Sacred Fire captured by Sergiu Vălenaș via Unsplash 3.2 Decolonising Self_ A Collective Poem The Bones of Our Sacred Fire In Session 3 of our Winter Season on the topic of “Decolonising Self” Terrellyn Fearn and Vanessa Reid invited us to sit in circle around a sacred fire. We reflected on the following questions: What do I need to surrender to? What do I want to come into a deeper relationship with? Vanessa captured our sharings and interwove them into the tapestry of this beautiful poem. The Bones of Our Sacred Fires I look down to the ground of my ancestors’ roots to speak to the votana (plants) and allow them to heal me I feel my grandfather and our ancestral vines at my back My heart breaks open when I feel into my ancestors My family is lighting up as we discover more, and acknowledge our past Waking up! We are alive, noticing and perceiving It’s hard to grasp all this with the mind Grief kicked me out of the efficiency lane It needs so much resource; the truth is that it needs more space Wait a bit and see what gifts come I am done done done with the internalized patriarchy I surrender to the Mud and the Earth of the Mother That’s where I want to be I am centering the fire right now It’s transformed me with a deep longing to connection to what matters These simple things of love and breath To come into contact with life and with death I’m letting go of being anything other than myself I come from warriors of truth and honesty Would I be a different human in knowing my ancestors & what they fought for? I feel the blessing for my women line who made space for me so I can open the door and healing for those after me I have deep feelings, rememberings and knowings And I have deep un-certainties and un-knowings It’s easy to get lost and forget the wider connection of inter-connectedness LOVE… could be as simple as Love? I am touched and grateful for the profoundness of the heart I can feel the connection with the spiritual and the sacred I will not hold myself back for fear I surrender to all the love that I feel for everything that is alive Our bones have deeply anchored knowing When you don’t know where you are going, you go back where you came from Where do I belong? Where do WE belong? The red moon over the silver lake Kinship friendships of deep belonging Weaving the village The roots go deep and wide Connecting to my local place The place at the essence of humus of all life I want to surrender to what comes after To the longings and integration The life-giving compost To these dark and strange soils The Great Fires Lineages lost How to excavate the griefs and stories and heritages? Show our honest kindness and kindest honesty Listen to our poems with open hearts And deepen my own creative fire The logs and the wood we place on the fire are our ancestors bones The white Thunder Beings are with us The fire is burning down so fast It’s doing the medicine *** ~Vanessa Reid capturing our collective poem January 24, 2022