Samhain.

[daniwithtea]

With all my focus on "November! November!", I almost forgot that today is Samhain. I had some things I'd put off last year and the year before...maybe I put it off, or maybe the time just wasn't right until now. Maybe I just wasn't ready. Tonight, I lit a candle, got myself a bucket of water, and brought out The Box. The Box has been sitting in my closet for over two years now. It moved from Green Lane to Downingtown with me. In a lot of ways, it moved farther than that. The Box held remnants of my last relationship, pre-Mer, pre-hospital, pre-meds. It held notes, a grocery list, a t-shirt, some stickers, hard copies of emails, and other various detritus that accumulated during that particular two years in my life. They were my first female lovers, my intro to bdsm, a two-year whirlwind of love and anger and sex and tears and....just a lot. Things I've been holding on to, not just physically.

So tonight, in true "Dani celebrates a holiday" fashion, I set it on fire.

I remembered the good and the bad. I gave thanks for everything I learned, and for all the love that was there. I went over each piece of that life and the memories that went with it. And as I watched it burn, I let it all go with the smoke.

I read a blessing from my Celtic Devotional, and read my personal Samhain piece, which was (rather ironically) originally written for what became our last Samhain together. Then I asked Mer to come in, and I re-read a shorter version of that same Samhain piece. I blew out the candle, we dumped the water and ashes into The Box on top of everything that couldn't safely be burned, and Mer took it out of the house for me.

I have a headache (I always do after ritual), and I can feel the irritation in my lungs from all the smoke, but it's done, and I feel good.




Samhain.
Change of season, change of light.
Days grow dark, yet my heart grows lighter still.
For my own strength and knowledge fills me
Flight only with soaring wings
Not with scared heart/mind/soul
Screams of terror past feed smiles yet to come
Ever learning, changing, growing
Feelings change and hearts unknowing
Burn the power, free the fear
Time has passed, so far to near
Journeys end begin again
And round and round and round

Fear.
Fear of known, of un-, of sighs and fun and laughter reigning down on sunny days.
Time.
Passes, flows, like string through sand and water trees unfolding hands seeing blue as bluest skies can be.
Change.
To feel, hope, care, understand, hold. Change.
Sunset of the year.

The horizon is red, like a true sailor's dream.

Beauty will come
There will be pain
There will be hope
There will be new breath

Before next Samhain, many things will come to pass.
Passing cars.
Passing trees.

But constant hope
Constant love
Constant strength

We leave behind the pain, the sorrow, the tears.

We welcome the joy, the strength, the love.
Caught in the goddess' wheel we turn

And pray that the things she has worked so hard to build

Will finally come to pass.


(c) Danielle Nelson, 2004, originally posted here