"IF" The Divine Masculine and Feminine Were Woven

I have a story to tell you. It is incredibly vulnerable. Here it is:

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Last summer at the coolest nature retreat I've ever been to, Return to the Source, I was standing in a circle with heroic beings when one read the poem "If" by Rudyard Kipling (you can read it at the bottom of this page). It was a parkour retreat, and everyone there had various movement backgrounds and practices - which meant most of them embodied the tenacity the poem captures so well. All week I had witnessed amazing physical feats that required years of practice, training, and a shit load of courage. The poem was so inspiring to me at the time, describing the actions and adventures of our group so well over the past week. It was near the end of the week so I felt a sort of “finish line” feeling and a sense of deserving to stand alongside other athletes and brave nature explorers. I’ve struggled with feeling athletic, confident, and brave most of my life - but this retreat seemed to be the right challenge at the right time… the whole time. I took everyday and every heroic feat as both a grain of salt and a universal sign from the gods.

So when this poem was being read, I let it wash over me like an initiation, like a ‘welcome home’ to my future kind of thing (which ended up being intuitive because I moved to Washington a month later). Anyway, the very last line of the poem is “you’ll be a man, my son.” And when the poem was over most of the group inhaled a sense of power, confidence, and ease. But I felt deflated, embarrassed, and isolated. I wasn’t a man or a son, so I shouldn’t have identified with the rest of the poem - which I know is illogical thinking! I immediately reminded myself that I too, can dream and not make dreams my master, and think but not make thoughts my aim. I can meet triumph and disaster and treat those two imposters just the same. I love this poem dearly, and I have it nearly memorized now, a year later, because it inspires me so much. But that final line makes it sound like it’s written for men - and I will never be a man, or a son. I can only hope to stand alongside you, but I can’t be you.

I realized in that moment that despite the call to heroism the retreat embodies and the emphasis on telling stories of heroes and calls to adventure - I will never be a hero. I am a heroine. I am the feminine version of this poem, or at least I could try to be. So for months, I lamented over this specific poem, which I felt in my bones, being for men. I wanted a version for women… and every time I sat down to write one, the words wouldn’t come. I waited for months until in the middle of the Immersion at Wilderness Awareness School, in the dark winter, after a few soul wrenching ceremonies, one day I woke up and nearly this entire poem poured out onto the pages of my journal. I refined it over months longer, and finally shared it with my class on the last day - and sharing poetry used to be a huge edge for me, a fear I didn’t think I could get over. But I realized if I ever want to ever really reach people, you’re going to have to reach me too. So here’s a glimpse into my heart.

A few weeks before my version of the poem was captured on paper, I heard a woman in outdoor school ask the question “who am I as a woman in the patriarchy?” questioning her worth, perhaps the worth of all women, in times like these and throughout history. Although I winced, feeling the true sense of worthlessness in both the question and my blood, my gut and spine knew the answer: you are a Daughter of Gaia. That’s who we all are.

This poem was written to mirror the call to adventure the Rudyard Kipling version captured for the masculine hero so well. This poem is for the divine feminine, the heroine, the wild women that still belong to the earth first. This poem is for the friends, daughters, aunts, women, girls, grandmothers, mamas, ladies, heroines, and witches of the world. This poem is for all people who feel the presence of yin, the feminine underworld, when they complete heroic journeys the external world will never see. In a way, both poems contain both the masculine and feminine way to journey - regardless of gender - so both inspire me in similar ways now. So it’s time to share.

🌙 Whoever you are, this poem is for you:

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If you can have your heart completely broken and use your wound as a vessel to pour love back into the world,

If you can turn the other cheek but only after knowing you could burn them down if you wanted to.

If you demand the attention of a room in silence or adorn invisibility with equal ease - and with your words become regal or common. If you shapeshift all too often.

If you bring together clashing worlds and they celebrate with pride - or you leave behind those you bring war to your threshold. You bring peace to the table to be remembered for generations - and though they don’t know your name, you won’t fold.

If over your hearth hangs harmony and healing, blanketing blades that trim skins - where last summer’s forest warms this winter’s family, and not a child is fearing their sins.

If you can heal a wound on the front line then turn back to the fray to stare your enemy in the eyes and without words scream, “Not Today.”

If you can grow in the darkness or freeze time with the sun, or leave the tomb of your own tomb ajar - if you can give way to the currents, waves, and tides… using the chaos as compost for your own edification and drown into steadfastness and a strength that rises to be a lighthouse of hope in the dark night for those who see you from afar.

If you can withstand the burning it takes to be a light from a beacon or pyre,

If you can stand true when condemned before all, like a spark spit from the fire - and *never* put on the full body of shame. But upon its taste when force-fed to me, I spit the spark back lest that poisonous seed take root in my belly.

If you were to scream, “My Pleasure Can Move Mountains!” and no one would call you a liar,

If you can catch fire with a forest and a will then quench the flames with your desire - and then reignite in sagebrush or damp needles alike, then ride on the wind back to land. Transformed entirely just below the skin - returning to people with your own salvation in hand.

If your rising feeds a village, and you demand your ether embodied, and despite your destruction whisper to others, “Stay True,” and because of your Love they listen to you.

If people heed your words but that doesn’t quiet your tongue, and you keep telling stories of hope and freedom,

If your bravery is a song that has yet to be sung, both Heaven and Hell sing “Hallelujah.”

If you can treat both death and sorrow as kin - bleeding animals that never die.

If you can welcome God into the pack, the way Earth Goddess holds up the sky.

If you can walk this horizon like the daughter you are, child of Gaia, keeper of Light -

Atop the ashes of a girl a Woman will stand.

You have found freedom in form - your Birthright.

~ with love, sae-el 🌞

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If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master; If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son.

--- Rudyard Kipling

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So what do you think? Does one read more for a masculine or feminine audience? Where does gender come into the masculine/feminine conversation, if at all? Is it binary thinking to breakdown the yin/yang approach to journeying?

Please comment or let me know what you think!