close up of snow drop in clutch of snowdrops, in low light, dark behind, but the front ones have a little weak sunlight on them, and are just beginning to open.
Inclement Weather for Immortal Hags
February comes in on a storm, wind
shaking the roof to its rotten core, slates
chattering. We are spare teeth compacted
in its jaw like enchanted sleepers. Trees
tapping at our panes with fingerbones loaned
from the dead, infecting our fractured dreams.
Everything screaming. All gale, no owl.
No one could rest through a night like this.
The day rises up like a flood, inevitable.
My ancestors shudder in my skin. We go out
not because the day is better,
but because the nights are worse. We go out
to move our blood. We meet three deer
on the common. We see a giant raven
carrying sticks in their beak. At the top
of our tiny world, a weak sun blinks
through cloud. The lightning rod of the white
birch I tied a red thread round
on this same day in an antique era
watching suspiciously with its many eyes.
The thread – a spell against loss, a plea
for mercy from the perilous realm – frays
into a sleety wind. Next year
it will vanish entirely. I won’t notice for months.
It’s not raining or snowing. It’s not fine either.
The lake slate grey like a roof or wall
that would shut any mortal out.
Is it winter enough for an end to winter?
We declare inclement weather for immortal
hags. Aged as we have, a thousand
years in the turbulent dark, my crone
shadow on top of me now. We have
one foot in this place and one in another
and something is dragging at both of our hands.
I want to go home. I want to sleep through.
I want the cave and the torpor. I want
to take all these layers off and lie skin bared
to a parallel sky. Do immortal hags
feel their feelings? I’m feeling all mine.
We have left an offering of our sadness, our small
despairs poor fuel for her fire.
An imbolc poem from #EmergencyDream. I wish you inclement weather for immortal hags today. I wish you fuel enough for your fire but less need for it. I wish you an early and thorough thaw. Melted ice. A new season of hope blooming. Spring spring spring spring spring. #Imbolc #BrigidsDay #Cailleach
