Sacrificing Old Identity
“There is an opening now but everyone is caught up in bargaining words…
Pull back from your sense of crisis. Separate yourself from all this contention… Turn your life into a dance of the great symbols of transformation.”
The goshawk watches the tiny black phoebe perched on the railing. The phoebe sings, the goshawk listens. His eyes flick to the phoebe, to the garden, and back to the phoebe. The phoebe chirps and hops as it tracks the goshawk with quick, subtle glances while seeming to ignore it. Both are aware that goshawks eat songbirds.
There is a subtle tension in the goshawk’s demeanor, the way he holds himself at the ready: he grips and loosens his talons; he gives a quick, horizontal waggle of his tail. The phoebe flits and fluffs, then tilts his tiny head to glimpse the goshawk as if trying to pretend he’s just looking around without worry. And maybe he is, in fact, unconcerned: he stays about six feet away - near enough to keep track, far enough to escape if the goshawk decides to attack. In order to lunge at the phoebe, the goshawk would have to reveal his intentions, tensing and turning as he lifts his wings in order to snatch the meal that is singing nearby. By then the black phoebe would be far out of reach.
The careful dance of the phoebe and the goshawk is, in fact, a finely tuned relationship. Danger is a constant for the phoebe. Cunning is a necessity for the goshawk. Hunger is a fact for both. As for humans, both distance and closeness are risky. Unlike humans, the individual and relational experiences of birds are embedded in the natural order of things.
I am thinking now of dangers to humans and our relationship to those dangers: edgy neighborhoods; power-mad politicians; people with guns we can’t see. Pollution. Plastic. Climate collapse. What is my - our - relationship to each of those dangers? Are there relational principles that apply? In these times of poison and possibility, our disorders shape reality in ways that require us to find order within our responses to peril.
Disorder can be an adjective or a noun. As a noun, disorder means illness. As an adjective, it describes a state of mind. A disordered mind arises from an anguished heart. A calm heart is kind.
Observing the dance of the birds on the railing, I think about how it feels to swim in the ocean knowing there are sharks nearby, though, because I do not see them, the threat of their presence remains hypothetical. Because sharks do not seek humans as food the way goshawks seek songbirds, I am free to experiment with ways of quelling my fear. I linger in the shallows. I duck under and open my eyes to look around. I tell myself that the most potent defense is to meld my awareness with theirs as I practice the elusive sensation of connecting beyond fear. Predators sense fear, but they also sense benevolence, though, for me, that benevolence is mostly hypothetical: appreciation and love are so much easier from the warmth of my living room.
The same is true for the people I fear. Is it safe to ignore them? Is it dangerous to approach? The truth is, I don’t really want to approach. For me, at this time, the real danger that fractures connection is the fragility of my benevolence because benevolence is what suffers when fear kicks in. What that looks like is self-criticism. Exasperation in traffic. Fury at the western industrial culture I both loathe and depend on. Benevolence is fragile: it is easily torn and requires constant reweaving. Otherwise it becomes a frayed basket that collects resentment, grievances, and judgments, instead of good will.
We are told that seeing is believing. But believing is also a form of seeing, particularly if we believe that, like thriving, danger is relational. Mending is relational. Benevolence is, as they say, an inside job.
A solitary great blue heron skims the swells - a bird-shaped, bird-colored piece of gray-blue water flying over itself. For now, until we choose otherwise, Empire will use us to devour the world, and with it, ourselves and each other. But Earth, not Empire, is home. Connection is home. There is no other. There is no other.
A mud hen bobs on the chop. As she lifts into flight, her knobbed toes drag through the water, unzipping the surface. Light pours in. Water closes over the gash. There is no scar. Seeing is a needle. Listening is a stitch. Love is the thread.
