The difference between comfort and nurture is this: if you have a plant that is sick because you keep it in a dark closet, and you say soothing words… - Clarissa Pinkola Estés

Art is not just for oneself, not just a marker of one’s own understanding. It is also a map for those who follow after us.

I’ve not forgotten the song of those dark years, hambre del alma, the song of the starved soul. But neither have I forgotten the joyous canto hondo, the deep song, the words of which come back to us when we do the work of soulful reclamation.

So what compromises the Wild Woman? From the viewpoint of archetypal psychology as well as in ancient traditions, she is the female soul. Yet she is more; she is the source of the feminine. She is all that is of instinct, of the worlds both seen and hidden — she is the basis. We each receive from her a glowing cell which contains all the instincts and knowings needed for our lives. “...She is the Life/Death/Life force, she is the incubator. She is intuition, she is far-seer, she is deep listener, she is loyal heart. She encourages humans to remain multilingual; fluent in the languages of dreams, passion, and poetry. She whispers from night dreams, she leaves behind on the terrain of a woman’s soul a coarse hair and muddy footprints. These fill women with longing to find her, free her, and love her.