"Come to the edge", he said.
They said, "We are afraid".
"Come to the edge", he said.
They came.
He pushed them ...
and they flew.
-Guilluame Apollinaire
"Who we are from conception to death isn't the whole story, our life in the universe isn't the whole story, and the universe itself isn't the whole story...and a day will come when we all of us will have stars at elbow and foot."
-John Moriarty, in an interview with RTE
Archive for the ‘The Silver Branch’ Category
of Safety and of Wildness
This, then, is our ordeal.
The wildness here is like no other. Even in the wildest range of mountains, there is solid ground for us to put our feet on. Here, there is nothing solid.
No safety.
Only our boat.
Only our small cramped boat that is being tossed about in the wildness of solitude. Even in the sudden calm and doldrums of the sea, there is a wildness, a language that we know but can not speak. In this stillness, we languish, hoping for a wind to take us west, north, south, east. Somewhere. The horizon is everywhere. Distant; smudged and misty. No island. Nothing solid. Only the wild stillness and silence.
When the island appears, it seems as if it does so from nowhere. Perhaps it rose up from the bottom of the sea. Perhaps in our stillness we have moved more than we perceived. The island that called to us long ago, the island that has always called to us, has been reached.
We put ashore on the misty and mystical shore.
the most perilous of adventures
Renowned for his wisdom, Solomon had spent half his life pursuing wealth, and another large chunk pursuing wisdom, and when asked which was better, he replied:
“The fear of God.”
I think Solomon might have had it wrong.
Bold words I know, but when you think about it, he could have at least articulated himself a bit better.
I think he got it wrong.
Neither wealth, nor wisdom, nor fear of God is better.
Posted in The Silver Branch, Tribal Compassion | 
Tags: amhairgin, bran, cerridwen, chuchulain, discontent, finnegas, fintan, fionn, gwion, human, medb, silver antlered stag, taliesin, tara | 
No Comments »
the mantra of fionn
At times the singing voice of Mananaan Mac Lir rises above the din of the sea to reach my ears in a symphony of longing and serenity.
At other times, the din of silence drowns his voice out. At times, the noises of my thoughts chasing and bleeding into one another destroy all sounds, and strain as I might, I cannot hear the singing.
Perhaps this is the way it is supposed to be. Perhaps not. Perhaps I am on the wrong path. I don’t know. All I know is that this is the way it is, for me, currently. I have to start where I am. We all have to start where we are.
Posted in The Silver Branch |
Tags: beauty, bran, druid, druidism, fionn, forest, human, lesson, maelduin, mananaan mac lir, music, oisin, osgar, patrick, sacred places, sea, serenity, sheep, silver branch, song |
No Comments »