You heard whispers among the trees and called out, “Who’s there?”
Dearest Doodle Soupsters,
Above is one of my latest artworks, “Petals in a vase, scene turned to blue, or at least that’s how I see it, I wonder.” It’s part of the series I’m currently working on, Whispers among the trees.
Do trees have feelings?
How does a flower know which way to grow?
Is there anything more true than I don’t know?
Can you have a conversation with the universe? Have you tried?
I think this new series, Whispers among the trees, started with a song I created this summer … I sing, I-I-I don’t know I-I-I just am I just keep on going, anyway, I went to the water and I asked the waves, how do you know which way to flow? but the river just replies, I-I-I don’t know I-I-I just am and I just flow …
or, maybe before that? in creating my Love Letters to Mother Earth series, titling paintings “How does the river know which way to flow?” and “How does the wind know which way to blow?” and “Your soul already knows which way to go”?
then again, who’s to say when something really started, right?
okay, now I want to share a portion of something I’ve been writing over the past couple of months ….
I’ve been called many names. Devil girl. Mischievous sprite. Fairy. But no matter, none of them ever called me by my name. Well, until I met you.
You heard whispers among the trees and called out, without a whiff of suspicion in your voice (I know, my sense of smell can pick up even trace amounts of ill will, lust, bitterness, tenderness … you name it, I can sense it), “Who’s there?”
Who’s there?
I want to know, you sing to me.
What is this place?
Why do I exist?
How can it be that the truest answers are I don’t know and how? and why?
Tell me
I want to know
I want to know
What a strange human. That’s the first thought I had of you. What a strange human. A human who sings to the trees and confesses to the forest how little you know and how badly you want to know all while admitting that the truest answers are I don’t know and the questions themselves.
My second thought of you? How strange that more humans aren’t like you. Honest. Curious. Spontaneous. I look at your face all lit up with wonder and such, singing, singing, singing. You did not see me but I saw you. I saw all of you. And my second thought of you wasn’t even of you. It was, why don't more humans dance around the forest and sing?
My third thought? That I wanted to know why you are different. Although I must say that I already know why you are different. You have eyes, don't you? And yes, all humans have eyes and ears and noses to smell and fingertips to gently caress flower petals as they pass by but rarely, rarely do I see a human who uses their eyes and ears and noses and sense of touch. Rarely do I see a human who feels. Who chooses to sense and feel the way you do.
So, anyway, this is just all a roundabout way of saying yes. I will tell you my name. I will tell you of all the secrets and mysteries, as much as your puny little human brain can grasp.
My name is Willow. My name is Lily. My name is Wildflower. My name is Chrysanthemum. My name is Dirt. My name is Sunflower. My name is Cloud. My name is River. My name is …
You get it, don’t you? I am Mother Nature. I am Mother Earth. I am the center of the sun and the whole sun and each and every curve of the moon. I am everything and nothing. I am the sprouting of Spring and the chill of Winter and everything in between. I am existence. I am a black hole. I am everything you can see and everything beyond what you can grasp.
So, what should I call you?
Just call me Willow.
Why?
It’s simple and true and I know you love willow trees, don’t you?
So you want me to associate you with something I love?
I am already all that you love.
So how could they call you devil girl?
I am the wind. A breeze is a sweet relief on a summer day. Yet, I am also the wind that catapults towns into chaos. I am every hurricane. I am every thunderstorm. I am terrifying, am I not?
Why devil girl?
How can humans understand that destruction and creation are two sides of the same coin, can’t have one without the other? How can a human grasp that all opposites are interrelated? How can a human accept that duality is embedded into your existence? That if I were to become a savior, I would rob humans of what makes them human? That there is no freedom without free will? That there is no saving humans from themselves if they are autonomous beings? That there is no fixing pain? That nature is a soft place to land and it is harsh too? That I am reality and I am not a force of cruelty and at the same time, I kind of am? That I am not evil and that even though I do not cause harm, I am the harm itself and what is the difference? There is a difference and yet can a human grasp it? When one human hurts another, it is me, isn’t it, who is to blame because I am the existence of free will and I may be the wind yet I do not stop humans from hurting each other? I just am.
Why girl?
Maybe humans feel a girl is a thing they can control. Maybe it gives them hope in some twisted way to call me a girl, a little fairy, a tiny feminine thing. And yes, what strength and power they know deep down is in the feminine and isn't that why they call it weakness? At the root of denial is fear, is it not? You know this. I know you do.
Why do I hear you? In all your complexity? How can I?
You are strange.
Come on!
I already told you why and how. It is your job to accept this. I cannot make you.
Tell me again, please.
You are willing to see. You are willing to hear. You are willing to feel.
Okay. I will try to accept that. Give me some time?
You have all the time you’ll need. And at the same time, there is never enough time for everything and always enough time for everything, depending on how you define everything.
Okay. I see. I think.
And then, this strange human began to sing again.
Tell me
How do I know which way to go?
I want to know
I want to know
I went to the river and I asked,
How do you know which way to flow?
But the river just looked back at me and replied,
I don’t know
I just am
And I just flow
So I went to the garden
Looked down at the weeds
How do you know which way to grow?
And how do you feel when they cut down your brothers and your sisters?
But they just stared back at me and said simple and plain,
Doesn’t change the truth,
We just are
We just keep growing
We don't know why and we don’t know how
We just keep going
It’s in our roots
It’s in our stems
We just know which way to grow
Even as we don’t know anything
So I looked up at the heavens
And I prayed
How do I know which way to go?
Are there any answers?
Why are the truest answers
The questions themselves?
But the sky just replied,
I hear you asking
Don’t you find another reason to doubt it
I don't have any answers for you, my friend
We don't know
We just are
We keep on existing
We keep on flowing
We keep on growing
We keep on living anyway
What more is there?
What is more true than we exist, even just for a little while?
Human form, a way for your spirit to exist in this world for a while
To question, to be, to live, to exist
To get to exist
You exist!
We exist!
Sweet child of the universe,
All you need to do is live
As you are
Exist, exist
Why sing? Why did this strange human choose song, of all things?
When there is nothing left for me to say, I sing. I guess I sing what I cannot say. I paint what I cannot say. I dance what I cannot say. It’s not that I don’t want to speak the words aloud. It’s just the truth, the heart of the matter … it moves. Each time I try to grasp something, put it into words, describe, describe … it all gets muddled again with more questions. But when I sing, when I paint, when I dance, it’s all true … I can embody the heart of the matter for a while yet I cannot ever describe it. I cannot ever put it all into words.
So why, human, why do you write?
There are so many things I want to know and understand. And no matter how many times I feel all mixed up all over again … I don’t know. I am driven toward making meaning of the wordless. I want to express the wordless in song and dance and art, yes, but how could I not also want to say it, to write it down …
Are you saying you want to pin down the heart of the matter, quite an impossible task wouldn’t you say?
Listening to whispers among the trees, trying to live in each moment, this moment, one at at a time,
Nicole Sylvia Javorsky