Healing + Memorial Landscapes
From time immemorial, we have used our amazing human imaginations to express our innermost selves in the landscapes we live in. The infinite intricacies and elemental poetics of the natural world offer their powerful, nuanced language to us on our quest for truth and meaning as we navigate the inevitable tides of joy and pain, birth and death, love and loss. We have historically turned to stone and bronze to embody loss, or to fix a memory, a person or a story in place… We know, however, that memory is fluid, that grief and other emotions are not finite, that consciousness and perspective can expand, that peace is a process. As we better embrace the current research and understanding of memory, trauma, loss and grief, the art of healing and memorial landscape design can evolve and elevate its therapeutic potential through an intentional embrace of the radical impermanence inherent to both wild nature and the human experience.
Interactive gardens can hold space for processing a range of emotions and grief over time through simple ritual, dynamic engagement and entwinement with nature and “the peace of wild things” (Wendell Berry). To have a place in the world to feel one’s feelings – as an individual and also in community – can be immensely helpful. There are a lot of places in the world that need healing too. Locations of violence, loss of life, institutional abuse, extinction or climate trauma should not go untouched by our hands and hearts. Furthermore, the often ambiguous and anticipatory ecological grief we hold in the face of climate change and extinction is still widely underacknowledged and in need of place-based remedies.
A number of the pilot projects below are templates that can be adapted to meet you or your community’s personal vision. If you have a spark of desire to make meaning in your garden, in a school, hospital, spiritual or religious institution, park, city street, or elsewhere within your wider homeground, please reach out – I would be thrilled to hear about it, and to help create something that is helpful and transformative!
Healing Landscape Templates (under construction)
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ancestral nest garden
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lifestory witness pole
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feather bridge altar
Shared below are a number of early pilot projects and design concepts. These will be expanded upon as further research and collaboration unfolds, and can be adapted for your vision as well.
Pilot Projects + Concepts
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I am watching a robin sit on top of a large boulder, greeting the morning sun. Light is pouring into the high valley, illuminating the earth-orange singing breast of the bird, and equally washing over the face of the rock – another ancient orange, vibrating with lichen. Beyond the cluster of stones, a soft grassy hill rises 200 feet, gracing the blue sky with the most luscious, perfect curve. Every time I look at this hill, I recall how enlivened it looked one recent early evening, watching seven tawny coyotes run with mysterious, passionate purpose across its face, weaving the warp of its impressive contours with their radical vitality. The sunburnt blonde of the grasses endlessly validated the kindred flaxen fur, and vice versa. This old camouflage, evolved over millenia, appeared to me in that moment not about hiding, but about harmony. The joy of life washed over my whole being, as if I could feel a direct transmission of how happy the hill was to come alive under all these wild running feet. I feel sure, this morning, that the rock loves this singing robin, and how the hills all around us ache for and adore all the life they remember here. (continued below)
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We see the same coyote – we call him ‘Te’ – almost every day. Hunting ground squirrels, faithfully walking his favorite paths, resting in the grass on hot days, running, running, running... Seeing him so constantly, I have grown an innate sense of our cohabitation of this California landscape. Somehow, I feel like a better person for having expanded my awareness not just of his being, but his well-being. When we didn’t see him for two weeks during this January’s intense wave of storms, I felt a lot of heart space going towards imagining him staying dry, hoping he wasn’t too hungry. When the sun finally came out over the wholly soaked earth, I rejoiced to see Te strolling along the road. He was walking more slowly than I’d seen him walk before – I wondered if this was his humbled, mid-winter stillness, or his getting used to seeing me, or both. How I had missed those gorgeous red legs, those curious eyes, those big, wise ears.
The Santa Lucia mountains here are still graced with many handsome coyotes, families of noble black-tailed deer, foxes, badgers, and other still-common four-leggeds. There are mountain lions and bobcats here, too. Every time I look to any hillside or ridgeline, I can almost expect to see something, (almost). Seeing so much life still here, though, makes me realize more than ever what is NOT here anymore. I have begun seeing these creatures in my mind’s eye. Perhaps this is a way to assuage my feeling of loss – to bring the life that is missing back in the only way that I can. Like an amputee that can feel sensation in their absent limb, I am beginning to feel feelings about the life that used to roam these landscapes. I want to know everything and everyone that made coyote who he is. If the grasses and the sweet sunshine made the color of his fur, and the ground squirrels and gophers made his poignant pounce, his dance -- what made his speed, his long gaze, his powerful, emotive voice?
I think of the striking pronghorn antelope that used to run at high speeds through these meadows and valleys – their own sprinting capacity evolved to outrun the jaguars that once hunted here too. Is coyote’s fast grace made to chase those vibrant herds? Does he miss the epic running hunt, where today he is stuck in his gopher and squirrel pouncing routine?
Does coyote miss the grizzly bear, who forged much bigger paths for him to follow across these hills and through the canyon brush, whose kills offered him the occasional easy meal, whose predation also must have made him such a fast runner, a smart survivalist, and good den digger? Did his incredible survival imagination arise from living amongst from grizzly, or perhaps from living amongst the wise first humans of this land too?
How did coyotes’ voice once entwine with that of wolf? Who inspired who to be more emotive, more sensual, more subtle in their howling? How did the darkness evoke these canine hearts into such authentic, unique expression, such tender, potent truth chanting. What does coyote cry for now? For missing the voice of big brother wolf? Undeniably a competitor, but somehow an ally.
Carving the tracks of grizzly, wolf and antelope into these old redwood boards helped me to fully acknowledge the life that has been likely forever lost here. I wish to bring a simple symbol of these happy footsteps back to this sweet hill that just keeps rising up to meet them, moment by moment, year after year. Here they are, gone but not forgotten. I bring these footsteps back to the bosom of the hill herself, to feel and to hold again. I bring these footsteps to you too, coyote. Perhaps your paws can find solace in these tracks. The majestic flight of antelope lives on in your sprint, the soul of wolf lives on in your song, the enormity of brown bear lives in your tenacious wit and will to live.
Let us offer these ancient grasses that made this place – a favorite of grizzly to eat. I welcome you to come here to offer wildflowers, songs, tears, or love anytime the grief of what is missing moves through you, dear friends. These animals made us who we are too. Remembering them matters.
*This piece can be created for school gardens to help children make sense of the unique sadness of extinction. It can be customized to represent what is missing in your local ecosystem. It can also be made to be mobile.
*Listen to "Predator Prayer" - a poem to accompany this piece.
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What a gift it was to create this interactive altar for the celebration of the WAILS Songs for Grief album release in West Seattle on the Equinox of 2024. Alexandra (Ahlay) Blakely recorded these songs with a 200+ choir in the summer of 2023. These songs are inspired by whalesong and by the concept of the five gates of grief as described by psychotherapist, author and soul acitivist Francis Weller in his book The Wild Edge of Sorrow. (continued below)
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This interactive altar was designed and constructed to reflect on these gates that we pass through enroute to the ocean of sorrow and grief.
Everything we love we will lose
The places that have not known love
The sorrows of the world
What we expected and did not receive
Ancestral grief
The dark outer ring, made of organic biochar, represents the shadow we all pass through. Ten red cedar branches, symbolic of whale ribs, frame each gate. At the entrance to each gate is a bowl of wild offerings available to participants to help transform the shadow into something beautiful and meaningful upon passing through. The center of the circle remains a simple, open space where others may find each other, so that we may know we are not alone. I wanted to create something simple that would allow space for connection and witness, and that would invite people into the poetics of the carefully chosen, wild materials -- from bleached, Pacific driftwood "bones", to rusty madrone bark and ponderosa pine needles in poignant senescence, to delicate skeletonized alder leaves and lichen, to chunks of rotting cedar trunk, to windborn seeds that teach us how to let go. You can learn more about Wails, purchase the album, and explore Ahlay's work in community singing and grief tending here. Several of the beautiful photos are credited to Alexandra Doumas. Learn more about Francis Weller here.
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When my newborn mother was taken from my grandmother’s arms after what was likely a singular embrace, her heart became forever defined by the void of maternal love that cut a canyon of lifelong pain. As one of over 600,000 known forced adoptions executed by the Catholic church in Canada upon unwed mothers between the 1940’s and 1980’s, it has taken decades for this human rights atrocity to be acknowledged as such, much less reconciled in any way. Like other major traumas, the suffering of this separation can persist through generations. While my mother amazingly did her best to give her children what she never got, my own life has been marked by what never was – the comfort and reassurance of a wise grandmother’s arms, so many hugs, the solace of a mother’s embrace infused with her own sense of wholeness, the true ties of kinship, any culture of home cooking, somatic belonging, the modelling of healthy feminine power, a sense of coming from somewhere – from a lineage of love. Later in life, I have grieved not becoming a mother myself, but am grateful that the blood memory of “date rape,” forced adoption, and concealed grief and shame of my grandmother are just now coming to light to be released from my heart, mind and body. (continued below)
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I have always wanted to create space in a garden for a person to feel truly held in the world. Undoubtedly, this probably means something different for everyone. For this installation, I wanted to recreate the embrace that never was between my grandmother and mother. Pacific ocean driftwood worn smooth and washed ashore from last winter’s rough storms was collected in the depths of January. Cut to verticals, this weathered wood stands in two concentric arcs representing mother holding daughter.
On mother’s day, I gathered my courage to weave a tangible embrace between the two… With cotton ribbon dyed love-pink with redwood cones, I walked from post to post to weave the ties that were always longed for on both sides. (We know this, as there was a happy reunion later in life, after many years of searching.)
A potently fragrant native salvia stands guard over the embrace with immense spirit. The dry, sparse meadow remains as the base ground to the “hug,” with only a handful of ephemeral white poppies, clarkia and iris gracing the in-between space as a way to honor the truth of scarce and fleeting affection. The center offers itself as a space to make offerings and altars, to sit or lay down in both sets of “arms”… It’s never too late to build a relationship with an ancestor, to reclaim love, a birthright, and greater wholeness.
*This piece can be customized to reflect any embrace or ancestral presence you wish to bring into your garden
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Anyone who has lived through a wildfire will likely feel the return of trepid vigilance to their bones every year when the lush spring hills dessicate to a long held golden brown.
I will never forget waching 100+’ flames crest over the piney ridgeline directly east of my home the evening that the Soberanes Fire took hold of the Santa Lucia Mountains in Big Sur, CA. I felt like a wild animal, with flee instinct fully awakened, as the sky became a thick, dark, purple orange that - though undeniably beautiful - was primarily frightful. While I saw this fire bring out the best in humanity as well, with neighbors, community and crews bonding and joining hearts and hands in the protection of life and home, it is challenging to not simply dread fire season, and the imminent possibility of evacuation, loss, harm, death, unbreathable air, and widespread trauma. (continued below)
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Redwood Rising is an altar created to become an offering to the forest at the start of every fire season, accompanied by friends, song/drumming, and ritual. A burnt redwood trunk, which survived past fire/s, hosts a scar line from which steller’s jay feathers can be “planted”. The jay and its vibrant plumes represent what we wish to protect with our heartfelt prayers: the rich life of the forest, and the clear blue sky. Redwood and jay both embody tenacious resilience, resourcefulness and powerful, enduring vitality. Placing the altar across a flowing creek or waterfall, we embrace the symbol of a bridge - a way to move from fear to safety, fire to rain, death to life.
Living with increasingly intense and frequent fires is a new reality, especially on the West coast of North America. Simple ritual can truly help us to mentally and spiritually prepare us for what may come, and keep our sense of friendship and community strongly woven as we move into the dry months.
*this piece can also be made as an installation within an existing forest landscape ravaged by fire.
Furl Mural
Nature is not static, nor are our hearts, minds, or memories. The poetry of dissolution, destruction, flow, flux and outward change speaks to the ever-changing inner landscape. There is incredible solace to be found in the observation of nature’s abiding acceptance of ongoing change. Furl mural asks us to look closely at the sword fern’s way of turning in and letting go. To embody so much grace in its own natural decline and seasonal senescence, fern teaches us to face endings - including our own.
The words “Beauty comes of all things” were a takeaway from Mary C. Neal’s near death experience, which helped her navigate the loss of her son — as depicted in the Netflix documentary “Surviving Death".
*Furl mural may bring peace to a hospital or hospice setting, a meditation or yoga studio, a natural burial ground, a park or city street.
*Concept design - in process
Water is Life
“Jessica consulted with the Carmel River Watershed Conservancy to brainstorm interpretation concepts for California's largest dam removal.” Lorin Letendre
The beautiful, massive steel doors that were once affixed to the spillway at the top of the 106-foot tall San Clemente Dam can realize a proud new purpose... In this concept, each of the seven cities that source water from the Carmel River shall feature a segment of this historic steel infrastructure repurposed as a large, laser-cut tree grate to host one of seven species of trees found in the watershed - Western sycamore, red alder, coast live oak, madrone, big-leaf maple, California buckeye, and coast redwood. A curvilinear cut running lengthwise through the steel will evoke the river, and allow native understory species to grow through. Inscribed through each grate will be the simple words: "WATER IS LIFE," in both English and in the native Esselen language. Furthermore, a substantial list of names of the wildlife species that thrive here, also in both languages, will be etched through the once-imposing steel, becoming the conduit for rainwater to nurture each tree. These tree grates will serve as a unique kind of memorial to the dam itself, as well as a tribute to all of the life that will benefit from the river flowing freely in the dam’s absence – from the insects and aquatic invertebrates at the base of the food chain, to the reptiles, amphibians, fish, birds, rodents and mammals we know and love. The list will highlight both extinct animals, such as the grizzly bear, as well as the endangered species that demand our concerted and persistent care. These installations would provide a tangible, historic reminder of how the dam enabled the growth of these beloved cities, while reconnecting them to the the river itself.
"Water is not a "resource," it is the source of life." (Krista Tippett quoting a Native American elder in an interview with Layli Long Soldier)
*Concept design
Sea Star Walk
The Monterey Bay Aquarium recently constructed its new Education Center. The stretch of Monterey city bike path parallel to Wave Street that links the two buildings can become another means to inspire stewardship and affection for the ocean. Once an industrial landscape dominated by fishing canneries, which nearly wrought the demise of the foodweb and kelp forests of Monterey Bay, this stretch of coast has a completely revolutionized identity. Thanks to the Aquarium, Cannery Row has become a globally recognized hub for ocean education and marine conservation, attracting a steady stream of tourists year-round. The current bike path is not particularly interesting, and could quite easily, without compromising the historic character of the district, be re-envisioned to better reflect this new and positive identity of Cannery Row, and help tell the story of the critical heroes and heroines whose stewardship helped reverse the ecological collapse of the bay and its fisheries.
A Sea Star Walk clearly takes inspiration from the Hollywood Walk of Fame. This welll known memorial streetscape honors over 2,600 American cultural icons in terrazzo and brass stars embedded into the pavement along 1.3 miles of Hollywood Blvd. and beyond, and is estimated to attract 10 million visitors annually. The symbolism of stars is not lost on anyone – we grant them for respect and admiration. For the City of Monterey to host a memorial streetscape that reflects the strong ocean ethic of our community and that celebrates individuals who champion that would be a beautiful expression of this deep cultural value in the coastal landscape. Each star granted – to living and legendary local heroes such as David and Lucille Packard, Julia Platt, as well as Jacques Cousteau, Sylvia Earle, Rachel Carson and many more ocean “celebrities,” could be accompanied by ceremony and celebration.
*Concept design
Midlife Freedom Story Pole
This 6’ tall sequoia driftwood offered itself to become a story pole to reflect the experience of overcoming the pervasive phenomenon of oppression, invalidation and devaluation of women. A series of holes drilled down to the red heartwood express how painfully assaulting these habitual relational patterns can be to our identity. When the fires of mid-life come, they often bring experiences of death, loss, and soul reckonings. Painful experiences may also come with an awakening from the tragic normalization of gender violence and narcissism in our culture. As harsh as these fires can be, they can be helpful in burning down to expose the core of these omnipresent wounds so that we may finally bring them to the light for healing and integration. On the other side of our healing work, which may take years, we may find ourselves far less penetrable to the same acts of disrespect, abuse or violence that might have gutted us before. When we find deeper enlightenment in the gift of older age, the beauty of our inner peace, healthy strong boundaries, self-love, self-respect, forgiveness and emotional freedom are reflected in the abalone inlay at the top of the story pole. When wounded egos come knocking, we have the strength to simply reflect back love, calm strength, and a wild inner beauty that trumps all.
*This piece can be adapted and customized to reflect your own personal journey and planted in a special place in your garden as a reminder of your own strength.
*Concept design - in process
Cypress Moon
Our faces and hearts certainly age to reflect a map of our personal growth, our life path, our pains and our joys. Cypress moon rises out of a sedge meadow - a beautiful raw embodiment of the complexity of life - which reminds us (like a furling fern frond) that beauty comes of all things….
*Concept design - in process