Friday 13th November 2020…..New Moon in Scorpio leading us to the depths

Last night I dream. Yes, that mixture of tenses, grammatically incorrect and yet somehow, for me, suggesting something of the moontime, cyclical time, non linear time that I am striving to inhabit. I dream that I am squeezing rich white milk from my breast, that I am mixing it with my own clear urine, also, apparently rich and nutritious. I have not drunk enough to produce sufficient liquid. I feel my abundant breasts as I felt them when my twins were babes, heavy, swollen. I feel the familiar overwhelming desire, urgency bordering on panic, to produce enough of this potent mixture to feed whatever needs to be fed in this way, in the dream it is not clear.

Awake now, and still dreaming, my edges are soft. Clarity eludes me. I cry. I bleed abundantly, rich steady smooth flow. My womb hurts when I am not listening. My face is washed out and pale. My baby is crying. One of them. My heart breaks. I breathe. Hold him. Leave him smiling at his father.

Outside the leaves have fallen with the storm last night. The world turns, the seasons change. So much to be learnt from that simple fact. A pillar of my life and work.

Yesterday I began in earnest, gentle earnestness. I began to mark the first day of my bleeding womb with a little celebration. For the first time since becoming a mother. I walked without destination, timelessly, wonderingly, wanderingly, attentively, calmly. My twin boys shared the journey with me and I reflected on how wonderful it would be if they could carry something of this dreamy moon time feeling into their adulthood.

We set out with snacks, hot lemon balm tea, Stella the dog, our faithful companion… six feet, three wheeled buggy, an adventure the length of Turnastone, a largely unknown, unremarkable village in South Herefordshire.

We arrive, unbidden, at the church of Mary Magdalene. The twins explore the churchyard: the metal flower holders, the crunchy leaves, the echo of the church. I sit on the sheepskin in their buggy and scribble down some words related to red, next to the large old holly whose trunk has grown around a gravestone. Red brick barn, red yew berries, deep red cyclamen next to gravestone, red my blood cleaned with raindrops held on a red leaf, red ribbon around dead bunch of flowers, hidden red yew heartwood, red brown bracken fronds, red post over gas pipeline, red gate post, red on McDonalds cup (awakening a suffocating feeling for queues in Hereford City), red holly berries (reminding me of Winter Solstice, Christmas and the return of the light), pink spindle berries (conjuring images of fellow women spinning), hawthorn berries, rosehips.

An open wound in my belly is what I feel today. The second day of my moon time, me time, down time, dark time lit by moon time, inward to the depths time… vulnerable, open and yet too easily wounded again. Too tired too dreamy to explain my way, my day, my needs. Wanting to hole up and hide. Rabbit warren like home. Steal away unseen without ruffling feathers or water or feelings. That I used to do. Timelessness. Now, without that ability I cling to time and order and certainty in the hope I can ´get it over with´ and enjoy the timelessness. But I can´t. So I have to weave between worlds. Drift and settle. Like a cold bright beautiful snowflake that falls and disappears. Blood on ice… in the days when I thought that bleeding should not stop me doing anything I climbed a glacier with my period, legs weak, body heavy, blood on snow. Blood, for now, on Autumn leaves.

How to heal this heart ache? What I believe to be not mine alone, but a collective feminine heart ache. Felt deeply by men and by women. How to heal? One small step at a time, one month at a time. It is tension now, more than pain, the tension between ideal and reality. The wounding is too raw for conflict. Soothing words on the inside create peace on the outside.