Winter Seeds

January 12, 2025 Sharifa Oppenheimer

Winter’s Dark Womb

Ice diamonds fall in the night, the owl’s call echoes across moonlit hillsides, seeds incubate in sheltering soil beneath the frozen snow. Human seeds of creativity incubate during these dark nights and quiet days, as well. It is good to ponder the seeds of our own creativity at this time. These days of darkness in both the terrestrial landscape and especially the socio-political terrain demand that we tend carefully the seeds that, as they grow to ripeness, will carry us through the coming unknown. What seeds will each of us tend and cultivate in the soil of the heart? My hope is to grow a crop of generosity, patience, love, courage and hope; what is yours?

I’m pleased to share with you this news: the seeds of a new endeavor of mine are rustling in their earthen beds. My new book Rewilding the Human Heart ~ A Journey of Reunion is in the publication process now, and will be complete this spring! It is my hope that this journey of reunion with the Elements and Realms of Nature will bring love, courage and hope to many people searching for a way forward in these troubled times. Here is a short synopsis:

“In Rewilding the Human Heart ~ A Journey of Reunion, Sharifa Oppenheimer invites the reader to travel with her into a new and ancient relationship with the living earth. This journey is a return to humanity’s ancient roots in earth wisdom. Sharifa strips away of the veneer of “nature appreciation” and celebrates a homecoming to humanity’s primordial embodied symbiosis with Gaia. She guides readers not only through outer terrains, but also into interior landscapes of the soul, making the alchemical properties of the elements and realms of nature readily accessible. Through ritual, story, breath and internal inquiry this exploration can be a journey of transformation for the reader.”

I will let you know when Rewilding is ready to launch and I certainly hope that you will join me in celebration! And here is a winter poem for you, from my book of poems A Litany of Wild Graces.

In winter dawn’s pure

shadowless light

~ mountain’s north face

shapes emerge, recede.

Her slow pace stops

she bends

holds in her palm

the smooth

flat hip bone

~ last winter’s venison

weathered to a richly

embroidered surface.

She sees synaptic deltas

of her mind

reflected in bone’s

fractalline calcium terrain.

Fingertips trace

its ivory in

ever repeating

diminishing

patterns.

She gazes soft, open.

Its infinite living form

refracts outward

visible in forest’s

fine tapestry

~ stone, mycelium, bark

Her branching

veins, arteries

are reiterated

in bare winter’s

intricate, eloquent limbs

in reindeer moss

etched by crystals of frost

and velvet lichen

grown chocolate brown

on walnut trunk’s

north side.

As always, I’d love to hear from you. Please share any inspirations, streams of thought, and comments! Let’s keep the conversation going.