MEDICINE WOMAN MEMORY

i come from a line of medicine women. on nights of a full moon like tonight, i am taken back to the river in my father's hometown, where my grandmother once took me and where my female ancestors appear in my visions, wearing red dresses--as if i was part of a memory.

i see the woman with the red hair always lingering on my left side who my father later identified as one of his aunts, whom he never met yet whose mere mention was suddently our introduction. she was one of my three paternal great aunts who were known to gather and sell healing herbs. i see them with long braided hair, huddled around the kitchen table, wrapping bundles of herbs.

i feel their blood running through mine. i know what they know. and under the full moon, the divine feminine connects us.

image (treated with filters): harper's bazaar // august 2012