Meetings... Cody & Cappy

Cody raised her equine head

Four of them formed a circle with an opening for me

Wide perimeter, three horses facing me

One behind me, sentinel-like.

I was drawn to the first one, the first-responder,

but the circle invited me more.

I have held circles of women for years

These mares, tending the grass, held me.

Unsure of this language, I inched closer to Cody,

curious, grieving, feeling my way

She let me touch her, and then walked ahead,

but it did not feel 'away' somehow

I moved back to center, standing sentinel myself

Beckie asked, "Is she the one?"

I felt relief to know more about 'her,'...She.

Yes, I said. "First responder."

"Like you?" she asked me. "Yes...like me."

Cody moved her large body down to earth.

Beckie and I sat down too.

"Lying down is the most vulnerable thing

a horse can do," she said to me.

We sat while the horses drew closer.

Later, Cody even laid her head on the ground.

We did too, learning from her as we went.

"Do you pray?" Beckie asked me.

I smiled inside. "Yes and No," I said.

"I don't pray as I was taught to pray anymore.

More opening my belly and heart with intention..."

But then I remembered how I pray in a circle of women.

Or mares, in this case. 

I sing. So I sang. 

"Woman...Woman...Thank you for showing up..."

The world shifted.

**********

"You can take pictures," she said to me as she led Marcus to be groomed.

I left the engine running and approached the fence with my iPhone camera

Velvet looked at me, walked the fenceline between us

Close, yet bounded. Olive followed her.

Cappy, standing further behind them

waited for them to pass by.

Then he walked directly toward me,

his dark eyes finding my own.

He put his nose close to the fenceline,

within reach. I brushed his face with my fingertips

He gazed at me, into me, for a long time.

As tears welled up in me, I whispered

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

He looked into me some more.

I wondered if he was smiling at me.

Do horses smile? I don't even know.

He shifted his hooves and meandered over

toward Olive and Velvet.

I may have bowed. I'm not sure.

I returned to my car and shifted into gear.

Fifty yards up the road homeward, I stopped, 

weeping deep belly tears of long years gone by.

Home.

Something in me had been welcomed Home.