A Letter from Nanci Lee
Divination
Let the thunder roll
says the yarrow and
I’m comforted by the
craggy sticks in my fist,
the light friction of gathering,
parting, the care
in the count and the tend.
When you’re slipping around
in the grief
inside the fear
it’s good to get tangible.
Always below the thunder
above the thunder
there’s laughter.
Writing these very words is breaking a spell.
Our wise and courtly thespian died but didn’t lose his voice,
his impish witch settling, gathering us around the pot,
cobbling notes, lines, a silk bag, porcupine quills,
the spirit-two brought the haskap, put her back together again,
a family walks the land along crumbling forts
and the sprite is out in the wilds
invited to nurture small steps,
clouds dense and moving.
How to stay in the thunder?
Meet the rolling moment with a wink,
eyes wide,
metabolize our old tales & trolls
that they might
tell us.
Nanci Lee
Friends,
Blessed to have found so many friends and teachers in you from practical HR tips to how to navigate the friction and thunder, how to speak my truth in it. It’s been beautiful and hard.
Our communities under attack right now need safe, sacred places of refuge and belonging, of play. I do.
We also need deep tending practices our ancestors & traditions have long known to move from a different place. I’m in these returning to my body, singing in choirs, writing, planning a retreat at Corrymeela. Nourishment and rest needs nourishment and rest. Re-wilding.
Honoured to be of support to the Land Rematriation process at Tatamagouche Centre with Women of First Light and the United Church of Canada. Please support them too. There is a wonderful new Executive Director at Tata Centre, Isaac Vallentin. We’ll stay engaged with RCC & your reparative land justice circles.
I’m with you too, many of us are with you in these brutal times. These are, I have to believe, the last scared gasps of a crumbling empire. We’re courage labs nurturing shifts. We are the shifts.
With love and gratitude,
keep that wink,
Nanci
