Step Two, Herbal Tarot, The World
I am a tender slip, I bend and sway, I am silvery and delicately veined, and deep and fleshy, and the tips of my fingers are nine tiny bells; and I am stronger than I look. I can withstand ocean blasts, salt spray that would kill larger plants, and draw sustenance from sand itself, a fluid ocean in its own right. I can root and remain as the particles around me lose their ground; my tap system is vast, much wider in perimeter than one would think; and it is this system which gives me my security, my confidence in the face of climactic uncertainty and caprice.
For the most part the elements are my friends; I like to hear Mr. West Wind blow his trumpet, to feel the merest hint of his breath against the tips of my leaves and know that he is due for a visit; I even enjoy his fits of temper when he sputters and spits in frustration, pelting me with bits of precipitation and pocking the surface of the beach. Madame Sun, his professed enemy, while a bit of a gossip all round is also a good friend to me. She warms me when I'm feeling low, whispering words of comfort and occasionally welcome advice. When I'm not in need of comfort, and she is of a mind to dish it out, which is more often than not, her presence can prove just a bit . . . overwhelming . . . but shhh! I would never want her to hear me say that, the last thing I want to do is hurt her feelings; she is such a sweet woman, after all, and genuinely means well. And, of course, when she chooses to sing . . . she is such a gorgeous soprano.
And then there's this matter of the hoop. The dunes I get, the water lapping at their skirts, matters of barometric pressure and subtleties of the visible atmosphere. But this hoop thing??? --Right there in the middle of it all??? Sometimes I am reminded of an old-fashioned mirror, the sort a bride might look into, although where these words "mirror" and "bride" come from I don't know, somewhere in the depths of my subconscious I guess . . . Anyway, on some days I glance over at that mirror--oops, I mean hoop--and it seems a solid flat surface inside of it, a barrier or gate leading to a different place, a trick or illusion of time or space; while at other times--particularly when Madame Sun has come to visit--I look and everything seems perfectly normal, no funny flat surface, no gate, no other place. I've even (to my shame) brought the matter up with her and been thoroughly humiliated in front of all those dunes . . . And you know how judgmental they are! Well, I suppose I should have known better. I do have an overactive imagination, and, in future, will just have to learn to keep it to myself.