Well...I've been away for a while. Attending to home things and family and holiday dinners and school presentations and sick children and drawing excursions and a new computer, among other things. And now I feel, on this brand new day of 2013, that I can return a bit to myself. On the winter solsitce I fashioned this new winter alter...
...listening deeply for the blessings and lessons of the season of darkness. Things are asleep, the sky is dark, the moon on the snow bright. I light the little fires on my alter and burn the new studio fireplace....
...beckoning to the light to enter my life and help me find clarity for the new year, the next turn around the sun. Tea is sipped and ideas and dreams of plans are swirling; the new year a open book. I wanted to share a very dear poem by John O'Donohue for this special day, given kindly to me by my sweet friend Ellen. May your new year be blessed always, in all ways.
A Blessing For The New Year
By John O’Donohue
On the day when
The weight deadens
On your shoulders
And you stumble,
May the clay dance
To balance you.
And when your eyes
Freeze behind
The gray window
And the ghost of loss gets into you,
May a flock of colors,
Indigo, red, green
And azure blue,
Come to awaken in you,
A meadow of delight.
When the canvas frays
In the curragh of thought
And a stain of ocean
Blackens beneath you,
May there come across the waters
A path of yellow moonlight
To bring you safely home.
May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
May the clarity of light be yours,
May the fluency of the ocean be yours,
May the protections of the ancestors be yours,
And, so may a slow
Wind work these words
Of love around you,
An invisible cloak
To mind your life.
...and so, the beautiful poem given to you, given to me. Beautiful and very moving. Thank-you my friend Fran. You add depth to my life.
Posted by: alix | January 01, 2013 at 05:42 PM
I stand still so I may be moved towards enlightenment. Happy New Year to the dearest friend I know. What a beautiful poem to open the new year. May you dance always in the sunlight.
Posted by: Kathy | January 03, 2013 at 05:28 PM