This poem should have been up yesterday but I am still catching up after a month of problems with the local network exchange. Ho - de - hum...
Equinox
When dawn rose on the twins your dance began,
an endless reel around the standing stones
where the water - bearer floats the cradle ark.
But in the trees a silent watcher stood,
envious of your power and your art.
He planned to challenge your dominion
over moon and hearth; mark and enslave you,
subject your secrets to his tyranny.
He was your lover once, partner in this rite,
other half of fate's consummation, now
he would take you for a plaything to be used.
And yet you cling to one great secret still,
one thing your master can never control
though his dark science seems to shade the sun
and hides your joy in deep shadows of guilt.
So as the balance tips, dance in the dark
and while the light is weak protect the flame
that soon must kindle the absolving fire
so temple's false deceiving walls will burn
and two that once were one are reconciled.
The poem is from a set "The Eightfold Year." Here are links to some of the others. All these links open new windows, use [ctrl/w] to close - and that's a useful tip to get rid of any pop ups that get past your firewall. Closing them with the mouse is risky as hackers often use a "mouseover" procedure to kick off a malware script.
Fires of Love
The Making And Unmaking Dance
The Hounds of the Morrigan (halloween)
Solstice Fires
Imbolc
Good King Lud
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Comments: 15
thank you
Pray? For moi? Its nice of you to care but I wonder how much of the poem you understood? (I was being deliberately obscure.)
Thanks for your comments. I will visit you soon.
Thanks for this Equinox poem. I love all your different interests.
I am a man who follows the Goddess (be careful how you reply I might turn you into a lizard ;-) By the goddess we do not mean an actual being as followers of the Abrahamic religions do but an energy, an inspiration. This poem actually charts the conquest of the Goddess by the male, patriarchal cults. Its also about lots of other things too but they are complicated.
I have never wanted to be a woman (all that monthly business - yeuch) and have no idea what a metrosexual is, a man who shags trains on the Paris underground railway system maybe?
In pagan belief systems the woman has more social status than the man because she is both the ark in which the future is carried and the first cradle that the child rests in. The role of the male is that of protector and provider. What could be more manly than that?
Not things of my mind, the poem is a series of references to the "single source" myths. I just have my way of translating them into something relevant.
One of the ideas behind this is the way Stonehenge was designed as a primitive analogue computer to calculate the phenomonon known as the precession of the equinoxes. This was known to the ancients but not rediscovered until the 1950s.
You know the Goddess as well as I do. I do wish people who don't know her keep suggesting I am so deluded as to think there is some big old lady sitting on a cloud looking after me.
Thanks, this interest (understanding the basis of civilised society) has been with me most of my life. The British poet and novelist Robert Graves said all poetry is inspired by the desire to celebrate the Goddess. To him the Goddess dwelt in the lady he happened to be in love with at the time which is in line with the beliefs of the Brahmins (the highest caste of Hindus) that everything is a manifestation of "The Oneness." My own view is different to that of Graves but not by a lot.