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Midwinter Festival
All posts tagged Midwinter Festival
I remember so well.
That tang of wood smoke in the air
Crisp clear frosty evenings
Lights twinkling from ages old windows
Once looked through by ancients in years so long ago
I remember as we sat together in love,hearing sounds
The gravelly crunch outside
Booted feet in frost hardened snow.
Laughter of that midwinter season
Passers by. Passing by. Wooly hats and enfolded in scarves.
Words of joy mixed with steamy breath.
At our beginning
The start of our dreams and desire
And awakening passion
Windows morning frosted with rimey white ice
I’d rise and wipe a warm hand over cold wetness on the glass
Watch a fresh new world of hope and beginning
As the town started to stir.
Bright sun in a cold blue sky
As you slept still in our warm loving bed
I loved to hear you stir, bed creaking as you turned
Your soft breathing changing
As morning and wakefulness instilled its freshness in you.
A car starting outside Coughing as blue smoke clouded the clear air.
The sound of ice being scraped from a glass.
As exhaust smoke joined the fray.
And I’d slide in beside you to feel the closeness of you
The warmth of body and heart as I kissed you
You sighed and murmured
At the start of our dream.
I felt your warm arms enfold me in love and my protection
From the evil of this world of tears and hate
“I love you.” you’d smile.
Tousled hair and sleepy dark eyes
And our joy for a new day. A new life.
Our escape. Our freedom to strive
Against those that would tarnish our love if they could
But they won’t
And rising. Our day began.
Noses tickled by the tang of wood smoke.
©2010 Stan Rogers. All rights reserved.
I personally love Christmas. Not because of it’s quasi religious connotations but because of it’s true meaning.
Christmas as we call it is actually a pagan ceremony. Yes it is. Where in the bible did Christ celebrate with Yule logs, Christmas trees, holly and ivy, mistletoe and all the other modern paraphenalia. These traditions are far older and probably druidic in tradition.
The true Christmas celebrates light from darkness and was set for the shortest day of the year (21 December) it has nothing to do with any virgin birth in the middle east. Basically the church hijacked the ceremony when it realized that it could not persuade the people to stop their true worship. I suppose they summed it up as ‘If you can’t beat them , join them’ and make it ours. As I have explained before religion is the original shyster politics, whether so called christian or islamic.(Lack of capitals intended)
But the true Christmas, or Midwinter festival as it should be called has far more sublimity attached to it than fake christian belief.
Even historians now believe that ancient sites such as Stonehenge did not celebrate midsummer but were astronomical alarm clocks for telling when it was the shortest day, not the longest and celebrating it.
The true Midwinter festival celebrated the changing of the year. From nights getting darker, to days getting longer. A time of spiritual or rather human re-birth. A time to celebrate the start of the run up to spring. Times were hard and they feasted on their stored food as the time to plant new crops arrived and decorated their homes with green things, such as holly and ivy and mistletoe, even fir trees. Probably some of the few green things in the Northern hemisphere in late December. Animals were killed to feast on not merely for ritualistic reason but because the previous years feed stuff would be low or almost out. So the sensible thing would be to kill and eat surplus livestock, keeping any remaining supplies for breeding stock for this new year.
And that is why I celebrate Midwinter festival. Rebirth of humankind. Rebirth of spirit and hope and the happiness of life starting over. Not for some pathetic excuse to force a false middle eastern religion on us all.
Stan M Rogers 