The presence that I became aware of, around and within me, is apprehended through an act of rapt, silent attention, both passive and probing, like sonar. And what the presence seems to be is the web itself, the thrumming relationality of all things.
– Joanna Macy, from the introduction to Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God
As perhaps most of you know, Joanna Macy, the great Buddhist scholar, Rilke translator and teacher of Deep Ecology is passing over. Thinking of her, I’m reading Rilke, one of my favourite poets, and realising how much Joanna must have felt met by his depth, clarity, seriousness and spiritual insight when she encountered him as a young woman.
I have begun to sense how Rilke, this great explorer of the Imaginal (his term for it was ‘das Offene’ – the open) influenced Deep Ecology. To consider the lineage of Western depth traditions that Rilke tapped into, there alongside the wisdom of Buddhism, as sources for Joanna’s profound and effective practices of grief, empowerment and transformation – I newly appreciate the groundedness, the gravitas of her work.
Deep Ecology has been an important influence on me for nearly thirty years, I consider it foundational to the practice of co-becoming, this practice of attuning to ’the thrumming relationality of all things.’ Thus for me this is a poignant moment, as I know it is for the many thousands who consider her a great elder of this time, this delicate time we fervently hope will unfurl into the Great Turning. Here’s wishing Joanna a gentle passing into the sweet thrumming.