I had a dream once, or maybe it was a vision. I was standing on the back of an alligator moving down the river of fear in the underworld. It was so dark and I was so afraid. I can’t see! I can’t see! I was gripping with terror. Then the alligator spoke to me. She said, you are looking in the wrong place for the light. It is here, reflected on the surface of the water. It is illumination, lunar, a different quality than the radiance of solar light. Look at the water, let your subtle eyes shift. This is the vision of the dark. You only need the smallest light to see. This Inanna-esque vision helped me to learn how to see in the dark. The light is different down there. If I can take a breath and lean back into my cells, into a different kind of knowing, I can see. It is a seeing that happens from my bones and my guts, perhaps it is more a felt sense of sight, a body vision, rather than from my eyes. It’s as if I have eyes all over my body. Have you ever seen those images of buddhas with eyes everywhere? I wonder if they were born of the dark. 

Then Solstice comes. A sliver of light, a flicker. A tiny flame that I can hold up. It’s as if the stars themselves hand me a lantern. With this small light, I can hold it up and start to read the inscriptions on the cavern walls. There are no shortcuts. I have to already be down there, surrendered to the restful, quiet, powerful darkness for this to work. The wise, crone-mother of winter is the dark goddess of immortality. She is ancient, fierce, yet nutritive, protective and gestational. She holds us in her steady gaze. She asks us to surrender to generative rest. To cocoon in a hibernatory pod, even if we can’t stop our work in the world due to social norms and constraints, she demands of us to find a way, small ways, perhaps simple small ways to gestate. How can I slow down while moving at the same speed? How can I pause? Am I consciously engaging with my breath? How can I lean back no matter what position I'm in? How can I live in active stillness?