Pagan Godspell

I hope that each of you had a refreshing, beautiful vernal equinox yesterday.  As for me, I got me a little spring cold and spent most of the day shuffling and snarfling about my house, doing a bit of cleaning but for the most part resting and soaking in the sunshine, which was blessedly ample and pooled out on the floor next to every available window.  Cats have it a-right – those are the best places to nap.  But for being mildly ill, the day was lovely, and I give thanks for it.

In my particular practice, I don’t usually celebrate the equinoxes and solstices quite as fervently as the cross-quarter holidays.  For me, these are times of simplicity and reflection – honoring the Mama as she spins on her axis, giving thanks to Old Man Sun and his waxing and waning as He washes us in gold.  That sweet first rush of soft wind as it relaxes the grass, waking with newness, the world covered in mud (the vernix of Earth), the blossoming of this miraculous year – I pause to wonder at the miracle of this repeating glory, that newness always comes…soon, soon it will be time for all the riotous dancing.  Even now under warm rain everything is gathering for the Party.  That I am privy to this not-so-Secret Joy thrills me to the core (and to the Kore).  That birth and death hold hands and dance.  That I get to witness it over and over again – revelling every time in its perfection, its little differences, the ways my own life waxes and wanes within it – a microcosm containing microcosms performing a part within the macrocosm (itself a microcosm of an even bigger picture – forever and ever amen) – what an extraordinary gift.  Laughing, singing, laughing singing, come the children over the hill – fa la la la la la la la ha ha ha laughing over the hill (this little round always reminds me of spring and fall, the shifting seasons).

Once, when I was 14 or so I guess, I had a small cut on a finger that was starting to heal.  I made some passing comment to my mother about it as we sat at the dinner table.  She grabbed my hand and started to wax amazed at the power of the human body’s natural ability to heal itself (my mom’s a nurse, so it’s par for the course).  Since I was 14 at the time, I rolled my eyes and giggled at her effusive rhapsodies.  Today, years later, I find myself getting caught up in my own paeans to the amazing everything.  When a young person rolls her eyes at me and chuckles at my nerdy love for the complex World, I’ll know I’ve truly Arrived.

Happy Spring!  Blessed Ostara!  Come come come come come!!!

in Just-
e.e. cummings

in Just- 
spring    when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles    far    and wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far    and    wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it’s spring
and
   the

        goat-footed

balloonMan        whistles
far
and
wee

————

Such Singing in the Wild Branches
Mary Oliver

It was spring
and finally I heard him
among the first leaves -
then I saw him clutching the limb
in an island of shade
with his red-brown feathers
all trim and neat for the new year.
First, I stood still
and thought of nothing.
Then I began to listen.
Then I was filled with gladness -
and that’s when it happened,
when I seemed to float,
to be, myself, a wing or a tree -
and I began to understand
what the bird was saying,
and the sands in the glass
stopped
for a pure white moment
while gravity sprinkled upward
like rain, rising,
and in fact
it became difficult to tell just what it was that was singing -
it was the thrush for sure, but it seemed
not a single thrush, but himself, and all his brothers,
and also the trees around them,
as well as the gliding, long-tailed clouds
in the perfectly blue sky – all, all of them
were singing.
And, of course, yes, so it seemed,
so was I.
Such soft and solemn and perfect music doesn’t last
for more than a few moments.
It’s one of those magical places wise people
like to talk about.
One of the things they say about it, that is true,
is that, once you’ve been there,
you’re there forever.
Listen, everyone has a chance.
Is it spring, is it morning?
Are there trees near you,
and does your own soul need comforting?
Quick, then – open the door and fly on your heavy feet; the song
may already be drifting away.

————–

Prayer for the Kore at the Advent of Spring

The morning breaks, a shift and a cry, the Mama sighs -
O My Daughter.

Ten green children are laughing behind the old winter bush.
Their fingers pluck earthworms from the wet grass,
spinning prayers and memos of warm earth,
mud and vernix – the lift of a veil, the tapping of a foot.
There is an egg waiting
in the flush and bloom of 9 o’ clock.

Laugh!  O She comes!  O She rises! 
The green thread winds up the branches.
The sap moves in concert with her singing.

The crabapple blossoms are dreams in the fluttering of her eyelids. 
The golden sisters in their combs cry out together -
Io Melissa!  Io Kore!  The Wild Girl, the Honeyed Star!
And the west wind rides behind her.
And the smoky rain clothes her in its perfection.

She is come – the world cannot but throw its arms out in welcome!
She is come – the veil of winter falls away!
She is come - we are all new in the glory of heralds and trumpets!
She is come – show us the secret in the early flower!

The world mints itself a new coin – this shining is only a beginning.
Wait.
Wait.