“Arrival”

When the land and the creatures around you 

become a place of belonging,

You will finally have arrived home.

 

Oak, raven and hummingbird will know your name.

The smell of lilac beside the garden fence 

invites you to remember long still summers.

 

To truly experience belonging 

is not a matter of how deeply you notice your surroundings

or what you can tell me about this place.

 

To say that you truly belong  

Is to become authentically familiar 

to the ones that live here;

to allow yourself to be deeply seen and heard by them.

 

Be still and listen; they say.

You have descended from the love of thousands

Stand humbly upon our shoulders as a mountain upon the earth.

We have made this place around you

We will find you.

 

And one day

when you are awakened in the night

in the quiet and dark liminal space between dreams

you will hear the prayers of your great, great grandchildren

looking for home.

 

May the way in which live your life

be an answer to their prayers and

a blessing to all your relations.

 

~Kedar S. Brown, May 2017

Vision Quest Ceremony, Capital Reef National Park, Utah.