Photograph by Kurt Bauer / Connected Archives
Words by Kinsale Drake
In Diné tradition, one rises each morning with the sun, blessing and greeting the day. How, in a modern world that encourages disconnection, can we honor synchronicity with nature?
forgive me mothers
I have fallen out of step
with the rhythm
of the sun/ not to eco-ndn but
something pulls
at the tide
in my chest/
forgive me/ for stumbling
out of the kitchen into light
too often already scorching
down mid-afternoon/
angry
from your eyes/ I imagine/
the holiest talking-to
from the jays in the brambles
and the cheii
in the prickly pear/
look girl
don’t you remember
the song of your birth?
forgive me/
I forget my tongue
and yours/
perhaps one/
you trail the soft edge of horizon/ I trek
the crumbled roadside/
to cities/
misled by false light/ syncopation/
the protest dimmed/
in my body/
forgive me/
let me find
the song
the song
/
when I was a girl
my mother went out
to greet the sun
each dawn
palms pooled
in blessing
I stayed
in the cool dark
of the rooms
until one morning
her calm movements
woke me
I crept
sliver of horizon
toward the threshold
of home
the sky
splintering
into light
This article first appeared in Atmos Volume 08: Rhythm with the headline “Circadian Song.”
Nature is an elaborate orchestra of interconnectedness, in which timing is everything.
