Category: kin

have mercy.

On By ©️K.T. 2025In agraria, barn swallows, birds, Death, dirt road chronicles, dying, Earthling, fauna, Free Palestine, Funerary, funerary portraiture, Gaza, Genocide, holocaust, july, kill lists, kin, Life and Death, maternity, mortality, Mother, Mother God, Motherhood, ornithology, outer rural, Palestine, ruralia, threshold, wildlife, ZionismLeave a comment

in mid-July, the summer-resident barn swallows who had successfully raised and launched four fledglings by June 23rd, 2025, attempted to raise a second brood;

while i am not absolutely sure if it was the same set of parents or another in the barn swallow community that utilized the nest — as there is a collective of more than a dozen swallows that visits and assists in feeding sometimes too — it is most likely they are the same parent pair;

this is the second summer the barn swallows have nested here in my barn — using last year’s well-constructed nest which they attached to one of the joists like a balcony cantilevered on a Chicago highrise;

i began leaving the overhead barn door open when i first noticed them circling and investigating the barn a few years back; and i was thrilled last year when they began construction of their nest — they were so very welcomed and wanted here — i now know to leave the barn door raised from mid May through July to give them access.

the first brood of four swallows,
not quite fledged, but stretching their wings in the safety of the barn, June 2025
Continue reading “have mercy.” →
Featured

on Christmas eve

On By ©️K.T. 2025In anthropocene, apartheid, birds, Capitalism, Chicago, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Cities, december, earthlings, fauna, flora, kin, Lament, Lamentations, Poem, poetry, Proof of Life, son, wildlife1 Comment

i traveled a river of concrete in a machine,
you traveled an ocean of air in a machine,
babies crying, inconsolably, you said
i said, eustachean tubes aren’t meant for 30,000 feet.

i am not meant for this,
neither are you,
neither are they.

not the opposite of joy
on Christmas eve
but the false pursuit of it
whatever is actually contrary to it
even if we don’t know it when we see it.
even if we refuse to know it when we see it.

if i allow myself to cry, he will see it on my face.

Continue reading “on Christmas eve” →

waiting for the bough to break

On By ©️K.T. 2025In author, autobiographical, crone chronicles, death and other endings, december, dirt road chronicles, earthlings, endings, Essay, flora, Gaza, Genocide, grief, kin, Life and Death, liminality, mortality, Palestine, plant beings, Reverence, threshold, time, Tree, Trees, writerLeave a comment

i am waiting for the bough to break — or, to be severed by proxy at my behest.

earlier this week on my daily walk-about, i noticed that a primary limb, the major artery, on a nearly 80’ tall and likely nearing 100 years-old, elm tree on the land i occupy, had cleaved and that the fracture was migrating down into the trunk — and dangerously so.

i don’t know the cause: if it was the abrupt shift in temperature to freezing here in southwest Michigan — or, if the tree was stressed from a standing-water-wet spring followed by a very dry summer, or if “it” is simply at the end of their life — all the elms here had unusually held onto an abundance of their prolific leaves until the fourth week of November.

no matter.

the matters:

the massive limb of the elm stretches high and precariously over the old barn, and depending on the wind direction, there’s a chance if it falls, it could clip the back of my house or take the whole tree down with it.

i await the tree surgery & removal crew. i am at their and the northerly and westerly gusts’ mercy.

in the meantime, i have also been wrestling with the possible choice of whether to have the crew amputate just the cleaved limbs — if the tree is in fact salvageable — or, to remove the entire tree at once instead of forestalling the inevitable.

Continue reading “waiting for the bough to break” →

contemplating intent, consent, kill lists and ceasefire: deer hunting season, regular firearm, November 15 – 30, 2024 Michigan, U.S.

On By ©️K.T. 2025In agraria, america, Animals, anthropocene, autumn, Ceasefire, Crone, crone chronicles, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, Death, deer, deer hunting, Earth hospice, Earthling, earthlings, ecocide, Essay, fauna, Gaza, Genocide, holocaust, hunters, hunting, hunting season, Hylic, kin, kinship, Life and Death, liminality, limineen, Manifest Destiny, November, outer rural, Palestine, Philosophy, planetary hospice, Politics, Psychic, ruralia, the accidental seeker & intentional opiner, the old gods, Tradition As Violence, Tradition Is Violence, ZionismLeave a comment

“The assumption that animals are without rights and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality.”

Arthur Schopenhauer.

a white-tailed deer drinks from a bird bath,
which was presumed to be of exclusive use of songbirds — especially, eastern bluebirds,
on the land the author occupies
Halloween 2024
“all treatery, no trickery”

Regular firearm, deer hunting season began yesterday in Michigan, United States of America, and the crack of rifles and the blast of shotguns destroy both peace and life.

There is some version of a legalized, defined kill list or belated, legalized “protection list” for nearly every non-human animal being population on Earth. And, for human animal being populations on Earth too.

What defines murder for human beings, of the human animal body?

INTENT.

All Hunting is INTENT – intent to kill.

All animal “livestock” agriculture is INTENT — intent to kill for profit.

Genocide is INTENT.

Continue reading “contemplating intent, consent, kill lists and ceasefire: deer hunting season, regular firearm, November 15 – 30, 2024 Michigan, U.S.” →

399

On By ©️K.T. 2025In anthropocene, author, autumn, bears, bruin, Crone, Cronehood, Death, Earth hospice, Earthling, earthlings, endings, fauna, Grand Teton, grandmother, june, kin, kinship, Lament, Lamentations, Life, Life and Death, Mother, National Parks, photograph, Poem, wildlifeLeave a comment

The Queen, Mother and Grandmother Grizzly Bear,

the iconic Matriarch of Grand Teton National Park & the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem

Monday morning, June 22, 2020,
Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming, US
The iconic and prolific female grizzly bear [399] — a mother and grandmother was in forage with her own eldest adult daughter [610] — also a mother, along with her cubs and grand cubs.

399, pictured here, who should be referred to respectfully as Grand Mother Bear, at the age of 24, in Spring of 2020 birthed four cubs [a rare, large litter no matter the age of the grizzly, but at 24, was truly astounding] was with 610, whom should be called Daughter Bear, who birthed two cubs as well.
All but two of the six cubs were mostly hidden by the deep sagebrush and dense fog.

What wild majesty to behold.
Lodged in my mind’s eye forevermore.

photo by: author

“Grizzly 399” is gone,

and this Autumn, and last, and every season in between have required so much Auden

Continue reading “399” →

ghosts

On By ©️K.T. 2025In anthropocene, autumn, Capitalism, climate, Climate Acceptance, Climate Chaos, Climate Collapse, Colonization, Crone, crone chronicles, Crone Consciousness, Death, Dendronglow, dying, Earth, Earth hospice, Earthling, earthlings, ecocide, Funerary, Genocide, ghosts, Hospice, kin, Lament, Lamentations, Life, Life and Death, liminal, mourning, october, Poem, poetry, Sixth Mass Extinction, WarLeave a comment

if you’re seeing this, you’re alive,

though dying — no matter your age, health, relative safety, relative comfortability —

on this living, though suffering and actively dying, planet

Earthlings and Earth together in a protracted hospice

right now, in these brief years, these grief years,

we are the “ever-living ghosts of what once was”

a “was” that most all of us alive this morning have never known as lived experience — save for the untouched tribes — 10,000 Uncontacted Peoples — 10,000 unsystematized, “uncivilized”

and the Ocean, and the few, still-standing Ancient One Trees; the untouched Desert, and the Mountains — even the youngest of them — The Tetons and The Himalayas, know what it “was” to be alive.

we are mere ghosts, walking dead.

Continue reading “ghosts” →

institutional knowledge

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Crone, Crone Consciousness, Death, death and other endings, endings, Estrangement, Family, friendship, grief, kin, mourningLeave a comment

another part of mourning, an enduring part of mourning:

the loss of the “institutional knowledge” of you that they alone held, documented and archived;

when

a life-long, childhood or early adulthood friend

a beloved mother, or grandmother, or father,

a harmonious sibling, a close cousin

a long-time lover,

a partner in a long marriage, officiated — or not

a child whom you birthed or raised and who may have also birthed or raised you, have mercy.

when, those relationships become one-sided through death — or other endings,

not only are they gone,

Continue reading “institutional knowledge” →

the apple pickers

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Animals, August, autumn, bucolia, dirt road chronicles, Earthling, earthlings, fauna, Gold, kin, outer rural, Poem, poetry, ruralia, summer, SunriseLeave a comment

when the Sun reaches the precise height
above horizon,
then arrive the tawny-bodied apple pickers and gleaners/
stilts for legs,
i count twenty limbs in tree camouflage/
bypassing the bushel and the sack
the bounty of fruit down into their bellies //

ears like SETI,
searching for sounds of hoof-less life — canine or primate in the universe
and also, for movement of my unseen, yet intense presence —my breath and pulse slowed, just above, just beyond them —

but i am not in a tree stand/ i brandish no shotgun, no ray gun ///

how rare, these ones are among us,

— among we Earthlings :

silent, gentle and elegant ///

they linger in the morning gold as it stretches West to the lake and evaporates too quick into its blues/

i linger in the dark cool of the open bedroom window, facing North

my senses also honed — and sated//

on this eve of August’s ides,

autumn has not trespassed on the summer,
but was intentionally summoned ///

apple-picker in the morning
on the eve of
August’s ides
2024

proof of life | awkward family fotos

On By ©️K.T. 2025In baby bird food recipe, birds, childhood, Crone, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, Earthling, earthlings, grandmother, july, june, ki, kin, maternity, Mother, Motherhood, Poem, poet, poetry, postpartum, son, starling, summer, women, WomenfolkLeave a comment

a suspension

of borrowed time & life

recipe and method for feeding a baby starling

recipe:

one-half of a medium-boiled large egg, super finely diced 

3-4 sardines canned in water, with all the bones and skin, gingerly rinsed under a thin stream of tap water, to remove excess salt, laid atop a paper towel 
to passively drain the water,
then, finely chopped 

mash sardines and egg together,
then slowly add up to 1 teaspoon of unsweetened organic apple sauce,
 
the mash should be integrated and mostly smooth
but not too wet or runny


store in sealed glass container refrigerated for no more than 2.5 days

(increase to whole boiled egg and full can of sardines and extra applesauce — and increase mash chunkiness as bird grows)

to feed: 

fill a plastic drinking straw with the food,
by pumping the straw up and down into the mash with suction

warm the filled straw in hand while wearing a disposable glove to bring the mash close to room temperature 

gently but quickly eject tubes/ribbons of mash into baby bird’s mouth as she gapes for food - like toothpaste on toothbrush almost; it’s daunting at first; she is so demanding! so loud! so urgent! 
so hungry!

she will stop gaping when full

wash straw and reuse 
(DQ & Five Guys straws are wide, flexible and work best)

repeat feeding every half hour, then eventually every hour or so, about 300 times over the course of next three weeks

to thrive:

during that time create and whistle to her a short, 3-4 note, unique song to recognize your voice 

love her, talk to her, 
encourage her, comfort her, 
and hold her, carry her outside to see the world she will soon enter

also during that time: bring her small worms, slugs and insects to taste and/or eat / you will need to manually reduce them to be digestible for her, at first

then teach her to forage and hunt for them herself; she will use her beak as a shovel to unearth them and poke at and sever them with her beak;
watch her back while she’s busy doing this - be her wingman!

she will teach herself to bathe and sun, fluff, dry and preen 

one day she will hop, sputter-fly into the grass, into the garden; into the bramble or tall grasses 

then, she will fly and soar - high into the trees, beyond your reach, sight or protection 

you will worry about predators and bird bullies, weather, machines, injury and hunger

you will listen for her voice
and whistle and call for her

sometimes you will hear her;
but she will always hear you; she knows your face, form, voice and song

she will still come home for supplemental feeding

she will still come home to sleep in her nest box inside the barn overnight because being a baby bird alone in the world - is exhausting 

being a mother bird, even moreso 

she will come back, again and again.

she is just pure joy.
she is pure trust.

you are so lucky to have experienced her first weeks of life 

you rescued her; but she has restored you, in fact.

please know,
always remember, and never forget:

every bird you see, every wild mammal you see, they all initially survived because of a very devoted mother
Continue reading “proof of life | awkward family fotos” →

Sylvia Dickinson Edgar Anne Hughes

On By ©️K.T. 2025In birds, bucolia, Crone, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, dirt road chronicles, Earthling, earthlings, fauna, Gnostic, julia gordon-bramer, ki, kin, metaphysical, Mother, Motherhood, mystic, outer rural, plath, Poem, poet, poetry, Proof of Life, Psychic, ruralia, Survival, sylvia plath, ted hughes, the occult sylvia plath, time, witch, witchery, witching, women, WomenfolkLeave a comment
Star — the starling, on the evening of July 7, 2024

every poet should know the company of a wild bird, at least once

i recently binged the biography:

“The Occult Sylvia Plath: The Hidden Spiritual Life of the Visionary Poet” by life-long Plath scholar Julia Gordon-Bramer

i feel fortunate this book was my introduction to Plath and her poet husband, Ted Hughes— and other significant influences in her life and poetry /

hat tip to my long-time favorite podcast: Aeon Byte Gnostic Radio — created and hosted by Miguel Conner at The Virtual Alexandria for interviewing Gordon-Bramer, because, for the first time ever, i was actually interested in Plath — and furthermore, i unexpectedly experienced a psychic “something” with Plath while listening to the audiobook; this “something” — i want to digest, explore – and possibly explain, in detail, in a future essay //

The Occult Sylvia Plath: The Hidden Spiritual Life of the Visionary Poet

Julia Gordon-Bramer

while i imbibed this book, i was simultaneously raising an injured and orphaned starling nestling — on an intensive feeding schedule — and during this time, i learned from the book, that Sylvia and Ted also attempted to rescue an injured and sick baby bird — but after a week, and upon determining rehabilitation was futile, they jointly and sadly euthanized the bird in their gas oven (i know. wow.) ///

Continue reading “Sylvia Dickinson Edgar Anne Hughes” →

maybe on the full moon

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Animals, Crone, crone chronicles, Crone Consciousness, dirt road chronicles, Earthling, earthlings, ki, kin, kinship, outer rural, Poem, poetryLeave a comment

if you move out of the city
if you move into the country

if you reclaim a meadow

if you plant more than two dozen trees
if you oppose paving the dirt road
if you fill ten bird baths, every single day, until they freeze
if you refuse to mow the clover, plaintain, and dandelion before they set seed
if you sit in silence on the stoop each night, watching
if you turn off every single light before bedtime

if you listen, listen, and listen
if you offer your attention
if you humble your human brain
if you embrace your animal body
if you fall into instinctual kinship
if you are ceaseless in your reverence
if you follow your intuition

maybe the crows will tell their brethren you’re a safe one
maybe the doe will bring her fawns to the salt lick during daylight
maybe the snake will slither under the workbench in the barn while you stand there
maybe the rabbits won’t flee your garden at your footfall
maybe the bats will dance in the twilight sky just above your head

maybe the luna moth will reveal herself to you in that meadow

Continue reading “maybe on the full moon” →

the reincarnation of sylvia plath

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Alchemy, barn swallows, flora, Gnostic, june, ki, kin, liminality, limineen, mystic, Persephone, plath, Poem, poeme, poet, poetry, Psychic, Rebirth, Reincarnation, Samsara, sylvia plath, witch, witchery, women, WomenfolkLeave a comment

this was the summer of
broken limbs on trees, animals — and men
this was the summer of
the fuck-it, no-good vegetable garden
this was the summer of
“not this year”, “but, maybe next,” — again
this was the summer of
the i-still-can’t-believe-she’s-dead birthday
this was the summer of
nesting swallows, wicked sparrows, and a fallen starling nestling, whom she fed, and kept in her pocket for future starlight
this was the summer of
hanging baskets heavy with rainbow gazanias and pots full of midnight black petunias — for balance — incessant dead-heading and concrete stains, a small price
this was the summer of
the blue serpent; of serpentine bracelets and of the serpent-printed dress — she to be photographed on this land with the flowers, the dog and the bird, like Frida
this was the summer of
first-realizing she may be the reincarnation of the spirit once-embodied in
Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath & her crystal gazing ball.
photo: Eric Stahlberg, 1954
Continue reading “the reincarnation of sylvia plath” →

chosen by swallows, finally

On By ©️K.T. 2025In barn swallows, blue swallows, crone chronicles, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, dirt road chronicles, earthlings, fauna, howard nemerov, joy, june, kin, kinship, nature, outer rural, photograph, photography, Poem, poetryLeave a comment

an ascetic’s petitionary prayer, answered

for six consecutive summers, i’ve observed barn swallows enter and inspect the barn — diving and swooping in and out, perching and chattering wholly unbothered by my presence — but not until this, my sixth summer, did they finally deem worthy and decide to make their nest on a joist in this old, ramshackle barn

to experience their nesting is such a tender mercy in the time of remote, yet constant virtual witness and heartrage of genocide, of global horrors and famine — and of the daily unnatural disasters and unrelenting evidence of abrupt, irreversible climate breakdown and biodiversity/ecosystems collapse.

barn swallow nest under construction,
june 9, 2024
Audobon’s Birds of America, Popular Edition,
1950, Macmillan,


*from the author’s collection of vintage books of North American birds, wildlife and insects

O swallows, swallows, poems are not The point. Finding again the world, That is the point, where loveliness Adorns intelligible things 
Because the mind’s eye lit the sun.

Howard Nemerov

Continue reading “chosen by swallows, finally” →

she talks to serpents

On By ©️K.T. 2025In agraria, Animals, Archetype, author, bucolia, Crone, crone chronicles, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, dirt road chronicles, Earthling, earthlings, Eve, Garden of Eden, Gnosis, Gnostic, ki, kin, kinship, Knowledge, limineen, Mother, Ouroboros, outer rural, photograph, photography, poet, Proof of Life, ruralia, serpent, snake, telepathy, The Trickster, Tree of Knowledge, witcheryLeave a comment

says they call her out by her name

blue racer sunning themself beneath
the author’s window
Continue reading “she talks to serpents” →