DAILY I’ve tried to take down the tree on three separate occasions. I couldn’t/can’t do it. We always take the tree down the week after Christmas, as in “You’re out’a here!” This year, this tree is different. It feels like a felony to de-nude her. She continues to hold a magic that touches me/us personally, and inhabits the house, filling it with glowing warmth. We are more at her mercy than she ours.
She was the first tree we ever went out and cut down. The day itself was magical, marking her birth with joy and sweet pleasure. We loved her at once, for she did-does not round out perfectly. Au contraire, she is built narrowly, like a great queen in a panniered, whalebone skirt. Despite her tiny waist of baby cones, her full hips and bosom insist she turn sideways to enter a room.
She soon billowed with pearl and sapphire, diamond, and every manner of shinny crow-bait her branches could hold; ‘more is more’ perfection. There she sat holding court, through a vast chaotic flurry of friends and family coming and going. Though she held the masses magnificently, she is most beautiful in the silence of late night, or very early mornings, with just her small lights revealing her grandeur.
But what now? As with any queen, when her time is up, do we finally cut off her head? Is she dismantled gently, working down to her undergarments, allowed to say her prayers, and then dismembered? Perhaps the greater honor is to burn her, sending her spirit up in smoke to tell her story to the earth. Is she then set free? Will she remember? Will it be a good death? For as she lived so must her death resonate. No careless trash pickup here.
Asana: Sphinx. Lie on your stomach, lift chest, bringing forearms parallel in front of you, elbows under shoulders, fingers spread. Gently pull heart forward as well as up. Either take your focus inward to imagine or remember something exquisite/meaningful. Or find something quite beautiful/unusual to contemplate. Let your vision connect to your breath connect to your heart. Feel grateful. Thank whatever it is that has brought you this moment of pleasure, perhaps recognition.
Health Notes: If you do this as Yin Pose/Seal, hold for five minutes or more, keeping legs and buttocks relaxed. If you do it as a preparation for Urdhva Mukha Svanasana/ Up Dog, or Bhujangasana/Serpent Pose, then the legs must be strong, pressed down & back, with knees tight. In all poses, the spine becomes more elastic and rejuvenated. It’s good for sciatica, and slipped discs, helpes tone back aches, gives lungs greater expansion, and circulates energy in the pelvic region.
Comments