The personal space of Leanne « Awaiting Sentence «

An dà shealladh

"Second sight" -- variations on a theme, I suppose. Might even come close to getting it right one day.

One-eyed winter, bent-backed hag, she
slopes across the shadowed corries,
harvesting the weak and wasted,
rinsing Alba with her wake.

I have seen her, outside-in and
boiling through the fog of Mary's
mildness, driving ice before her,
genesis beneath her feet.

Throw your words of he-said, he-said,
jealous black and whitely righteous,
onto fires of harvest's ending:
Cailleach cannot see a cross.

Call the mists to veil the vistas
ancient under concrete scarring;
none may yoke her, land or lady:
she is threefold, she is One.

Tracey on Oct. 27 2008 edit · delete

A perfect pagan poem for this time of year when the "veil" thins and our connection between earth and spirit are close. I love the imagery -- the crone, the change of seasons, the reference to the enduring strength of girl-woman-crone in comparison with the stereotypically "soft" visions of Mary.

You may not think it's complete, but even so it's an instant fave for me.

Leanne on Oct. 27 2008 edit · delete

Funny, isn't it, how some religions -- the same ones that marginalise or water down women -- assume that they were the first and only to come up with the three-in-one notion?

And they'd be the same ones who encourage trick-or-treat trivialisation of something much older.

Tracey on Oct. 27 2008 edit · delete

They usually go for the three-in-one MALE version of humankind. It's maddening.

Colleen on Oct. 29 2008 edit · delete

I love what you have done with this concept. Does your idea have any relation to the Celtic trinity knot? this poem makes me think of the the celtic trinity knot. in the pagan beliefs it symbolizes daughter, mother and crone... three in one.

Leanne on Oct. 29 2008 edit · delete

Yes, in Celtic tradition one of the names for the Crone is Cailleach Beara. She is "born" at Samhain, the day that the last of the harvest is gathered in and winter begins. She is almost always depicted with one eye and a blue face.

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