Spring Festival 2015
A Song of Gratitude
 We came from the dense pavements of Denver, the sandstone canyonlands of southern Utah, an old Colorado railroad town, and throughout the Grand Valley. But not as teachers, carpenters, parents, or even healers—we came as the Land, the Sky, and their many and various Children. We stepped from the shore of clock-time and into an ancient current unmeasured and unforgotten—buoyed by fresh waters still hanging in the air where the day before poured Spring rainfall and lay fresh snowpack. Joyfully, we were in over our heads, breathing together to a heartbeat of drums, and dance, and sounds of creation—joined in a song of gratitude for the enduring generosity of this mountain called, today, the Grand Mesa, but known also by its sacred name, Tum-bi-ap-pah soop-arter-Kahn kaib, meaning Sky Meeting-House Mountain.
 On a bright and delightful Sunday morning this past April, friends and founders of the Mesa Life Project gathered to once again enact the Creation Story of the giant flat-topped wonderlands in which we dwell. A precious gift entrusted to this community, the sacred story of how this magnificent mesa came to be was told in song and dance, in spoken word and sewn regalia, and most essentially in open-hearted gratitude for all that this place provides. We told the birth story of this beautiful high desert in the best way humans know how: by birthing more beauty in the very telling. In doing so, we deepened our bonds with each other and the manifold forms of life with which we share the adventure of living. We glimpsed how, as poet Muriel Rukeyser says, “the Universe is made of stories, not of atoms.” And we healed, with each step around the sacred fire, the headstrong inheritance of alienation from our own hearts. With each footfall of the dance, we all came down to earth, closer to an abiding warmth, and rooted in a remembered home and hearth.
 We are so grateful to all of you who came to make with us Beauty and Bounty—and hopeful that more of you will participate next year. The Creation Story is not a spectator sport—we will find a place for you because the dance is a dance of belonging. If you have never participated, start listening now for what your role might want to be. There may be an animal, a plant, a weather form, or some other being just waiting for you to open yourself to their voice. We welcome them—and you—to the chorus.
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or the International Institute of Bau-biologie and Ecology. She is the primary author of Prescriptions for a Healthy House and a contributing author to several books. You can find 
