“Root Mother:” a poem

Root Mother

I do not see you

as much as I feel you–

know you, the way I know

my bones hold me upright as I walk,

or the pressure of bare feet on cool grass.

You, Root Mother, draw my eyes downward

to the earth, where the heart of life beats,

the deep throb beneath

all the distractions we call life.

Root Mother, yes, that is the best name

I can give you, although your true name

sounds more like water over stone

or the creak of growing corn.

Some truths are hidden,

tucked away in the holy darkness,

far from my dissecting mind,

yet I know they are there,

safe in your hands.

Who says I must understand

something fully in order to celebrate it–

even to be held by it?

You call me back to the center

of my own being, a space much lower

than any lofty thoughts of my mind,

where you wait with divine patience.

I will never begin to know

the truth of my own body until

I rest in the rich darkness of yours,

and for this grace I thank you. 

—Stuart Higginbotham

(I returned to this earlier poem from 2023, trying to notice what themes have been prevalent in the poems that have come to me…)