mumma yaga

 October 20 2023 As Fox and I walk up the camp road, I can smell the October leaves; a distinct soft and brown smell.  We walked to the top of the meadow and then came down, but near the top of the road, where it turns north and the top of the meadow is to your left, he wanted to be carried. "Gamma cayyie. ". So I hoist him onto my shoulder, since he is quite heavy for my hip, being two years old. Do I feel so frail that I am surprised by this competency? I can carry him easily on my shoulder. (When my children were small, if I had to carry them a long way, I would imagine that I was carrying them seeking refuge from war or flood. In such a situation so many parents have carried their children miles and miles, then slept by the road, and rose to carry them miles more. How fortunate we are to live in a safe country with resources for life.) And it is a surprise that I do all the things a grandmother should do, without every having read a book or been to a workshop! I am so goo

 october 16, 2023 looking for magic walk the hill  call the witches leaves red and brown and golden are  returned  to  earth spell cast the wise witch saves apples on her upper branches for later falling a spell uncast  waiting for winter the sun came through the half-naked trees  against the stormy sky the guardians bare and cold are watching even in sleep the trees are present  breathing their slow slow breaths waiting for snow there must be  some dance or words or song  to find again the magic i once felt not so long ago before the world crashed in and broke the web synchronizing breath and hill call the name that has no letters draw the symbols on the stone draw the fire make the transformation  leaf to earth apple to deer vultures gather to fly south  how do they know the way?  we are lost without such magic to know our own way home mumma yaga 

 September 28, 2023 Now that the equinox has passed, we are starting to be up in time to see the sunrise.  We have had many wonderful September days. September is my birth month,  - so, notable - , the month of grapes, my childhood family's yearly day-trip to Niagara Falls, chestnuts, new shoes for school, new crayons and pencils, notebooks fresh, smooth, not yet dog-eared, nor full of scribbles and mistakes. Best of all are these precious warm and sunny days, when the turning of the leaves is beginning, and somehow not sad, a symbol of the equinox which calls to mind season and change, not death, but the circle of life. How we look forward, so quickly, from mourning summer, to some magic that comes with the autumn. The acceptance of season by the natural world is foremost in my thoughts. I have no eagerness to reach for a new summer. It feels perfect to be here now with the leaves leaving the trees and the birds heading south without any forward-looking, or hope, or despair.  How