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New poems in Puerto del Sol, Fourteen Hills, and American Poetry Journal

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The Land Where Your House Is Built

The Land Where Your House Is Built

Remember it was once gold, desperate as a coin placed n a reservation slot machine. When your father drives through town in his Corolla he feels small again, like he could park all day, listen to the dusty wind cut the feed lots and be forgotten. Already we’ve ridden to the drive -thru at Rosa’s three times to sate our craving for beef tacos. I say there must be drugs in their tortillas. Here…

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Descendants

Descendants Loneliness is solitude with a problem. — Maggie Nelson Memories tinged with purple tinged with red–from periwinkle to myrtle herb they swarm the cargo hold to be held. Like children made of cloud, we do not trust their current or their pulse, though they fill each empty decibel in us, make the attic howl. Wind can never be trapped or it will die. But jars of swirling wind, eons old.…

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December Swim

This is an excerpt from Part I of my book-in-progress. It takes place before my soul “awakens.” I hope you enjoy reading!   “Soul seems to have the capacity to remember not only what was but also what would have been better. There is some instinct or knowledge about what is needed to grow and unfold a potential for good.” – Hunter Beaumont   I returned home from Dallas feeling really fuzzy, as…

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What does it mean to make a journey to soul?

What does it mean to make a journey to soul?

“To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.” – Pema Chödrön I walk through a museum designed and built by Frank Gehry. Every time I turn my head there’s a different angle, a new study of light to observe. It’s like a child savant has dropped his pick-up sticks in a heap of brilliance. I like Frank Gehry. He’s no rule follower. I once owned a…

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It Is I Who Eat This Pizza.

It Is I Who Eat This Pizza.

I wake up early, just past six a.m., not because I want to but because I hear loud voices in the atrium outside my door. Instead of trying to fall back asleep, I walk straight out my door and, barefoot, up to the rooftop to watch the sunrise. I sit and watch the sky break pink, lavender, blue while crows circle the rooftops. In shadow, the old city in punctuated by pretty angles, birds, and t.v.…

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Top Five Suggestions for Your Soul's Call to More Life

Top Five Suggestions for Your Soul’s Call to More Life

Since starting my Journey to Soul, I’ve discovered several tools which have helped me come into more alignment with my ‘new’ self. I’ve spent time in silence and contemplation; shared stories and wisdom with people I consider to be new teachers and friends; participated in a natem ceremony with a Shaman from Ecuador on the beach beneath a full moon; found myself joining a breathwork/rebirth group…

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Many Tribes, One People

Many Tribes, One People

Wow, Panama! I think I am in love with this place. I am here at the Tribal Gathering with about 280 other people. Lots of dreadlocks, hemp clothing, and, each day, more and more naked sunbathers on the beach. We are about four hours from Panama City, or anywhere, really. And just like my arrival at PachaMama, I arrive on site Friday night at about 2AM, late, in the dark, seemingly at the edge of…

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Hey folks, looks like I am leaving PachaMama early…which means that at some point I am going to have to back up and fill you in on a lot that has gone on between my arrival at PachaMama (see yesterday’s post) and today, 12 days late, like…

1)  The three pillows I stole from “downtown,” –which is the quaint way PachaMama residents have for referring to the center of the village, or

2) My perceptions about Tyohar, the guru/mastermind behind PachaMama, or

3) About the PachaMama philosophy, much of which is quite fascinating, though I’ve found some conflicting messages…

In truth the PachaMama way has a lot that is desirable, replicable, and sound. A very short description of the philosophy here (as I see it) being that it is a new model of a traditional indigenous society where residents live close to the earth and its rhythms. It is also comprised of some of the best, most modern approaches to zero-waste consumption such as permaculture, composting toilets, only natural products sold in glass recyclable containers, only raw natural foods are made and served, and most importantly, the inclusion of a community spiritual practice–unlike western consumer culture, in the evening the entire village comes together at meditation. There are also constant individual healing or group sessions or trainings. Both of these elements are at the heart of this place, reason being that spirituality is also at the core of every human being— remove the spiritual and you remove the meaning from life, essentially, or, in the words of Eliot Cowen, “I saw that when nature is out of balance, we feel a longing that drives everything about us, including our thoughts, feelings, tastes, cravings, voice, skin color, and odor. Most importantly, longing distorts our experience of life. Our symptoms merely dramatize the true disease, the need for our soul.” This place put ‘soul’ first, it removes the material bandaid of consumerism which masks our deep longing and need for meaning with shallow and temporary fixes via over consumption. Here at PachaMama you are allowed to explore and express your spirit, to feel your emotions, to challenge your self-limiting beliefs. I have so much more to say on this subject…I’d love to write an article about it (Yoga Journal? Shambala Magazine? email me please : )

Anyhow, it looks like I am leaving PachaMama early to travel with two new friends to Panama to something called the Tribal Gathering which is a three-week festival that includes the participation of more than 20 indigenious tribes from surrounding Central American countries. These tribes will be offering workshops on everything from shamanistic healing practices to sacred fire keeping. The first two weeks are dedicated to education. The third week (before which I’ll probably want to take off) is going to be a music festival, a trance party, um, like something I would have been totally into when I was 24, not 44, so I am sure that I will shove off before that last week begins. I’m hoping that I might possibly be able to look up my family’s old exchange student, Rita, who lived with us for a school year while I was in High School. She shared my bedroom and we took her on a lot of shopping trip, specifically one to buy all her family member cowboy boots at a Frye outlet. Rita have to purchase extra suitcases when it was time for her to return home with her goods and her much improved English. Now she has two grown children back in Panama but I can still remember how curly her hair was and how she pronounced “shopping” so that it sounded like “chopping.” So cute.

Anyway, I will have to return to my PachaMama saga at some point…it is a story well worth telling. It is definitely like a family here and I have slipped right in to being friends with so many new people, trading contact information, talking about healing practices and journeys. I met a man from Brazil who studies frog medicine, and the daughter of a famous memorist/novelist…I’ve been told I have an ‘elfin’ quality, that I am ‘grounded’, that I seem ‘native’. People often assume I’ve been here for a long time or that I live here. I’ve had several people tell me how much they enjoyed my ‘presence’ or ‘energy’ during the silent retreat or in general.

I also want to share with you about the times I’ve been so filled with compassion during evening meditation that I felt God’s presence, his love for us, his acceptance and forgiveness. I’ve left Osho Hall with my heart wide open, feeling taller, the sensation lasting through dinner, and following me into my tent where I fell asleep with my tent open to the breeze feeling swaddled in currents of love. Osho Hall is a place of worship here, it is like a church, a synagogue, a temple, all of these things put together in the characteristic way Tyohar’s philosophy strips the old in order to establish a new way, a way unobstructed by tradition and a thousand plus years of institutionalization of spiritual practice. What’s left is a clean, white and wood wide open space in which to contemplate the divine within and without, the non-duality of all life, the pulsing flow of what’s real beyond the dream or illusion of what we are told to believe.

So, I will keep you apprised of my adventures…I should be packing my backpack tomorrow morning and heading on my way. I will let you know where I go! My journey to soul continues…grateful for you for following and sending love from Costa Rica.

Keep yourself bright and lite, keep your soul warm, let go and glow

xoxoxoxo

Jessica

From Nosara to Panama Hey folks, looks like I am leaving PachaMama early…which means that at some point I am going to have to back up and fill you in on a lot that has gone on between my arrival at PachaMama (see yesterday’s post) and today, 12 days late, like…

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The Dusty Road, the Locked Gate

The Dusty Road, the Locked Gate

I’m sitting in the ‘Welcome Hut’ waiting to find out where I am sleeping tonight here at PachaMama. I’ve arrived late, under cover of darkness, after a 45-minute open-air taxi ride—the “taxi” more like a motorbike-pedicab hybrid or motorized rickshaw than a cab. We fly down dusty back roads (as if there is anything else here in Nosara), winding between deep ruts and large stones, swerving to…

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Day 1: The Airport Scene

Day 1: The Airport Scene

I nearly faint at the ticket counter. Patrick has just dropped me off. I’d woken feeling a little sad, even now I feel tears welling up. Are they tears of gratitude? Heartbreak? Am I simply exhausted? I can’t be sure because it feels like all these things. As the young woman at the counter checks my passport I crouch down, my giant blue backpack still on, and try to steady myself. There’s a…

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Intentions: How to Turn a Trip Into a Journey

Intentions: How to Turn a Trip Into a Journey

A great time of transformation might always start with an awakening. There are many symbols of transformation. For me, one of the most active symbols has been the snake. I’ve encountered snakes many, many times in dreams and sightings in nature over the past several weeks. I’ll be sharing more about the snake animal totem later, though Ina Woolcott says,”As Snake sheds its skin so we can shed our…

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Watch Me Rise This is what I do: When what I need to talk about is blood, I talk about birds.

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the US is unreal like girls cant wear shorts to school, you can literally lose your job for being gay, and unarmed black children are brutally murdered on the regular but old white ppl r still like “what a beautiful country. i can freely carry a gun for no reason and some of our mountains look like presidents. god bless”

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Wedding ring sets by Artemer.

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Aidan Koch