at life's crossroads

The sun is doing a dance between cloud and open sky. I should be so glad and feel as if I am a part of it all, but I spent the morning crying which made the sun just a soft spot for drying my eyes. Some people will tell you that you need reasons if you're going to be crying but the truth is sometimes crying is just a human way of saying "look after yourself." Many a dream or idea was born out of the badlands of a crying bout, it is a certain kind of reaction that happens when hearts and heads meet. Today, it was no other than feeling like I have so much to be done and not knowing how I will get to it all. How does one measure the day with just the right amount of work and rest so you can carry on happy as a fat caterpillar on its way to becoming a butterfly?
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Below the lilac tree, honeyed light colors my hair red, a color that used to sit on top of my grandmother's hair but we never had the chance to meet. I wonder what she would say to me now. Perhaps, she would say something along the lines of worry less and live more. It takes time, these things we do, these meanings we try to uncover, these dreams we try to pull out of the ground, but there is an art to befriending time in such a way as to not fear it, but to welcome it, an art to keeping time without wishing it away.

I know the nasturtium is growing wide-eyed and able, the snapdragons are climbing, the marigolds are already tall, and I remember how long I waited for this. To be able to rise in the morning and walk barefooted into the backyard. To look for hummingbirds and bees and all sorts of signs from the living. It is not yet over for us — even when it feels like it is as your eyes fill with salty water, you're just a human being and what you do with that both wicked and beautiful understanding is

 up to you.

outfit details: topshop embroidered jeans, thriftstore blouse & sunhat
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banjo and the lilac tree

I trace lilacs as they grow by the hillside, a hundred or so poems for those who survive. I move from one to the other like I have done so many summers before. I bite the air and when the sun meets my arm, it feels like somebody loves me despite any failings or misfortunes one may think I have. The sun does not care to remind me that I have had bad days or how I have ignored the doorbell when it rang or how I have wondered what the point of something was even if it meant everything to somebody else. No, the sun just lifts its head and in doing so, gives rise to a joy like no other.

Knowing how many days I have lived without the warm sun or the lilac tree blooming makes me clutch to the moment, these moments, where I know so well that it will all inevitably come to leave me behind. What was once a bookshelf will soon become dusty and the spines of the books will no longer open without the crackling sound of pages touching pages. Where there was nothing, there is now something. Where there was something, there is now nothing. Such is the way of our strange, strange lives.
 
When I come to the lilac tree, I come to know all there is to know about living. It happens until it doesn't. The lilac is blooming until it is not. Your love is here until it is gone and so I drift, I drift and I drift until there is nothing else to do but untie my shoes and watch the tiny purple buds once attached to the tree fall to the grass and go away with the wind. One day, that will be me, that will be you, but not yet, there is still living in our lungs and lilacs growing on that tree. Summer afternoons with a banjo bigger than my pocket, what will become of the hazy sun and the little green sprouts that line the backyard garden? What will be loved and what will be forgotten?

outfit details: eshakti custom made dress, savers/thrifted sunhat
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5 goals for June

The golden light of June is upon us and I am not sure if this is the best time for me to be making a list of 5 goals as I have been given to the grumps all day. Or, maybe, it is the perfect time to make such a list as life continues on despite the mood you find yourself in and sometimes the best way to fight the blues is to find new things to live and hope for. Here are my 5 goals for June. 

What are yours?
  1. Finish the vegetable garden. I have been a little behind in the garden this year - despite the fact that I write of it and talk of it so often. I could have swore yesterday was the first of May and now quite suddenly, the calendar says it is June. Time, remove your sneakers please!
  2. Shoot the How Long Blues music video. Just typing that sentence gave me goosebumps of the happy variety. I will be posting behind the scenes stuff on my instagram if you are interested in following along. Mostly, I'll be pinching myself to make sure it is all real.
  3. Spend as many daylight hours as possible underneath the sky. June can be a treasure trove when it comes to exploring, so I want to tuck myself into those warm sunbeams and live live live!
  4. Bake a chocolate cake. I have been craving one for the last few weeks and there is nothing that can compare to something homemade.
  5. Press wild grasses. I often find myself pressing flowers, but this year, I want to try to learn the art of pressing wild grasses, too.
How are you?
Tell me of your dreams, your goals, your plans, your curiosities   

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