Welcome Spring 2015

The Awakening

By Toni Truesdale

The Equinox of spring signifies the return of life

from the dormancy of winter.

Everything stirs, sprouts, unfolds..

We smell the awakening

 Welcome the continuance of earth’s eternal cycle.

Persephone is the Greek metaphor of spring.

“Cycles and Seasons”By Toni Truesdale The recurrence of the seasons continue to encircle our lives,Just as it gave celebrations to our ancestors.Spring Equinox, Summer Solstice,Fall Equinox, and Winter SolsticeMark those passages in a yearly cycle all over the world.We have learned to plant food and medicinesAccording to the agricultural calendar.We dance in a circle to celebrate the planting,Harvesting, and the storing of food.Buildings, monuments, and spiritual spaces have been builtTo align with the celestial movements that determineThe four seasons at the point of each transition. 

Water Spirit

Women and Water:

Water Spirit

Inhabiting all waterways;

Each river, stream, ocean and lake

Contain the presence of female spirits

Whose stories of wet splendor

Mirror our reverent astonishment,

Waters permeate and

 Sustain all life on our planet.

Copyright T. Truesdale 20003

ToniTruesdale.com

 As water becomes a central issue, as in the droughts and rising oceans; We turn our thoughts to this and remember what once it was sacred.For water is essential to all life on Earth.

New Beginnings, Adventures and Endeavors

Like the Pilgrims of ancient times, I strive to seek new places and spaces. All of Earth has it's secrets, both sacred and profane. Blessings and lessons everywhere for each of us to seek. I am moving back east to be closer to my family, wander new trails and smell the salt from the sea. Please follow my blog and explore my websites as I move into a fresh perspective. From the mountains of New Mexico at 7,000 ft to the Coast of Maine, sea level; it is sure to bring a new level of thoughts and imagery! Our lives are all a pilgrimage through passages in life's labyrinth...

" Pilgrim"

By Toni Truesdale

In early medieval times European women

Made pilgrimages to sacred places;

The many paths were well worn.

Although they wore Christian badges;

These spiritual spaces were the homes of the ancient 

Ladies of the Earth and healing places.

Their names come back to us now,

For they never left, but went underground

During patriarchal times.

Truesdale copyright 2005 

Winter Solstice: The Darkest Night

“Cycles and Seasons”

By Toni Truesdale

The recurrence of the seasons continue to encircle our lives,

 Just as it gave celebrations to our ancestors.

 Spring Equinox, Summer Solstice,

 Fall Equinox, and Winter Solstice

Mark those passages in a yearly cycle all over the world.

We have learned to plant food and medicines

According to the agricultural calendar.

We dance in a circle to celebrate the planting,

Harvesting, and the storing of food.

Buildings, monuments, and spiritual spaces have been built

To align with the celestial movements that determine

The four seasons at the point of each transition.

 Darkest Night

That moment of blindness,

 Just before

We turn into radiance.

It is the point of transition;

From fear into hope,

 And Despair into faith.

And when helplessness evolves into courage,

Inaction into resolve…

We heal from old wounds,

And become whole again…

We light the candles on the Tree of Life

As we turn from the darkest night;

To help  illuminate the world.

T.Truesdale copyright 2006

Every Child Sacred

Every Child Sacred

As we approach this season of lights, solstice, renewal; 

And we celebrate the birth of the man called Christ.

Let us remember all of our children are sacred;

The potential is in each to be a peacemaker, teacher, healer...

With the ability to reach out to others with compassion and understanding.

Each birth is a return to our common bond of human family.

Each child is our child;

See not the child of another faith, enemy, race.

 But each child injured, killed, sacrificed is our own.

And remember the sacred stories the feminine is eternal,

Through the daughter the family continues...

 

  

“Demeter and Kore”

By Toni Truesdale

The Greek tale of Demeter and Kore,

Symbolizes the sacred bond 

Between mother and daughter. 

In early civilizations inheritance passed 

Through the clans on the female line.

The role of female was central in matrilineal cultures.

Daughters were the invaluable continuation of life;

Through her the generations flowed.

The myth of Kore’s abduction by Hades is a 

Reflection of great social change.

From agricultural female deities to male dominated city states.

But Earth Mother, Demeter, would neither abdicate her role

Nor her daughter to patriarchal domination. 

She won a partial victory.

Her daughter remained with her the fertile half of each year;

Which became Spring and Summer.

This story is a reflection of creative duality,

And Balance; male and female;

Night and day,

Dark and light.

Death and rebirth

Solstice and equinox...

Art and words copyright  T.Truesdale

images:top left: Demeter and Kore

top right: The Mothers

middle:Daughters

bottom: Maia at 12

reproduction with permission only  

The Inspiration of African-American Women

New World Priestess

Wisewomen, Maroons, Conductors to freedom.

Leaders of resistance and civil struggle;

Mothers with magic in their hands,

Healers of grief,

Dancers with vision,

Poets and singers of the spirit.

Heart of the community, stern but sweet;

Architects of comfort and safety.

Artists of life using the threads of the past

Connecting sacrifice into future possibilities.

Mothers, Grandmothers, Sisters, Daughters, Friends

We give homage to all those who unselfishly, give.

The world is humbled before your loving legacy.

by Toni Truesdale 2014

In Honor of Indigenous Women

In Honor of Indigenous Women

Grandmother’s Prayer for Mother Earth

“I am a voice for the voiceless. We are speaking to an unseen world.

Speaking for Mother Earth, trying to stop our spiritual blindness.

We speak for the animal kingdom, for those in the waters, for the ‘four leggeds’ and the one leggeds (trees), the Bengal tiger, the elephant, the creepy crawlers.

I pray that the creator hears us. The creatures have a right to be. The creator gave us instructions about this and how to be a long time ago. He told us ways to take care of ourselves, what to eat and where to live. But now we are unbalanced.

We cut the green off our Mother’s face. We pollute the water, Her blood.

We do clearcut logging on the tops of mountains, when the trees they are the ones that call the wind and rain. Without the ancient trees at the top of our mountains, we are in trouble. The little trees can’t do the same work as the old trees that have been destroyed”

... Grandmother Agnes Baker Pilgrim

 

Grandmothers of the Continents

By Toni Truesdale

"Grand Mothers of the continents

Who crossed now deep waters...

Weren't we all once one?

Ancestors evolve into descendants,

To mix culturally;

Contradicting with bitter irony

The centuries of violence

 Caused by the mode of current biases...

If we could perceive through generations

Past, into what will be;

It would transform pointless superiority,

And embrace all the children yet to be

As our common family."

I am inspired by Native Women to think about big things, our place in the world, a sense of community, responsibility and respect for all living things.

Let us keep all our original instructions and with these find the path to a better world community of peace and understanding. It is the time of women to lead the way.