So named by painter Georgia O'Keeffe, the "white place" (La Plaza Blanca) is a geologically unique, stunningly picturesque area near the Rio Chama and Abiquiu in the state of New Mexico, USA. It was a favored painting location for O'Keeffe and is visible from her house in Abiquiu Pueblo. Nikki and I spent a beautiful morning there during our visit to New Mexico in November of 2019. Nikki had a vigor that had been absent since her diagnosis, and it seemed as if the chemotherapy through which she had been suffering was perhaps working. Little did either of us imagine that she had only ten weeks to live. This was the last hike we took together.

This song was the first track recorded during the "She Who Watches" sessions in December of 2020. It features guitar, Native American flute, mandolin, and accordion.

La Plaza Blanca
 
You could see it from
Her house in Abiquiú
Across the Rio Chama
Georgia’s skull-white
Landscape muse
It is owned now by a mosque
Dar al Islam
That grants us heathens
And pilgrims of Other
Respectful access
To this pallid sanctum
Of tuneful wind
Raven song ringing beyond
Chalky hoodoos and
Along milky ledges
Pastel creek beds
That seem to run
More ways than
One
 
Then silence
Then song again
Then wind
Then none
 
With the ghost of Georgia and
The hosts of Muhammed
We are tracking a shadowy past
Slipping through Crescent fences
Of barbwire and bone
Pondering strange exhibits
Of black stones on this ashen canvas
Stretching beyond time
 
This sun-bleached forever
Is quite hard to find
There are no signs
And the address in the local guide
Is 1234 Fictitious Lane.

I learned this ancient Sanskrit chant from my friend, master sitarist and singer, Pandit Deobrat Mishra of Varanasi, India. Not long after Nikki was diagnosed with cancer, I took a workshop on naad yoga with Debu and learned several beautiful chants. Chanting has since been an important facet of my grief-work and my attempt to heal. I am grateful to Debu and to my yoga teacher, Maddie Adams, for instilling in me a love for this practice.

The Indalo Wind interpretation of this sacred mantra features Native American flute, and shruti, a traditional Indian instrument that produces a drone using a system of bellows (similar to a harmonium, but without the keyboard). It was recorded in December 2020.

It had been decades since I had played electric guitar. I started up again recently and have found it to be very therapeutic. I just play, just to play, without any destinations or expectations, focused on the present, which is fluid, always at hand but so hard to grasp. There is something very liberating about it, something, dare I say, primordial. Is it practice? I guess. Is it creation? Maybe. Is it something I want to keep doing? Definitely.