Let's Start With An Acorn

Christina Burress
5 days ago
4 min read

On a rainy New Year’s Eve our son Nico drove us to the top of San Diego’s Palomar Mountain (6000’ elevation) for a hike in the clouds. His 1998 Toyota Tacoma, fitted with a new set of tires, easily maneuvered dirt and gravel switchbacks hedged by coastal sage scrub. As we climbed out of the valley, the tree line took over and soon we were in the forest. Near the peak, we parked at Scott’s Cabin trailhead and made our way through sections of incense cedar, black oak, scrub oak, Douglas fir, and white fir.

Along the trail we came upon towering California incense cedars turned granary trees. Generations of Acorn woodpeckers, in an artful symbiotic relationship with the tree, have been storing acorns here to insure their community’s survival. First, they drill perfectly sized holes by “boring through solid wood with forces more than 30 times their own weight and drilling up to 13 times a second,” then stash the meaty acorns into the holes to secure food for winter and early spring.

Steve Ryan from Groveland, CA, USA

Acorns are both a seed and a fruit. Potential and nourishment. Each acorn that falls to the ground is a perfect gift to the wide web of creatures including the woodpecker and also squirrel, deer, bear, raccoon, opossum, Blue jay, wild turkey, and insect larvae. If conditions of heat and moisture are right then the acorn will germinate, root, and eventually sprout into an oak holding the promise of more acorns, barring drought, fire, and disease. What a generous kin!

The image of an acorn is one of beginning. American psychologist James Hilman’s Acorn Theory provides a metaphor of our own potential for growth with acknowledgment that growth is not achieved alone, but guided by a daemon (inspiring force from the Ancient Greek), a type of companion to help our destiny unfold. Hilman believed that in addition to our parents, mentors and teachers can excite our imagination and “release an image” of our calling. To me it is a reminder to seek the right conditions for flourishing.

Source: Petr Novák, Wikipedia

The encounter with the granary tree, with all its snug acorns, had me thinking about taking inventory, which is something many of us do this time of year, not as a tally of accomplishments, but rather an account of the many gifts I’ve received thanks to the creative genius of others, especially the many mentors and teachers who have excited my imagination and helped me understand my calling that is entangled in my own essence.

Yesterday, I learned that a mentor of mine, San Diego poet and peace activist Jim Moreno, transitioned on December 2nd at the age of 77. In 2009, I contacted Jim because of the poetry work he was doing with incarcerated youth. Without hesitation and in his quintessentially generous way, he invited me to accompany him to the East Mesa Detention Center in Otay Mesa, CA, to observe his poetry class. I’d been teaching poetry to elementary school kids as a California Poet in the Schools, but something was calling me to offer the healing powers of poetry to other populations.

The Detention Center was an uninviting concrete box of surveillance cameras. Bright lights and hard surfaces accentuated every movement and sound. Inside the glass-walled classroom we made a circle with the chairs and then Jim wrote a prompt on the board as the young men quietly found their seats.

Jim welcomed them with a chant and then introduced me. Then the two of us walked the inside of the circle. Jim made eye contact and shook each young man’s hand to exchange names. Some got right to writing, others asked questions, and some tested Jim’s resolve, but he always found a way to help them give birth to their piece. Without exception, he brought the poet out of each of them.

On the way home Jim talked about the transformative power of poetry. He said he witnessed it every time and I believed him because I felt transformed by the experience. It was Jim and Poetry. Or maybe it was just Jim’s authentic way of being in the world, especially his ability to listen to these young men as people and not inmates. He created a safe environment to be vulnerable and share. That manner of teaching, one of trust building and love, has always been an aspiration of mine, no matter who is in the room and I’m forever grateful to Jim for his kindness on that day and every day that I had the honor to be in his presence.

I want to close this piece by returning to the mountain and the acorns. By the time we got back to the truck, we were soaked, but no one cared because the inspiring force of the granary trees, with their healthy stockpile, was a perfect reminder of the richness of life and the important relationships of the many teachers and mentors in our life.

...I ask him what classroom I’ve taught him in,

he says I’ve never been his teacher but

he heard about me and wanted to meet me,

and one more time poetry performs a miracle,

one more time poetry transforms,

and I am humbled in the presence of spirit

I don’t understand,

but I know for sure spirit waits,

poetry spirit waits… to dance with you...

from "Palms Up" by Jim Moreno (listen here)

resources:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-woodpeckers-turn-their-entire-bodies-into-pecking-machines/