"Livin' Like a Lusty Flower" ~ SCROLL DOWN!!! Share Some Life With Me!

"Livin' Like a Lusty Flower" ~ SCROLL DOWN!!! Share Some Life With Me!
"Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right"

Soulshine

Soulshine

DOSE

DOSE

Saturday, January 27, 2007

The Blackfoot Maiden

I took this picture this past August 2006. Mighty was trailing behind me and it was a lovely day. Not too hot nor too cold.

I love Rocky Mountain wildflowers and have spent years trying to identify which ones can be used medicinally. When I took the picture you see of the Indian Paintbrush from outside in my yard, it was a lovely cool afternoon and Mighty was trailing behind me sticking his nose in logs and burrows. It was a very lovely memory. I've spent many hours/days/months/years with Mighty traipsing around many a mountain hill while I've been hunched over a particular plant or specie. I also think this is why I became such a rabid fan of disc golf...one would inevitably throw a disc in a bog full of Shooting Stars and Columbines...pure heaven!

I came across the story of the Blackfoot Maiden in Terry Willard Ph.D's book Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rocky Mountains and Neighboring Territories. I quote him directly

"There is a beautiful story about the origin of Indian Paintbrush in Anora Brown's Old Man's Garden which she has taken from Mabel Burkholder's book "Before the White Man Came"

Once upon a time, a Blackfoot maiden fell in love with a wounded prisoner she was attending. The maiden realised that the tribe was only nursing its captive in order to torture him later. She planned an escape of the prisoner, accompanying him for fear of the punishment for such a deed. After some time in her lover's camp she grew homesick for a glimpse of her old camp. She finally went to the site of her old camp, hid in the nearby bushes, and over-heard two young braves discussing what would happen to the maiden who betrayed them, if only they could find her. Knowing she could never return, but nonetheless longing to return, she took a piece of bark and drew a picture of the camp upon it with her own blood, gashing her leg and painting with a stick. After drawing the picture, the maiden threw the stick away and returned to her lover's camp. Where the stick landed, a little plant grew with a brush-like end, dyed with the blood of this girl, which became the first Indian Paintbrush.

Thursday, January 18, 2007

"of the people, by the people, for the people..." For obvious reasons I can't send this to all of my best friends...it would or could appear I'm electing to overthrow the government...but isn't it my duty? Hasn't it also been written "We hold these truths to be self evident..." yes, I'm sure these ring strong with you as well. Of course I take liberties...I paraphrase, delete, omit, include what I want to share...I have always loved these words...I hope we choose to keep them strong, healthy,vibrant and ALIVE! IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776. The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. Declaration of INDEPENDENCE! We got CONSTITUTION too! We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Enion's Complaint

What is the price of experience? Do men buy it for a song? Or wisdom for a dance in the street? No, it is bought with the price Of all that a man hath, his house his wife, his children. Wisdom is solid in the desolate market where none come to buy. And in the wither'd field where the farmer plows for bread in vain. It is an easy thing to triumph in the summer's sun And in the vintage & to sing in the waggon loaded with with the corn. It is an easy thing to talk of patience to the afflicted, To speak the laws of prudence to the houseless wanderer, to listen to the hungry raven's cry in wintry season When the red blood is filled with the marrow of lambs. It is an easy thing to laugh at wrathful elements, To hear the dog howl at the wintry door, the ox in the slaughter house moan; To see a god on every wind and a blessing on every blast; To hear sounds of love in the thunder storm that destroys our enemies' house; To rejoice in the blight that covers is field, & the sickness that cuts off his children, While our olive&vine sing & laugh round our door, & our children bring fruits and flowers. Then the groan and the dolor are quite forgotten, the slave grinding at the mill. And the captive in chains, & the poor in prison, & the soldier in the field When the shatter'd bone hath laid him groaning among the happier dead. It is an easy thing to rejoice in the tents of propserity; Thus could I sing, & thus rejoice: but it is not so with me. William Blake 1797
credit to William Blake Archive...link is to the right...for some incredible Blake!

Innocence Project

This is a cause I have wanted to help with for a very long time. Therefore, I would also like to encourage you. Donate money if you can. Remember those lost and forgotten. Remember that it is just as easy to become forgotten as it is to remember. I can't say it better so I won't.

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Astonishing...Great Mystery...

Astonishing. Getting older and older I still stand here at this window, watching-as if never having watched anything like it before-the wrens, juncos, and purple finches picking the seeds strewn on the pile of frozen snow. Through my breath condensing into fog on the cold window pane, I still see bare branches chasing their shadows in the icy wind, black threads of water crinkling though fissures in the frozen river. I am aware that what I am seeing is no more, no less than the great Mystery, that of being here at all, that of seeing it-as from the other side of a mirror-snow, birds, my breath still condensing, that breath that started so long ago as my first cry. Frederick Franck from "Behind the Mask, " The Stranger, Summer 1995

Monday, January 08, 2007