Last night as I was driving home from my friend Carly’s lovely, moving, earth-based Pesach seder, I looked up and saw the full moon brightly, calmly shining in the night sky. I began to rifle through my memory for any songs/chants that I could remember about the moon. I sang two over and over:

Full Moon shining bright
Midnight on the water
Oh, Aradia,
Diana’s silver daughter

Silver shining wheel of radiance, radiance!
Full Moon, come to us, come to us!

But that wasn’t enough for the spirit that moved through me. Through various hummings and snitches and snatches of words and melody, I finally allowed a new song to well up.

Artemis Selena
Lady of the Moon
Hear the people calling
Bless us with your boon!

Silver bright in the night sky
Shining in the dark
Reflecting in each other’s eyes
Connecting heart to heart

It has been a decade since I’ve been in a group that regularly met on the full and new moon. And frankly, I don’t notice the energy pull of the lunar phases that many say they feel. For me, it is often a happy surprise to look up and see her shining round and bright. Like a phone call from a distant friend you think about occasionally, but whom you haven’t talked to in ages.

I have been toying with the idea of doing something more regularly at the new and full moons, but haven’t been sure what would engage my imagination enough to ensure that I follow through….I’ve never been good at being solitary. Perhaps one song from the deep self and the heart will spur the desire forward.

We shall see where the wandering takes us.

My contribution to Second Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading is excerpts from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass

I CELEBRATE myself;
And what I assume you shall assume;
For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my Soul;
I lean and loafe at my ease, observing a spear of summer grass.

Houses and rooms are full of perfumes—the shelves are crowded with perfumes;
I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it;
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.
The atmosphere is not a perfume—it has no taste of the distillation—it is odorless;
It is for my mouth forever—I am in love with it;
I will go to the bank by the wood, and become undisguised and naked;
I am mad for it to be in contact with me….

….I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars,
And the pismire is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg of the wren,
And the tree-toad is a chef-d’oeuvre for the highest,
And the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven,
And the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery,
And the cow crunching with depress’d head surpasses any statue,
And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels,
And I could come every afternoon of my life to look at the farmer’s girl boiling her iron tea-kettle and baking shortcake….

….I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so placid and self-contain’d;
I stand and look at them long and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition;
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins;
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God;
Not one is dissatisfied—not one is demented with the mania of owning things;
Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago;
Not one is respectable or industrious over the whole earth.

In the sunlight and the shadows of leafless, winter trees, I walk alone and silent. Hush, child, and listen to the quiet expectantly.

Yes, there it is — so still most miss it — the heartbeat between the waning and the waxing. Just a moment, quick as the blink of an eye and full as an open heart.

Turn off the TV and the Christmas music. Put down the books. Stop the fantic bustle. Just be still in the silence and darkness. Just breathe and listen for the blood pumping through your body.

Wait for it. Do not “do” anything. Breathe into it. The space between — the Solstice.

Inspired by the Hokusai exhibit at the Sackler:

Swirling and spattered snow and smoke
Calls forth the dragon, ferocious and fierce
Climb on, child, if you dare
Hold on for dear life
Ride the dragon, ride
Wherever she takes you, you will see beyond knowledge
Push, push through the veil that clouds your eyes

Last fall, while waiting for the bus, I was thinking about how we needed a song for the lighting of the Samhain fires. The voice bubbled from inside:

Rise up, Sacred Fire! Burning divinity, live in me!

This last week, it began to rain as I was walking home from work. I had no umbrella. I lifted my head and this song flowed from my heart:

I am washed
Washed in the tears of the Goddess.
And her rain
Carries away all my pain.
I am washed
Washed in the tears of the Goddess.
And her love
Flows over me in a flood.

I am not exactly sure where these come from. I don’t write them consciously. They bubble up from the divine inside as it connects sporatically with the divine beyond. It’s just there, and then it’s gone. But I have a song or two to remember it by.

I belong here and nowhere and everywhere
I am the sea that rises up and takes back

Sides are being taken and lines are being drawn
I wash over opposing armies indiscrimately

I am the sea that rises up and takes back
Hate and love, right and wrong, life and death

These mean nothing to me
I am the sea that rises up and takes back

I am that I am

Death is a healing
torn and tired
spirit stretched impossibly
over worn, fragile
flesh
tears shed and wounds
scarcely healed
white scars; red eyes
smells that live forever
scents no one else notices
pungent in the pinched room
electronic bleeps keep
time with the labored heart
a torturous tarantella
a ghost fist loosens its grip
death is a healing
not a failure

Weary of the screams that filled her ears,
Tired of cleaning the blood from her fingernails,
Her acorns turning to ash in her pointed beak,
Macha turns away from the battle
And her sisters
In search for the normal life of home and family.

Loving his children was easy.
Tending the farm a joy.
Laying with him in the night,
She almost felt safe.
Macha dreams of roiling clouds
And jeering crowds
To be betrayed by carelessness.

It’s just a legend but it is her history,
And she curses her part.

written November 30, 2003

Another drowning man
finds his way upon my shore.
Another wounded soul
kicked in the teeth by the gods,
bad luck and some Siren…

I taste the bile of knowing
my recurring role in the story,
the suspicious beginning,
the sweet middle, and
oh yes, the bitter end…

I am not doing this again.
My compassion has run out.
My heart is a seeping patchwork,
the work of previous Odysseuses.
This Calypso quits.

And Zeus can kiss my ass…