My forthcoming book, A Year in Practice, continues to support this collective remembrance. This book illuminates some of the ways each season requires us to pay attention, showing us actions to perform and practices that fit the cyclical dispositions. Each chapter asks us to remember that we are gifted with a time to begin, a time to ponder, and a time to recharge.
As we strive to construct a different future and shift climate change, we need our creative magic to reach as widely as possible. Instead of reinventing the wheel and struggling to find a rhythm that enables such potent imagining, I turn to the four seasons for guidance. I study my own creative expansion and contraction throughout the year and take careful notes. By exploring the traditions and motivations of each season, I remember the venerable schedule of the earth and aim to show how each season offers me its own version of this schedule.
We don’t have to do the work of remembering alone. The earth is constantly showing us when to dig deeper and when to pause.
What time of year fills you with vigor?
What season asks you to slow down?
Are you trying to burn the candle at both ends because you feel a sense of urgency as our planet cries out in pain? Maybe this isn’t what the earth actually needs?
As I work on Poem Forest, I’m reminded that trees grow slowly, but the earth does revive and heal. We do, too. With a single poem, I watch a child find inspiration, leaning into scientific facts that link them to an understanding of interconnectedness and hope.
Just like the leaves that drop and rot in the fall, we must rest and rejuvenate as we try to develop the next phase of human life on earth. If we give ourselves the time to sync up with natural cycles, we remember that we’re infinitely held by this planet, our home, and its inherent clock that ticks within each of us.
One poem of hope and vision can offer that clarity to someone searching for it.
As I watch my work transform and move into this new shape, I hope you enjoy a transformation as well—A new season of expression and purpose building off of all you’ve already created.
What kind of forest can you nurture in your community?
What subtle lessons are unfurling now as we lean into the communal days of summer?
How can we help each other remember the earth and our connection to it?
May it be steady and celebratory, restful and inspiring, season after season.
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