Words of another…
A poem, a song a picture and not a revolution in sight!
Hello lovely friends, readers and writers.
What an amount of fizzing and buzzing there has been in the ether this week, the connected world ringing loudly it’s bells in to the New Year, high notes and low notes filling the air with lists brimming with good intentions and resolutions—or not in my case—words of the year too, so difficult to choose amongst the many thousands of meaningful others, are we all thoroughly bored yet?
That’s what I thought, it’s been quite a noise hasn’t it?
January is a slow month up here on my hill. All is paused, breathe held, in wait for spring; field conversations have halted, my muse, the old hare, spied last in November, no doubt snuggled in his hidden winter form comfortable in the warmth of sheltered leafy woodland glades. All in patient wait for the explosion that heralds spring. Fluorescent lime buds, blossom laden trees swinging like bridal sprays enticing us to come hither, to dance in the abundance of scented wild.
Alas, though, the wait feels long.
And, in the waiting, my energy depleted, after what feels like weeks rather than days of festivities, I find my page still blank. I have no inclination to add to already overly repeated words of good intention, scanned and likely deleted faster than it takes to read the title. Ilnstead a little magic, not my own, to make of what you will…but I hope you find a few minutes quiet in between.
William Butler Yeats was born in Ireland on June 16 1865, the family moved to England in 1867 where he was educated by his mother who read stories of Irish folklore. Undoubtedly these captured his young mind, were perhaps an early inspiration for his work. He began writing poetry when he was aged seventeen and gained notoriety as an acclaimed British poet with his mystical poems scattered with beguiling prose often with a latent political slant.
In 1892, he wrote: "If I had not made magic my constant study I could not have written a single word[…] The mystical life is the centre of all that I do and all that I think and all that I write.”
The drowsy water rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Whilst much was written as though relatable to the mind of a child he succeeds beautifully in enticing the reader, no matter age, into an enchanted land of fairies and far away lands entwined and often indistinguishable from the reality of nature surrounding him.
The Stolen Child
Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
Away with us he's going,
The solemn-eyed:
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than he can understand.
I will leave you entwined in the mystic and wish you a weekend filled with wonderful.
As a child, this poem, along with Maurice Sendak's "Outside Over There" simultaneously entranced and terrified me. I was always on the look out for faeries that might swap me for a changeling.
Thank you Susie, for taking us away from the Earth and leading us on a little meander into the other world. 🧚🏼♀️