The snow is finally melting, and today it even smelled like spring. We even saw the first snowdrops of this year. Usually they come in February, but this year was a long winter – they’ve only began flowering now at the end of March.
Temperatures here where I live in Canada can often drop to -30 degrees Celsius, sometimes even – 40 degrees. So in winter we also wrap our beloved rose bush, protecting her from the harsh cold, wind burns and freezing rains.
Yesterday we uncovered her and now I can’t wait for her to start blooming; in June she is absolute heaven, just in time for my birthday. But every phase of her is beautiful – in snow like a sleeping beauty she rests, in spring she begins her dance with the leaves, and then petals come, and then her sweetest scent releases gifting us divine beauty and inspiration. Caring for roses is a gentle thing – you need to really understand them as they are very sensitive.
I’ve always dreamt of having a rose garden ever since I was a child. I’ve been enchanted by them ever since I first saw them. I remember as a child I’d also listen to the tale The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Andersen, about Kay and Gerda and their rose garden, and would dream I’d have my own someday.
All I’ve ever wanted in a garden were roses.
And now I have the most precious one.
And can you believe how strong she is? She is so gentle and quite petite, yet she braves the harshest of snow and cold here. We don’t cover her completely, only put some cardboard boxes around her, especially since the winds are absolutely chilling. She’s withstood countless freezing rains, winds, snow, dark days with few sunshine, it’s really unbelievable actually; everyone is so surprised that she withstands such winters.
She is the most beautiful and sweetest smelling rose. I love her and all roses as much as ever, perhaps even more each day. Some people, when they get a wish or dream come true, may perhaps now move to the next, but not I. Not with the rose. What makes her even more special is how we tend to her, how we care for her, and how we stay with each other through the changing seasons. Hands of love, eyes of love, the way we care and love is what makes love.
My mom has healing hands, my dad has too. My great grandmother was quite magical also. Wise and deeply spiritual, people would seek her for guidance always and travel far on foot to see her.
With my great grandfather they had a house in a little town near the mountains – with the most beautiful garden. There were many flowers, vegetables, and a whole row of raspberries along the fence. And there was a magic cherry tree – half of it with red cherries, and the other half of it with white cherries.
I loved that tree – not only would I be able to climb it high but my curious nature would love having the choice between what cherries I can eat. I thought at the time all trees had different kind of cherries. She made that – though what is called grafting.
She was quite magical at grafting, and for those that don’t know, it is essentially a practice of joining two different plants together. There are many reasons why you may want to do that – perhaps to grow healthier and be stronger, or some use it to heal their plants, or propagate. Essentially, two become one; and of one, love grows even more.
People from all around the country side would seek her to make their flowers and plants and trees. They said her plants were magical – the lemon trees grew like never before, and teas from flower leaves tasted sweeter and were more healing in the winter months. At the time people didn’t have phones, so they’d travel sometimes for long to see her – or at least for a chance to give her their address when she can come help them.
Being good at grafting is being good at nurturing the needed environments, and knowing how to hold things, and how to witness things, in order for the union to occur. It goes beyond planting – it is intentional action while knowing how to fuse energies, blend things and move them. All has its spirit, and when we know how to listen, how to hold, how to create, beauty happens in the sweetest scents.
It’s about eyes of love, hands that hold.
It’s about seeing, honouring and witnessing love. It’s about using our light and wisdom to nurture the inner flames of others, to raise them, to lift them up. It’s about real seeing, and holding their dreams, hopes and joys, as much as their quietness, tears, disappointment and vulnerabilities, with gentleness, compassion and love.
One of the things I am very mindful of is the words I use. Words are powerful, and they can heal. And the energy behind them is powerful also, because this sets the intention. This is why before any reading with my clients, I pray, and in my own life I live of intention, devotion and purity.
In ancient wisdom words are not just sounds – they are carriers of power, vibration, creation or destruction. Saints and sages of all times have known that words are instruments of life; and like a river, whatever we pour into it, continues its flow within which we ourselves live.
When we speak with love, we heal – both ourselves and others. When we speak with harm, we poison our selves. When we criticize, insult and gossip, we fill our aura with dark spots, and the river too darkens that carries us forward.
Words are like energy arrows; they carry movements, like ripples in the water. A single word can awaken joy, inspire, hope and heal. Certain words carry very high vibration – they are sounds of love; and when we use them, we can truly uplift someone, as long as we the speaker or writer truly feels them also.
It’s also important what we observe and how we witness others – not only in their present moment and through life’s waves and changing seasons, but how we hold their dreams and hopes too. Intend grace. Intend love onto people. Hold a vision of light and goodness for them.
As I wrote in my poetry book Moonhold,
“such love is those who have the eyes to see what is missing, and yet never give up showing you what is still there; these eyes are so beautiful, these eyes are yours.”
And then there’s the hands.
There is a beautiful Vedic practice, where upon waking, upon rising each morning, we join our palms at the marriage line and simply look at our own hands. This is where we meet the divine presence, God, or in their practice they call her Durgā , the divine mother.
The fingertips hold Lakṣmī – abundance, beauty, the fruits the day may bring.
The middle palm holds Sarasvatī – the knowledge, wisdom, skills and art your hands will carry.
The base of the palm holds Gaurī – the quiet strength beneath everything.
It’s not a practice about “summoning” anything – this is about realizing what is already here and held. It is about the gratitude that grace has given us this day. Realizing we are held by grace and we hold it also.
This is no small thing. In the Vedic understanding, this earth, Bhūloka, is considered most precious, as it is a landscape where the soul can actually move, learn, and choose. To wake up is to be given another day of that.
And here you are, with grace holding you and you holding it. Three mothers in your palm rising you, waking you, and you may now touch beauty and love into others also. In your hands you have the gifts of today, the wisdom to act, the strength to endure, the making in love and of love.
You can now make beauty alive, love shaped by your choices – by your sweet words speaking love into existence, by your gratitude and appreciation, by supporting and encouraging others, by making tea or a meal for your loved ones, by tending to your roses.
A loving hand, a hand of grace, is known in any language.
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Cover art by Claude Monet, The House amongst the Roses, La Maison Dans les Roses, 1955.
