I am feeling feelings.

Prayer Flags: The Holyland @ Lake of the Ozarks, MO.

As I journey through these final days of gestation I have become mindful of the different layers of opening in which my being has engaged. There is the physical opening-- our child to dropping down into my birth canal, my uterus contracting sporadically allowing my cervix to begin to open. There is also the spiritual and emotional opening, which has brought about greater intuitive sensitivity as well as a rawness and vulnerability that at times I find challenging to navigate. Upon consideration of this openness there are times when at first the things I am experiencing are indescribable, I go to Josh and simply say, "I am feeling feelings." He is very patient with me and with great gentleness allows me to open at my own pace uncovering the emotions I am experiencing and their roots deep within.

We are now rounding the corner of being one week past our "due date." I have accepted the idea that this is just a date set around the approximate arrival time of our child, given that he is just as actively involved in this process as I am, his body and spirit experiencing just exactly what they need to be experiencing in these final days of being in the womb. Even still, these last few days a certain melancholy has settled upon me at different times throughout the day. Honestly, I had thought that we would have our baby in our arms by now. The days leading up to our due date were frenzied with activity-- preparing our nest. And now, as I look around our home, which I can honestly say has evolved drastically from simply a house we dwelled in to a home that reflects our joint intention of peace-full, creative, loving-living, there are little things which I could be doing (won't there always be?) but really all I want to be actively involved in is the birthing of our child.

I am seeking to remain mindful and present in these days of waiting. I have lost count of the prayer candles in which I have lit with the intention of patience. I understand that these days are sacred, they are teaching me lessons which go deeper than just waiting. These days are about letting go and embracing the mysteries of motherhood. Yes, I am consciously involved in creating my reality, but there is only a certain level of control in which the universe allows me to possess, the rest I must offer up to the Spirit from which all evolved. I must surrender.

The Fortieth Week

Family Self Portrait, 39 Weeks @ Grindstone Nature Area: Columbia, MO.

When I pause, become mindful, and fully absorb the moment which I am presently in I am awakened to an awe that I have never quite experienced before. We are now in our fortieth week of gestation, yesterday being our "due date" for the arrival of the divine being of light that nestled himself into the sacred pink of my womb 10 lunar months ago. He is still quite comfortable inside of me, dancing gracefully in his watery world, preparing for his birth-- for our birth. For we will all be born again when he emerges from the lifegate of my body.

This season of gestation has been one of holy transformation. Both me and Josh's lives have evolved through this refining fire of pregnancy into something more pure and full of light. We are beginning to understand our responsibility in the manifestation of our own reality. We have begun to manifest our own reality. When I stop to consider our lives now it is so clear to me that we are living our dreams and that our action is what has birthed those dreams. This is something that I will teach our son, Arlo, from  the moments he takes his first breaths in this earth realm. Though, I have the deep heart feeling that he will be the one teaching us more and more about this idea, for I believe he has been leading us all along on our path towards him and this life we are living.

Josh and I have walked this journey hand in hand, with each other as well as with the blessings and challenges this great big change brings with it. As I look back on these past 10 month I cannot come close to encapsulating this stretch of our walk in a simple statement. There has been joy and woe, laughter and tears, great love and heart rending fear. And now here we stand stronger, wiser, brimming with love for the life that we created through the passion of our own bodies, our own souls, combining to bring divinity to this earth. Yes, I am in awe.

As we enter into parenthood I hope that this space may become an sanctuary where I can come and be present. This is my ultimate goal for this fourth trimester-- to be present in the midst of the pleasure and the discomfort, to find myself ever more deeply immersing myself in the moment, with mindfulness and intense love.

Something that is teaching me about being more fully present these past days has been the poetry of Mary Oliver. One poem in particular, Wild Geese, has impacted me greatly and it will accompany me through labor:

You do not have to be good. 
You do not have to walk on your knees 
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. 
You only have to let the soft animal of your body 
love what it loves. 
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. 
Meanwhile the world goes on. 
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain 
are moving across the landscapes, 
over the prairies and the deep trees, 
the mountains and the rivers. 
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, 
are heading home again. 
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, 
the world offers itself to your imagination, 
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place 
in the family of things.

Water

Today we went, as we have before,

to visit the wise woman who will help usher you from your watery world

to this new home,

of stone and air and breath and moss.

Her gentle hands outlined your form--

your head down resting at the lifegate of my body,

your back curved along the left slope of my swollen belly,

your feet extended up beneath my right rib cage.

How in awe I am of you, your body within mine.

You seem quite cozy, comfortable even.

Always moving about, preparing for the new journey

you are about to embark upon.

I think you will always be drawn to the water.

I am.

I think it reminds us of our first home.

Reading a lot of Mary Oliver

Three Short Poems Written on Different Days

I've grown greedy to feel you move.

Such intimate communication I've never know. Until now, as you swim deep within my body--

my soul, cries out for you.

To know you is the greatest privilege of my life.

My hips ache these days,

as my body opens and

removes its self--

making room for someone else.

And so my body has grown and grown,

expanding as the summertime fruits.

We've grown ripe and plump together and

one day soon our bounty will drop amidst

thick juices of nurturance,

to be caught by willing hands,

not timid of the sticky and sweet.

Transformation

Changing forms, taken by Josh on a creek walk.

This is a time of opening, of releasing, and of accepting. The transformation that my life is currently swept up in is vast and sacred. It seems every aspect of who I am is evolving. My belly swells larger, my heart opens wider. Some changes are more subtle than others, but all are felt deeply. Regarding my silence in this medium in which I use to create, well... Some things are just so challenging to speak of in words. Yet I will begin again to try, as this time in my life is something I feel led to share. Stories, I have many. They may come in bits and pieces, or they may pour forth gracefully. However they flow into me I will release them the same.