The Work: Summer Solstice, Avebury
Across the land this morn, a roll of light
Gave birth to shadows, cast from chalky hills
The larks ascended, sang away the night
Vibrated sky to waking with their trills
‘Tis Summer; round the circle swirls the breeze
As darkness yields unto the swell of day
As every meadow hums with birds and bees
And scent of elder steals the breath away
This is the time, when earth craves heaven’s kiss
All full of lust, all bursting in its bloom
All lost in heady momentary bliss
Before the fall, and crashing down to doom
Now comes the wren, as if from nowhere blown
Within its beak a lively twig of oak
And suddenly, forth from a door of stone
Springs sacred fire, and wild midsummer smoke
And from within the smoke the King appears
From black stream spilled, the son of mountain high
With shield burnished bright by virgins’ tears
And salamander flame within his eye
Upon his head a crown of acorns sits
He holds a horn of gold from faery lands
Across his face a flick of fear flits
He plants his feet on earth, and solid stands
And She; blue butterflies around her head
Bare breasted, barefoot, riding a white mare
With piercing speedwell eyes to blind the dead
And poppies red all woven in her hair
She rides, in to the circle, on her horse
Dismounts in silence, looks him in the face
Above them both, the sun, stopped in its course
For here is now, and only now, this place
He touches her, he places sword to cup
She speaks some ancient magic without sound
Above their heads the heavens open up
Bright waterfalls of light pour to the ground
She touches him, and fossils shake from sleep
Electric rivers rise with shock and force
To flood the sky with fire from the deep
All light in circuit, flowing back to source
Just now, oh now, now come, now come; now gone
All energy subsides, and colours dim
They rise up from the ground they laid upon
He steps away, and bows, and She to him
A feather from a lark falls gracefully
To land among the flowers where they sat
He fades into the smoke, and so does She
And so The Work is done, and that is that
The wren returns, and sits upon a stone
A holly berry glistens at its feet
It sings a song through all the ages known
A song of earthly bliss, and heaven sweet
For all the Gods are one God, sang the wren
All Goddesses one Goddess, ‘neath one Sun
And we are one another, Gods, and men
As God and Goddess, joined together; One
© Gail Foster 2016
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