Echoes

There are those weeks or months when everything seems to come around to the same idea or the same story...we are having one of those times, and it's not completely by accident, but it is being noticed by the wee ones and there is something so gratifying about that...resonance.

We've been reading harvest stories, of course, and I came across a wonderful Day of the Dead book a couple of weeks ago which lead to all sorts of discussion about death and celebration and life. I taught the girls a song that somehow I learned, though I can't remember when; it was whirling in my mind for a few days and I managed to find it on the internet (of course):

Hoof and Horn, Hoof and Horn
All that dies shall be reborn
Corn and Grain, Corn and Grain
All that falls shall rise again

The girls love everything about this song, which is sort of a chant and is easy to fall into and just keep going as you walk, or draw, or drive...we've sung this a lot at this point! (here is a clip, if you are the singing type and want a good harvest song - I wish I could play Eliza singing it for you; she has such a wonderful singing voice) The words have also penetrated their thoughts and they find echoes of the idea of rebirth in so many other places.

We recently read a sweet book called "Ears and the Secret Song", about a mouse and his life's cycle with the other mice in his family and field, and there again was this idea of death and rebirth. The secret song became like a little sister to Hoof and Horn, and the girls sing this one all day, out loud, together, alone, under their breath:

I am small and brown, in the earth I lie;
I spring tall and golden, waving at the sky.

I just sat down to try and write the notation of how we sing this out for you and take a picture, but I am tired enough that I can't quite figure out the key signature!!!!! Yowza. Where's Dan when ya need him? (ok, for the geeks among us, here it is in simple notation:

I am small and brown, in the earth I lie
C Eflat D Bflat C (repeat)
I spring tall and gol--den, wav-ing at the sky
G G G F G--F, Eflat C C Bflat C

Um, yeah. I should go to bed. But wait! There's more! We started moon journaling this moon cycle (maybe more on that later), and, starting with a new moon, we were talking about why we can't see the moon when it's new. Eliza thought about it, and though we've talked about the moon a lot and she could give a fairly accurate explanation of the scientific why, she knew I was fishing for more - she said the old full moon had died and a "new" moon was being born. Anika got an excited twinkle in her eye and started in, "Hoof and horn, hoof and horn, all that die shall be reborn..."

It's a little bit of magic, these echoes...