Station 4
Location: Bench where pathway detours due to storm erosion.
Location: Bench where pathway detours due to storm erosion.
“All things are connected like the blood that unites us.
We do not weave the web of life; we are merely a strand in it.
Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves.”
~Chief Seattle
Damage to this pathway is clear, having been greatly eroded by storm surge. Please use the pathway responsibly by following all directive and warning signs. Thank you.
The hillside behind the bench is covered by Staghorn Sumac (Rhus typhina) and Goldenrod (Solidago canadensis). The unseen roots of these plants resemble interlocking fingers, providing vital support and preventing erosion of the hillside.
Notice the the structure of the tall Sumac with its crooked, leaning trunks and the texture of its fuzzy branches, and rust-colored blooms, Goldenrod grows all around the Sumac, producing bright golden flowers in late summer that transform into brown seedheads in fall and winter. Both plants are native to the state of Maine. They are thriving together in a symbiotic community, contributing their individual strengths. Even in this time of dormancy the unseen roots support each other and the hillside they exist on.
Looking out over Casco Bay brings to mind two types of human connection. 1. An obvious, scheduled connection that the ferry service provides, connecting people from the islands to the mainland. 2. An unseen connection, much like the intertwining roots of the sumac and goldenrod.
Do you feel like you are part of the mainland with connections close at hand? Or more like an island (more isolated), or somewhere in between?
Would you like to feel more connected? If so, what would those connections to look like? Obvious and scheduled connections, or unseen but supportive in their own way?
You belong to the web of life. Are there ways you can strengthen your connecting strands in the web, seen and unseen?
Because in trying to articulate what, perhaps, joy is, it has occurred to me that among other things - the trees and the mushrooms have shown me this - joy is the mostly invisible, the underground union between us, you and me, which is, among other things, the great fact of our life and the lives of everyone and things we love going away. If we sink a spoon into that fact, into the duff between us, we will find it teeming. It will look like all the books ever written. It will look like all the nerves in the body. We might call it sorrow, but we might call it a union, one that, once we notice it, once we bring it into the light, might become flower and food. Might be joy.
Begin standing tall, back straight, feet hip width apart, hands to your sides with palms open. Lift your face toward the sun and take a deep breath through your nose, exhaling slowly through your mouth.
Slowly and mindfully walk back to your starting point along the path.
Using all five senses of touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing, notice all the natural beauty that surrounds you.
Has your breathing slowed and become less restricted?
Is your body more relaxed?
Have you acquired a clearer mind?
Can you find joy in what you have just experienced?
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
The smoke of my own breath,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and dark-color’d sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from bed and meeting the sun.
I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,
The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me,
Of the turbid pool that lies in the autumn forest,
Of the moon that descends the steeps of the soughing twilight,
Toss, sparkles of day and dusk—toss on the black stems that decay in the muck,
Toss to the moaning gibberish of the dry limbs.
There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.
I exist as I am, that is enough.