After the first Rain

Thursday it was raining hard. This morning the forest is awake with a firework of green.

Dormant springs start flowing. Water gives life in abundance.

A spider’s nursery survived the rain.

Mushrooms are growing where the rain collects in the cracks of dead wood.

A forest monster rests across the path, waiting to come alive in the twilight of the moon.

As I leave the forest I am greeted by beautiful flowers.

Decay and New Life

We had a little rain a few days ago. Enough to give the forest a foretaste of the winter rains.

This morning there was more life in the forest. Birds were out and busy. Fresh green comes out of the ground.  

As I look around to absorb the mood I am struck by all the decay. 

Leaves, dead wood and mushrooms feed the new life.

I remembered a word from a Sufi master, which I read the night before:

Everything in the world of existence has an end and a

goal. The end is maturity and the goal is freedom. For

example, fruit grows on the tree until it is ripe and then

falls. The ripened fruit represents maturity, and the fallen

fruit, freedom.

The final goal is returning to one’s origin. Everything

which reaches its origin has reached its goal. A farmer

sows grain in the ground and tends it. It begins to grow,

eventually seeds, and again becomes grain. It has returned

to its original form. The circle is complete. Completing

the circle of existence is freedom.

NASAFÎ

Everything in the forest slowly returns to its origin, loses its form and gives new life.

When the sun comes through the space created by the fallen tree, new life comes out. 

The cycle begins again.

Full Moon

Friday night I tried something which I always wanted to do. Walk the magic forest at night.

I startet going up just before 19.00. It was a bit scary; everything looks different in twilight.

Just below the contour path I turned left on a wider path, because it was very dark.

The city lights were shining below and the bright flood light of newlands stadium were nearly blinding me.

I sat down on a rock and started listening to the rhythm of the cricks. Sometimes close sometimes far away. Suddenly I noticed some clouds at the horizon becoming illuminated from the back.

Moon rise. I sat and watched until the full moon was up.

Everything was painted in a silvery light. Slowly I walked down again. The grass was high on the path and I was scared of snakes.

Under the trees it was really dark and I could not see the ground before me. I came to Newlands Stream and sat down in the middle of it on a rock. The water was telling stories. Ancient voices in a strange language. I sat at this stream many times before during day time but never heard it in such intensity.

The path through the rocks was well illuminated. At the pool are two benches. Leaning on a bench was a strong freshly cut branch. A walking stick or a weapon to defend me as a gift from the forest.

I took it along and it made me feel better at the most dangerous part of the walk. The path along the M3 back to my car.

I had a dream that night and draw a picture later. My Newlands Forest dream.

Spider’s Webs

I walk in Newlands Forest at least once a week.

It is a meditative walk. Usually I begin just after sunrise. I try to pay attention to the small things around me, that’s part of the meditation.

This morning I decided to go up the Fernwood trail, through my favorite enchanted indigenous forest. Walking brisk through the pines below heats me up.

I like to take of my T-shirt, which I do. I feel the air around me, smell the smells.

As I walk up the path and listen to my steps, I close my eyes for a few seconds at a time.

The steps sound like the shamanic drumming I have on a recording to use for meditation.

I have the idea to record a walk. The rhythm of the steps, the sounds around me, the birds and the sound the wind creates moving the leaves.

At the end of the pine forest I stop for a moment, feel my breath and my heart pounding.

I am alive and well. Sweat cools me down.

I walk further up. Watching my steps. Stepping on the ground hard, to announce me to any snake around.

I notice the fern and the grass touching me with a moist lick. Moisture as a gift of the night.

At the end of the lower growth and the entrance to my enchanted forest some lilies flower.

There I feel it for the first time. A tingling feeling across my chest.

Cobwebs which I break as I go up.

The spider has been busy at night, spinning thread across the path. To catch its prey.

I feel sorry that women cannot walk like me through the forest. Feel the thin thin thread tingling me on my bare breast.

Every opening has been spun closed with thin tin threads. One can only see them at a special angle. One has to look out. The light has to be right.

Whole nets with the hunter in the centre are there. Or only single threads waiting to be touched and signaling a catch.

I walk on, do not care, there is a walk to be done. What is in the way will be broken. But it touches my skin. I feel it as I walk on. The work of the night. Done to feed the hunter and save me from a nagging fly or a biting mosquito.

I am breaking the web but tonight the spider will start over again.

If I come tomorrow and feel the threads and will know, no human being was on this path before me this morning.

I can break it again.

How difficult must it be for a fly or mosquito to fly through the enchanted forest?

Traps are everywhere. Open spaces between trees are booby trapped. The hunter lurks waiting for a meal.

As I walk on the contour path I meet two butterflies playing in the sun.

I shout at them, be careful don’t get trapped.

They play around without worry. Enjoy every moment. And every moment disaster can strike.

Cought in a web. Prevented from flying. Sucked dry by a hunter.

A hunter spider spinning threads in the dark of the night.

But I am strong and can walk through the web. Just feeling a tingle on my skin.

As I walk down towards the parking area, I see a spiders web, high up above the well walked path.

The fat spider sits in it above the hikers. The web is old and dusty. More visible than the fresh ones.

No butterfly will fly in it.