Goddess in my Garden by Mut Danu

Neighbors ambling along the path behind the back fence stop to look twice at her abundantly curved, monumental form that resembles an ivy-covered Venus of Willendorf. At six feet tall, she stands on the summit of a hillock at the back of our suburban garden. Very clearly visible from the living room window, she beckons, "Come out and plant something."

When I tell my family or friends that I'm out in the garden focusing on "the whole," I know they are hearing  "the Hole," and thinking of the huge cistern we dug in our back yard, and not "the whole" as in … trees, wind, sunshine , dew… the whole! It's understandable, the Hole being the subject of quite a few conversations over the course of the past two years.

The twelve foot deep excavation was painfully dug out of clay and impressively took up about half the backyard. The bottom of the Hole was filled in with pipes snaking back and forth underground to bring either warmed or cooled air, depending on the season, into the house. This was then topped with a cistern the size of a small swimming pool designed to catch rainwater and that construction was topped with a patio. We continued on, adding a sun-filled room onto the back of the house, handy husband and I. The amblers now stopped to gape over the fence and shake their heads as though we were building the Ark. So it's no surprise really that people visualize me meditating on the Hole. Sometimes, at days end, I would look up, take off the heavy masons' gloves to wipe the concrete dust and sweat off my face and see the Green Goddess on her little hill, above the desolation of the garden that by now had been pounded to hardpan. With lush green ivy wrapped around wide chicken wire hips and twining among green breasts, her message was unmistakable, "Hold on."

By the end of summer we had used up the materials that had filled the backyard worksite and not a blade of grass was left standing. Now Goddess was whispering, "I'm still here, and over there, and look along the fence!" Nettles had grown up in the shade of the wooden pallets and cement blocks. A variety of moss with the tiniest leaves I'd ever seen began growing on any tiny trace of organic matter that drifted down to the concrete-like soil. Chamomile sprouted up in cracks in the clay. When fall came, I spaded soil that was packed too hard for worms to enter, turning in fallen leaves, and working carefully around those places where a few blessed weeds had somehow managed to grow. Throughout a long and dreary winter, we now began working in concert, she inspiring from her hilltop, and me poring over permaculture books and web sources of organic seeds. I went out once on a semi-dry winter day and raked some peat into the clay, then settled in for the long wait for Spring.

Spring was late this year and even though the calendar says we are definitively in April, the weather still changes its mind every ten minutes. As I write, huge snowflakes are falling for the first time this year. The Goddess in my garden beckons all the same. In Spring time her hill is covered with brilliant blue forget-me-nots and she watches over newly planted hazelnut bushes and dwarf apple trees, a benevolent Entwife of young things.

Today during a moment of sunshine that was quickly chased by ominous grey clouds and followed by snow, I went out to plant something. This year's early Spring gardening seems to have evolved into a ritual. First I fuss around, looking at the quickly spreading bits of green weeds that push up overnight even though it is still too cold for most vegetable seeds to germinate, then look at the temperature, then at brilliant blue sky that only a half an hour ago was banging sleet against the window, then gather tools and put them by the door and finally get enough momentum to burst outdoors and actually do something. As soon as my garden shoes touch the dirt, everything changes. The stiff wind becomes an invigorating breeze, and I thank Goddess for the raindrops that seem to bless us abundantly and often in this part of France.

To believe the multitude of gardening books and magazines out there, gardening is work, with a zillion tasks to accomplish and insects and fungi to worry about. Actually, it is surprising how little insects and fungi disturb things if you just leave everything well enough alone. For me, gardening often as not turns into a meditation of "the whole" and ends as a form of worship.

So now I'm on my knees with my fingers smoothing out rich, aromatic deep brown soil. Scattered on the ground are seeds for spinach and radishes, different lettuces and green onions. They aren't sown in rows. Instead they will grow to cover the soil and will resemble a tasty mille-fleur medieval tapestry of greens and reds. And then, just for the space of a transcendental moment, I don't see different shapes of the seeds, nor feel the weather around me. The incessant habit we all have of naming, processing and ordering everything around in our heads is hushed. There is only Connection; the dark earth, the seeds, the wind and me.

Then whoosh, time starts up again, the instant of bliss becomes an instant of recognition of bliss which is all the more frustrating because now it is over. I pat the seeds, connecting them firmly to the earth and sprinkling more earth on top, then pat them again with affection. The moment of bliss has passed, but I am happy, the feeling of connection is still strong. I imagine that the seeds and I both feel the simultaneous pull to grow upwards and to push down roots. I leave them tucked into their warm home and go into mine. Green Goddess is standing on her hill, forget-me-nots mirroring a tiny patch of blue sky that has suddenly opened up above and the ivy twines up around Her face, like a smile.

Mut Danu
Beltane, 2008

Mut Danu is a High Priestess of The Apple Branch, a Dianic Tradition and La Branche du Pommier, France.

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