IMBOLC, (Candlemass)

This festival is a power point on the wheel of the year. To our ancestors, one happening (one that only a few of us are today even know about) marked this date with great importance:

"Lambs are born; there is milk now."

 The winter (or at least that's what this season used to be) was in those Little Ice Age Days winding down. There was higher sun. Bare turf patches appeared in the pastures that lay upon south-facing hills. 

Perhaps, down in your valley, the sun sets today in the center of the notch upon that looming crag.

Or, maybe, over there in the next valley, the sun sets at a particular spot, right there in the circle of stone built by wise ancestors.

The sun stays above the horizon for longer every day—and with that and some regular rain and no plague among people or livestock—there will be enough to eat again. If we are lucky, there will be plenty over to get us through the next winter, and enough to leave seed to plant in the year after that. 

Besides the agricultural, there were contracts between men and families which must be made, oaths given, hand clasping hand, in a community where a man's word was his bond. 

I think it's a good thing to remember such times, though long ago.

Our world is different, but aren't our basic tasks similar? Shouldn't we support one another in community? Shouldn't we celebrate the simple miracle of the lambs? Shouldn't we speak truth to one another? 

So, let's suck up our courage and go forth to continue the work which will reshape our society for the good of all of us. Let's give up our fears and rally to put a brake upon those privileged few who sit like dragons atop the spoil of an entire planet's resources. Remember, even here in the 21st Century, "sunlight is the best disinfectant."

~~Juliet 

https://bookswelove.net/waldron-juliet/

She Is

There is a real world; 

there is a magical world, too. 

Sometimes we forget the magical one, 

struggling too hard 

in the painful, dirty, bloody real one.  

But the magic is here, and 

She is here, too, 

Our Nightmare Mistress, Life in Death.

www.hannahboeving.com
artist

Sometimes she reaches down and touches,
Be still and sense 

just the slightest grace.  

The gold of autumn against blue sky, 

spring green -- poignant, aching. 

                           Heavy languid summer,                          
leaves, bliss in whisper of air.

White frozen lake of winter, 
crystal glitter bubbles riming the edge
so the fallen fool can contemplate 
the looking glass, gazing into glacier.

In each season 

She whispers a syllable in the ear, 

sprouts a mushroom, 

sings a bird ,

offers a single, starburst wildflower, 

tosses a stone from nowhere 

to ripple the pond.  

That's a

life worth living.  

The ghosts I've seen 

near bodies dancing,
 heart's pumping blood spilled
on sandy shores.

I've blessed you, chorusing cicada, 

geese exulting through a torn sky.

Moonlight, starlight, 
wind and rain and stinging snow. 

I've seen the Aten,

 clamoring hands reaching 

from below the horizon,

my eyes 

swimming in seawater,
heard souls at the gate 

of that incandescent chantry...

Juliet Waldron

See all my historical novels @

http://julietwaldron.com/books.htm

A Visit to the Fey

I was recently privileged to join in a procession of the Fey--behind no less a personage than the Queen of Fairies, as a part of her entourage. This doesn't happen to a human very often, and certainly not often to elder humans. 

Old people remind the Queen of decay and death, things she does not allow within her realm, her realm which is eternal--ever-green--as they say. She and her subjects do not age; they are forever young and fair. Therefore, to sing to her and walk beside her people was a great honor for this old woman, definitely a bucket list item.

(Not to say I've never danced with the Fey. I, in the days of my youth--back in the now legendary and generally misunderstood sixties, back when I was young and fair, I participated in her rites--rites which raise energy, and all that naturally follows after, those encounters in the dark scented forest, where all celebrants channeled Venus and Mars. Never mind, it's all back of me now.)

Bay Laurel

The Fairy Queen is a lover of high fashion, of flashing sequined quirks, tinkling bells, supple bare flesh, bejeweled dresses woven with spider's web. She even loves kinky boots, so her devotees wore them too.

Her entourage was more than ready to indulge her every whim, and upon this high magical occasion, they certainly pulled it off. I wore the best dress I had, long sleeves, flowing in mauve, in blue and green. A generous member of Her court gilded my cheek with a star. I braided my long white hair and carried a wand taken from the Holy Laurel. At first I held an inspirational leaf between my lips, like the Delphic Priestess.

  The Queen of Elphame, by Fuseli

Oh, how these fairies shone as they walked, fairy lights and fairy dust around them, making music with their sweet voices, a procession through twilight, following the glorious Queen and her tasty Year King! Beguiled, I followed after. When they began to sing, I took the laurel leaf from between my lips, lifted my laurel wand and had the pleasure of joining my still true voice with theirs.

And what did we sing in our ecstasy--again and again in an endless spiral--but one of the songs which captivate mortals and carry them into a realm that is fickle, cruel, and totally enthralling, a song which the fairies will sing even as the silver flash of a sacrificial knife pierces their own cool fairy hearts:

We shall be free

We shall be free

To sing 

And dance 

And make love--

Won't you come with me?

~~ Walker