When you don’t know how to pray, hum

I went to the Winfield Mounds today. It was my second trip. On my first trek, I couldn’t find the mounds but I did come across a lovely hidden grove where some other woodsy witch hung dried orange slices in a tree.

This time I found the mounds. It was more emotional than I was expecting. Actually, I had no idea what to expect, but I didn’t think I would cry. I wrote some stream of consciousness stuff as soon as I got back to the car, which I will clean up for the sake of preserving the moment in a way that will make more sense:

The messages are in the wind. The wind speaks in body language, forcing the plants into action. It’s a feeling. It’s purposeful. It’s important: The universe is naked, right here exposed before us. Learn to see it.
The Great Spirit is here. The Universe is ready for us to breathe it in. To come home. Awaken.

My muscles twitch. I can smell my sweat. I can smell something else, something delicious. I stop in the path and take several long sniffs, turning from side to side, snuffling like the mother wolf. I don’t know what the scent is, but I suspect a fragrant tender bud of tree leaves is opening somewhere close by. My goodness. It’s so good.

I reach the mounds. I… I don’t know what to do. I am overwhelmed. My eyes water. The wind is fierce and powerful.
I don’t know how to pray so I hum. I would sing something, but words are failing me. I feel sorrow. White guilt. I hum quietly, treading softly.
I say thanks. So many thanks.
I leave an offering: a pair of waxed pinecones and an intention on parchment sealed in wax. Where there was death, let there always be life. For the Fool, The Empress, and the spirit that connects us even now: the Magician.
I hear a loud caw from a tree just before me and I am startled, I actually jump back, but I can’t see what made the noise.

“I can hear you; what are you?” Three times I asked (once on the path, once in the mound grove, and once in the mowed prairie).

I trace my steps back in a blissful daze. I wish I could talk to the trees. They know what happened here. They witnessed it, they nourished the ancestors then and are still here now.. Can they tell the tale? Share the old wisdom? How can I speak to the trees?

More delicious smells. All my senses engage. I listen with my soul. I minimize my vibrations. I descend softly, closer to the Spirit.

I reach the end of the pathway and emerge from soft earth to manmade gravel, exiting the covered trees in what feels very much like a portal: a whipping, swirling wind. It SHOULD feel like I am snapping back into reality, but it’s more of the opposite. I am shoved back into humanity (an un-reality), rushing cars go past, oblivious to the sacred site just beyond the wall of trees.