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Earth Knowledge
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Here is what I have realized: if you learn to make fire with nothing but what the forest provides, and you purify water in bowls you yourself have carved, and you spend the night warmly wrapped in a house of fallen hemlock needles, and if you find cattail roots and salmonberries for your dinner among…
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The Greening of Cities, The Restoration of Wilderness,
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I hope for a world in which the wild has been restored. Seas of open wilderness interspersed with islands of settlements. Cities, but not as we know them now. Buildings with solar panel roofs. Streets of moss, or low-growing grass, lined with raspberry bushes and flickering birch trees. Small homes; open, light, window-heavy, where…
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The Redwoods
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In my “barefoot” walking sandals I wander along endless wood sorrel carpets. Head tilted up, always up. I want to hum to match their steady breathing. There is no wind. The trees; they catch it all. They are not the ones who show us the wind; they are the ones who steal it, who…
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The Great Peril of Our Existence
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“The great peril of our existence lies in the fact that our diet consists entirely of souls.” A few years ago I read this on Wikipedia while researching the Inuit worldview for a school paper, and, for some reason, it’s always stuck with me. Maybe because it’s true. Scaldingly true. Our diet consists entirely of…
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Would You Like To Buy The Sunset?
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A man sits on the muddy sand along the river, watching a band of turkey vultures dip through the sky. He takes the hand of his companion, a young woman whose face is ruddy from walking against the wind. They bow their heads toward the water and listen to it sing. The whole day…
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White-Tailed Tropicbird
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I love Oregon, but I know I’m meant to live in Hawaii, or another tropical place. I’ve known this since the moment I first swam in the ocean in Waikiki as a fourteen year-old; when I first floated on my back and felt the colors of the sky drain into me. I’m going to live here…
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A Walk
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Yesterday I went for a walk, and the world was mine. It was just me and my dog; the only two people in the river’s sight, the only two people ever to live. Heavy water spread in waves against mudded cliffs. Their sound was cylinders, wind chimes. Always we looked past the houses lining…
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Inspiration
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There was a time when anyone could look up at night— anyone, anywhere on the entire planet—and, if the clouds were absent, they could see the sky in its entirety. I have always looked for the stars on clear nights, but I haven’t always found them. I’ve stood outside, tilted my chin to Canis…
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And So The Ash Tree Grows
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There is a little ash tree growing at the base of the cedars. I hope it grows tall, and I hope I get to see it tall. Someday, after we move away, there will be other people living here. What will they see? Will they know the trees as I do–wandering between their trunks,…