Peaches

A peach is the closest thing to a breast in the fruit realm. It has the same inviting, soft roundness, with an aura of fuzz, making its skin more human. And inside is a sweet juiciness that drips like mother’s milk from the corner of our sated, innocent lips. The same trancelike state of contentment can result. If the apple was offered from the tree of knowledge, then surely the tree of life offers us peaches.

This helps explain my rivalry with my stepson for claims on the peach tree in our yard. He says that it’s his—because the peach tree planted when he was born was left at the house of his parent’s broken marriage and this one replaces it. I say it’s mine—because I have watered and tended it, watched it and talked with it. After all, we are both vying for the mother nurturance of those breasts that each of us still feel we need.

If only peach trees, like breasts, produced more peaches the more one suckled from them. On the Front Range of Colorado, our trees bear fruit sporadically. Our changeable springs often warm enough to coax the branches into blossom, only to destroy the flowers with a late freeze.

Yet, I remember one year when the peach tree of my previous marriage was so full of peaches that we had to prop up the branches. And that was after doing some serious thinning earlier in the season.

Oh, what glorious juice those peaches yielded – so tree-ripened tasty. Such joy of plucking off the tree and immediately biting in, the fruit still teeming with life force. Sweet Peach Mother, I hope for a spring that pleases You and brings us enough peach nectar to satisfy us all.

Placenta- excerpt from "Giving Birth to Ourselves, contemplations for midwives and other birth companions."

The placenta is an amazing organ of nourishment & cleansing, which also maintains the hormonal state of pregnancy in the mother. The beauty of a healthy placenta goes far beyond its meaty mother's side and shiny baby's side. Yet many people in this culture abhor the thought of seeing and touching it. It is treated as garbage or made into cosmetics after the birth. Honoring the placenta is a way of honoring nourishment and the process of life itself.

In giving birth to ourselves we each have that which nourishes and cleanses us, maintaining the state of creation in us. That is our placenta now. It may be something very meaty, motherly , shiny, or baby-like. It may be Mother Earth Herself . Whatever it is that provides for us in this way brings us the blessings and nourishment of our Great Mother. By honoring it - acknowledging & thanking it for it's support- we honor ourselves and the process of giving birth to ourselves.

Contemplations--

· Do I know what constitutes my placenta now?
· Do I honor it?
· What could I do to better respect this aspect of giving birth to myself?

Activities--

Create a physical representation of your placenta to help remind you of it. It could be a special pillow, or a collage of pictures that represent that which sustains you.
Start a placenta book. It could include anything you learn about nourishing yourself and physical placentas.
Be sure that all birth placentas you are in contact with are treated with respect - if need be, take custody.

Giving Birth to Ourselves, contemplations for midwives and other birth companions by Terra Rafael is available as a print on demand book or download at www.lulu.com