This is the first chance I've had to write since the Solstice five days ago. I'm listening to Snow, a track by Loreena McKennitt. Hop on over to her website and listen to a voice for the season... (Her song's lyrics are by one of Canada's finest poets; text below.)
No Christmas tinsel around here. When I left my ex in 1990 I abandoned exoteric Christmas. That very year I happened by Minerva Books where my friend Robert Clark sold me a small pamphlet talking about Yule wreaths. Ever after I've done just that: celebrate the cycle of the year with a wreath and apples. This year I bought a sumptuous wreath from White Flower Farm. I decorated it with four bright red apples to represent the four Equinoxes and Solstices. As I've explored and evolved in my own neo-pagan inner life these times have become great with meaning. Yule marks the return of light.
Leading to Yule is my time to explore the year in my intensive journal. When I finished work for the year last Wednesday I opened my intensive journal to see if I had anything more to write; I'd already streamed about fifteen pages and ten diagrams for the year. I decided that I hadn't - save one thing. My last entry says that I need to move out of my safety zone. That I'm still exploring - and I'll share with you what comes next.
On the Solstice I wrote the following:
It was a most difficult ritual to sustain. My energies were flagging; I fear I may be coming down with something. No matter. I sat zazen in preparation but never fully centered. I moved to my ritual space, tolled the bell, and began to invoke the return of light.
Once I began I blanked out on some of the words of invocation that I wrote years ago. I stopped, began again, and moved on through - even though I missed some of the words. I sank to my knees and began to meditate. This was not a ritual to effect change externally - at least initially it wasn't.
Nothing moved. I was hopelessly stagnant. I affirmed that nothing need change, that all was well even in my stuck place. I was even unhappy that the direction of the evergreen boughs in my wreath were wound counter-clockwise...
I simply kept on. Suddenly everything shifted. Yule is about continuity, about the revival in the face of bleakness. The boughs were moving in the right direction: if we gather forces from around us they spiral inward to us.
Continuity. I kept meditating on it, on the evergreen boughs, on the return to life, on the rebirth of light. When I rose I went to the four corners and asked the friendly powers for their help. As I closed the work I asked them to extend a film of light around the world, granting freedom from suffering, from pain, and bestowing joy on those seen and unseen.
My affirmations to the corners:
- For Air: wisdom and communication with others
- For Fire: great heart and passion
- For Water: love and devotion
- For Earth: health and prosperity
May you have these four in this new year.
Snow
Archibald Lampman (1861-1899)
White are the far-off plains, and white
the fading forests grow;
The wind dies out along the height,
And denser still the snow
A gathering weight on roof and tree
Falls down scarce audibly.
The meadows and far-sheeted streams
Lie still without a sound;
Like some soft minister of dreams
The snow-fall hoods me round;
In wood and water, earth and air
A silence everywhere.
Save when at lonely intervals
Some farmer's sleigh, urged on,
With whistling runners and sharp bells
Swings by me and is gone;
Or from the empty waste I hear
A sound remote and clear
The barking of a dog, or call
To cattle, sharply pealed,
Borne echoing from some wayside stall
Or barnyard far afield;
Then all is silent and the snow
Falls settling soft and slow.
The evening deepens and the grey
Folds closer earth and sky
The world seems shrouded, far away.
Its noises sleep, and I
as secret as yon buried stream
plod dumbly on and dream.
