“My heart is full and my soul is energized after talking with you!”
My friend, Courtney, says this to me, as she zooms off to her next Zoom room.
So is mine.
This clarity of vision, fullness of heart, luminosity of soul.
These qualities are reflected in my Sisters–chosen, found, and forever companions on this path of embodied leadership, joyful service, and wild gifting.
This week, one of my Sisters and co-weaver, Noshene, sent me the book we worked on together–with two other beautiful Sisters–for over a year.
Really, though, it’s taken a lifetime, many lifetimes, to write this. To publish this.
Seeing Noshene’s inscription, and our names, together, in print, undoes me.
The night the book arrives, I cry, calling out to my foremothers and ancestresses, speaking their names in my quiet living room.
Enheduanna
Draupadi
Nefertari
Hypatia
Hi’iaka
Hatshepsut
Hildegaard
Julian
Mary
Maryam
Mona
Mahsa
Maya
Lucille
Lydia
Sisi
Tahirih
Kwan Yen
Yemaya
Wangari
Sister Wendy
Zitkala-Sa
White Buffalo Calf Woman
Alma
Ana-Maria
Anonymous…
On my knees, I speak to my mother, Jacqueline, from her perch on the Tree of Life.
“Mom, you know. You know what I’ve gone through. You know how miraculous, how unimaginable it is. That I’m here. I’m here. I made it this far.”
My relationship with my own body has been so fraught–so intimate–so perilous–so precious.
I have to remind myself, each morning, when I get up, that it is ok to be in this body. That I am ok, inside my body–no matter what my brain may be telling me.
That old trauma is still there, but daily, moment by moment, I see her, speak to her more gently.
I eat breakfast, no matter if I want to or not.
I move, stretch, go for a walk.
Some days it works. Some days are easier.
Often, it still takes a while to allow my skin to embrace me, to drop the traumatized (oppressive, colonized, patriarchal) habits of mind and thought that have so berated me, and re-member myself, over and over again.
Perhaps this perilous, precious journey into your own body is relatable?
Perhaps you too were divorced from your authentic embodied self and are restoring–and re-storying yourself–to yourself?
If so, thank you.
Your ancestors thank you.
Your children thank you.
Mother Earth thanks you.
I thank you.
Love, ae
andréana elise: poetry & prose 
Thank you, precious Andréana, for expressing what many of us would wish to find the words to share. I am treasuring my copy of this new volume in which your transformative words are contained. Thank you, extraordinary seer, thank you. ❤️