RETURN OF THE LIGHT

It is Imbolc, the Celtic festival celebrating the day that the land reawakens after winter and the sun and light returns to Earth. But in this year, two thousand and fourteen Mother Earth, Gaia, is under siege. Her death by water torture is her imminent punishment for the sins of her people. At the time of the Winter Solstice, the shortest day, the rain started and it rained continuously for forty days and forty nights as predicted long long ago.

But the builders wouldn't listen. They built on Barrow Mump and on the flood plains of Arthurian legend. They turned their backs on reason and built their dreams on sand. But sand can turn to mud and mud can silt rivers, and rivers can rise, and river water will always find a way of reaching the great seas and oceans. The builders were consumed by their passion for making gold, but were wise enough to build their own homes on higher ground. And fill them with good things to eat and drink.

The skies filled with sadness, seeing the world was nearing its end. They spilt their tears over Gaia, crying over her demise. Branches of birch held their tears at the end of their spindles until they became so heavy that they drooped and could no longer hold on. The tears plopped onto the ground and formed channels of grief. The channels trickled into the streams, and the streams poured into the rivers. In the South and the West the rivers rose. Parrett and Tone, Severn and Thames rose up in angst high above their banks, and looking for ways to escape, they divided, again and again,flowing fast and furious over anything standing in their wake. Kelpies, spirits of water horses, lured people to ride on their backs, tricking them,they drowned their riders and ate them up.

So the flooding and the devastation began. But the builders and their leaders still wouldn't listen or see. They were blind to the suffering of their people, deaf to the distress calls of robins and blackbirds, oblivious to the drowning of otters and foxes, ignored the flooding of fields and forests, the demise of horses and cows, but still they continued to count their gold in coffers on high ridges. But the mountains could no longer hold the glaciers. Gaia was angry and she could no longer hold the world safely in her hands. As the glaciers slipped from her grasp, they melted and joined the rivers in their race for the ocean. The oceans swelled, and their seas grew fuller and fiercer, forming tsunamis. And the tsunamis joined the torment of the torrents backlashing over Mother Earth until there was only salt and acid water, and total misery in our world.

And finally the builders and their leaders listened to the silence of the stillness and saw the devastation and the damage. And they looked into their own torn souls but could find no use for their gold to redeem themselves. So they emptied their pockets and threw their coins up high into the northern skies. And the coins were caught by dancing Fir Chlis, who threw the golden coins across the sky in a streak of dazzling green light to Aurora, the Goddess of the Dawn. And Aurora changing form from crone to maiden mounted the sun and began her journey to return the light back to Mother Earth for the forthcoming Festival of Imbolc. And so the proverb was born, 'What doth it profit a man if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his own soul?'

Janet Daniel

February 1^st, Imbolc 2014