Hosted by Blog o' Gnosis, this poetry festival is intended to celebrate Imbolc and the goddess Brigid who is often associated with this pagan festival. She is the Irish goddess of poetry, healing, and smithcraft, and so a potent symbol for inspiration and creative endeavor, and very welcome during the dormancy of winer.
Some neopagans celebrate Imbolc as a festival with overtones of its Roman festival that occurs a few days later, Lupercalia. (I discuss this in last year's blog post for this holiday). So Imbolc becomes a time to honor Pan, wild god of the forest and its creatures, who are beginning to stir and ready themselves for spring.
But whether your main deity focus for your rites is Pan or Brigid, both can certainly be said to spark creativity: one via the hearth of the heart, one via the fire of the mind (and other places perhaps).
So, a poem for Imbolc (actually, this is a song I wrote some years ago; it still doesn't feel finished):
Man in Green
Saw him in the forest,
His eyes speak trees and vine
Saw him bless the harvest,
His lips taste songs, sweet acorn wine
Green, green his cloak
green, green his hood
green, green the garments of the man in the wood
Saw him dancing shadows
Misty meadow grey, dew-dropping rain
Watched him waltz with the barley mows
Gold and silver shining, warming grain
Green his hazel wand
Green his oaken shield
Green his ivy-covered mantle, the lord of the field
From his hands sweet berries fall,
To the winter sun standing tall,
Autumn’s circling seedlings he returns,
Springtime’s Beltane branches burn.
Running through the forest,
Hunter, brother, master, the Horned One,
Creatures by the Oak King blessed,
Flee forever poison, crossbow and gun
Green the twilight glows
Green the water gleams
Green, green his secrets, the lord of dreams
Dark the midnight forest,
Shroud of starlight, cup of moonlight in your hand
Singing weary souls to rest
All is silence, all is peace o'er all the land
Green, green the stars
Green, green the fire
Green the whispering glade around us
Green the shade of desire
Green, green my eyes
Green, green my heart
Green my love's dusky shadow
The man in the dark.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
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Scrying on the Moon
By sibylline light
appear images I recognize,
creviced captures of my life.
I know her judgment to be my own.
"Nourished by Moon rivers
mythical cavern blooms
unseen by sunlight
glow green." Thus she sets the scene;
becomes the prophecy.
"Purest white simplicity
curved to suggest fragility
faith fed maiden ready for
plucking,
given in bondage to womanly woes,
hard rows to hoe
for that little bit of hug through
crying of night.
Fate of Trojan soldiers, sacrificed to lust.
Unbended, beg for the boon of drama
high adventure
sneaking into sad hotels
for a fix or a tumble.
Laughs,
deadly play,
danger, a real chance.
Barefoot in the snow
icy roads
winds so strong
I could not make you hear.
I thought you were my destiny.
These thoughts are far from clear;
but I believed
song lyrics from somber deities
would not lie, leave me
dying, fading into winter's grey
drifting clouds,
endless sorrow endured for naught.
Lost on this careless corner,
dreaming of oblivion, intent on visions
like rain
tapping against eternity's
vast windowpane.
Scenic serenity.
Nature's gradations of green
soothes tired eyes,
trembling nerves, throbbing veins.
Slivers of moonlight reflect
in withered refrains, unearth secrets
embedded in song
effervescing through cool pure air
"cleansing the uprising nestling
set aflame
resurrected
tempered mettle,
pure, wise, tested
engorged with the will
to rise"
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