Musings

The heART of Ritual

Welcome to the MUSINGS room in our digital nest! Here you will find an extensive selection of articles, poetry, prose, videos, recipes, and tutorials that journey the natural cycles, seasons, elements, and archetypes in the Celtic Wheel of the Year, as well as our Irish indigenous festivals, folklore, and customs.

This is lovingly provided as a free community resource, however it is copyrighted content. As such, we respectfully ask that if you share this content outside of this dedicated space, either in whole, in part, or paraphrased, that you credit the author and source. Thank you.

Seasonal Poetry & Prose: 'The Cold Earth Slept Below' by Percy Bysshe Shelley

The cold earth slept below; Above the cold sky shone; And all around, With a chilling sound, From caves of ice and fields of snow The...

The Ancient Midwinter Deer Mother Goddess

Female reindeer are unique with regard to other deer species in that they grow and shed antlers. This attribute is part of the mythology...

Scottish Folklore: 'The Laird of Balmachie's Wife'

In the olden times, when it was the fashion for gentlemen to wear swords, the Laird of Balmachie went one day to Dundee, leaving his...

The Ancient Pagan Goddesses of Winter

There are many goddesses associated with this time of the year, so in this post we will take a brief look at some of them, collectively,...

Seasonal Poetry & Prose: 'And death shall have no dominion', by Dylan Thomas

And death shall have no dominion. Dead men naked they shall be one With the man in the wind and the west moon; When their bones are...

In Loving Memory of Robert Bly

"He was a King, a seer and a poet. He was a lord with a manifold and great train. He was our magician, our knowledgeable one, our...

Seasonal Poetry & Prose: 'Melancholic Perception', by Theodore Roethke

It was beginning winter, An in-between time, The landscape still partly brown: The bones of weeds kept swinging in the wind, Above the...

Irish Paganism Does Not Belong In The Past

When people first discover, (or rediscover), Irish spiritual and animist tradition I notice that, for non-Irish seekers, at least, there...

When The Source Ran Free: A Story For The Present Time

Watching the sun rise over the wetlands, the mist fading, even here in the midst of nature there is the strange stillness of a world in ...

Ancient Irish Star Lore: The Pleiades, Fairies and the Ancestral Dead

When it comes to ancient Ireland, star lore is conspicuous by its absence. There are some theories that the Celtic stories of Gods,...

The Time of the Cailleach

It is again a time of seasonal change and the Cailleach has stepped through the veil and into our world. The fields are bare and the wind...

The Turn of the Seasons

I was reading about a white stag shot by police in England today and I was reminded of both this image by Vexim and the almost archaic...

Samhain and the Return of the Dead

As we begin to approach Samhain, and the astronomical cross-quarter, I though I'd begin to post some traditions associated with this...

Samhain and the Seed

I recently finished Andrew Micheal Hurley’s excellent folklore novel, Starve Acre. Without spoilers, the protagonist discovers the bones...

Mirror Folklore at Samhain: Reflections of The Otherworld

Although the following custom is considered romantic, I must admit that I've always found it slightly eerie and disturbing. There are a...

Fairies: Navigators or Passengers of the Dream?

Writing in Fairies, Demons, and Nature Spirits: 'Small Gods' at the Margins of Christendom, Professor Lisa Bitel draws attention to the...

Burning the Fairy

I attended an excellent lecture by Dr. Thomas Waters this week entitled Fairies, Curses and Witches: The Uses and Abuses of Magic in...

The Land of Fairies and Giants

There are many places in Ireland said to be the domain of giants, as well as ancient monuments believed to have been built by them....

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