May 21, 2016 Faun In the Rushes of the Cottonwood Trail

I has rained for days. The trail has deep puddles of water. The creek is the delicious color of caramel.  Just a few feet off the boardwalk, a tiny faun is nestled in the reeds and rushes, a baby of such perfect beauty with large brown eyes and white speckled brown coat.  It has a complete stillness.  I have the impossible urge to touch it and speak to it in hushed tones, sing it a lullaby.  I don't see it's mother, although I suspect she is there watching.

Native Americans, especially the Eastern Woodland and Plains Indians associate deer with fertility and love.

There is often a duality in the spirit of the Deer Woman of love and death, encouragement and punishment. She gives and she takes away.

Native peoples of the North West believed at the time of creation, that there were Gods who were Animal People. In a later age, the Great Changer arrived to turn some of them into rocks and mountains and bodies of water or trees and plants.  There is a story of Deer trying to stop the Changer and for this, the Changer turned Deer into a shy creature, often the food of man.

Today the earth itself is giving.  All around it is lush and green. Purple flowers bloom in the marsh. Red wild strawberries are along the paths. Blue birds zip through the sky.

I look for Great Blue and suddenly he is there, soaring over the full wetlands.  It is a good day for fishing.