Mabh Savage
Words and the world passing by; how it sings to me; how I clamour back.
NaPoWriMo Day 8 – The Queen
She is sovereignty
Walking the land
Owning it
Loving it
Guiding it, somehow
She sets the boundaries
She is the boundaries
Firm, kind as she needs to be
Unwavering, a favourite word
May I waver not
Though the firmer I set my boundaries
The more bitter the bullets that bounce right off
But after all
That’s what boundaries are for.
NaPoWriMo Day 4 – Piety
It’s not easy, being green
She laughs, and tosses hair of flame
Whilst directing me to clean up
Alder trees
Wasteland
Abandoned buddleia
Whilst nudging me up the hillside
Starting compost piles
Feeding the birds
And not just the “pretty” ones
As I place bacon fat
On the grass
And duck inside away
From probing beaks
Of magpies, crows
Jackdaws now the spring has
Yes, sprung
And today, a kite
A red kite
Tail forked in flight
But straight and serene
Sitting on my fence
A bird once considered
Nothing but a pest
Then a rubbish cleaner
Scavenger extraordinaire
Now a valued member
Of our ecosystem
We learn, we understand
She sits, she eats, she leaves
My garden is clean, her babies are fed
I nod to the sky
To the land
To the liminal spaces between
To Her
And while I wonder
About honour and worship
A pair of robins
Start a home
Oblivious.
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NaPoWriMo Day 1 – Restless
Starting is such sweet sorrow
Picking up that pen
In a fit of restless
Energy
It feels right, twixt finger and thumb
Yet sad I am
Sad to stop the dream
The wonder
The wander
The drift around the room
Sorrowful parting from
Solitude and silence
Into activity and work
But why become a writer
If you can’t turn the dream
Into something real?
Wander no more? No, wonder on,
My mind
Be restless, all over the page
Show me what you’ve got.
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NaPoWriMo Day 2 – Stillness
I’m currently building a deeper relationship with my tutelary deity, an Mórrígan, based on studies with the Irish Pagan School and my own observations and experience. One tool I’m using is a deck of oracle cards by Morpheus Ravenna and Hannah Storyteller called The Morrigan’s Oracle, and many poems this month will be based on the titles of these cards. I shall try and include pictures, when I remember!
How many times she has told me
Stillness
How many times they shout
From their papery prison
Voices heard by means of escape
Open the doors
Let them out
Stillness
Sitting in my hand
Then on the skull,
The jar
The wand
Resting there on my altar
Stillness
Yet in my mind I fail
To embrace their message
Is it any wonder
This time
The card comes out
Reversed.
NaPoWriMo 2021
You may have already noticed that I’m partaking in NaPoWriMo 2021, the annual poetry writing month that inspires writers of all abilities to try and compose a poem every day. Recently diagnosed with CPTSD and suspected ADD, I’ve discovered that my always terrible time management may actually be linked to one or both of these conditions. Embracing that, I am posting my poems, and indeed, this introduction, in no particular order! I have a rigid schedule for my paid work which I find exhausting, so to allow myself to randomize the writing I love is actually very freeing.
This first poem was actually written pre-NaPoWriMo and the only poem I’ve performed live in many months. I don’t normally explain my poems, as I think it’s kind of like explaining the punchline of a joke, but I hope it’s clear that this poem is about my own anxieties around our returning freedoms, and how we may or may not adapt to them.
April Fool
I’ve been tricked before
Thinking that the rain had gone
Then soaked by selfish
April showers
Thinking that the sun was stretching
Cranking it up to 11
So I left the jumper in its
Yearly cocoon
But Sol was still
In bed
I’ve been fooled once,
Shame on me
Twice,
Shame on me, me, me…
Thinking that the snow
Was done, that Cailleach’s cry
Could not reach my ears
Thinking that seedlings soft and
Fragile
Could pop outside for a time
What an April Fool I’ve been.
Now can we pop outside
Is it truly time
To stretch our roots and tendrils
Back towards the dense forest
Leaving our individual copses
Ours stands, our hedgerows.
While March Winds blew
Through aching leaves
We longed for May-time flowers
Are we truly built
To wait, to want,
To withstand April showers?
NaPoWriMo Day 5: Mystery Haiku
“Why is this?!” I asked
The cards answered, “Mystery”
Guess I asked for that.
NaPoWriMo Day 3 – Slap
A slap to the face
Leaves a red mark
Obvious, critical, easily criticised
So we shun
Physical violence.
A heart racing
Blood pumping
Veins jumping
Throat popping and retching
Hands tingling
Muscles twanging
Tired, old guitar strings
Tired of being played;
Not so obvious
So criticism
Not so easily received
Believe
Just believe
You don’t have to understand
But a slap to the mind
Is still a slap.
NaPoWriMo Day 6 – Companions
Seen and unseen
Felt, always felt
Trailing thoughts like fingers
The blackbird in the fence
Guardian at the gates
Of heart and mind
Turning energy into matter
Words into action
Idea
Into
Reality.
Hermitage Haiku
Bathe in the white warmth
Of words well met, for even
The hermit has friends.
Global Recycling Day
Global Recycling Day is tomorrow and the international event offers folks a chance to nominate their recycling heroes and give a shout out to those who have kept up their work for the planet during the pandemic.
In honour of this, I will be taking a very short, local walk to a copse of alder trees by some council offices, with the aims of cleaning the area up and recycling as much of the rubbish as possible. The offices have been empty since last year, with the amazing staff now working diligently from home. The area has, in their absence, become something of a dumping ground and isn’t visible enough to warrant any attention from the refuse collectors.
Litter can be very harmful to local wildlife, and it’s an important part of my spiritual practice to do what I can for wildlife, local plants, and the environment at large. I’m currently working (very slowly) through an amazing Ogham course with the Irish Pagan School. It involves journeying to try and communicate with the spirits of Ogham, which of course have some strong tree associations – and many other associations, too! My journey with the fid, Fern, led me to a discussion about Alder trees, and a commitment to help them – although at the time, I didn’t grasp quite what this meant.
One sunny Sunday, I was out with the kids and we were all taking our government-sanctioned exercise. I’d long known that the grounds of the council offices were full of interesting trees: an apple, rowans, and birches. This day, I discovered that at the path side of the building, there are some old and beautifully gnarled alders. I decided there and then that the area needed cleaning up, as it’s currently full of litter which will not only discourage wildlife but actively harm it. As I made this commitment, a crow flew down and sat in the top branches of one of the tallest alder trees. Although no stranger to coincidence, in this moment I felt like this offering of service had been accepted.
Learn more about following an environmentally-kind spiritual path in my upcoming book, Practically Pagan: An Alternative Guide to Planet Friendly Living
