I dreamed there were thirteen treasures in Britain, Not the wealth of feudal kings, nor yet their power, No weapons of war, no tools for control. I saw the generous loom Taking but a small handful of threads To warm and clothe a humble back. The log that burns and yet remains. Come […]
poetry
napowrimo
The Welsh Bardic Tradition (lecture audio)
Little Lamp – cute little story
This time when I turned on the lamp in the den it said “Hello”.
Imagine my surprise.
“Hello?” it said.
“Hello?” I called.
“Over here.” Said the lamp. I walked over and peaked under the white fringed shade.
“Do you mind removing this thing on my head?” asked the lamp.
I am losing my mind, I thought. Yet, obeyed.
“Ah, much better. What is your name?” the lamp asked in a lyrical little voice.
“John?” I said.
“You sound unsure.”
“I’m not sure what I’m sure about right this second.” I muttered. The lamp laughed and shined a little brighter.
“I understand. I am not being terribly fair. I know light cannot speak here. I came here from another place. I had to leave, you see.”
I looked around the room to see if anyone was watching before turning back to the lamp.
“Why did you have to leave?” I…
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Balancing
posted a year ago as an end of the year poem
such shadows come and fall on me
from joy to sorrow, like a switch
i fight to turn the light back on
i don’t know where the joy has gone
a single note in some old song
a word not said
a thought unwise
i try to see where i went wrong
the tender sweetness
on a breeze
can turn my heart
and make me freeze
and then i go and sit a while
and lean against a steady tree
and wait to smile again
and see
like the earth we reach for warmth
and the thirsty kiss of rain
all things in nature
are the same
it’s all a mirror of ourselves
dimmed and scratched
things unclear
and things not seen
this constant flow
of dark and light
is just the deep souls day and night
and the turning of the year
The Maid of Harlaw
one for Halloween
Great storytelling
Part One
and Part Two
An Audience of None
true
Who will judge us, and by what measure?
We closed our eyes upon the living world and awoke to find ourselves standing in the presence of a powerful being, being both jackal and man. We do not fear him, but rather the great set of scales besides which he stands.
In one hand he carries a single feather, plucked from the wings of the goddess of truth.
He places that feather upon the scales, and then reaches out toward us, into us, and though we are not harmed, we see that he carries our heart in his easy grip.
This two he places upon the scales.
A heart weighed down with a lifetime of regrets, and a feather infused with the weight of justice.
The scales tip, one way or the other, and we are judged.
The taste of the coin lingers as the small boat finally comes to ground.
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Awakening of the Heart: Permaculture’s Ethic of Care
well worth a read – no shortage of wisdom here – let’s not say it’s impossible to change direction – change ethics and all else follows
Love the earth
As I write this, a brave group of Native Americans are standing in support of the earth and protesting yet another oil pipeline that threatens water supplies, health, and home. Here, we see the clash between those defending their mother in care and compassion, and those representing profit and pillage. It is in the care for our lands the tribes take a stand; it the understanding of sacred connection of all things, all life, that helps them brave the dogs, pepper spray, the intimidation and much worse abuses. In some ways, the situation unfolding in North Dakota is a representation of similar circumstances that peoples and communities find themselves all over the world facing: fighting giant corporations who seek to pillage and profit while paying little attention to the human and environmental costs involved in their actions. I believe that many of today’s problems stem from a…
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Quote from Da Vinci’s Demons
Hell happens when the evil of this world exceeds our belief that we can conquer it
Living in a fairy tale
nice article that arrived in my inbox today – and illustrated by the wonderful Brian Froud, who really knows what The Gentry look like :)
Painting by Brian Froud
I’ve been looking into old faery lore lately. Not the sanitised Victorian version of miniature winged beauties, but at the old tales of strange encounters, customs that go back beyond memory, time lost in the faery realm and the darker aspects of the hidden folk. At the instigation of my writing partner, I watched a documentary and, amongst a few other ideas, one in particular got me thinking. The suggestion was that if faeries do not have a concrete and objective reality of their own in our world, but do exist for us in the realms of imagination, perhaps imagination itself is a state of being we do not fully understand, bridging the gap between our usual vision of reality and unreality in a way that has a validity of its own. As a concept, and after years of working with magical systems, that…
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The Dreaming Path 