🐞
grief belongs to the living,

only the
breathing cries.

your life is free now,
for me to remember-
🐞
how you spent your time
for years

is still unknown to me,

but i release the writing
from the diner’s walls of history
during our after-midnight booth meetings

where and when
we shared words from our notebooks
🐞
no words needed to make sense-
to understand and be understood was
the essence of our connection,

this was a first soul friend,
the artist path unveiled-
and then re-clothed in black.
🐞
you were a friend
who with non-explicit language
blended music, energy, art

and lived a raw & real life
🐞
shared booze, cigarettes, relationships,
all examined through emotion
with our paints while we chased our shadows,

i held your hand in deep sisterhood.

🐞
i am told you found a path of health
to walk for a while, and ever more
people who would love you.
🐞
you always were loved, and deserving,
may you find your way back to me.
To us all. for in my heart you have not left,
and the news i received, is still not real.
💗

Here’s a new song I discovered while grieving and healing. I know you would have liked it.
Forgive my inability to be poetic, or write exactly what’s in my heart. This is the best I can do. You don’t go in silence…

*Recently heard of a dear friend from my teenage years had passed away. That gives new meaning to “I don’t want to say Goodbye” poem. I hesitate to explain myself to others, because I know that the truth is beyond saying. Most of my closest friends understand this. My poem was in part prophetic. I just didn’t know it at the time.

Is being a Leo Sun really about sassiness and celebrity? Is it really all that over-dramatic and self-seeking egotistical etc etc? I’ve seen the dark side of all the signs… and it doesn’t exist quite like that, or does it?

Are Scorpio’s really manipulative and jealous? Do Gemini’s strike you as shallow and Cancer’s as over-sentimental and stuck in the past? Is it impossible for a Sagittarius to commit? Are Virgo’s really all that uptight? These are some of the pejoratives that circulate the ethos.

To me, these are examples of the worse side of astrology, yet tabloid types of horoscopes continue to fascinate curious and desperate folks and circulate everywhere. After all, this is where it all starts. Why feed that?

Even people who aren’t even interested in astrology and who “don’t believe in it,” they are still aware of the stereotypes given of their signs, because of culture and media; these ideas are pervasive. So what’s beneath that? That would be a reasonable question for people to ask. Penetrate.

Is it human nature to make a caricature of human personality traits? What is the cultural obsession with personality all about? I hope more people begin to realize that reading lists of “pros and cons” and “positive and negative traits” overlooks the beautiful and rich nuance that is available in the art of astrology. When more people realize that astrology is not a fortune-telling game, but a deepening and meditative glimpse into the mysteries of all the things, it offers the ability to transcend them – even culture, even the transits themselves. Good astrology transcends itself by moving through the dross, asking the questions, and freeing the assumptions. It takes study, examination, and above-all, observation.

In our statistics we understand that correlation is not causation. So say it is with all observations. How do we know if we are creating self-fulfilling prophecy? The answer is through examination. It is through lightly holding ideas.

The path and the journey are not the road to transcendence, but the obstacles along the way are the gifts that make transcendence possible!

New Moon in Leo, July 31! Looking forward to it! One can be present in the here and now and also enjoy the possibilities of the future. The future is ‘now,’ dressed as time. We can transcend time by using time.

penetrating the shadow
from the line that holds the
alphabet

allowing the words to fall
into the empty bucket
of my mind

from voice to page to back
around again, inside voice
inside my head again

a box opens with mind
in gaze and the landscape
is more perfect upside-down.

too good go slow
for passing speed is
not ideal these days,

no HOV lane near the solid
line of thought, in sight
go slower, still,

until you wake.

Ka Malana©2019

There might have been music to this but it sort of started itself on its own and wanted to be written and shared on Fiestaestrellas. It was more about the energy behind the words as I embarked on an entirely new, and yet normal-for-Ka, mysterious journey that will continue for the next 16 months.

i woke up this morning
and saw my whole life
rise with the sun,

the flame burst over the hill
and all the land caught fire
with its golden gleam
made sunbeam

the light became a twinkle
in the center of a songbird’s
lively eye,

while crows perched and drew
their wings from the shadows
made from passing night

glowing orangely, a warmth
slowly saturated the
soil and made shapes
on the land

i drew up my mind and
forged a pen, found myself
as clay-like animated
raw material

born from spirit in this fleshy
business for a time
to be situationally present

i watched the clouds form and fade,
the critters stir
and scamper,
my soul laid content as
a non-layer, non-entity

a force without a face
the gaze of the sun as
if by the sight of the land
were to trace…

unlimited openness,

born from the fuel of grace,
born from the magick of fusion –
born from the spark of a new union.

***************** ******************

May you all feel the soul nourishment this Solar Eclipse

It’s that time again! We are about to change our tunes and our runes over here! (Google is cute as usual.)

Well, at our household, anyways, we are being musical, including singing to the baby, and being silly.

This blog is being written extremely slow with my left hand, btw.( then i switched to just the right hand).

I wanted to look at the astrology and write up something since this is why i blog, but having so many of my own planets in the sign of Cancer, I’m pretty intuitive (though not psychic, so leave a comment). I’m intuitive enough to “feel” most the astrology so the rest of it is managed (Aquarius rising and S. Node) by my intellect and my “objectivity” – and sometimes, EH… it’s not that interesting to talk about in that way, especially when “feeling it out” is far more compelling. After all, Leo Sun here: should explain the rest (if explaining is your thing ((not mine))). Nested parentheses included.

Since the transiting N. node is in Cancer, we are lined up to be in touch with our more personal, household, domestic/family affairs, contrasting with those planets in Capricorn in opposition (career, business, reputation), and we’ve been dealing with some interesting squares… What have your dreams been telling you?

How will you enjoy your summer?

What are your plans?

I just love the solstice time and am having an inner celebration. Looking forward to those awesome moments that arise when I get to head outdoors and take pictures and explore nature, and maybe get back to rollerskating again. There’s so much to look forward to! I can’t wait to show my daughter a waterfall for the first time. Right now, however, she’s just learning how to focus her eyes, and binocularly yoke them. What fun.

Also, I’ve been making space to study on my own more, and that’s a real treat for myself, and nerd cavort with my colleagues, and take numerous free classes that are available through my associations to keep me busy while away from Acupuncture school.

I will definitely finish my acupuncture program, it “feels” inevitable, but we shall see – just two more semesters of coursework left. Lots of discussion and time spent on working that one out…

Speaking of programs, meanwhile: I’m two weeks away from completing my certification for Medicine Woman Rite of the Six Moons! It’s mostly self-guided with teacher essences from New Zealand.

Needless to say, life has been intriguing, beguiling, challenging, and relatively fluent!

I did just complete my last Journey Quest with a specific group that I was working with for the last 4 or 5 years, and had an (unplanned) graduation ceremony on the day of my daughter’s birth, as well as a ceremony for her birth and my labor and our gateway into transition. The ceremony happened at the hospital with another shaman medicine woman, midwife, facilitating.  I did tell my teacher for JQ that I was going to have a baby for graduation, so if you call that a plan… it could have been! It was really just a statement of what I thought was inevitable once I sensed my process and flow.

I’m looking forward to visiting everyone soon and will be over at your blog.

No sooner does the fog clear
and the way ahead looks
like – coast clear,
another event and more
unsolved. unresolved.

time out from the rush
of ordinary life is
not enough,

ease and care
and all the right things
done is still sometimes
not enough.

the truth is up and down
and the challenges are real
and enduring.

maybe tomorrow the light
will shine again
and bring us into grace and
ease.

transitions are happening,
and asking for relief –

You know, we can ask for it-
and beg and plead,
but sometimes,
happiness wants to play
tag, and sometimes,

“you’re about to be ‘it,‘”

(and you don’t
even know it,)

until your eating your
granola snack behind
your favorite tree
at your
cousin’s house,

on a wicked hot
summer afternoon,
slurping up your
favorite, grape drink,

only to get startled a little bit
when happiness sneaks up,
tosses out a

💦 water balloon 🎈and says,

“bet you can’t catch me!”

and before you know it,

‘you’re it,’ 🏃

again.

✊

Ka Malana c. 2019

I’ve been fighting off a borderline fever for the past couple of days. Rarely do I write about my hardship publicly; mostly because I believe I have really good fortune, and don’t feel like I have legitimacy to complain. Complaining has been drilled into me as a bad thing. Venting is okay in small amounts, certainly don’t want to turn people away from us. So many of us tire from our own suffering, we tire of sharing it.

One of the reasons why I created Fiestaestrellas (including the astrology bit) was to celebrate all the good. So I could make it bigger in my life, and stronger than what gets me down.

That’s the truth, and yet, people are at a distance and we feel stifled when our reality is not accurately portrayed. Then we just go on and on sharing, and attempting to balance and express until it’s so obvious it’s beyond words and maybe we relax into it a bit more.

I’ve had a lot of joy lately. (Jupiter transits have always given me a mixed bag of plenty).

But it has come with a decent amount of hardship.

A couple of weeks ago I gave birth to my beautiful daughter. Despite getting a midwife and trying to be very natural about our birth –none of that part of my desire was met. I signed up for all the classes, but in the end, I had a very long labor– over 48 hrs, followed by 5 hours of unproductive “pushing,” only to result in a C-section. This all came after a mostly wonderful pregnancy (I had prepared for the worst and hoped for the best).

Then before my water broke at week 37 and 6 days, I got sick for two weeks with a very persistent cold and a fever and tremendous head congestion, only to barely clear it in time for my water to break and to have a very long and arduous labor. Though there were moments of shamanic ceremony, and moments where I pushed and smiled, and claimed my power. There were “fleeting” moments among all those hours where I was in charge. This is something that I learned to do, and I applied it as best I could.

I DID give birth to a great love in my life, my daughter. I will not be sharing photos of her online because I consider our images to be private, especially hers. I did toy around with sharing an image of her that doesn’t have her face or any identifying features, and maybe that photo will come out and play one day.

The life path? I don’t know. I was on the road to finishing my degree in Traditional Chinese Medicine and becoming a licensed acupuncturist (just two more semesters and board exams). However, I got pregnant, and here I am, falling behind on that goal, feeling tragically remote from it, unable to appreciate all those other years of HARD work, that got me through each step. Forgetting so much of what I’ve learned and wondering if I even could pick it back up. Also I play among many paradigms and I am not the typical “alternative medicine” person. At all. I’m actually pretty conventional. At least I’ve become (aware that I am) that way while in school.

Do I want to return to school? I receive all the emails and see how the field is growing in leaps and bounds. Acupuncture can do a lot of good. Yet, I am not able to rise up and meet all the plans I had. I am just barely able to rise up to breastfeed — which is easily its own private story. I’m not even sure about my inspiration for finishing my degree.

Right now I am just so very grateful for the osteopathic physician who delivered my baby, for Western and modern medicine, and for people with open minds who are able to read and enjoy my life’s circuitous and often convoluted story, without judgement or agenda. Realize that it will all change.

I am also struggling. Every day.

Do I have joy? Absolutely I do. More joy than I’ve ever had.

Why do I have a blog? Why share this public ally? Why didn’t I wait to “get clear” before writing, and really “process” it?

I really cannot answer those questions. I want my world to be private, but there’s this small chance that maybe something I write lifts someone else up, they are less alone. Maybe that’s it… maybe that’s all of it. I hope that the people who need to read this, find me and do.

So there’s my joy *and* my sorrow.

I will return to focusing on the joys as best I can, and resolve this current challenge, while I keep meeting challenge after challenge, one by one, and posting my own style of poetry when the mood strikes me.

Because you can,

even if you don’t feel good —

The music comes on

And the hips sway,

And suddenly you both –

Own the world,

The scenery,

The stage,

The quiet.

The floor tiles,

The cabinets,

the spot-lighting

flexible frames

glide through

your home’s simple space.

The food’s right there,

You can dance all night

And dance all day —

Because you can.

The kitchen sink,

The food in the microwave,

waiting –

The perfect time to be

with your best friend. is.

Anytime.

the winds of change
have come again
and made me pure,

carved out my treasure,
opened my womb

I became a ritual
inside a ritual,

on a stage, that is set in another world

transforming this world.

in transcendance, the nesting

dance

the nested

the total egg 🥚 unbroken, broke

And emerged the circle ⭕️

I speak of bliss
in the opening of this circle,
merging and joining

of the past,
present, and future

my life just created another life🌸!

ka Malana poetry c2019

from its depth in
unseen waters
the angelic dark-deep
unearthed mountain
rumbling, readying
lifting

from first quiet
of the poet’s
underground fountain,
as it bubbles and readies
under the surface,
undulating slowly
in layers

the water pools, preparing

to siphon up
a new spring
a sprite of light
the sparkle of its diamond

from the thrust of earth
made to divide and
liberate new soil,

opening
astonishly, unpredictably
unapologetically, sparklingly
fresh

rise my soul
to the heaven you
made me,
and from where
i make you,
anew.

go beyond!

know no bounds
in your great escape!

Ka Malana poetry c2019

************** * ************* *

Happy Full Moon in Scorpio