Glistening sun, playfully hiding behind the mountains. Closed up, unfolding the night’s darknesses through dreams of sweet smells and possibilities. With the growing blue light that begins streaming in from the rounded horizon, I feel the lines of my body emerge in tremors with the wind. It’s a game we play, myself and the sun. He spends his time flowing in circles around me as I move to face him, gleaming with open color and vulnerability.

Sleeping, closed up, but not for long. Neighbors hiding in the bushes begin to bounce along the waxed leaves, poking their heads out of their nests. The blues soften like the ocean waves, slowly floating by on the air. Coolness of the rustling leaves and the ground’s winter temperatures are beginning to seep out of the earth. Spring is knocking on winter’s door, giggling in the light and showing its youthful spirit.

As the birds sing, as the fingers of the sun part back the curtains, the sides of my body lift up and stretch, naked to the dawn. I am uncertain even though excitement builds along my limbs as life begins to open its wings. Crows in their black suits, glowing in greens and blues light reflection, swoop down to find last night’s crawlers making their ways back into their holes. Tilted heads, hopping along paths, they peck at worms and snails that move slowly, drunk from last night’s aboveground footloose debauchery.

I stand up in my dainty green core, pulling life from the earth below as I sway in the breezes that blow across the hillside. There is nothing to be afraid of, the day is sharing its light with its children, and I know that I am strong enough to grow tall.

As the sun shows its face fully, the coyotes darting through the brush to find their dens, I turn my head to feel the warmth of the new day. Still closed, still unsure of how to emerge as I am, I turn to find my brothers and sisters pushing off the leaf blankets to bask in the orange light spreading over the ground.

And without hesitation, the exhale finally releases each petal down, baring my soul to the rest of the world. Letting down my hair, simply allowing myself to be. The desire to expand through vulnerability is enough for me to feel brave to open up in the light. How am I supposed to welcome the love of my winged friends if I keep myself closed up, my colors unsaturated and withheld?

I am the flower, the sweet nectar of my roots, the connection of lightness and strength I unfold. Each petal is uniquely its own way, purple softness contrasted against darkened lines, layered one on top of another in the sweetness of creative explosions from life itself. My blood runs through each vein, fractal designs and sacred geometric shapes that sprawl out like invisible spiderwebs. I connect up through my core, the dark center of my body that holds all of the pollen. The most sensual openness of my soul. The parts I wish to share and be spread far and wide.

I choose to give this part of me. I choose to live expanded, the singularity of my being that so deliciously exchanges life with the elements around me. Kissed by the joyful hummingbird and the revelatory butterfly, I move slowly and connect deeply. We become drunk on one another, honoring the sunlight and the water from the grounds above and below. Falling in love over and over again, I remember that while I may not be able to grow outside of the place that I’m in now, I will be carried on the backs of my feathered friends.

There is beauty in this love, there is space that I create for my heart. I mimic the light of the sun, powerful in its clarity and strong in its heat. I allow myself to dance with the wind. Deep breaths from the life that we share with each other, the dependencies of us all, a part of nature.

I know that my life will not last forever. The wonder and love that I transmit through the giving of myself is a part of each day, the opening act of the show comes with the dawn’s symphony and ends with an applause of the dusk across the ocean’s blue floors. I practice slowness, I breathe with the wind as it crosses my path and blows my petals up and out along the sky above. I spread my own wings, the petals that fan out in waiting for another suitor to approach. Willing to share so that life can be expanded more readily, more sweetly, with more freedom. While I may not be a part of life forever, I know that my body will have colored this time here and now. I know that my courage will give the rest of the world strength to share itself with others. I choose to play, to be who I am, to appreciate the kindness of the sun and the kiss of the moon. Life is too short to stay folded up in my dreams, darkness overtaking me as I get lost in the sea of green. Taking the risk to show myself as I am, fears of being plucked or shortness of life will not stop me from expression  with all that pass by.