the earth as lover, A Valentine’s Message

Have you ever reached your arms around the trunk of a tree and pressed your cheek against its bark? Have you inhaled its musty fragrance, heard the shiver of leaves above your head making sweet talk? Have you walked in a meadow trailing your fingers through the long, sometimes spiky, sometimes silky grasses? Have you felt in your own body the thick, dark wings of a raven whooshing by?

There's no doubt that many of us have a sensual, even erotic, relationship with the natural world. I know I do.

As a child I loved a particular tree because it was titillating to straddle the thick branches and inch along their length, though back then I couldn’t have named why. I loved the smell and the taste of earth. I loved sprawling in grasses of wildflowers lulled to drowsiness by the hum of the bumblebees and the warm touch of the sun. And water has always lapped my body in delicious ways. It’s cradled me, too, a generous lover who knows I need only be held to feel loved.

Mountains, steely, steep, strong, challenge me to reveal more of my essential self. And still I find resting places on them where I can lay my sweaty body upon sun warmed rocks and rest.

This Valentine's Day I want to invite all of us to be not just Earth lovers, but Earth lovers. To let, as Mary Oliver writes, “the soft animal of your body / love what it loves.

Step outside and breathe the quickening air or stroke the flirty feather moss at the base of a tree. Wiggle your bare feet into the earth or put your hands in the soil. Sway your hips to the tempo of breezes. Even rivulets of rain sliding down slick city streets can carry a love song. Above all, feel nature’s murmurings like a lover's breath pressed against your ear, thrilling and inviting.

To be very clear, the only man I want in my bed is my beloved husband, Bruce. But after that, the world is my lover, as she is yours too.