Summer Solstice 2024
Summer Solstice 2024
In this video, I am sharing a poem and some music with you. Happy Summer Solstice to you!
Beltane – a poem and a dance
Beltane – a poem and a dance
A few bits, but by no means a full dive, about the history and meaning of Beltane, include its translation as “bright fire” or “mouth of fire” in Irish. Like other seasonal ritual days, the celebration of Beltane was supposed to have involved fire. The fire was a way of ushering in the summer and light time of the year. Beltane also connects to a time of fertility and fecundity, when the earth is coming alive with color – plant and flower life, greenness of trees and grasses,
new animal life. The abundance has arrived and continues to burst forth. Like its counterbalance in the fall (Samhain), the time of Beltane is also a time where the veils between the worlds are considered thin, when we have closer access to the ancestors and the otherworld, whatever we may consider that to be.
Right now, when I look at the land around me, I see more animal and bird life, I can hear birdsong all day long, the vibrant pink of the azaleas and the green of the grasses are saturating the yard. The snowdrops and crocuses have given way to the dandelions; the fragrance of lilacs and hummingbird shrubs fill the neighborhood. The bees are flying two by two. There is a hint of summer in the air, but nature will not be rushed, and I don’t want to be rushed either. There’s an invitation to linger in this late springtime, to be taken by the sweet smells and colors, to dream in the afternoon breezes and begin to soak in the warmth of the sun.
Here’s an offering of a poem and a dance to welcome some of that Beltane energy.
On this New Moon Solar Eclipse day
On this New Moon Solar Eclipse day
On this New Moon Solar Eclipse day, however it finds you, take a moment to let yourself move. Let yourself dance and maybe even dance harder for all those who can’t. Enjoy the poem below and let yourself be moved.
We Have Come to be Danced
By Jewel Mathieson
We have come to be danced
Not the pretty dance
Not the pretty pretty, pick me, pick me dance
But the claw our way back into the belly
Of the sacred, sensual animal dance
The unhinged, unplugged, cat is out of its box dance
The holding the precious moment in the palms
Of our hands and feet dance.
We have come to be danced
Not the jiffy booby, shake your booty for him dance
But the wring the sadness from our skin dance
The blow the chip off our shoulder dance.
The slap the apology from our posture dance.
We have come to be danced
Not the monkey see, monkey do dance
One two dance like you
One two three, dance like me dance
but the grave robber, tomb stalker
Tearing scabs and scars open dance
The rub the rhythm raw against our soul dance.
We have come to be danced
Not the nice, invisible, self-conscious shuffle
But the matted hair flying, voodoo mama
Shaman shakin’ ancient bones dance
The strip us from our casings, return our wings
Sharpen our claws and tongues dance
The shed dead cells and slip into
The luminous skin of love dance.
We have come to be danced
Not the hold our breath and wallow in the shallow end of the floor dance
But the meeting of the trinity, the body breath and beat dance
The shout hallelujah from the top of our thighs dance
The mother may I?
Yes you may take 10 giant leaps dance
The olly olly oxen free free free dance
The everyone can come to our heaven dance.
We have come to be danced
Where the kingdom’s collide
In the cathedral of flesh
To burn back into the light
To unravel, to play, to fly, to pray
To root in skin sanctuary
We have come to be danced
WE HAVE COME.
Exploring Self-contact
Exploring Self-contact
The video below explores using self-contact and touch to support settling, relaxation, grounding and ease in our bodies and our nervous systems.
Imbolc
Imbolc
The first time I really felt the meaning of Imbolc in my body was about 5 years ago on the dance floor at a 5Rhythms dance in Philadelphia with Rebekah Zhuraw. It was early February around the time of Imbolc on the Celtic calendar. Imbolc, meaning “in the belly,” is the time when lambs turn in their mother’s belly getting ready to make their way into the world. It is the time when seeds begin to turn over in the ground and start the process of rooting and eventually growing up to sprout in the spring. It is a time when spring is not yet here, but there is a hint in the earth, in the womb, in our own bodies that something is beginning to shift. I remember on that day planting a seed in a big pot of soil that Rebekah brought into the dance. We planted our seed with the intention of what we were hoping would root and grow in the coming months. And then we danced those intentions. Our bodies living and moving into the experience of Imbolc.
Below is a reading of an excerpt from Caroline Mellor’s poem, “Imbolc,” from her book The Honey in the Bones (highly recommended for those interested in the changing of seasons and the celtic calendar).
In the video, I invite you to listen to the words, take them into your own body, into whatever is beginning its organic process inside you of turning down and rooting, and to let that move you into a dance, into an expression of how your body is living these words.
The reading of an excerpt from Caroline Mellor’s poem, “Imbolc. The music is “I See You” by LAOR
Video reading of A Blessing for Traveling in the Dark
A video reading of
A Blessing for Traveling in the Dark
I am trying a little something different in this blog post. Usually, I would just post a copy of the poem I am enjoying right now; in this case, A Blessing for Traveling in the Dark, by Jan Richardson. People can enjoy it at their own pace, use it however they want to, pass it by or maybe even note it for another time. And I will still copy the poem below so that you can do all of that as desired. However, I am also going to post a short video of myself reading the poem for a different kind of experience. In the video below, I lead you through a short grounding exercise, simply to take a moment to orient to the here and now, and then I read the poem twice, inviting listeners to take it in while also noticing what happens in the experience of listening to the poem. It’s a different way to enjoy the poem, rather than just reading it on the page, and also a way to offer a little taste of what happens in the workshops I hold.
Special audio appearance by my dog, Levon, during the first reading of the poem. You can hear his little collar jingle as he shakes. Consider it an added sensory experience!
A Blessing for Traveling in the Dark
By Jan Richardson
Go slow if you can.
Slower.
More slowly still.
Friendly dark or fearsome,
this is no place
to break your neck
by rushing,
by running,
by crashing into
what you cannot see.
Then again,
it is true:
different darks
have different tasks,
and if you
have arrived here unawares,
if you have come
in peril or in pain,
this might be no place
you should dawdle.
I do not know
what these shadows
ask of you,
what they might hold
that means you good or ill.
It is not for me
to reckon
whether you should linger
or you should leave.
But this is what
I can ask for you:
That in the darkness
there be a blessing.
That in the shadows
there be a welcome.
That, in the night
you be encompassed
by the Love that knows
your name.