The Vows I Made to the Wild

Notes from the Hollow Bone | entry thirty

I didn’t marry the world all at once.
It happened slowly—
in the way soft things learn to trust again.

One morning I found myself keeping promises
I never said aloud:
to return to the oak that waited for me,
to ground my shaking bones in its shadow,
to lift my face toward the same sky
that had watched me grow and break
and grow again.

I made vows without a ceremony,
without witnesses,
without anything but the wind
whispering yes against my cheek.

I vowed to come back
even on the days I felt unworthy of belonging.
I vowed to look up
when the world felt too heavy to lift.
I vowed to read the language of branches
and not demand they speak mine.
I vowed to listen
even when what I heard was only my own breath
settling into stillness.

And to the storms—
I promised respect.
Not fear.
Not resistance.
Just the knowing that life
cannot be all sunlight,
and that breaking open
is sometimes the truest way to grow.

Somewhere between the rain and the roots,
the world took me as its own.
And I—
with a heart that had been half-forgotten,
half-overlooked—
finally said yes.

This marriage has no ring,
no aisle,
no applause—
just a quiet union between the world above me
and the world within me,
two steady halves
forever calling each other home.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai