“they help us jump to a higher timeline”

“they re-align our career paths”

“…help us upgrade”

and my personal favorite,

“comment eclipse to join my quantum program”

but, wait…

cries that sweet honey breasted moon

wait…

I am choking on all these lonely, rootless prayers

I am longing for you,

to throw back your head

peel open your eyes to the black night

I am aching to be felt by broken hearts

Me, the mass of my being

stabilizing yours,

is longing

to be more than a symbol

And I have grown tired

of being used for personal progress, again

What would you offer the Sun,

in a moment when they were dimmed

by my milky, billion year old rocks

and half the world grew dark?

How would you pray, if the air grew cold in a moment?

Pay attention,

the birds are shy today

the air is still

the trees are thirsty

no one is quantum leaping

Look up

Isn’t that what your soul needs?

Listen.

Isn’t that what the world needs?

ANNA WILDFLOWER

to join a splash of sunlight

as if you belong to it

waiting for you

to rip yourself

away from yourself

experiment

with embodiment,

like the birds do

be mindful —

full of other minds

wilder minds

let your limbs be danced

by the hot breath of the sky

this is the journey

from who am I

to whose am I

ANNA WILDFLOWER

That thousands of other hearts have been shattered by ice cold winters, have decomposed with autumn leaves, and have shriveled in the light of the day — but somehow with each steady beat of sunshine, a new stem is pushed through the soil, then a bud, and a petal unfurls...bursting with ivory and indigo. We can carry this bouquet wherever we go, these eternal flowers, not always in bloom but forever seeded in our chests.

XX,
Anna Wildflower

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“If the forest had a heartbeat, what would it feel like in your chest?”

And I am so tired of the metaphors.

because,

the forest has a real heartbeat

and a thousand lungs

all reaching for the breath

inside your chest

the voices of many

who breathe together

are quiet but clear

you can hear

a trickling brook of blood

alive with oxygen

yes, the forest holds a heart

that fell out of your chest

and now waits patiently

at the threshold of your skin

a body

high on a living ecosystem

a body

utterly dependent on that

other heartbeat

bark-crested hands,

reaching inside the chest cavity

to drop a few blossoms

send a trace of sun-steeped sap

through the nose

so the soul might be awakened

to remember,

just as you see and feel —

the branch scars

on the birch trees

are also

the eyes

and the heart

of the world

ANNA WILDFLOWER

A love that is senseless, and made of only senses.

A love that takes you to another place — wisps away all your oxygen and devours your lungs. A love made of breast-shaped mountains and beauty that even the flowers turn their heads to witness. A blazing love fierce enough to end every active war on this planet. A love that cries enough tears to put out every human-caused wildfire. A love that isn’t afraid to say, “I need you. I depend on you the way every living creature depends on one another.”

A love with a throat that shouts, “I can’t fucking live without you.”

A love that is exhausting and life-giving all the same. A love that believes in itself, so no one else has to.

A sweet love, that tastes like sun-soaked mangos and smells like wet roses bursting in the heat of the day.

A salty love, that leaves sweat marks on the moon.

A love so deep, even distance has no place to go.

A naked love, that undresses your soul.

ANNA WILDFLOWER

even after hurricanes of bliss

you will enter caverns

where the air is ice to your bones

exposed to the aching forces of the world

you’ve been there,

felt that bone-chilling current

entered those canyons

where there is only darkness

and still

and still —

you crawled your way out

to read poetry to the sky

drink lavender tea

luxuriate in an old hurt

as your heart thawed

against the summer sun

don’t be afraid,

because fear

will not stop your heart from breaking

covering your face

with feathers

that fell from the wings of God

will not stop your heart from breaking

attempting to bend the winds

in a direction of your choosing

will not stop your heart from breaking

so let them rip through you

wipe away

every last chance

you thought you had

at avoiding

both the terrifying

and liberating

vulnerability

of this life

ANNA WILDFLOWER

More money. More romance. A more aligned work place. More passion. Greater purpose.

And is this asking (this “manifesting,” this prayer), also an offering?

An offering such as: May more for me, be more for all.

This poem is an offering to the rocks on the edge of the ocean and all they continue to enliven in me:

I calibrate my system,

embrace with my whole

bare front-body

what is already here —

this answered prayer

this ripening of what is in season,

this nectar dripping down my chin

before I begin a new prayer

before I ask to receive more life

I am being swallowed by time

and rapturous chaos

like the flesh of the rocks

at my feet

soaked to the bone

beneath the fangs of the ocean

chewing through

the soul of the world

saliva thick with salt and foam

and ruptures from the wind

from this place

and this place only,

I continue looking to that horizon

a belt between two blues

the line I’ll never cross

but still brings me closer

to the belly at the center

of my longing

ANNA WILDFLOWER

walk back into this body

the one who feels, shivers, roots

and wisps away just the same

there you will find

a sternum piercing,

swelling force

that sets you aside

so another you

can fall towards the places

your heart wants to go

vulnerability is not only

letting your fears be known

to other humans

but also

whispering your

terror to the sky

and into the forests

softening the air

waiting to swallow you whole

vulnerability

is how honest you are

with the ones

who know you in a way

you never will

walk back into this body

be awake to this altar

longing to place

its feather onto

the soul of the world

ANNA WILDFLOWER

And with events that shaped your life in an un-namable way, I think this confusion is common.

I often ask myself:

Do I begin this story with the earliest, most joyful childhood memory? Do I begin with grief? With the days following?

I guess I’ll start with this:

I was 11 years old on my way home in my friend’s Subaru from a play date. It was cut short because I had to be driven home due to a “family emergency” that was a complete mystery to me. In the seven or so minutes of us driving from my friend’s house to mine, I remember exactly what I was thinking: “What could it be? No one in my family is sick. It couldn’t possibly be that bad I thought. I shouldn’t worry. I won’t.”

I was a wise 11 year old, but I had no idea what was coming and that my entire life was about to change forever, in a matter of minutes.

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to move every deer beside the road

blackened and lifeless 

to a patch of wild daisies 

I wish I had the time 

to hug and kiss the bark of each tree

that stitched my heart and sang my name 

I wish I had the time 

to kick up terracotta powder 

on every desert plane 

The time to get lost 

so lost 

that home fastened itself 

to the soles of my tired, wise feet 

I wish I had the time 

to rest in the arms of the myst 

their limbs pouring through the grinning mountains 

like a duvet 

only there in the morning

I wish I had the time 

to watch every wave swell from the Ocean and froth at the shore 

whispering bring me with you 

I love you 

again and again and again 

I wish I had the time to stay up all night 

counting each star as they revealed themselves at dusk 

waiting for Great Horned owls cry 

Oh that eternal cry 

I wish I had the time 

Then again, maybe I do

have the time

and maybe, just maybe 

the time 

is wishing

they had me too

ANNA WILDFLOWER

death has a smell

you know it don’t you?

a taste, a fervor, a sound

that takes up all the air around you

stains regions of your mind

you assumed would always be floral

before you knew death

you believed it happened

only in far away places

movies and myths

stories from your grandmother

but now,

you see a spider in their web

and are reminded that

death always happens at the center

and if grief has not yet sunken it’s teeth

into the body you belong to,

just wait

because when it does

it will soften you

it will chew every fiber of your soul

dissolve every pathway you had mapped

if grief has not bitten you,

scrambled your life

and devoured your heart

i promise,

one day it will

as it did

for me

and when you encounter it

remember

to let the rawness of your flesh

become the nutrients

for more life

ANNA WILDFLOWER

to these waves 

who carry unhurried rage 

from every direction of our Great Mother 

erasing 

burying 

foaming at the mouth 

you’ll feel them in your dreams, 

infinitely more commanding than those

touching lakeshores 

turn my back & all I hear is

my fear & hunger 

for the vast unknown

that winged ones 

have felt in a way we never will 

the stones say, 

they have been dreaming 

of bodies 

to lean against their ancient palms 

weathered & callused 

waiting to be loved 

like the ocean 

two feathers 

of the

death tenders,

to trust what is decomposing, 

without naming 

sounding 

or evening singing 

all of it swirls slow 

— the birds never fly in a straight line, 

so why should I — 

calm in the chaos,

if bones could breathe

they’d say: 

“pray to the ones who know your secrets 

and you will 

feel 

your way” 

XX, 🪶

Anna Wildflower

I believe many of you reading this are deep feelers, so I’m sure you’re familiar with this story: You’re on your bedroom floor with snot dripping into the carpet, wishing you’d soon wake up from the nightmare that is now your life. Your soul is being wrung out and the ox blood dripping from the wild caverns of your heart, is infused with everything you thought you knew about your life. From here on, everything is uncertain and terrifying.

*Cue: heart-opening, heartbreak-through.

Let’s just call it what it is, heartbreak.

Weeks go by and your friends remind you, “It’ll get easier soon…”

Moons are rising and falling and you read: “Three months after a breakup you’ll start to feel better.”

But now, the year is almost over and you still have a guttural external longing for the person who left you.

Can you relate?

Do you know of this wringing out?

I feel inclined to present one of love and heartbreaks greatest questions:

Why do we long most to be chosen by those who aren’t choosing us?

*Even after we have firmly convinced ourselves that the separation was meant to be.

Well it’s likely because we believe that if the person chooses us again we’ll feel a greater sense of self-worth, self-love, belonging or satisfaction.

A relief from the pain even.

And whether this belief is buried under the bones of our subconscious or we know damn well what’s going on… it’s the driving force behind this desire to be chosen.

However, as you probably already know, the belief that anyone else (including someone who has rejected us) will give us some kind of self-worth — is totally misconstrued.

I mean it might for a short while, but past that, you’re on your own and it’s not sustainable anyway.

So, your self-worth isn’t placed in hands of another human. You’ve heard this a million times, I know.

But here is something to try on for size…

Let’s talk about longing.

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the way meat is butchered from bone

we have been cut from Great Mystery 

ripped from the bleeding tendons and tissues that connect us to

that which will never decompose 

that which resists to be melted, burned or turned to dust 

that which will be,

…all that is left of us 

why is it, that when the eternal eyes meet ours, we break our necks looking away?

why is it, that we run fastest from that which we most long for?

and is it our life's work play to be with these questions?

because if we continue to run,

only emptiness will seep into all the places life has left her loving mark 

and infatuation with answer, and explanation, will numb our senses

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the dead skin over our hearts,

will decompose in the rich soil of solitude 

to brush our bones into fertile oneness

so we may feel how passion desires to move through our awakened veins 

so we may sense the aliveness that tingles in the wisps of old hair and how the fever of devotion graces our spine

so we may see the way lapping oceans, loosen the air around us into a ripening promise of wild abandon 

so we may taste the flavor of Earth 

on the tip of the tongue of our souls 

and sip her melody 

as a song to come home to

again and again and again

and at last

may we dance,

to the rhythm of mysteries enchanting drumbeat

with pure hearts coiled around our sweating souls

ANNA WILDFLOWER

What is your relationship with solitude?

within the words i hope to find peace in my mind

but every few sentences

i drift off into the thought of you 

i start at the top again

and again 

and again

until i finally realize

it’s okay for my mind

to think of you 

during moments of peace

when you merge with peace in my mind, 

i have found wisdom within my pain

— heartbreak-through

ANNA WILD FLOWER

her shadow soars too, 

on the soil of the Earth

and so i ask,

are you willing to braid the wings of your shadow 

into your hair like sweetgrass

distill into natural law and unfurl

as in sky

so in underworld

your wings aching to take flight of tomorrow

but remember, the time it takes

to carve your bones hollow

so lay patiently on the chest of who you are becoming

hear the eternal, internal,

beat of your wild spirit drumming 

empty your grief-worn heart of words  

& allow who you already are,

speak to be heard

before -

you listened for the birds

to sing songs of truth you had yet to know

now -

you hear their song, 

and sing your own, 

-in harmony-

ANNA WILDFLOWER