Yes

by Kathe Schaaf

The patriarchs are feeling confident
that our spirits must surely be broken,
as they have been so many times before
when men came for us to burn away our power
and our sacred wisdom.

They came for us once again,
with the authority of the highest court in the land
and we did not rise up too loudly.
We did not swarm the streets by the millions
as we did not too long ago,
rivers and seas and oceans of pink-hatted women.
I am sure that was a little alarming to the old white men,
especially as those images on our little phones,
broadcasting that particular shared frequency of power,
inspired and electrified others far beyond those crowds.
Like a secret language of holy rebellion only the women could understand.
Like an encoded oath to never forget and never surrender.

Whew. That was close.
These days, we seem once again pretty quiet.
Once again either distracted or hopeless in the face of their desecration
of our Mother,
of our freedoms,
of our sacred powers.

They sit in their leather club chairs
swirling a good scotch in the cut crystal glass and smiling ever so slightly,
confident that the game will continue as it always has.

They do not even notice the subtle shift in power that has already taken place.
It would not be on their radar
the way we have been stitching and weaving and knitting
a new world
right under their noses.
Like Madame Defarge, we knit long scarves encoded with messages.
Not lists of names of those whose heads will roll
but lists of those for whom we pray:
The hollow men.
The walking dead.
The lifelessness at the heart of the game.

It is not easy to love
the patriarch who sits across the table at dinner,
to have compassion for the billionaire and his endless hunger for more,
to forgive the narcissistic self-absorption of the distorted masculine,
to love the wounded bear
howling in pain and confusion.
And yet this is Her guidance to us:
Love the bear.

They do not hear the ancient songs
we have been once again singing together,
The primal incantations and prayers that have been
reawakened
in our hearts,
in our circles,
in our cellular memory.
They do not hear the buzz
of our thriving hive
or see the nuances of the dance each of us does at the entrance,
delivering reports on the dangers coming,
sharing knowledge about ancient future ways to thrive.

They do not glimpse the increased activity deep underground
as our sacred root systems have become interwoven;
as our fine tendrils dance together and rejoice in recognition and remembrance.
They will never know the pure joy of such reunion
With another.
With truth.
With love.
With Her.
They cannot imagine the strength of the basket we weave
and all we are prepared to carry together
when their march of death has run out of fossil fuel.
And yet life persists.

They do not hear the messages
from the trees
and the birds
They do not know the deep companionship of the four-legged
or the thriving veriditas of all green growing things.
We sit still, listening,
back pressed against a tree,
scanning the horizon for the songs of the whales,
tuning to the frequency of a wisdom
too ancient to name.

We have been remembering the truth
of what is sacred
of what was sacred long before men erased all traces of the feminine
from their sacred books and stone temples.
Before they buried the true teachings deep in the desert sand
and made a false idol of fear
and crafted a vengeful god named Father.
We remember the Great Mother
and She remembers us.
And the sheer persistence of their attacks upon Her
have signaled us that they do indeed know Her true power;
that they do indeed know what it means that so many of us have left their temples
to return to the Earth for our sacred communion.
We too have persisted.
She too has persisted.

We not only travel deep underground
but turn our gaze
to the wisdom of the Star Beings
to the galactic messages
encoded in our bones.
They too whisper to us:
It is not too late to save your beautiful planet,
to be restored to your rightful place
on the Galactic Council,
to bring healing to a tear in the fabric of the Universe.

Our stillness and our silence in this birthing chamber
do not mean we have given up.
Oh my. That would be silly and we are anything but silly.
We have turned inward
to recover our deepest sacred wisdom
to connect with ancient truths
and with one another,
to commit ourselves to love and joy and gratitude.
Together we hold space for the birth of a New Earth.
We each carry a thread
of the magic
and the strength
and the faith
that will be required.
This is precisely the moment
and we are the women who said yes.

© Kathe Schaaf
All Rights Reserved.