Morgan Harper Nichols' Blog

Tag: nature

  • Place to be while the landscape keeps changing

    Place to be while the landscape keeps changing

    4 cabins, 4 poems

    Choose your “cabin” for the next few days and scroll to read the poem below

    A – A Cabin With a Tree Growing in the Middle

    B – A Cabin Halfway Up the Mountain

    C – A Cabin at a Fork In the Road

    D – A Cabin by a Waterfall

    –

    A – A Cabin With a Tree Growing in the Middle

    here’s to allowing yourself to consider

    what beautiful things might be possible here, 

    even if it looks different this time.

    because perhaps, after everything

    there is still room to grow in new directions.

    your roots run deep, and at the same time, 

    you can still become something new.

    may there be room for you

    to welcome what is slowly

    expanding and becoming possible now.

    B – A Cabin Halfway Up the Mountain

    remember this when you start to think

    you should be further along by now:

    there may be more happening within you 

    than this moment can fully reveal.

    the middle of the journey 

    can still be a place of meaningful change, too.

    what you have carried this far 

    has already changed you.

    what you have practiced along the way 

    has already become part of you.

    and it matters more than you know.

    you are free to be proud of how you have grown,

    even while you are still on the journey.

    sometimes the most lasting growth happens before proof.

    C – A Cabin at a Fork In the Road

    at unexpected crossroads,

    new chapters in the story

    of who you are can still emerge.

    you may be faced with new unknowns,

    and this is also true:

    you will continue to encounter 

    both steadiness and openings

    all throughout the many layers

    of the landscape you are moving through.

    wherever this journey takes you next,

    the things you nurture today

    can become part of what you carry

    with you toward tomorrow.

    4 – A Cabin by a Waterfall

    while the reality 

    of what is unknown is ever-present

    your growing readiness to find 

    rhythms within the change

    is becoming more present, too…

    just by returning, again and again, to the water,

    change is becoming something 

    you are learning to move with

    slowly and steadily you discover

    livable, breathable ways of being here

    -Morgan Harper Nichols

  • Changing the landscape itself

    Changing the landscape itself

    Earthworms live in soil and eat decaying plant material. Their movement helps mix and aerate the earth, making it healthier for plants. And perhaps, one thing that can be learned from the earthworm is the significance of daring to go beyond the surface level. Without earthworms, soil would become compacted and less able to support the growth of crops and wild plants. In the same way earthworms patiently carve out new spaces underground, we can shape the spaces we move through with quiet persistence and determination. The smallest act can shift what seemed unmovable.

    Even when our efforts take time to show results, what remains is a kind of patient persistence that can continue to grow and a determination that we can continue to build upon. We can decide to say “yes” to depth. To spend more time on what good, honest things hold, not just what shines. To be present to the soil of this very moment, not only the distant skies.

    This does not mean hiding away forever or stagnating. Instead, it means thinking about the long-term, including the long-term that extends beyond ourselves. Like earthworms, we can learn to work steadily beneath the surface by staying present in what’s slow but necessary, and as a result, transform the landscape itself. A landscape not made overnight, but built to nourish what comes next. That kind of steady effort may not look like much at first, but it’s often how something good begins. – Morgan Harper Nichols