“Man is a stream whose source is hidden. Your being is descending into us from we know not whence.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson.
What, then, truly endures? This question lingers as I ponder a curious fact I heard the other day: we replace nearly every cell in our bodies over time, yet somehow, I remain—me. Grounding
Like autumn leaves falling gently upon a sweet, mossy bed below.
Earth inhaling rain,
exhaling memories,
not the end of the tree but
re-generation.
When I watch the flowing river, carrying the seasons on its ethereal waters, I see that me.
The me untethered to the cells, that came from stardust, and are loath to define me, unless I declare: I
am
a star. I feel in the soil between my toes
the common heartbeat of all of
nature and all of
us and all of
the cells that were
and will be—
of mine and yours
and mine
again. What would happen, I wonder, if we never
let go
of anything?
Seven Breaths “I can’t go back to yesterday,” said Alice. “I was a different person then.”
Neurons in the brain igniting with synapses like wildfire; not replaced, but strengthened. Conspiring to create thoughts and memories
like the rings of a tree grounded in history:
drought,
flood,
fire—
each year eternally etched into its trunk.
Memory, like stars strung out across a vagus nerve of galaxy vastness,
fills the night sky of consciousness—
persisting, burning bright. If these are the cells that are never replaced,
am I the sum of
my memories,
my encounters,
my ancestral twine?
Memory, though, feels like an illusion; each recall, replaying it differently—
rebuilding,
layering,
mis-memories,
distortion—
until what remains of the original truth is known
to no one.
If then
my cells are not the ones I once had
and the cells that remain tell a different tale
to mine: why
do we cling
so fiercely
to the past?
What if we said:
that terrible thing that happened when I was such and such years old,
that did not happen to this me.
Or:
that terrible thing I did at whichever the age—
that wasn’t me either.
Is that okay?
b
r
e
a
t
h
e
Flow Greek philosopher Plutarch posed The Paradox of Theseus—the hero who sailed his ship upon the seas for many years.
But time
by time
by time,
rough and biting seas gnawed away at the very planks beneath his salted feet.
And so he
replaced
them
one
by
one
by one
until
none
of the original
wood
remained.
Is it then
Plutarch asks,
still
the same
ship?
Is the ship a vessel of consciousness that began and will end the journey—ever present in spirit, enduring the eroding salt of its being, yet there, always there.
But, what if, the discarded planks were gathered and rebuilt?
Which would then be
Theseus’
ship?
Is our identity, our me, linked to our cells that were and are no more?
Or simply—
has that ship
sailed?
Phoenix
In-hale
And what of the heart stomach—the place where nature is you and you are it, and there, it is not made of cells at all but wisdom, and wind, and fire, and earth, and a knowing beyond language. But some people don’t see it, can’t feel it, and then they cry—
Ohhhh…
I still feel like twenty-one,
although they are thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, and clearly their bodies are not
twenty-
one. Are they talking of the spirit of mind—not of the heart, or of the stomach, or of the tree?
We do not begin to age the day we are born; we were born thousands of years ago. The arbitrary counting of years around the sun that happens with or without your will—a mere drop in the universal ocean.
Why do we preoccupy ourselves with this one act of nature and ignore all of the rest?
And
if these cells are constantly replacing themselves, can’t they be a little kinder…leave me with the ones that made me skip, and dance, and eat that chocolate cake without
CONsequence.
A Faustian pact with the spring of eternal youth…
tick…
tick…
tick.
Think about
you.
Are you the sum of your parts—an arm, a leg, a cluster of cells creating your collarbone?
Not until they don’t
work.
Perhaps.
Ex-hale
Calm No, we are seasons, cyclical.
As autumn bares into winter and melts into spring and arrives in summer, we too are the reflections of golden trees in stilling lakes—revealing the shedding of skin that no longer serves us.
The exquisite fingerprint of snowflakes falling,
flames of pine logs sparking, crackling,
a pause in the wonder of the winter months.
Recuperate, regenerate.
Reawaken to spring with the birth of youthful energy,
of every cycle of the sun
from first to last.
The wild iris of eighty years does not crawl out weary from its rest, but pops and blooms and radiates its indigo light with joy year after year after year.
And in summer rejoice at the beauty—embrace it all.
There are no years, no age—only, simply, beautifully you.
The things we think we try to hold on to will ripen and fall and wither from our grasp, as fires rage through the land built by man, they will reclaim what is theirs, no matter what the “logical” mind has contrived.
Embrace the tide of being that floats us into nature.
Thank you so much for sharing @Kim West 💞
Amazing how much you unpacked here. The Hopi’s believe we all have stars. As an older lady, my memories are my best friend. Thank you Kathleen, this is magically wonderful!
✨🤍✨