Over the past week, in every space I’ve been, Joanna Macy’s name has been called into the space. People lift her name as she stands at the threshold of life and death, amid transition. In so many ways, I think we all are there, at the threshold, between life and death, trying to find our way through darkness. While I have been deeply influenced by Joanna Macy and The Work That Reconnects, I have not studied with her directly. She has made her way into teachings I’ve received from others because her spirit is vast and she is a weaver of story, song, poetry, silence, earth, spirit, and soul. I imagine she feels as if she has lived a good and meaningful life, and I am sure she has prepared for what comes after one crosses the threshold and journeys to other realms. I know her medicine will continue to permeate every cell of the spaces I will journey because she shared her heart with the world. 

 

A little less than a year ago, I moved a healthy hive into a long Langstroth hive box. I wanted to make space for one of my hives to live in a hive where they could build horizontally instead of vertically. In the wild, bees build in this manner, horizontally, not vertically stacking comb on top of comb. When I moved the hive, they were healthy and bursting at the seams with brood, worker bees, and, of course, honey. They oriented themselves to their new home quickly and began bringing in resources right away. I was hopeful. A couple of weeks after the move, I noticed some fighting at the entrance and suspected some robber bees were trying to steal honey from the hive to carry back to their hives. I wasn’t that concerned because I thought the hive was strong enough to defend itself. At least they had been when I had moved them. 

 

I went into the hive a few days later and noticed fewer bees, which left me curious. They were concentrated in the front of the hive, which wasn’t unusual because the brood chamber is located in the front, and the capped honey was in the back. I added a frame of brood to boost the number of worker bees and a pollen patty for food, and I waited. Over the following week, I witnessed a decrease in activity at the entrance. I went back into the hive and didn’t see the queen; I imagine the robbers killed her. I saw an ailing hive and evidence of varroa mite and parasites taking over the hive. The bees couldn’t defend themselves, and I knew they would die. On the day when I knew that I had to open the hive, let the few remaining bees go, and dismantle it, I pulled out a frame of brood and saw a baby bee being born. I teared up and thought, there is no way you can survive in these conditions. There weren’t enough workers to keep the brood viable and warm. More tears came. I wasn’t just crying for the baby bee; I was crying for the children, all of them who are born into conditions that are untenable and make survival nearly impossible. 

 

I let the baby bee hatch and placed her at the entrance of another hive, hoping that they might take her in. I froze the salvageable frames of nectar, pollen, and capped honey to save for a future hive. I burned the frames that parasites had overtaken. I laid flowers in the hive, and I prayed for the bees. I prayed for humanity. A prayer for change. A prayer for peace. A prayer for justice. 

 

What I know about Joanna Macy is that she would never want us to look away from the historical and present-day conditions that compromise our ability to survive and thrive. She wants us to return to our true nature and to remember our connection with the more-than-human world. She wants us to lead with broken open hearts and to grieve as an expression of love. She wants us to change because of our capacity to love. As everything falls apart, we are here in the liminal space, between birth and death. What is your prayer and wish? It’s not that prayer will shift everything. Prayer without action is empty. But the vibration of a thriving honeybee hive does heal us. Their sound is a prayer and a gift. Perhaps, when sent with intention and followed by action, our prayers, vibrations, holy hum, and gifts can also heal us.  

 

I am sending love to Joanna and all those whose lives she touched with her beauty, teachings, joy for life, and wisdom. May we be forever changed because of her. May we change the conditions that stand in the way of our collective liberation because this is the work we must continue to do, carrying on a legacy of love. 

 

I’ll end with this prayer and invite you to whisper or speak it aloud.

 

We call first on the Beings of the Past. Be with us now all you who have gone before, you our ancestors and teachers. You who walked and loved and faithfully tended this Earth be present to us now that we may carry on the legacy you bequeathed us. Aloud and silently in our hearts we say your names and see your faces….

 

We call also on the Beings of the Present: All you with whom we live and work on this endangered planet, all you with whom we share this brink of time, be with us now. Fellow humans and brothers and sisters of other species, help us open to our collective will and wisdom. Aloud and silently we say your names and picture your faces….

 

Lastly, we call on the Beings of the Future. All you who will come after us on this Earth, be with us now. All you who are waiting to be born in the ages to come, it is for your sakes too, that we work to heal our world. We cannot picture your faces or say your names – you have none yet – but we would feel the reality of your claim on life. It helps us to be faithful in the task that must be done, so that there will be for you, as there was for our ancestors, blue sky, fruitful land, clear waters.

 

If you're interested in learning more lessons from the bees, please consider listening to a podcast with Sounds True about The Wisdom of the Hive AND a lovely conversation I had with LaUra Schmidt and Aimee Reau from The Good Grief Network.