adorned with golden brown skin.</div><div dir="auto" class="">My canyons carry paws that slink silently, echoing the limestone’s stark face.</div><div dir="auto" class="">I am the One whose duff is stampeded with others, close, connected in my sweet, dusty face.</div><div dir="auto" class="">My ridges hold a travel that goes farther than humans could ever understand.</div><div dir="auto" class=""><br class=""></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab ii04i59q o9v6fnle c1et5uql hcukyx3x" style="overflow-wrap: break-word; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div dir="auto" class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Patria Brown</div></div><div class=""><br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
</div>
<br class=""></div></body></html>