Wild is the Way

Ye old gods of the greenlands and the raging forests have gone to ground.

Your acolytes were burnt, stretched upon the rack, hung,  cruelly drowned.

For century after century until now. Druids — we who know the old, oak tree -

Were found only in histories, myths, tales. But, come, walk with me in this freezing mist

Of a deep-winter's night —  don’t get squeamish and don’t take fright. We are kissed

By the sky and the moon’s milky light: shadowing the yew trees and the wild oaks.

See with me the holly and the ivy and the mistletoe in sacred groves. The living dead,

Dew’Featha, O Queen of my Wood, whispers her songs so deep in our blood.

She dances with winter at the end of a rhyme, settles in frost as church bells

Chime. She’s leading us into the heart of the wood, moving with elegance, just

As a Queen should. She's whirling her feet, echoing my fluttered heart’s beat.

We’re close to the secrets that grew from the roots and are planted in minds

And are played on the flutes, where the spirits of trees will tumble and sneeze,

As we sing our laments at the end of the day and whisper the stories that don’t fade away.