Foraging

I found the experimental fruit farm today, but only got a little further than the entrance. Rowenna was with me and didn't want to walk too far, so I decided I'll check it out tomorrow. I can't wait to just be able to go out into the jungle and eat in the trees. I've been reading a book about instinctive eating which I'm finding quite interesting. The author isn't fruitarian, not even vegetarian, but he seems to be eating what is right for him. This book is bringing more acceptance into my life. In one chapter of the book he wrote a poem about foraging which I think I will share here. I found it so inspiring and beautiful. He really captures the feelings I have when I forage in nature.

Foraging (upon Leaving Eugene)
I was asked by a dear friend to write a poem about what I see when I forage:

I see answers to the cries of billions of suffering souls.
I see satisfaction long sought in every
adolescent coke line, bong hit, and keg-worshipping party.
I see the demise of canning, pickling, dishes,
toilets, stoves, forks, mopping, freezing, waiting, wishing,
medicine, produce, and truck drivers' aching backs.
I see the resolution of the longing for understanding that has created
philosophy, religion, law, and names.
I see the end of disease and of the desire for destructive technology and concrete.
I see folks, without names, walking in the sun and rain,
naked, not ever straying too far from the equator.
I see dissolving of government.
I see everybody respecting and loving every other being
who has also dared to incarnate; so that anarchy functions so smoothly
no one would think to mention it.
I see healing. I see sweetness. I see life.
I see the incapacity to make mistakes.
I see the disillusionment of fear-based belief systems.

--<>--

I am walking with a friend, so beautiful, so light, so sound,
so touch, so aroma, so spirit; i am so enraptured
by this finite expression of infinitude
I would not even feel the slightest urge to invoke my biblical power to name.
The one of us are travelling at foot speed on the earth.
I spot, on the horizon, a hair standing out of the earth.
This hair twists and poses, negotiates with the wind,
prays to the sun and the clouds, , and has so much faith in the earth
that it has rooted its very life in the earth.
E trusts e will be nurtured, e surrenders
to the ever giving compassion of creation.
E is at the mercy of the earth,
and the earth pours its compassion into the tree.

My eye notices an amazing sight: there are beautiful round solids
of colors hanging from many places on the tree.
My fingers touch the solids and feel the softness.
I am reminded of nursing that bit of absolute compassion
that fed me for my first revolution around the sun.
Certainly that softness is akin to this. this too must be a life giver.
My nose, open, mucousless, with the capacity for complete discrimination,
tells me that the solids are not just a colorful wonder, not just soft
and exciting to hold, but they are sweet.
Oh sweet! Oh sweet is the taste!

My mouth - this mouth is a medium of my soul.
My mouth is a creation with most special gifts:
With my mouth i can taste the fruits - the silent song of the trees.
I can know what it is to be a cool, clear, and flowing river.
I can experience the perfect composition of a human body,
drinking, licking, dancing, and releasing
the joy for all in the union to know and share.

My mouth can take this solid in and envelop and release
the magnificent crescendo contained within. This thing of sweetness
with a signature seems to be a gift for me, made for me.
The fruit sustains my body, gives joy, heals me, touches me, becomes me.
Yet it is made by the tree to suit its own joy.
It sings the colorful solid for its own, knowing how much I too love the song,
and e is so pleased when I come to play, come to listen
to this season's accomplishments - this latest instance of the great song.
So I listen with my mouth over and over
and over and over until I wish to play no longer.

The fruit first sings the secrets of creation into my mouth,
rejoicing, "life is sweet, eat eat, eat!"
And the tree can withstand the voracity of my appetite,
and it welcomes the intensity of my intimacy.
The tree never says no, is never off doing something, or wants to be alone.
E is always ready to love, and e has no prejudice
to type or amount of partners. E is a perfect lover.
E calls me to the dance through my open senses,
and e gently and clearly tells me when to move onto another song.

There is a magic voice that tells me when I am done with this oral Ecstasy.
The voice was heard in my mind when I believed in limit and right and wrong.
The voice was heard in my pocket when i believed in money and working.
The voice was heard in my stomach when i didn't know what to believe in.
But my stomach never signalled until I was too late,
and I had struck the dissonant note. For the food i used to eat
was no longer alive, so it could not speak to me.
But now the magic voice is heard by my tongue. The voice whispers,
"you've had enough of this song for now, go enjoy another one."
I know to dance on because this solid that explodes sweet life
into my mouth in endless ecstasy signals me by not tasting quite as sweet.
Oh, and if I continued to push this union song - a "yuck!"
The signal received, I move on in ecstasy to another ecstasy.
Goodbye my beloved.
In the afterglow of this oral union I lie down beneath loving shade
as I watch the one I came with continue to listen with e's mouth.
Soon I will be dreaming of liquid clouds and colors.
And unbeknownst to me a seed has been planted in me.
For there are two songs that the tree cannot sing without me.
The tree happily does not dance unrooted, and joyfully does not sing aloud.
But now that I am good soil, and now that I know my role,
and now that I am living compassion - found in this circle of nourishment -
I will sing and dance, sing and dance for me, and
I joyfully sing and dance by the tree,
and the earth, and this friend, and all.

And What's more is that when the big light dances elsewhere
e leaves a wonderful darkness for sound to play in undistracted.
Oh how bright the sound and rhythm are now that it is dark at night,
as I am ever-pregnant with the song of foraging...

--<>--

I was asked by a dear friend to write a poem about what I see when I forage:

I see this suicide note -
For I'll no longer survive in the cold, in the hard, in the rules, in the fear.
My love - all i have, all i live for - feels crushed and unwanted.
I can no longer martyr my love to save the old growths or the ozone.
No longer can I cling to the deep love of friends I have grown with.
I have sung with thee. I have danced with thee.
But i cannot sing nor dance anymore.
I must leave, I am leaving.

I am going to claim the joy i cannot have here.
I am going to sing with purity and truth -
because I'll be living what I am saying.
This I cannot do here.
And I go because I love. i love so much that I would stay to sing with you.
I love so much I would live through winters of colorless trees
to ignite dreams with you.
And I thank that I also love enough to leave.

And I know that wherever I am, you have a home.

-Zephyr



For me fruitarianism is the instinctive way of eating. It's also the most species specific diet, the most pure, it brings the most joy and peace. For me it is right.