May ’23 Love Notes

Decipher the art that you’re already doing, recognize the artistry around you, and the everyday miracles of life around you, and create from that place. And what you find is that is some of the most generative meaning in the world. Every crisis for me is an opportunity for compassion.. is an opportunity for creation.

ALOK

Beloved Community, 

We hope you are flourishing!

Our days have been bustling with activity here on the farm: seeding, planting, mulching, hosting, hauling and building. The soundtrack of our days has been filled with miter saws, bird song, goats munching, irrigation lines pumping, weed whackers whacking, and laughter as we transplanted our baby sunflowers into the warm soil. 

Through Soul Fire in the City we established 9 new gardens for our neighbors, and with the help of our extended community we transplanted over 140 perennials, spread mushroom inoculated wood chips on the raspberries, and shelled some colorful Indigenous corn during our Work & Learn Days. We have some sweet surprises on the land and hope to welcome you soon!

Read more juicy details, updates and invitations below. 

With tender love and care,

Briana, Brooke, Cheryl, Clara, Crysta, Danielle, Hana’, Hillary, Ife, Jonah, Kai, Leah, Maya, Naima, Ria, Shay, and Susuyu

In this season of irrigation testing and transplanting, our farm is getting filled up with summer crops like sweet peppers and our favorite Haitian tomatoes!  We’ve planted hundreds of perennials like elderberries, currants and blackberries, and we can’t wait to enjoy the literal fruits of our labor. As the forest has taught us, the soil prefers to be covered rather than left bare, so we also mulched all of our perennials with mushroom inoculated wood chips. 

As the pests start to also wake up for the season, we have been blanketing our brassicas with row cover to protect them and keep them warm during chilly evenings. We used other precautionary methods of pest control when transplanting our cucurbits, dipping their leaves in kaolin clay as an organic control to keep cucumber beetles away.

Lastly, and maybe the cutest, is our other farm friends. The goats. They have also been hard at work with a new multi-tasking innovation: laying down in their beautiful pasture to bask in the hot sun… while simultaneously munching grass. 

May’s Work & Learn Days were lit! We prepared one high tunnel for summer planting and two others for our seasonal cover crop, spread mushroom inoculated wood chips on the raspberries, and shelled some colorful and sacred Indigenous corn.

We are so grateful for the magic that’s possible when our love and labor come together. 

JOIN US!!! You’re invited to Soul Fire Farm to learn about some of our farming practices while supporting our food sovereignty work and getting your hands on the land.

• June 13 – Registration
• June 27 – Registration
• July 11 – Registration

Learn more

Leah Penniman and the Soul Fire Farm team weave together the lessons from today’s most respected Black environmentalists, those who have cultivated the skill of listening to the lessons that Earth has whispered to them. This beautifully curated cinematic experience takes viewers on a poetic journey through Black ecological thought.

Watch the trailer, learn more and purchase here

Becoming Friends with Plants: DIY Herbal Remedies
Friday, July 21, 10am to 4pm ET – with Antonia Estela Pérez of Herban Cura

We all embody a lineage that connects us directly to the plant world as a source of living energy and ancestral genetic information. Colonization attempted to erase people’s connection to land and medicine in order to take their autonomy away. Keeping this connection alive is part of our legacy. Plant medicine has been used by our people for survival for generations, including utilizing what some consider to be “weeds.” 

Antonia will support us in connecting with, identifying, and respectfully harvesting plants for healing. Together at Soul Fire Farm we will learn to make a balm, glycerite, and tincture with herbs we will spend time befriending including anise hyssop, plantain, dandelion, and goldenrod. 

Learn more and register here

The workshop is designed to be a culturally relevant and safe space that centers Black, Indigenous and People of Color (read why here).

We established 9 new gardens for our urban neighbors through Soul Fire in the City! 

It was a deeply powerful experience to create these new oases for food and medicine. One is a memorial garden for someone’s Godmother, another is for a group of neighboring elders who want to reclaim more agency over their health, and another is helping connect 4 young brothers to the outdoors. 

All the gardeners received seeds, seedlings, hand tools, watering cans, a gardening guide and lots of helpful tips! Danielle and Naima hosted a workshop at Collard City Growers in Troy for folks to learn how to harvest and prepare delicious recipes from what they grow.

We are soooo excited to welcome you to join us in person, on the land for our 14th annual SOULstice Party!!!

On the first day of summer, we will celebrate our interdependence with the land and each other. Join us for soul stirring live music, aerial trapeze, food vendors, sacred play, camp fire, and the most starLIT dance party of the year!

Sat, Jun 24 5:00 PM – Sun, Jun 25, 12:00 PM

Advanced registration required: https://bit.ly/soulstice23
Please read the full description before registering. Hope to see you there!

This month we took a closer look at our soil using in-field tests, which help us to understand how healthy our soil is. Healthy soil provides an abundance of nutritious foods for our community, and supports climate change mitigation by storing carbon and decreasing greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere. Our results included 31 earthworms per cubic foot of soil, a 6-second infiltration rate (1 inch of water in a 6-inch diameter frame), and CO2 respiration indicating soil that is “very active biologically.” 

Assessing soil to understand its vitality and fertility isn’t new. Long before the western study of soil science, Indigenous communities practiced–and still practice–methods of evaluating soil health, using characteristics like color or the presence of specific plants or insects that tell us something about the soil ecosystem as a whole. 

Learn more in our Guide to In-Field Soil Health Measurement Protocols: How Alive is My Soil (English) & ¿Qué tan vivo está mi suelo? (Español), and by watching our Liberation on Land skill share videos: Soil Carbon part 1 & Soil Carbon part 2 & Investigating Soil with an Auger.

Soul Fire Farm is hosting 6 tours throughout the 2023 farming season so that our beloved community can experience some of the plants, animals and humans that grow here. We will guide you through the growing fields and agroforestry gardens, take you up close to the building projects, share whole-hearted stories, and answer your questions. 

Our next tour is June 30 – Register here

Group registration is still available for July 28 and September 29.

Learn more and register here

Our hosts Leah Penniman and Clara AgborTabi we were joined by the brilliant nature enthusiasts and earth-listeners Nicole Jackson and Taina Spicer. Check out that beautiful conversation here. 

That’s a wrap for 2023! Check out more past episodes here (IGTV) and here (FB). Full list of past episodes here. 

Learn more about Black Earth Wisdom and get the book at blackearthwisdom.org and @black.earth.wisdom

We cut and raised the frame for the equipment shed, which today is filled with tools, firewood, supplies, and the occasional baby chickens in the brooder. I remember being completely entranced by the level of precision required when measuring. The whole experience ignited an interest in math and geometry as I wrapped my head around angles and planes, mortises and tenons, chisels and saws. I was struck by the elegance of a frame—the materials responsible for holding the building true for generations—being in the foreground, rather than concealed by “finish” materials.

We recently raised the timber frame for the Program Center loft, and it brought me back! The camaraderie of working in community—needing them, as each post and beam needs many hands to lift gently into place, joining tightly amongst the other members of its woody kin. 

Many thanks to the hands and hearts that came through to help raise the frame. We’re excited to gather with y’all in and around this structure soon!

– Kai Thomas, Site Manager

In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, it’s important to uplift the ways that we – those of us committed to social change, ecological care, and Black and Indigenous liberation – can and must love one another better.

This article humbly offers a few strategies for being with one another in a way that is skillful, humanizing, abolitionist, and trauma-informed, as we do the messy, sacred, and necessary work of building a just world. These suggestions are based on direct experience and anecdotal reports from other organizations on what has worked and what has not as we attempt to model the collective care we want to see in the wider society.   

A few “How can I love you better?” strategies

• Provide resources for all teammates to access professional mental health care outside of the organization (e.g., QSEHRA, health insurance, wellness stipend.)
• Train and retrain the team on skillful disagreement and conflict transformation (e.g., nonviolent communication, courageous conversations.)
• Practice and commit to addressing concerns with one another directly and face-to-face, using the protocols from your training.
• Offer proactive and regular opportunities for folks to give feedback to all others on the team, and to the organization itself, in both verbal and written form. Have a transparent process for integrating feedback and evolving your practices. 
• Agree to eschew performative cruelty in all of its forms (e.g. public shaming, bullying, triangulation, gossipping, etc.)
• Have a professional mediator “on retainer” and/or use the free agricultural mediation services offered in many states.
• Dedicate time and resources for folks’ in the group to spend time getting to know one another beyond “the work,” to build trust and mutual understanding.
• Write down your collective agreements and decision-making processes in exquisite detail and in full transparency. Hold one another accountable to these agreements with care, courage, and consistency.
• Create a paid time-off policy and Sabbatical policy, including resources for redundancy and coverage, that acknowledges the need for rest and mental wellness.
• Practice grace. Everyone makes mistakes, no one has the whole truth, and no one is disposable.

Read the full blog post at Black Farmer Fund  

The Praxis series reflects on how our community can best put our values into action, sharing resources, ideas, and practice toward collective liberation. These will be shared each month in Love Notes and also on social media. 

“Oche’chã’kwun thtaw ke’ãakun: Ma’eekunew keek noom”
“Soul Fire Farm: Homeland of the Mohican”

Gratitude to our dear friend, Unchatwa, who taught us the name of our farm in the Mohican language. 

The Stockbridge-Munsee Community invites local residents to consider how to be in good relationship with Mohicans and their homelands. Their new Stockbridge exhibit, Our Lands, Our Home, Our Heart, will explore this by connecting those living on Mohican homelands with the Tribe’s local history as well as its ongoing governance, protocols and

priorities for establishing respectful relationships.

The exhibit will be open for visitors in the summer season during the hours of

the Mission House Museum on Thursdays-Mondays from 10AM to 4PM through September 4th. In the fall season, the exhibit will be open on Saturdays only from September 9 to November 18th

Learn More

After transitioning out of this work, I joined Sama-Sama Cooperative, where we cooperatively facilitate summer youth programming focused on FIlipinx culture, environmental education, & food justice. This work has been powerful in particular because we partner with local farms, community organizations, and food justice organizers to enrich the experience of our young ones. It’s special to witness middle school students build earth altars for our ancestors, sing about efforts to stop dams in the Philippines, and identify ancestral herbs & foods out in the nearby forests & gardens.

During my free time, I’ve been growing my online course/curriculum called “Filipinx Food as Medicine”. This class empowers our communities with ancestral cooking skills within the context of Philippine earth based spirituality and our movements for liberation, self-determination, and land-sovereignty. This spring marks the the 3rd cohort and will be a seasonal offering from here on out!”

Soul Fire Farm was in attendance at the Black Farmer Ecosystem Retreat which took place in NY on May 1-5th 2023. Ecosystem participating members (Black Farmer Fund, Black Farmer’s United, Corbin Hill Food Project, Farm School NYC, Northeast Farmers of Color Land Trust, Soul Fire Farm Institute) utilized this week to agree on a name, determine demographics served, and sharpen the mission and vision of the Ecosystem. We are glad to be in continued partnership with aligned food and land justice organizations based in NYS working together in such generative ways!

Soul Fire Farm also joined the Federation of Southern Cooperatives Land Assistance Fund, American University, and Berkeley Food Institute for a summit and briefing entitled “Pointing the Farm Bill Toward Racial Justice.” The summit took place from April 30th-May 2nd. Soul Fire Farm was glad to facilitate a robust conversation around Racial Equity Definitions with colleagues from our partner organizations National Black Food and Justice Alliance (NBFJA) and the Federation of Southern Cooperatives (FSC). The summit culminated in a senate briefing, during which the FSC 2023 Farm Bill Priorities and recommendations were amplified.

Our partners, the National Black Food and Justice Alliance, have published their 2023 Farm Bill Demands! Please click the link to review these priorities, and amplify them in your own political advocacy around the 2023 Farm Bill. 

The Columbia Land Conservancy, Inc. (CLC) in conjunction with the owners of Thompson-Finch Farm, LLC are very pleased to announce a unique opportunity for an experienced farmer (or farm business) to acquire and operate a successful and well-known 

NOFA-NY Certified Organic strawberry farm in New York’s Hudson Valley at an affordable price. In March 2019, in collaboration with the family, farmers, and with support from more than 300 community members, organizations and foundations, CLC purchased this beloved property to protect it from being sold and developed through a conservation easement and agricultural ground lease. We are seeking a farmer or farmers to transition Thompson-Finch Farm to the next beginning in 2024. Interested applicants are encouraged to visit the farm in person during the strawberry picking season (approximately June-July). Letters of interest are due by October 1, 2023. Finalists will be selected to complete a full application process in December 2023.

Community Work & Learn  June 13, 2023  10:00 am – 3:30 pm Soul Fire Farm, 1972 NY-2, Petersburgh, NY 12138, USA Volunteer at Soul Fire Farm to learn about some of our farming practices while supporting our work and getting your hands on the land. Registration is required. Link  Each One, Teach One. Many Hands Make Light Work.

SOULstice Party  June 24, 2023  5:00 pm – June 25, 2023  2:00 am Soul Fire Farm, 1972 NY-2, Petersburgh, NY 12138, USA Registration is RequiredRegister Here We will gather in reverence and revelry to celebrate life on the day of maximum sunlight, giving thanks for the inextinguishable flame of our souls’ fire. Expect live music, food vendors, sacred play, camp fire, and the most starLIT dance party of the year!

Community Work & Learn  June 27, 2023  10:00 am – 3:30 pm Soul Fire Farm, 1972 NY-2, Petersburgh, NY 12138, USA Volunteer at Soul Fire Farm to learn about some of our farming practices while supporting our work and getting your hands on the land. Registration is required. Link  Each One, Teach One. Many Hands Make Light Work.

Farm Tour   June 30, 2023  3:30 pm – 5:00 pm Soul Fire Farm, 1972 NY-2, Petersburgh, NY 12138, USA Visit Soul Fire Farm for our monthly seasonal farm tour! You’ll get to experience some of the plants, animals and humans that grow here. We will guide you through the growing fields and agroforestry gardens, take you up close to the building projects, share whole-hearted stories, and answer your questions. Registration is required.Registration begins May 19 – Link

• 6 environmental books that will give you hope with Leah Penniman Environmental Defense Fund
• Black Earth Wisdom: Soulful Conversations with Black Environmentalists with Leah Penniman Next Big Idea Club
• Leah Penniman on Black Earth Wisdom Garrison Institute 
• REQUIRED READING: 7 BOOKS ON SUSTAINABILITY TO CHECK OUT FOR EARTH MONTH Ebony
• Selections from what customers at Root & Press are reading Worcester Telegram & Gazette
• Earth Listener with Leah Penniman The Post Star

The food system was built on the stolen land and stolen labor of Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian and people of color. Our ecosystem partners, Northeast Farmers of Color Network and National Black Food and Justice Alliance are claiming our sovereignty and calling for reparations of land and resources so that we can grow nourishing food and distribute it in our communities. The specific projects and resource needs of BIPOC land-based projects are listed on Northeast Farmers of Color Network and National Black Food and Justice Alliance’s respective maps linked above. We are so excited about these powerful opportunities for people to people solidarity.