Walk with me through
owl-sung tattered woods,
moonbright, thorndark, sleaved
with dancing rootless spells
that wing twixt shadow & shadow
above the bloodless pale stones
sleeping like enchanted children
beneath rent, mossy blankets
Sing the wolfsong,
rant widdershins through a forest
out of time, behind the Moon,
cobbled from snips of story
fireside-chanted & wisps of dream;
send voice fluting through
chambered moonlight, spill blood
on the wormholed foxed pages
of a gramarye lost for aeons.
Call Herne to the
Dance, in shattered silk
run windward alongside the Wild Hunt
thundering enhorsed in ebony splendor
fleeing madly though heather
down hill skirting stone circle
to plunge through shuttered town:
battened against wild witchcraft
they hold candles to the immense
darkness of a world of magic & madness.
Rattle doors, loose the witless noisy dogs
to join the quadrille, the Hunters’ Ball,
the fairies’ procession from dark to light
across the world before dawn, fools dance
in laughter and mayhem to finally
Fall to rest in the sweetling meadow
where our moonstruck cows lie dreaming
a step from havened cottage,
from hearthfire that busily sweeps
nasty dark magic from its white stoop.
We fall into a jackdaws’ nest of quilts,
layer of forest, leafbrown, watergreen
layer of stone, shadow, pale earthed bones
layer of cloud, moondark, enskied childseyes
World into world we bind the wild magic,
make it fast with cord & chanted rhyme
& sleep entwined…back of Moon,
beyond the dark, in the twelve quarters
of the wind.