A HYMN TO RIGANTONA AT CALAN MAI
Rigantona, I strew rose petals about your altar
For your coming from the Otherworld.
Spring is all about us,
The hawthorn tree has leaves
Emerging from the Otherworld.
I feel your presence in the blossoming boughs,
In the flowers of the fields,
In the green leaves and the many-coloured petals.
These petals from another year I have kept for you
Until roses bloom again
And you ride
Through the gates of the Otherworld
Across the land in splendour.
Rigantona, I strew rose petals about your altar
For your coming from the Otherworld.
Heron[Spring 2014]
AIR WAVES
I call to the spirits of the sky
Breathe into my thoughts if you will
May I ride the air waves
That invisible force of air.
I embrace my fear,
It’s toxic grip loosening
As I dare to let go and breathe…
Yes! That’s right! I breathe in life
Allowing the unknown to kick right in
Exploding my mind beyond all reason.
Throwing my self open to vulnerability I trust
Feeling that ecstasy rush through every vein
As I fly higher than ever before
Outstretching my arms to the sky
I breathe…
Awakening my spirit to freedom.
Star
BEDD BRANWEN (BRANWEN’S GRAVE)
A dodi ucheneit uawr, a thorri y chalon ar hynny.
A gwneuthur bed petrual idi, a’e chladu yno yglan Alaw.
And she heaved a great sigh, and with that broke her heart. And a four-sided grave was made for her, and she was buried there on the bank of the Alaw.
‘Branwen uerch Lyr’ – ‘Branwen daughter of Llyr’ – Second Branch of the Mabinogi.
(trans. Gwyn Jones & Thomas Jones.)
Glan Alaw
green flowing
onward going
blowing sowing
future seeds.
Here a legend lies
told turn again
ageless yet new
with every telling
swelling upwelling
tears sadly crying.
Young she was
and beautiful
pledged to a foreign king
her brother hated
baited frustrated
and in his hatred
destroyed his house
his lord his country
and only seven
came from the isle of death
only seven in Prydwen sailed
to tell the tale.
And the maiden
mother torn from child
rejected by her husband
her family slaughtered
rescued at such a cost
no rescue to despair
spare to share
hollow victory
her heart broken
death claimed her.
Her grave four-square
by Alaw’s bank
marked by a stone
in twain split
as her heart
a place of water
and slaughter
and cauldron’s fire
fit memorial for such as she
so shall it be
and it will be
to all eternity
a sign to show
that hate and war
brings bitter harvest
death breeds death
and ever will.
Life breeds life
green flowing
onward going
blowing sowing
future seeds…
Kestrel (Angela Grant) [December 2004]
BLODEUWEDD
Let your sap rise up in greeting
Of the tender light so fleeting,
Bright the blossoms of the broom, sweep fresh joy,
Golden boy, future groom.
Old Math’s words the earth does waken,
Flowers from their slumber shaken,
Winter’s brittle tomb cracks with painful sigh,
Butterfly starts her reign.
Time does youth its bright colours fleece,
From the Gods we our rainbow lease,
Unfurl your petals whilst the sky can see
Such beauty ~ be not shy.
Decaying winter exorcise
With rich perfumes and lover’s sighs,
Nodding heads of flowers beat life’s rhythm
With them languid bees meet.
Honeyed love blooms beneath the sun,
Yet wilts without its chosen one.
Growing free she is savoured best of all,
What fool plucks her in jest?
When the light is gone, what remains?
Bloodless spectral white, shadow stains
The bower through which the ghostly owl sails,
Wails in the night, pale host.
Cavort with her whilst she is here,
Treasure blossoms like jewels dear,
When all is grey and the white owl swoops low,
Know that the dawn brings light.
Robin
CERIDWEN
Morvran’s mother, grieving womb
Spawned grim fiend fit for the tomb,
Hidden in the deepest gloom.
Daughter like the dawn cool bright,
Shields her brother with star light,
Shadows grant but brief respite.
Croaking cormorant weeps rage,
Trapped within his fleshly cage.
No king he, but perhaps sage?
Upon the hearth the cauldron set,
Hope and wrath by moonlight met,
Magic wrought to meet the debt.
Tower empty, servants fled,
From bard’s hall, the music bled,
The Cauldron fires go unfed.
Morda blind, his faith still true,
Untouched he by that vile hue,
Scorns not infant Afaggdhu.
One old man to feed the flame,
Sad silent this hall of fame,
Help now sought to lift the shame.
The moon she calls far and near,
Gwion answers, knows no fear,
Stewards the hall once so dear.
Twelve tides turn on her quest
For Awen herbs rare and best,
For her son she takes no rest.
Gwion stirs and Morda tends,
Till at last the hour descends,
Then the mighty Cauldron rends.
Sweet Awen drops fly out Three
Past the raven from the sea,
On to Gwion, wisest he!
Knowledge floods within his vein,
Dark infant robbed howls with pain,
Mother turns with livid mein.
Gwion to his heels takes flight,
Seeks refuge in morning light,
Hot pursued by baying spite.
“Fleet of foot and fiery fair”,
Shaped by thought, he now a hare,
Red streak flashes beyond care.
Blue skinned, sharp-fanged moon-led witch
Turns herself to howling bitch,
Snaps at hare’s tail, blood so rich.
“In that deep lake I could dive!”
Change again to stay alive,
Salmon now, on weed-bed writhe.
Greyhound savage now goes meek,
Shifts shape into otter sleek,
Hunts fish still in vengeful pique.
“Shelter false, oh for the skies!”,
Salmon leaps, spreads wings and flies
Far from water-dog, he sighs.
Lake-sprite jumps and too takes wing,
Hawk-eye spots sparrow’s ending,
Deadly flight the forests ring.
“Were I but a tiny grain!”,
Hope to deed, he hides in vain,
One amongst a thousand lain.
Hawk upon the threshing floor,
Gulps a seed, then eats some more,
Now a hen in farmer’s store.
Eyeless, earless, Gwion small
Hopes for rescue, little fool,
Black death finds him in farm hall.
Chicken clucks in triumph now,
So to end her bitter vow,
Turns to home as great white sow.
Nine lamps light the darksome night,
Her womb fills to fullest might,
A child born to make all right.
Wondrous boy, sister’s brother,
Morvran’s hate sure to smother,
Set afloat, tearful mother.
On the tides baby carried,
Till in salmon weir harried,
Found by prince, whilst he tarried.
Elphin looks into the bag,
“Radiant brow!” says the wag,
Taliesin named, son of the hag.
Robin Herne
EIGHTEEN MARY
The play is written, the author’s hand is free
Arrogance in bright plumage, posturing piously
The witch’s hammer blinds all as we rise in power
The stage is set, all props in place, the plot most holy seems
A closer look reveals but assassins in their scheme
The witch’s hammer holds the maiden in the tower
Act I, Malleus Maleficarum hammered to top billing
And gave the church authority for torture and for killing
The witch’s hammer, you must embrace
Act II, torture devices of great evil are so wrought
That many are the false confessions with them unfairly bought
The witch’s hammer striking fear and disgrace
Act III, pockets lined with golden power, the death toll mounts
And who will call this dark lord’s power to account
The witch’s hammer, evil in his darkest hour
Act IV, in tender bud yet another rose is taken
Eighteen, Mary Lamont; strangled, burned, forsaken
The witch’s hammer falls hard upon so frail a flower
Act V, haughty sits the evil as predator upon the prey
We’ve women in the laundries and more orphans on the way
The witch’s hammer falls hard upon those with no power
Long silent, Mary Lamont but for one final curtain call
And to the audience relates the author of it all
I was eighteen, Mary cries, with no defence at all
But now I wield a sword of truth and by it shall you fall
Deceitful author, pen your name, but write it as you may
We recognize your hand in this last act of the play
The witch’s hammer fell hard upon many a Scottish flower
With sword of truth are we returned, let now the author cower
Janice Lamont [January 2005]
FOR BRIDE
Bride of our hearth
Bless this place
With warmth
With shelter
With fire that burns for us.
Bride of our streams
Of wells and water courses
Asperge our land
With rain
With dew.
Bride of the candles
Lit for your remembrance
Bright be your blessings
As the Sun climbs higher
In his Winter rising.
Bride of our company
Of links and friendship
Across Brigantia, the isles
Of your people:
Veil us within the bounds of belonging.
Heron [Imbolc 2014]
FOR BRIGHID
For Brighid and the silver streams
Running deep in the Earth
For the kindled fire
And the sacred well
And the hope she guards through the dearth
Find her in the snow-filled dell
Where the old dry leaves lie still,
Look for her in the empty woods
Where the early shoots are bidden
But slowly as the fire grows
For her secrets are yet hidden.
Heron [Imbolc 2014]
FOR RHIANNON
[Nyt oed nes hagen idi no chynt. Y uarch a gymhellaud o’r kerdet mwyaf a oed ganthaw. A guelet a wnaeth na thygyei idaw y hymlit.
He was no nearer to her than before. He drove his horse as fast as he could but he saw that he would not be able to follow her.
– Pwyll Pendeuic Dyved]
….. like a rainbow, when you look
from afar it seems to ground
right there, but if you move
towards the spot where the crock
of gold might be it shifts
– as colours shift – and such
elusive allure is in the nature
of real presences defined
by their unreality when you reach
out to the spot where they are.
I thought this while watching a
rainbow arc across the salt marsh
towards mountains to touch a mound
in the middle distance where the
ground begins to rise. Is it there? But
the thought thinned and evanesced
as the colours did and her light
shone elsewhere touching other
pupils of her wayward ways;
unless they turned away?
Or like Pwyll found a way
to apprehend and speak with her;
on, perhaps, that very mound
if she would stay and gather
up her light around her – like
the golden sheen of her gown,
the white gleam of her steed –
and lift her veil a little to share
some words and acknowledge
this yearning, this love, this need.
Heron [Winter 2013]
FOREST DANCER
Forest Dancer, silver stream
bounding on the woodland green.
Bounce and bubble, hiss and sing.
Splash a spray on Heron’s wing.
Over rock; roll, boil and spout
making stairway for the trout.
Through the gorge in raging rush,
giggling in the underbrush.
Running by the grassy glade,
where the Coney path is laid.
‘Neath the Oak grove’s darkened leaf:
Haunt of ancient robber chief.
Muddy beach and shingle shore,
silent waters slowly pour.
Drifting o’er reflected sky,
hovering magic dragonfly.
Silver thorax gleaming bright,
twirling wings throw rainbow light.
Alder, Willow, drape the banks;
veils that sway on Dancer’s flanks.
Wagtail paddle, Dipper bird dive;
from the Dancer’s store they thrive.
Combed like horse tails for a show,
submerged Water Crowfoot flow.
Rat and shrew and water vole,
nestled in a streamside hole.
Yellowflag Iris blazing bold,
Purple Loosestrife, Marigold.
Patterns paint on waters edge,
hailing Warbler in the sedge
Surging life force never sleeps,
where the Forest Dancer leaps.
Coryllus
FORGOTTEN LORE
Alone she stands within the maze
The Statue with No Name
Her face is worn, her figure plain
But who is there to blame
She once was young and full of life
People traveled far and wide
To dance with her and sing her songs
Then came the changing tide
People turned away from her
Until there were no more
Stories, Laughter, Merriment
For she was called a whore
Eventually time took its toll
Her history ignored
For she was left forgotten
She and her mighty Lord
Only birds sing to her now
Though if one listens hard
The songs are still within the breeze
For the earth is her bard
Alone she stands within the maze
The Statue with No Name
She stands and waits for us to hear
So we may know her Name.
Brianne Reynolds[March 2004]
FOUR MUSES
Here at the centre of myself,
In the bright circle of my heart,
You hold me, keep me safe.
Inspire me, keep me dangerous.
Comforted and challenged,
In delight and terror.
Four muses, all beloved,
Longed for, desired.
Sweet Mistress of the East,
Your warm voice a caress,
Inspiring me to action.
Your command, my pleasure,
Your word my law,
Breathe fresh life into
My deviant imagination
With a smile like the dawn
After my darkest of nights.
My fiery Lord of the South,
With heat and wild intensity,
Ignite my inner fires
In all consuming passion,
Overwhelm me, set me burning,
A bonfire of the senses.
Bed me in the long sultry heat
Of summer afternoons.
Beloved Enchantress in the West,
Adored with tears and madness
When the light slips away,
You teach my spirit tenderness,
A torrent of feeling, cleansing all.
I am reborn from these dark oceans,
From the realms of raw emotions
Welling up inside me.
Beautiful boy in the North
Ruling the earthen drum beats
Of my restless, untamed heart,
Spend the longest nights with me,
Pounding your rhythms in my flesh,
Lost in the wonder of your eyes,
My clay self becomes bright gold,
And all things seem possible.
Here at the centre of myself,
You offer freedom, delirium,
The ecstatic rush of loving,
My derangement, my delight.
Bryn Colvin
GODDESS IN A WOMAN
Truly there’s a goddess
in a woman I know.
Inspiration comes to me
when I think of her.
Truly she’s there for me
in my dark day of despair
she comes and she holds me
in a dream.
Surely she must be
more than just a human shell
a picture of perfection,
higher soul.
She keeps me in the hope
that I seem to lose sometimes,
she’s my goddess and a woman,
my all.
Mark Ayling
GODDESS DIVINE
A Goddess surfed across the sky.
Her chariot spun from water vapour.
Her tall, majestic silhouette,
Looked tall and proud and graceful.
As I watched she changed her outline,
Became a poised and showy equine.
And just to show diversity,
She then became a harp.
Sweet music filled this heart of mine.
Thanks for sharing…
Goddess divine.
Dryac
HER NAME IS DEATH
Her landscape lies spread beneath the crags,
Where She sits memoried, brooding;
She sails out on broad dust wings now and then to look it over.
Her memories of when many Centuries ago,
She was summoned to a far off land,
For what?
To take what is rightfully hers;
Never has She had such a feast,
And never again shall She ‘till Doomsday,
Until then
She shall prey on what She can.
Her Eyes rove across her domain,
Searching:
Sometimes seeing,
Ever ready for what is by inheritance hers.
She see below her a victim and feels her presence summoned;
Her wings are spread,
She swoops,
And all that is left of a person is a crumbling husk.
She does not return to her perch high in her domain,
But heads forward into the night
And soon alights on a house where there is much sorrow and wailing,
There She sits and waits,
And waits,
For what is rightfully hers,
Her name has been a weapon of fear and mercy,
As,
She is one who has waited and will always wait,
And pity her victim,
For her name is DEATH
Dane
HYMN TO CLUTHA
Chorus:
Clyde, Cliota, Clutha, Clywd,
These are the names you are known as.
Waters of Glasgow flowing through us,
These are the ways you have shown us.
Fertile Clutha, ebbing, flowing
Giving to us your riches.
Fierce and protective warrior Spirit
Help us to know your features.
Chorus
Sacred isles adorn your waters,
Places of inspiration.
Mother and Sister, Healer, Priestess
Show us the path to wisdom.
Chorus
Cleansing and healing are your waters,
Bringing your peace within us.
Mighty Clutha, young and ancient,
Send out your dreams among us.
Chorus
Potia
I AM
The Song of The Lord of the Greenwood
I am ant, I am Alder, I am Ash, I am the breeze
I am badger; I am Beech and Birch, two graceful, stately trees
I am Cernunnos, and a cuckoo you will feed me with a feast
I am Douglas Fir & dandelion, the tallest and the least
I am the eagle on the elder and the ever-circling sounds
I am the foxglove near the dog fox running from the hounds
I am Gean and I’m gentian and my flowers will not fail
I am Hornbeam, Herne and hornet, there’s a sting upon my tail
I am intolerance and I am Ilex, Latin for the Holly King
I am Juniper and Justice and the latter makes nature sing
I am knapweed and the Kings own deer, kill me if you dare
I am Larch and lady’s mantle, which she wears upon her hair
I am mistletoe and meadow-sweet, now behold I am a mole
I am nightjar, I am nettle, and I am nought without your soul
I am the ox-eye daisy lit by the summer sun
I am Pan, partridge, Peace, and Pear, Poplar, pheasant, Plum
I am Quercus, which the wise old Druids knew as holy oak
I am rabbit; I am Rowan, Mountain Ash to mountain folk
I am squirrel, I am sparrow, and I am the stag at bay
I am tansy, I am teasel, and perhaps I’m Toad today
I’m the Undine of the woodland stream, can you hear my song?
I am violet, I am vetch, and I am vole who swims along
I’m the Willow at the waters edge, the Wych Elm and the wand
Except when I’m a xenophobe but with May Queen I will bond
I am yarrow standing tall and proud, I’m Yew who guards the dead
I am zealous and the Zodiac, the stars above your head
I am the masculine part of you, the spirit you dread and fear
I’m the barbarian that’s in your heart ever creeping near
I am green man, I’m John Barleycorn, fist in the velvet glove,
I am your suitor and the one who knows what it is to be your love.
Geoff Boswell [April 2001]
IKON OF BRIGHID
I did not paint you.
I am innocent of your gaze,
blank as the kiln where
clay frosts with liquid glass,
bland earth burned to beauty.
It was not me.
I did not smooth the off-cut wood,
nor layer your trembling heat-haze
with soft gold and lustre.
I had learned the craft
of writing ochre and vermilion,
forming skin dark as burnt earth,
grey and orange as embers
soothed with moss of ash.
Now I tremble at what my hands
have and have not made –
a nimbus of incandescent bells,
your face a scald, a liquid gash
where tenderness breaks through
in flakes of fire.
Now I too am ash and flame.
Caught in your crucible,
My Lady Temperer, here,
in the bright and burning glass
of your eyes upon me, praying.
Mark Wiliams
IN HONOUR OF BRIDE
Hearth-warmed war hounds relish rest,
With zest sing the tales of yore.
Mead-mulled lore keepers love best
To guest at Her hall once more.
Deep-hearted maid of high mein,
Poets reign by Her sweet aid,
Names fade not, but glory gain,
No vain deed, but honour made.
Frail snowdrops bloom in Her wake,
Hearts ache for the spring to flow,
Shoots grow. Emerges the snake,
Yearnings slake whilst life moves slow.
Frost-fell nights call us to clan,
Bride can lead us from dark plights,
Set our sights to summer’s plan,
Weaving dan* around our hearth.
[* Dan is the Gaelic concept of destiny, rather like the idea of Wyrd, and not some bloke called Daniel!]
Robin Herne
JACK OF THE GREEN
Tender leaves soft frame your face
My lips touch dew we kiss
And all I am breaks open in love
Another leaf bud unfurling
Charlotte [Beltane 07]
KING’S CURSE
See yourself a King if need be for your pride
But your hand may you not outstretch to me if I should stumble
For my mouth would no longer speak of one who has so lied
And more would I sooner take my ease with the ignorant and humble.
See yourself a King if it fits your rhetoric
But your body will be wracked and sad your aged head
For you chose your heart to be war-mongering thick
And when Love could have overtaken fear, Hatred raged instead.
A King, says you, with a desperate army all about you
Armies whose alms are stained alizarin still after all these years
May you use the length of your Kingly robes of red, white and blue
To dry the eyes of weeping widows, youth and broken men of bitter tears.
A King, says you, with mountains of gold laid all about
The souls of soldiers would you seek for purchase kept for sport
May compassion be returned to you as you put it to route
And may new life be spread again as inflicted dread’s retort.
Your sting has festered far too long in the flesh of broken folk
And your dream of raining concrete on the last of meadows green
I do hereby renounce even to my last breath from beneath a slaves yoke
Few greater villains toward our Earth and peoples has this world ever seen.
Know full well as you rise and twice more as you seek to find rest at night
That no angels await a man mad from uninspired ambition
And no spirits hail a half-hearted hero whose sword is swung in spite.
Your tomorrow is doomed to be dire that you’ve not learned from tradition
As of this day, as you have heard read to you, my words are true yet to come
Your eyes will certainly fail you as you’ve failed your weak and cowered kin
Your heart will feel the pangs of each man you denied the chance to age at home
And misfortunes will find you as numerously as you have hairs on your
bedraggled chin.
Hypocrite of the age, a proud lesson to learn from your lithe morals slanted
Shame surely resides sheltered in your house long after fame has fled non-endowed
In solemn thought I say there will be no sorrow seen the day you are supplanted
And though there is a pink slip of paper in your pocket, you’ll still need it read aloud.
The Ecossian Ovate
MOCHENDDU
I am Mochenddu,
Strong of limb, sharp of tusk,
Hairy of back, son of the forest,
Stout of heart, no fear have I,
The taunter of champions.
Black in the thicket,
My eyes ablaze,
I await the men,
Spears glinting,
Their songs preparing them for,
Their fearsome task.
I dance before them,
Tusks glinting in the moonlight,
I make merry sport,
And lead them into the wildwood,
Where I shall test their hearts,
And their high regarded honour.
For many leagues I tease them,
Over rounded hill,
Through laughing water,
The heroes come,
No longer singing,
Thorn-bitten and weary.
Then beneath the great oak,
And the croaking ravens,
I turn, I stand, Mochenddu
They await, heads bowed to me,
Before the final battle,
They make their peace.
Bloody and famous are we,
I gore them, thigh to neck,
Shield smasher, spear breaker,
They pierce me, snout to tail,
Bold hunters, men of Cymru,
Sons of Cerridwen and Pryderi.
They carry me home,
Shoulder high they honour me,
With songs of valour and glory,
Proud seat I have at the feast,
And listen to their tales,
Of the great Mochenddu.
Craig
MOTHER OF THE MOUNDS
Three faces, yet only one, twister of man’s fate
Weaver of destinies and breeder of futures,
Creator and destroyer, guardian of journey’s beginning and end
Be-straddling the hearth at the border of the worlds.
Spawner of fire within the forge’s cold heart,
Hammer pounds its staccato rhythm to the passing of life
Singing forth the steam’s hiss, into primeval darkness
Raising once again a sword, from stone’s fearful grasp.
Flowing waters feed the fount of life, surging onward
Past lives, recalled into the brooding lakes of the future
The cascading waterfall, veils your face, shielding the unwary
Guardian of the springs of inspirational gift and healing breath.
Cry of child, brought forth from your tended charge
Mother, Matron and Midwife, we sense you
Birthing Bloods and tides of life, to your heartbeat, flow
Healer of pains, bringer forth of life and spirit flame’s guide.
Maker of kings, you select, elect and direct their paths.
Your line still courses deep, old blood, within women’s veins.
Marry her and dominion is bestowed to the respecting,
Neglect her and suffer the cold, slow, wrath of the betrayed.
Ashpretani
OF THREE WOMEN – PRAISE TO BRIGHID
I sing of three women
Sacred Mother of the clan
Rousing the healing brew
Hostess of the hearth fire.
I sing of three women
Architect of the poet’s fire
Song-maker and storyteller
Maiden’s Clarsach melody.
I sing of three women
Mistress of the forge; iron’s glow
Blacksmith hammer; anvil’s chime
Sword, swift and cauldron, deep.
Bard Liath[2003]
OLWEN
Olwen of the White Track was I,
whose call chrysalised the coming,
whose soft silent sigh brought spring.
Slightly, gently I grow,
Alone ‘neath the grey sky,
twisted, burdened, hawthorn am I.
I nursed my bitter resent,
as – put to work to border your fields,
I stayed on the edges, fostered my shield.
I hid my claws from you,
shrike’s larder, beneath the green
many-footed canopy, they remained unseen.
Age old am I,
once hallowed grandmother, mistress of time,
hissing sibilant song through my wrinkled lines.
Now you wonder why,
when pulling your clothing, scratching your face,
from this exhausted labour, I scorn your race.
This is my story,
timid and tamed, you thought me small,
yet I am the wild, and will not be tamed at all.
Magpie
OUR MOTHER EARTH
We are born to her, our Mother Earth.
She nurtures us throughout our lives offering her all.
We have food to eat, water to drink and air to breathe.
She gives us light, warmth and love.
Forever silent but forever speaking, she patiently bears the
pressures we put upon her, scolding us occasionally.
Always she speaks not all will listen and some may
never hear her cries.
We are born to her, our Mother Earth and ultimately to
her we all return.
At the end of days she will again wrap us in her warm
embrace where we may nourish her and offer her new
growth.
She can be harsh but Oh she is so much more.
A giver of life, Our Mother Earth.
Alyssa Moon [Lammas 09]
POET’S INVOCATION
To Brigantia:
Exalted goddess of the wild hills heights
Warrior guide of the Northern tribes
Catalyst source of inspiration
Hear my poet’s invocation.
When the derelict day is a shadow of life
And the working wage leads the puppet show of strife
Let me see your fearsome reality
Steeped in laughter weeping its tragedy
Steer me through beauty and brutality
To visions of force to break this profanity.
When desire and drive are locked up in concrete
And the flux of thought is bound into office space
Sing me the songs of centuries of history
Map me the myths of this land and its mysteries.
Lead me deeper into Annwn
Show to me the gleaming hallows
In a magical pageantry of field and factory
The weapons of the ancients
Shine through the contemporary.
Grant me the weave of space and time
To lift this daze and shift this paradigm.
Lorna Smithers[June 2012]
PRAYER TO BRIGHID
My heart –
cells of soot.
My Queen, let therein be
Your tireless, ruthless
Alchemy.
Soot into honey,
Blood into light.
Burn here, burn here,
Burn here.
My hands.
Bore eyes of flame
There through. Cast
veins and vessels
as a net of shadow
thrown by You.
Your seared skein,
Your mesh of flame.
Burn here, burn here,
Burn here.
My mind.
Flash into ashes
what in me
sings not Your name,
Your sanctity,
dancing with feet of fire,
calling again, again,
crying Your name,
the unshakeable longing
Of moth for flame.
Burn here, burn here,
Burn here.
Mark Wiliams
QUEEN OF THE NIGHT
Queen of the Night: The Rite
Serene and silent you accept
The native offerings lain before you.
With calm gaze you watch
As we sing, dance and honour you.
In ancient splendour you listen
As we welcome you to a land foreign to you.
In wisdom’s peace you acknowledge
Our farewell biddings to you.
Queen of the Night: Leave Taking
We wish you Hail and Fare Well
Yet it is we who are leaving.
For tonight you’ll remain in that space
That for a time became sacred.
Tomorrow you return to your dwelling
In this land not your own
Without us to wish you
All speed on that journey
Queen of the Night: New World
Oh Queen of the Night
In splendour portrayed
With your nocturnal companions
Around you arrayed
What think you now
Of the world we have made?
Of oil and tar
And concrete all laid
Over earth, over grass
And around every tree?
What of the sprays, the poisons
To kill bug and flea?
Oh Queen of the Night
With your wisdom so old
Shall we meet with destruction
As is so oft foretold?
Queen of the Night: Who are you?
Your serenity and wisdom
Are the gifts you have earned
Through the long watches you have held
During mankind’s maturing.
You have watched this growth
From its smallest beginnings
Are you pleased with our progress?
With the path we have trod?
Do you welcome the way
We have used what was given us?
Do you weep at how we’ve spoiled
The gift we were given?
Are you mother to us all
Or our Destruction?
Will you cherish the creation
From the mud of the river?
Or do you wait for our death
To claim us as your own?
FireStarter
REBIRTH
Flaming jewel,
your brilliance and beauty
are like the fertile warm winds
seeding hope; the dance begins.
Shining star,
your soft light and deep song
are like the spring snow drifts
melting, surfacing hidden gifts.
Triskelle fire,
your mothering muse and kiss
are like that singular moment at dawn
breaking over our sleeping souls.
Warmth of home and hearth – –
Mother of milk and birth – –
You teach us through the labour pains
how to live once more again.
You, Brighid, bring the sun.
Eadha Deora[Imbolc 07]
SHE CALLS TO MY SPIRIT
[This is more an inner vision than to a particular deity]
She calls to my spirit from the shadows
From the blackness within I hear her
Face cragged like the high mountain peaks
Shrouded in the grey of winter morn
Veiled by the deep passage of time
Her fearsome gaze penetrates duality to its core
With one hooded eye she sees the oneness
The ultimate unity of the web
Winter storms rage, life recedes
Like an old woman gathering kindling
She stoops to gather her treasure
Priceless gems, the seeds of life
Onward she journeys, staff in hand
Tap, tap, tap
And each footstep brings death
Night storms destruction and decay
Still she travels, still she gathers
Then lingers to view her bounty
And in that briefest of moments
Her countenance is changed
Illumined by dazzling pure energy
Essence of life dancing in her palm
I see radiant features of beauty
A pledge of life to be
Phil
SHEELA-NA-GIG
Sheela-na-gig
wide open crone –
waiting to take in those
daring to risk
the edges of your essence,
willing to receive those
approaching to venerate
the depths of your mysteries –
terror and pleasure,
desire and death
the nature of your treasure
troved deep in our souls.
Sheela-na-gig
old woman, ripe woman, wise woman
you offer and share
of your gifts with patient ferocity,
you offer and share
what alone you can provide.
Sheela-na-gig
a map for my croneself
an icon of my restored body
a pathway to my hidden core,
and with your help
I shall once more be open
receptive to him willing to risk,
and worthy of veneration
through the gate of my being.
Sheela-na-gig
teach me and guide me
I need your instruction,
I desire your healing,
I cannot do this alone.
Sheela-na-gig
wide open crone –
waiting to take in those
daring to risk
the edges of your essence,
willing to receive those
approaching to venerate
the depths of your mysteries –
terror and pleasure,
desire and death
the nature of your treasure
troved deep in our souls.
Merchywen(Aurora J Stone) [Spring 2014]
SEVEN YEARS OF THE STAG
It was on the full moon of Ostara,
A night and day of great surprise.
A quest for the bardship of Avebury,
Was the seven tines of the stag,
His life.
I am but a simple man,
One that is not always in the know.
I follow my heart and morality
And bards are not just poets!
The stag he is the energy,
And one that is noble and brave.
The queens/goddesses escort and known,
As being the sacrificial king.
He stands so tall,
And he is so proud.
In his elegance and the splendour,
Knowing he will one day
Have to yield to a younger and better.
Tis the begining of the time for high Bel fire.
The lord of light and life.
Cernunnos, the horned god,
Queens escort, forever by her side.
He knows you know,
He tastes you in the air.
He needs to be a part of you,
One that’s sincere.He knows you know,
He tastes you in the air.
He needs to be apart of you,
One that’s sincere.
Cernunnos, the horned god,
You may know him as is.
He looks and brings fertility,
Is one with the Goddess.
He stands so tall,
And he is so proud.
In his elegance and the splendour,
Knowing he will one day,
Have to yield to one younger and better.
For when his time comes,
When he shall bow down,
To a Younger more worthy challenger.
In battle he may lose his crown.
To you and me, an antler.
He knows you know,
He tastes you in the air.
He needs to be a part of you,
One that’s sincere.
He knows you know,
He tastes you in the air.
He needs to be a part of you,
One that’s sincere.
Blessings to Cernunnos and the Goddess,
Blessed be to one and all.
Hail to the King and the Queen,
Waiting for the Beltain call.
He knows you know,
He tastes you in the air.
He wants to be a part of you,
One that’s sincere.
He knows you know,
he tastes you in the air.
He wants to be a part of you,
One that is sincere.
Chuck[Bard of Caer Abiri]
SHROUDED FRIEND
He came alone and all who saw him fled
For fear hangs about him as a cloud.
His cold embrace left all his houseguests dead;
His entertainment ended with a shroud.
I watched and saw the truth behind his mask:
Those he approached had reached their ‘lotted time.
No malice in his soul – it is his task
To free us from the clutches of harsh Life.
I met him and he gravely bowed his head
And showed me how the path of life does wend.
Then knew I Death is nothing we need dread:
No one’s more stalwart than our shrouded friend.
When my time comes, no quarter will he give,
But ‘til that day, I’ve all my life to live.
David Stone
SUN CHILD
The sun rides high,
The sky resonates with his laughter,
Infinite joy, light cascades
Like a fountain of ore.
He steps from the bright hot core
Bewildered not daunted,
Inhibited or harmed by insult and grime.
A widening arc hunt
From east to west, he illumines
The hills and the mills unabashed.
White dark mane has many feet
And all of them are dapples,
Horse shoe glinting golden
Candour in mirror art.
His flight is driven
Not by solitude or emptiness
But love for the mother’s birthing dance.
He touches the beautiful twining
And closed city stark, gathers
The melodies into his core
And chords their pangs upon his harp.
Lorna Smithers[June 2012]
TAILTIU’S SONG
Toil and labor – no rest for the weary
Axe swings, muscles ache, heart races
Those who are of my kin must not perish
My energy is the energy of the land
I am one with the earth.
Blood and sweat nourish the crops
Ragged breath, burning eyes, blistered hands
Hard work and sacrifice reaps rewards
My energy fades, my heart stops
I am one with the earth
Doreen Taylor
THE HONEY-TONGUED
Ogma, carpenter of song,
Harvest the forest of thought,
Carve the timbre of my voice,
That the nemeton be wrought.
Gnarled the Tree whence language born,
Old the God whom Ogham made.
Youthful yet the lips that speak
And the hand that wields the blade.
Orna praises the hero,
Makes memory history.
In Ogma’s service he works,
Freed from dark Inis Tiureadh.
Honey-tongue, caress my ears.
Amber tales in rivers run
Through the stream-beds of my heart,
Savoured by my loved one.
In the wildwoods of the mind,
Strange beasts rut, conceive new words
that sing in branches high above,
At the festival of birds.
Radiant-faced Ogma hears
The melding of words to verse.
Stories told, a joy to him
Who acts as Memory’s nurse.
Robin Herne
THE RAPE OF THE MAGDALENE
Born in poverty, your greatest sin, and in a popish state
What use are you to them who cannot fill their plate
So your sins have been assigned, to the laundries you must go
And forcefully you are taken, whether you will or no
Arise before the sun to eat your porridge cold
Then wrap yourself in provided rags, be grateful you are told
Your lice infested locks are strewn across the floor
And ridiculed you stand, behind the bolted door
You listen for your number, for now you have no name
And penance you shall do in silence and in shame
Now, it’s off to the laundries, you know you have no choice
No protest can you make, for now they have your voice
The years roll by and echoes of laughter through the town
Are heard as the penitents are paraded up and down
The church’s mercy must be shown to one and all
Then it’s back to the laundries to toil behind the walls
Yet, merrily the Magdalene be, ‘tis not your disgrace
Rejoice that you have shown the world a most deceitful face
So sing you women of Ireland of all you’ve endured and seen
Tis not the first betrayal of the merry Magdalene
Janice Lamont
THE RAVEN’S TELLING
Some say I am the harbinger of death,
Some say my blood curdling cries foretell the fatality of mortal men.
‘Tis true I have cast my shadow over many a bloody battlefield.
I was present at the hour of Arthur’s passing when cold metal met warm flesh and the noblest of all kings was slain.
I watched as the conquering enemy soullessly dragged your fearless warrior queen from her chariot of hope, fighting and courageous to the last.
I flew helplessly alongside my own wise mistress, my talons and feathers flaying as they dragged her sobbing to the stake.
I perched on the wet rocks of the sacred isle as the black robed priestesses screeched defiance to the last, before giving their lives and souls to the power hungry Eagle and to the unceasing waves.
My kin even now unceasingly guard the White Mount in the name of Bran.
Your land is in their hands.
My tale is unending, my shadow hovering over many a lonely battlefield.
I dance my dervish of death upon the rotting corpses of the departed.
With blood on my beak, I peck at the bodies.
I feast and feel no shame.
Their blood, your blood feeds my soul,
Nourishes my body.
I return you to your Goddess.
I pick at your mind and cleanse your soul.
I am keeper of your darkest dreams.
I am initiator of change.
Always though, I travel back,
Back through time, through space or distance.
It makes no odds.
Makes no difference.
I travel back and forth between the worlds,
The worlds of dark spirit and the world of men.
I journey back to where I belong, to The Stones,
Standing silent and aloof on the windswept plain.
Not all who come to The Stones see me there.
I cast a glamour; I beguile those who do not belong;
those who do not know.
Those who do know, see through my mantle of illusion.
Enter into my world.
Make the connection, enter the darkness,
Become entwined, become part of the telling.
My world is revealed at midnight and when the solstice sun hangs low in the heavens.
Then She comes, in her black billowing cloak, walking through the illusion, into the dawn of shadow.
She sees like I, the raven.
She connects, she senses, sees through my eyes.
She knows the power, from whence it came.
She knowingly offers sweet treats for the spirits who still linger at these mighty stones and for the ravens too.
She smiles, kin to kin.
She knows.
I hover overhead, then land on her shoulder.
I take her offering.
“Mistress” I say,
“You return to me, you journey through the flight path of time to the place of my heart”
“Tis the place of my heart too” she chides “You silly old bird”
Her eyes are dark, deep.
She looks at The Stones, standing ancient, tall and proud.
She hears what I hear, feels what I feel.
She feels the tides of magic, feels the currents.
Powerful energies, accumulating, building, taking shape.
The quickening.
This place is alive.
My mistress and I know.
We are part of the telling.
We walk hand in hand with death:
Your death.
Some say I am the harbinger of death.
Who am I to argue………?
Moonwillow [January 2004]
TO MOTHER EARTH
you are stillness, never silence.
there is always noise.
here, with you, it is rarely hushed.
you are a gentle yet fierce place,
your stones hold us, still…
i may seek gods of your high up places and clarity
and make songs to their rhythms,
but my back is rooted in you.
i was always earth bound, even when racing over your surface,
always home.
i know i belong to you as surely as you have me in your teeth,
but it took so long to realise how you run in my tears, blood and piss.
i lower myself into you, ancestors of place strong, they flow in me.
i discover witches and radicals,
healers and wild women that howl on a full moon.
you hold me firm as i bathe in light reflected from the sun.
ironically, knowing that your life is so long,
and mine so short, calms me.
i am a bow to the ground not a grovel in the dirt,
hands steadfast in the soil and belly along the ground.
integration not consumption,
though you’ll ingest and regurgitate me when i’m dead soon enough.
here i follow the threads through the forest.
here i open the door into blackness.
here i follow the roots and their gaps down into the earth.
Nina [Summer 2014]
TODAY IS GREY
(THE ARRIVAL OF BRIGANTIA)
today is grey,
a leaden grey,
as they say,
not really a day
for spring’s loud welcome.
cold wind,
wet air,
sodden ground.
nevertheless,
she is there.
i enter stage right.
she breathes me in.
as i cross over the water,
i see the magic
open up in front of me.
oak,
friendship hard won,
still harbouring an old offering,
beckons me with
her/his windswept branches.
come,
sit with me a while,
she/he asks.
so i do.
she breathes me in,
still,
calm,
clear as the peat-water
that sings its way past.
i feel my way
around layers of polyphonic tunes
words for brigantia
stream up my throat
and out through my teeth.
songs of truth,
broken harmonies to the
brook’s glooping bass lines,
the birds’ sharpened delight
and the feral growl
of a gust through branches.
i feel the approach.
she is running down the hill,
blustered in stage left,
easterly,
chilled.
but shoots push up
where her feet have been,
even lightly.
today is grey
but
tomorrow will be green.
Nina [Imbolc 2014]
WAILING OF A BANSHEE
Bringer of shady secrets of death
Feared, revered, with coldest breath
Your cries are carried out on the breeze
As the man’s last breath is but a wheeze
Like an old bagpipe hung out in the rain
One person’s life is no longer the same
Banshee screams all thro’ the night
Outside your windows until first light
No blame, no shame, no harm is meant
But on this night, a life is spent
A body is limp and breath is gone
No life in the eyes which brightly shone
Those left behind see a life as gone
But to that man, life has just moved on
Who knows what to, only few may know
The fey guard the secret as the winds blow
Spirit of the family, an empty chair you fill
Feared, revered, in the night’s cold chill
Although you warn of what’s not foreseen
To your screaming cries all ears do lean
They tell of the end of life’s precious gift
But also of new beginnings within the shift
So one year ends, so another can see dawn
As Gaia gestates as she waits to be warm
Ceinach [Siobhan Thomas]
WHAT BLODEUWEDD NEVER SAID TO LLEU
My skull which you cradle is a mossy nest of woven wood and feather-tangles.
Behind my eyes storms a hive, bee-heat and bee-murmur – do you feel it when you stroke your man’s thumbs on my eyelids, bend for the silk of my kiss? Do you hear her, the queen in the cells of my skull?
You love to run your nose in my hair, smell autumn in the golden hay lying on your pillow. In this hall wherever I tread there is the scent of things rootless and fragrantly dying.
I myself am a meadow, slowly dying as I wait in your halls…
If only you saw clearly, eyes not muzzy with magic, you would see my back as a snail-trail, a silver line you trace up the stalk of my spine, from which fan the slender leaves of my shoulders.
You bend down your golden head to kiss the knot of my navel…my darling, my honeysuckle, you say… and down between my legs, there, you find honeydew and salt, cuckoo-spit in my forking stem, and I stretch out longing for wild light and woodland rain, beyond this shuttered room you think we share. You think I am a woman; I am as fleeting and inhuman as the swirl of wind through summer leaves, or the moon’s glance at the moth.
If you looked, truly looked, perhaps you would see my glittering girdle is the dancing motion of insects, and it is not silver and gold that rings my long fingers, but the burnished backs of beetles on coils of bindweed and twisting vine.
The women whisper that you smell of the wood when you rise happy from my bed, of woods and earth-bread and meadowsweet crushed for strewing.
Oh my Lleu, my Lleu, it is not I whom your uncle enchanted, but you – you who see fruit of paradise in my breasts’ fullness, when you press hot kisses among my docks and blossoms, circle my rosehip nipples. You see human eyes where grey stream-pebbles lie couched in moss. You see a mouth where a butterfly only opens and closes her wings. And what seems a wife’s gracious words is but the hoot of an owl through the halls of the twilit wood. For if your uncle, the wizard, withdrew his wand from my spine, which keeps me tall and human-seeming, then I would turn and shudder into bee-swarm and summer mist, with a sigh of homecoming to my native elements…
and become once more only leaves, and flowers, and the owl’s call.
Mark Wiliams