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Your crannog is pure
breast, a well of milky-blue,
a silver spring which
blesses every
name for You.
Brigit of the fertile gasp,
candle of all wombs
rouse my words to
spark dark waters
with a tide of
brighter news.
Bless this page, let
it become your milch-cow,
enable these hands to work
tender and sure
the heavy teats below.
Show me the
moony bridge
that sings
over winter’s
white defile.
Light me with
the smile that
births the calves,
a welled warmth
brighter and surer
than all this
cold world halves.
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Notes
Today is the Celtic festival of Imbolc, or Candlemas. St. Brighid is the patron saint and Celtic deity whose well of healing and inspiration fonts this poem. I essayed at length on the theme yesterday.
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For a far more erudite and contemporary exploration of the Imbolc heartscape, be sure to read Hedgewitch’s “Candlemas Sestina,” reposted today. It’s part of her masterful 4-part The Hedgerider’s Lament — a sort of post-Christian, preter-pagan, atheist Four Quartets. (That’s a personal opinion. Just read the poem.)
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Crannogs were artificial islands found throughout Western Europe but especially in Ireland and Scotland. They were made of wood (the word has roots in “young tree”) and originally used for crafts (such as pottery and wood-weaving) and later become dwellings. They date back to the late Bronze age (ca. 3500 BCE), but most were built between 800 BC and 200 AD, at the height of pagan Celtic culture. Somehow I think of the chair I write in every day as a crannog, a dippers set on Brigit’s well, that font of all creative inspiration.
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The reconstructed crannog at Loch Tay, Scotland.
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Brigid’s Cross, derived from the Celtic pagan sunwheel and made from rushes or straw and hung by the door of a house and in the rafter to protcct the house from fire or evil. St. Brigid the patron saint of the arts and the ritual creation of these crosses; I wonder if crannogs played some role in that craft.
It’s a sweet and pure request for an Imbolc blessing, Brendan, and I have no doubt Brigit will grant it. Everything seems possible, given the bright hope those snowdrops sing.
This is fascinating – I knew nothing about Imbolc or Candlemas, nor of crannogs, and it’s good to discover your exploration of the old mythology. Fascinating pictures too!
Beautiful and lyric, and full of the most primal nourishment, like the breast and the milk of the mother, maiden and crone you celebrate here. Looking at your picture of a crannog, what other image could ever come to mind than that basic connection to the life force every infant, two or four legged, reaches for with its first breath. And i love the idea that this is where you write from, inside the symbol, the sheltering of craft. Describes our creative space very well indeed, and our hopes for the nourishment we hope to find/bring. And Brigit’s well, Odin’s well, the dark unknown so deep below, from which we draw the water of knowledge, experience, change that quenches thirst. Thanks so much for your kind words about my sestinas, though the last thing I would call them is erudite compared to your own delvings in this myth.
Thanks everyone – and a merry Candlemas to all! Milk’s on me!
This is soothing to the soul. Beautiful, Brendan.
Brendan, what happened to “The Secret Scroll”? it was here earlier, but now it is gone. I had hoped to read it and comment.
By the way, I have made a change on my comments that should alleviate the problem some of my commenters, including you, were having. Sorry about that! I was trying to foil a spammer, and foiled my friends!