Shel Graves' Sensorium

Taste: strawberries  Sound: blossom, blossoming; forage, glean, sing, hop, flit  Smell: jasmine, blossoms  Sight: magnolia blossoms, cherry blossoms, plum blossoms; a roomful of playful cats; squirrel-tailed cat Touch:  a soft breeze Intellect, ideas, and dreams: a pantoum about huckleberries  Grateful for: sight; t-shirt weather

Taste: popcorn, salt Sound: flutes Smell: Sitka Spruce Sight: marbled murrelet; lungwort lichen; lightening blue-green sky. Touch: evergreen needles; “If you find yourself standing near Lungwort, breathe deep. This is good, clean air.”  Intellect, ideas, and dreams: Strix occidentalis; compassion, wisdom  Grateful for: sleep, bed, a safe place to land; in the dog park

Taste: cinnamon, black olives, mushrooms Sound: frog cello Smell: sage Sight: tree of life-Western Redcedar; gloaming - a “texture of light”  Touch: slime — “Slug slime is an underappreciated and wondrous substance.” --  Cascadia Field Guide Intellect, ideas, and dreams: “in the oldest part of our minds, a thick forest stands, inhabited by talking beasts, changelings, wild people and lost children; by nightmares, reveries, and profound silences…” Cascadia Field Guide   Grateful for: Compassion Consortium

Taste: grape juice  Sound: shrill barking  Smell: rose smoke  Sight:  sky  Touch: cold glass  Intellect, ideas, and dreams: animal chaplaincy; a thin purple leash  Grateful for: cats, mice, and sword ferns

Taste: berry compote; mushroom gravy; carrot cake Sound: harps and cellos Smell: manufactured perfumes Sight: Soft, pale, yellow light. Touch: pelted; matted; wind-blown; crystals Intellect, ideas, and dreams: Salal “though Salal can grow to tower at twice the height of a tall person, given the right conditions”; an expensive perfume named “Diamond” Grateful for: fruit trees and Mason Bees

Taste: salt Sound: harp and cello Smell: dark roast ground coffee Sight: Stellar’s Jay; white light in the sky; dawn, dawning Touch: her soft chest Sound: kwish-kwishee; her breathing, wheezing, grunting Intellect, ideas, and dreams: fire-adapted Grateful for: Pacific Madrona (the tree is sacred)

Taste: chocolate cake; kombucha; anything with hibiscus Sound: banjo; “What are you going to go golf with her now?” -snarky Smell: Rose patchouli scent Sight: a corner of candleflame; a spoonful of pumpkin; hailstorm; colorful dawn: red, pink, yellow, blue;  Stones. Puddles. The cat who drinks from the puddles. Touch: bark; Moon Jelly; stones, puddles  Intellect, ideas, and dreams: small precious object or a trinket; generosity; a magic shop Grateful for: trees

Taste: Grand Marnier; chocolate mint creamer Sound: laughter Smell: catnip Sight: Osoberry; Oregon-grape; high candle flame; murky ponds, flattened reeds; emerald green heads Touch: shrub  Intellect, ideas, and dreams: a dog growls at me in my sleep; play, enthusiasm Grateful for: drag queens, flamboyance, passion; Mallard ducks; swimming

Taste: hot pepper; popcorn; nooch Sound: Goldfrappe, Systemagic; listening to silence; I'm Not madonna - Hi Fashion Smell: chamomile  Sight: birds in the underbrush; tattoos  Touch: The rain dampens everything. Tamps us down. Holds us in tight.  Intellect, ideas, and dreams: Trying to remember the songs that made me dance.; tonglen; employee handbooks; contemplation  Grateful for: Bunnies. Deer. Opposum. Oak trees and acorns. Oak trees need light. Light.

Taste: sweet spring grass Sound: caw Smell : rose water Sight: Great Blue Heron; a single possum; a single brown bunny; Bald Eagle; the evergreen poking out of the misty clouds on the mountaintops -what if we walked there? A quest.  Touch: wingspan Intellect, ideas, and dreams: ecolgue - a short poem, esp. pastoral Grateful for: death and optimism

Taste: black beans Sound: wind, patter Smell: evergreen Sight: orange/yellow; many cat faces; a face changed by the appearance of dogs; blue morning; dead ivy Touch: mist; walking on evergreen cushion Intellect, ideas, and dreams: Once, I was a baby. Once, I was a child.; The Star Trek Experience; Vegas; character arc "A human mind is small when thinking of small things. It is large when embracing the maker of walking, thinking, and flying." —Joy Harjo Grateful for: vegetables

Taste: water Sound: caw; chatter Smell: wet dog Sight: red-flowering current, ribes sanguineum; the green gray Snohomish River Touch: “…each needs open space roughly the size of twenty-two football fields.”— Cascadia Field Guide on Sitka Black-Tailed Deer Intellect, ideas, and dreams: “…how the deer is made from the world in which she lives, how this world is shaped by her existence within it, and how each is deeply infused with each other’s wildness.” —Richard Nelson, Heart and Blood Grateful for: books

Taste: salt Sound: stepping; rumbling stomach Smell: rainfall; anise incense Sight: deer; round globe eyes Touch: wet grass; 80 pounds Intellect, ideas, and dreams: pale pink dreams; blessed Salish Sea, blessed, magical place Grateful for: deer; a retirement party; movie with friends

Taste: black olives, brine Sound: songbirds; chirping, trilling Smell: rose Sight: hail stones; aquamarine toilet water; muddy puddles on bright green; green grass; black olives; leaves shaking; wrens in the underbrush Touch: hail; wind; mist Intellect, ideas, and dreams: Troglodytes is a genus of small passerine birds in the wren family.; passerine - perching, songbirds; gratitude Grateful for: tarot cards; beauty