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“[Skywoman] came here with nothing but a handful of seeds and the slimmest of instructions to ‘use your gifts and dreams for good,’ the same instructions we all carry.”

After letting it collect dust for far too long, I dove into Braiding Sweetgrass with a true hunger for its wisdom. As a creative writing minor in college, I took a Blank Verse poetry class, forever endearing me to how poetry speaks differently about the world, distinctly offering us a passageway through language into a deeper engagement with reality. Braiding Sweetgrass feeds the long hunger with poetry in prose, a fitting way of giving us wisdom, because it mirrors how the earth gives us beauty.

I’ve also had a years-long interest in herbalism. I can’t say I’m dedicated to it (ADHD) but I love learning more about the healing power of plants. The two ways I use herbalism the most are through tea and fire cider. I’ve been drinking hot tea since a child, but for the past few years I’ve taken the leap and gotten a variety of bulk herbs, so that I can mix up teas for various ailments. Thankfully, I don’t have too many ailments, but when I do, I turn to tea as one of my healing modalities.

As for fire cider, I found myself making a massive jar of it just last week as I got a terrible cold. If you’ve never tried it, I highly suggest it if you struggle with allergies and colds. I don’t use a recipe, so don’t expect measurements, but I mix together the following: lemon, onion, garlic, ginger, horseradish, cayenne pepper, apple cider vinegar, and honey to taste. I know it sounds wild, but it clears out a cold like nobody’s business. And, because I’m weird, I’ve grown to like the taste in an odd way.

And yet: I still struggle to honor plants in a day to day way. If I get sick, sure thing, but what Braiding Sweetgrass empowers me to remember is that the earth isn’t a first aid kit, it’s a home. I don’t just turn to it in an emergency situation, I live in it. I wonder: what if I tended to the earth like a home, not a first aid kit?

If I run out of something in a first aid kit, I replace it. It’s about being stocked. Then, in an emergency, I have what I need. And there’s nothing wrong with this. This is the appropriate way to use it!

But how do I tend to my home? I try to keep it clean, and I notice when I haven’t done so, to the point that it can change my mood. I’ve decorated it with items that bring me joy. I make my bed. I open the windows to let the light in. When I do clean, I feel a very palpable sense of joy. I feel genuine happiness and peace when I walk into my home from being away for a while; when I have tended to it, it feels like a deep breath after I’ve been holding it.

As we dive into this text, I am focusing a lot of my energy on this idea — how to honor the earth as my home. I mean this ecologically, spiritually, physically, and more.

“I like to imagine that when Skywoman scattered her handful of seeds across Turtle Island, she was sowing sustenance for the body and also for the mind, emotion, and spirit: she was leaving us teachers. The plants can tell us her story; we need to learn to listen.”

I’m seeking the wisdom of the earth to show me this sustenance for the body and also for the mind, emotion, and spirit, because I desperately need it. In many ways, I wish to sit at the feet of the earth and be its student.

“In the Western tradition there is a recognized hierarchy of beings with, of course, the human being on top — the pinnacle of evolution, the darling of Creation — and the plants at the bottom. But in Native ways of knowing, human people are often referred to as ‘the younger brothers of Creation.’ We say that humans have the least experience with how to live and thus the most to learn — we must look to our teachers among the other species for guidance. Their wisdom is apparent in the way they live. They teach us by example. They’ve been on the earth far longer than we have been, and have had time to figure things out. They live both above and below ground, joining Skyworld to the earth.”

I am choosing to understand myself as a younger sibling of Creation. I believe the earth is a teacher with guidance to share, guidance I need. The earth really has been on the earth far longer than I have been. As a priest, it is said that we live with a foot in our world and a foot in the heavens, joining these worlds. I seek to let the earth, both above and below the ground, join me to the worlds I have my feet in. I’d go so far as to say it isn’t just priests, but spiritual people who commune with God who have these feet planted above and below, so I trust we all have something to learn.

“Plants know how to make food and medicine from light and water, and then they give it away.”

I know I need to receive this food, this medicine, this light, this water — the light of God, the waters of Baptism — as a part of a renewal in which I receive the healing I need during this season of my life. And not just personal healing, communal healing.

“If one tree fruits, they all fruit — there are no soloists… What happens to one happens to all. We can starve together or feast together. All flourishing is mutual.”

All flourishing is mutual. I hope to receive this wisdom and, in doing so, grow in my compassion for myself, the earth, and all her inhabitants.

“Living by the precepts of the Honorable Harvest — to take only what is given, to use it well, to be grateful for the gift, and to reciprocate the gift — is easy in a pecan grove. We reciprocate the gift by taking care of the grove, protecting it from harm, planting seeds so that new groves will shade the prairie and feed the squirrels.”

I think often of how my friend Sarah uses the hashtag #shieldthejoyous on photos of children. It’s a line that comes from Compline, an order for prayer before going to sleep. Living by the precepts of the Honorable Harvest, taking only what is given, using it well, being grateful for the gift, reciprocating the gift by taking care of the earth — these are acts of shielding the joyous, noticing the tenderness of the earth. I love the idea of shielding the joyous in terms of children, because we can’t help but want to protect their childlike joy and wonder, and they are in many ways the seeds of joy we wish to plant, so new groves will shade the prairie. The earth holds tenderness, too, a need for the Honorable Harvest.

In a world deeply needing healing, we might learn how deeply we are called to shield the joy of the earth, our home, or else we will lose the gift of air, medicine, and beauty it exists to offer us.

May we shield the joy around us — in the earth and her people — including our own.

Welcome to book club! Here’s the reading schedule in pages, by the week:

Week of…

January 9 — 1-32
January 16 — 33-59
January 23 — 60-97
January 30 — 98-117

February 6 — 118-155
February 13 — 156-201
February 20 — 202-240
February 27 — 241-276

March 6 — 277-300
March 13 —301-347
March 20 — 348-384

So pumped!

gather the inklings

shield the joyous (erin jean warde)