Oddly enough, Penobscot School [1], “a center for language learning and international cultural exchange,” in Rockland [2], Maine is selling a 2006 calendar [3] of bendy, beautiful female yogis to raise funds for itself. The “Yoginis’R US Official 2006 Calendar” (which, despite the name and genre, is actually quite tasteful) features yoginis from Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, and Virginia in various nature-flanked postures. The project’s photographer, Chuck Lamb, told VillageSoup.com [4], a local Maine site, that the calendar came about when he and his wife visited the Hawaiian Island of Molokai a couple of years ago and a yogi friend showed them some photos of herself mid-asana.

Though the venue is unusual, the idea isn’t, especially this year: There’s photographer Mona Long’s [5] slightly edgy black and white calendar; Lynn Brunelle’s adorably illustrated Yoga for Chickens 2006 Calendar: Relaxing Your Inner Chick or Enlightened Poses Straight From The Coop [6] and the mixed gender, borderline erotic Yoga 2006 Calendar [7] by photographer Blaine Michioka, for starters.

It’s all enough to make you wistfully recall the early days when yoga [7] was about focusing internally, dissolving the ego, and stilling the mind.