Many moons ago, whilst on retreat, I met a moment which significantly altered my understanding of sound. As I sat in prayer while the tea of Mapacho swirled through me, my focus rested upon the surrounding sounds of nature and the sensations felt as it pierced my physical field. Each sound targeting specific areas of my body and creating stirrings there. Birdsong-erratic in nature, would stimulate a particular organ to shift from performing sluggishly. The rolling ribbit of a band of frogs would activate my base chakras. The warbling call of the guinea fowl another and the soothing moo of the neighbouring cow, a gentle balm that trickled through, centering all.
During an intensive retreat of fasting and meditation, I curiously tapped into a vibratory, continuous conversation with Nature. So powerful that distance could not intervene on her clarity as even the crunch of grass could be heard from a horse feasting in the distance.
Initially, as all sounds were heard with amplified intensity, I felt overwhelmed. I tried in vain to regulate the experience, like a tree trying to hold back its buds but my essence understood and eventually I relaxed in recognition. In the hot weave of the midday sun as Nature expressed in surrounding sounds, the song that is me… discovered its tune.
Since then, this awareness has blossomed to a daily practice of deep listening and soulful tuning to the gift of sound that is Nature.
A recent dream echoes its medicine.
The dream arrives in a petite pocket of sleep during a restless night. I stand in a place where rocks cover the earth’s surface and the sky boils with clouds. As I observe the dance of the mother of an ocean from the safety of a cliff, I sense the presence of enormous water creatures as they glide serenely in a tempestuous sea.
Whales.
They cast a gentle presence in a landscape of tumbling shores and jagged rocks. Their song that begins as a muffled smudge of sound, is carried loosely on the winds and bathes and soothes all in its proximity and beyond. Their heads glow with an iridescent blue light deepening in intensity as the sound escalates.
I stand infused with joy by the ubiquity of this intensely primal moment in the mellifluous and mysterious presence of The song, the song of all creation.
This feeling gently settles upon me as does the spray of the oceans mist and I drift into a deeper dreamlike state from which I am jolted by the piercing sounds of desperate screeching. Peering below, I see that a large pod of dolphins have been deposited on the shore by a huge wave. Their forms are helpless without the medium that carries them. I scramble to their aid but as I approach, the sand begins to swallow them. Squeals of panic fill the air. The soothing song of creation from the whales are now a distant memory as the stark cry of the dolphins demise demands my attention.
By the time I reach them, an entire pod of dolphins have disappeared beneath the sandy shoreline. Only a blanket of sand remains – gritty, coral fragments embedded with ancient stories of form across a multitude of timescales.
“Swallowed by a library of crystallized stories”, I express in shock and sadness.
Just as I resign myself to their fate of becoming a story of this sanded library, I hear a muffled squeal below the surface. As a thought of needing a tool to help free them enters my mind, a shovel suddenly manifests! I dig frantically to free the dolphins from this gritty prison of sand. My actions are filled with fear and fueled by panic and cause grievous harm to a dolphin that lies close to the surface.
In my attempt to save the dolphins, I had unknowingly hacked one into pieces!
Horrified and ashamed, I lift its amputated head from the sand, its glassy eyes still lovingly stare at me.
I carry it to the waters.
With the touch of the oceans frothy fingers, this part of the dolphin transforms into kelp and is carried away in ribbons.
The sound of more squeals filter towards the surface of the sand once more. This time I know to discard the man-made, mind-manifested shovel and to instead, plunge my hands into the sand. I reach hopefully until my entire arm is sucked below the surface and I feel my fingers make contact with the moist, cool skin of a dolphin … and I pull. Slowly, I release her from the sandy tomb, alive. I cradle her in my arms and walk to the waters to release her to the sanctuary of the sea.
As the waters receive her, in her freedom, I see how her single form multiplies until the 1 that she is, becomes 100. Each united as a member of a pod but yet alone with its fate to the depths of the sea.
These song filled water creatures are now blessed through this experience, with an understanding of what it is to trespass between worlds.
I wake feeling cold as the night breeze wafts itself over my drenched body and a distant echo of whalesong is heard as I hover between worlds.