Meditation and Poetry on the Sea of Cortez
Just back from the sparkling Sea of Cortez, I glimpsed some of what John Steinbeck must have found as he ventured down to the Baja peninsula time and again, soaking it up, soaking it in and writing about it.
Baja’s raw beauty and starkness made me yearn to write. But for me it called for poetry before prose.
I was on a wilderness meditation retreat with a great teacher of mine, Mark Coleman. As a group of 12 plus 4 superstar support staff, we kayaked, meditated and lived as part of nature for just shy of a week.
While there I also celebrated my most life-affirming birthday yet.
On the way down to Baja by plane, I read Steinbeck’s little book called The Pearl. One quote was particularly fitting as I entered the inner terrain of meditation and the outer terrain of the desert islands of Sea of Cortez:
An accident could happen to these oysters, a grain of sand could lie in the folds of muscle and irritate the flesh until in self-protection the flesh coated the grain with a layer of smooth cement. But once started, the flesh continued to coat the foreign body until it fell free…
This happy accident of oyster self-care yields something precious, a pearl. It reminds us that beauty can come out of suffering. Like a lotus flower growing out of mud. A dandelion sprouting from a pavement crack.
With this message echoing in my head I was ushered into the silence of the retreat. And with that I entered my inner world that yields ‘pearls’ from the often rugged container of my personal ‘oyster shell’.
Since my vow of silence on retreat included a vow not even to write, listening to poetry was as close as I got. Those poignantly spoken words often made my heart soar and wet my eyes with tears.
On our first night sleeping under the stars, Mark read us one of my favorite poems reminding me I was in the right place. I heard it first several years back from a consoling friend as I was diving into my own “Sweet Darkness”.
Here’s a passage from that poem by David Whyte:
The dark will be your womb
tonight.
The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.
You must learn one thing:
the world was made to be free in.
Give up all the other worlds
except the one which you belong.
Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn
anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.
Cultivate pearls,
Amy
31 Mar 2009
Bob
Amy,
It was a pleasure being with you for the week. Did you have any other photos. This one is a beauty.
Continue to cultivate the pearls.
Warmly,
Bob