The bee is enclosed, and shines preserved, in a tear of the sisters of Phaeton, so that it seems enshrined in its own nectar. It has obtained a worthy reward for its great toils; we may suppose that the bee itself would have desired such a death.
– Martial (Marcus Valerius Martialis
Return of the Goddess
Under your Milky Way
And slow-revolving Bear
Frogs from the alder thicket pray
In terror of your judgement day,
Loud with repentance there.
The log they crowned as king
Grew sodden, lurched and sank;
An owl floats by on silent wing
Dark water bubbles from the spring;
They invoke you from each bank.
At dawn you shall appear,
A gaunt red-legged crane,
You whom they know too well for fear,
Lunging your beak down like a spear
To fetch them home again.
Sufficiunt
Tecum,
Caryatis,
Domnia
Quina.
-Robert Graves
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Happy Friday, and Solstice Greetings a Day Late.…
I have had a wonderful day… with a bit of natural mystery, a nice afterglow from the previous evening thrown in, and the pleasures of a summers day as well.
I hope this finds you with friends and loved ones!
Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm
—-
On The Menu:
Summer Solstice In Portland…
From Morgan: Bat For Lashes – Whats a Girl To Do
The Swarm
Poetry That Hums
Bat for Lashes – Moon and Moon
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Summer Solstice In Portland…
We had a quiet evening with Trish and Kyle, recently transplanted up to Portland from the Bay Area. They were married last fall, and moved up here shortly afterwards.
Mary fixed a nice meal of Cous-Cous, and the evening flowed nicely. Kyle and Trish are involved with a nice scene Dance and Art Culture. .. Kyle does some wonderful photography which will be featured in the next Invisible College. Trish is starting up a small business in the fall…
We ate, talked and drank into the late evening. It was a bit of magick
We had a very nice time, and the Solstice was celebrated by candlelight, not Bonfire this year.
Rowan was off for a celebration with friends, first Summer Solstice he has been elsewhere… wings seem to spread every day….
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From Morgan: Bat For Lashes – Whats a Girl To Do
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The Swarm
His labor is a chant,
His idleness a tune;
Oh, for a bee’s experience
Of clovers and of noon!
– Emily Dickinson
Our morning hosted an interesting phenomena…
I was doing dishes… and Mary called me to the back door… To the south of our house and just overhead was a huge swarm of bees. It must of been a hiving occurring!
The air was dense with flying bee bodies, and a most wonderful hum filled the air. I went out and stood quietly underneath it, trying to catch the direction that they might be choosing.
When I looked up, you could see the pattern of the seeking dance, a mandala made manifest, undulating beneath the sky…
At first, it seemed like they would settle into our neighbors tree, then I thought they were heading into a hole in the side of the house; but after an hour our so, they had practically vanished except for scout bees flying to and fro.
A most wonderful morning….
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Poetry That Hums…
The little bee returns with evening’s gloom,
To join her comrades in the braided hive,
Where, housed beside their might honey-comb,
They dream their polity shall long survive.
– Charles Tennyson Turner,
A Summer Night in the Bee Hive
—
So work the honey-bees;
Creatures, by a rule in nature teach
The art of order to a peopled kingdom.
They have a king and officers of sorts;
Where some, like magistrates, correct at home;
Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad;
Others, like soldiers, armed in their stings,
Make boot upon the summer’s velvet buds;
Which pillage they, with merry march, bring home,
To the tent royal of their emperor;
Who, busied in his majesty, surveys
The singing masons building roofs of gold;
The civil citizens kneading up the honey;
The poor mechanic porters crowding in
Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate;
The sad-ey’d justice, with his surly hum,
Delivering o’er to executors pale
The lazy yawning drone.
Therefore doth heaven divide
The state of man in divers functions,
Setting endeavor in continual motion;
To which is fixed as an aim or butt
Obedience; for so work the honeybees,
Creatures that by a rule in nature teach
The act of order to a peopled kingdom.
They have a king, and officers of sorts,
Where some like magistrates correct at home,
Others like merchants venture trade abroad,
Others like soldiers armed in their stings
Make boot upon the summer’s velvet buds,
Which pillage they with merry march bring home
To the tent-royal of their emperor,
Who, busied in his majesties, surveys
The singing masons building roofs of gold,
The civil citizens kneading up the honey,
The poor mechanic porters crowding in
Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate,
The sad-eyed justice with his surly hum
Delivering o’er to executors pale
The lazy yawning drone.
– William Shakespeare
—
The wild Bee reels from bough to bough
With his furry coat and his gauzy wing,
Now in a lily cup, and now
Setting a jacinth bell a-swing,
In his wandering.
– Oscar Wilde (Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde),
Her Voice 
“O bees, sweet bees!” I said; “that nearest field
Is shining white with fragrant immortelles
Fly swiftly there and drain those honey wells.”
– Helen Hunt Jackson (Helen Hunt), My Bees
Even bees, the little almsmen of spring bowers, know there is richest juice in poison-flowers.
– John Keats
Listen! O, listen!
Here come the hum the golden bees
Underneath full blossomed trees,
At once with glowing fruit and flowers crowned.
– James Russell Lowell, The Sirens
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And a parting gift….
Bat for Lashes – Moon and Moon
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