Gwyllm.com

So… here we are, it is 2007, and it is a Summer Of Love. Not in San Francisco this time, but here in Portland. Surrounded by friends, family and our communities, physical and virtual. It all is the same thing isn’t it?
Love is the lubricant that keeps the world turning, the universe changing, and life renewing. Love is the secret ingredient to every mystery, joy, and moment.
Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm
On The Menu:

Young Eildon Visits Caer Llwydd/ & a bit of Wordsworth

Rowan & Syzygy

Keats Poetry…

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Young Eildon
I am in love with my Adopted-Grandson, Eildon. He is the light of many an eye! He is the son of Catherine, my Nephew Andrew’s partner. Andrew stepped up to the plate, and became Eildon’s Adopted Dad. He is a Love our Andrew is…
Here is a nice shot of Catherine and Eildon, on their visit to us last weekend…

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar:

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come

From God, who is our home:

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!

Shades of the prison-house begin to close

Upon the growing Boy,

But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,

He sees it in his joy;

The Youth, who daily farther from the east

Must travel, still is Nature’s Priest,

And by the vision splendid

Is on his way attended;

At length the Man perceives it die away,

And fade into the light of common day.

(Wordsworth – INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD)
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Eildon and Gwyllm. Looked into a babies eyes lately? I recommend it. Stars, Space, Clouds of Glory…

Another one!

And another! Eildon suspects that mustaches are actually caterpillars…

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Our son Rowan and Syzygy…

Rowan and Syzygy have been together for a month.

They are new at the whole relationship thing, but they seem to be a very good match.
She is very much into Science, and well Rowan is a poet by nature…
See? Love is Blooming Everywhere! 8o)

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A Bit Of Keats….

The Human Seasons….
Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;

There are four seasons in the mind of man:

He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear

Takes in all beauty with an easy span:

He has his Summer, when luxuriously

Spring’s honied cud of youthful thought he loves

To ruminate, and by such dreaming high

Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves

His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings

He furleth close; contented so to look

On mists in idleness–to let fair things

Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook.

He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,

Or else he would forego his mortal nature.

—
To Hope
When by my solitary hearth I sit,

And hateful thoughts enwrap my soul in gloom;

When no fair dreams before my “mind’s eye” flit,

And the bare heath of life presents no bloom;

Sweet Hope, ethereal balm upon me shed,

And wave thy silver pinions o’er my head!
Whene’er I wander, at the fall of night,

Where woven boughs shut out the moon’s bright ray,

Should sad Despondency my musings fright,

And frown, to drive fair Cheerfulness away,

Peep with the moonbeams through the leafy roof,

And keep that fiend Despondence far aloof!
Should Disappointment, parent of Despair,

Strive for her son to seize my careless heart;

When, like a cloud, he sits upon the air,

Preparing on his spell-bound prey to dart:

Chase him away, sweet Hope, with visage bright,

And fright him as the morning frightens night!
Whene’er the fate of those I hold most dear

Tells to my fearful breast a tale of sorrow,

O bright-eyed Hope, my morbidfancy cheer;

Let me awhile thy sweetest comforts borrow:

Thy heaven-born radiance around me shed,

And wave thy silver pinions o’er my head!
Should e’er unhappy love my bosom pain,

From cruel parents, or relentless fair;

O let me think it is not quite in vain

To sigh out sonnets to the midnight air!

Sweet Hope, ethereal balm upon me shed,

And wave thy silver pinions o’er my head!
In the long vista of the years to roll,

Let me not see our country’s honour fade:

O let me see our land retain her soul,

Her pride, her freedom; and not freedom’s shade.

From thy bright eyes unusual brightness shed

Beneath thy pinions canopy my head!
Let me not see the patriot’s high bequest,

Great Liberty! how great in plain attire!

With the base purple of a court oppress’d,

Bowing her head, and ready to expire:

But let me see thee stoop from heaven on wings

That fill the skies with silver glitterings!
And as, in sparkling majesty, a star

Gilds the bright summit of some gloomy cloud;

Brightening the half veil’d face of heaven afar:

So, when dark thoughts my boding spirit shroud,

Sweet Hope, celestial influence round me shed,

Waving thy silver pinions o’er my head!

—
On The Grasshopper And Cricket
The poetry of earth is never dead:

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,

And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run

From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;

That is the Grasshopper’s–he takes the lead

In summer luxury,–he has never done

With his delights; for when tired out with fun

He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.

The poetry of earth is ceasing never:

On a lone winter evening, when the frost

Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills

The Cricket’s song, in warmth increasing ever,

And seems to one in drowsiness half lost,

The Grasshopper’s among some grassy hills.

—

On the Menu:

Two Recent Events

Two Zen Parables

The Poetry of W.H. Auden

Art: Jessie M. King…
A few articles for catch up and all that… be sure to tune into the radio, 18 hours of new sounds!
Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm

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Two Recent Events:

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The Dragon Boat Races!
Rowans’ Dragon Boat, ‘Dragon Funk’ taking 1st place in its 1st heat of The Portland Dragon Races during Rose Week, the weekend before the last…. (The Rose Parade was going full bore at this point as well). There are several levels of competition, Rowan’s Team was competing in the High School Division/Level. They took 4th overall, out of some 24 teams…!

Rowan at the end of that race! The energy was very dynamic, and the Team was practically floating off their feet when they came up off of the deck…..! The event spanned the whole weekend… Mary and I stayed pretty much through the whole event. Rain, Shine, Rain Shine. Portland in June. Ya gotta love it, and look at all the different shades of grey!

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Visiting with Will & Ed
Towards the end of last week, we were blessed by a visit from our friend Will Penna and his long time friend Ed. The were just finishing up a 10 day tour of the North West from their homes in the Bay Area. Ed lives in San Francisco, and Will lives up in Sonoma County.
They went up all the way into Canada, and then back down…
Will and I have been crossing paths since 1966… We have known the same people, and been at the same events, but only got to meet back in 1998 or 1999, you know, last century. *0) It was nice seeing them both, and having a chat in the morning sun.
Cymon came over as well to meet Will, but wasn’t quite ready for the early morning camera. It was a very wide ranging conversation, with the birds overhead, Sofie the dog running around the rabbit hutch, and all the plants coming into bloom.
Anyway, we had a nice couple of hours, and it was great meeting Ed after all these years. He plans to come back north with his daughter in the fall, hopefully we will arrange some time out to the beach and all…
Will said he is planning to come north again as well. Hopefully we get more time together soon!
Do you know of the endless conversation? We always seem to pick up where we left off!

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Two Zen Parables….

Taming the Mind
After winning several archery contests, the young and rather boastful champion challenged a Zen master who was renowned for his skill as an archer. The young man demonstrated remarkable technical proficiency when he hit a distant bull’s eye on his first try, and then split that arrow with his second shot.
“There,” he said to the old man, “see if you can match that!”
Undisturbed, the master did not draw his bow, but rather motioned for the young archer to follow him up the mountain.
Curious about the old fellow’s intentions, the champion followed him high into the mountain until they reached a deep chasm spanned by a rather flimsy and shaky log. Calmly stepping out onto the middle of the unsteady and certainly perilous bridge, the old master picked a far away tree as a target, drew his bow, and fired a clean, direct hit.
“Now it is your turn,” he said as he gracefully stepped back onto the safe ground.
Staring with terror into the seemingly bottomless and beckoning abyss, the young man could not force himself to step out onto the log, no less shoot at a target.
“You have much skill with your bow,” the master said, sensing his challenger’s predicament, “but you have little skill with the mind that lets loose the shot.”

—-

Egotism
The Prime Minister of the Tang Dynasty was a national hero for his success as both a statesman and military leader. But despite his fame, power, and wealth, he considered himself a humble and devout Buddhist. Often he visited his favorite Zen master to study under him, and they seemed to get along very well. The fact that he was prime minister apparently had no effect on their relationship, which seemed to be simply one of a revered master and respectful student.
One day, during his usual visit, the Prime Minister asked the master, “Your Reverence, what is egotism according to Buddhism?” The master’s face turned red, and in a very condescending and insulting tone of voice, he shot back, “What kind of stupid question is that!?”
This unexpected response so shocked the Prime Minister that he became sullen and angry. The Zen master then smiled and said, “THIS, Your Excellency, is egotism.”

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The Poetry of W. H. Auden

After Reading a Child’s Guide to Modern Physics
As the son of a physicist, Auden had an enduring interest in science and the moral issues surrounding it.
If all a top physicist knows

About the Truth be true,

Then, for all the so-and-so’s,

Futility and grime,

Our common world contains,

We have a better time

Than the Greater Nebulae do,

Or the atoms in our brains.
Marriage is rarely bliss

But, surely it would be worse

As particles to pelt

At thousands of miles per sec

About a universe

Wherein a lover’s kiss

Would either not be felt

Or break the loved one’s neck.
Though the face at which I stare

While shaving it be cruel

For, year after year, it repels

An ageing suitor, it has,

Thank God, sufficient mass

To be altogether there,

Not an indeterminate gruel

Which is partly somewhere else.
Our eyes prefer to suppose

That a habitable place

Has a geocentric view,

That architects enclose

A quiet Euclidian space:

Exploded myths – but who

Could feel at home astraddle

An ever expanding saddle?
This passion of our kind

For the process of finding out

Is a fact one can hardly doubt,

But I would rejoice in it more

If I knew more clearly what

We wanted the knowledge for,

Felt certain still that the mind

Is free to know or not.
It has chosen once, it seems,

And whether our concern

For magnitude’s extremes

Really become a creature

Who comes in a median size,

Or politicizing Nature

Be altogether wise,

Is something we shall learn.

—
Voltaire At Ferney
Almost happy now, he looked at his estate.

An exile making watches glanced up as he passed,

And went on working; where a hospital was rising fast

A joiner touched his cap; an agent came to tell

Some of the trees he’d planted were progressing well.

The white alps glittered. It was summer. He was very great.
Far off in Paris, where his enemies

Whsipered that he was wicked, in an upright chair

A blind old woman longed for death and letters. He would write

“Nothing is better than life.” But was it? Yes, the fight

Against the false and the unfair

Was always worth it. So was gardening. Civilise.
Cajoling, scolding, screaming, cleverest of them all,

He’d had the other children in a holy war

Against the infamous grown-ups, and, like a child, been sly

And humble, when there was occassion for

The two-faced answer or the plain protective lie,

But, patient like a peasant, waited for their fall.
And never doubted, like D’Alembert, he would win:

Only Pascal was a great enemy, the rest

Were rats already poisoned; there was much, though, to be done,

And only himself to count upon.

Dear Diderot was dull but did his best;

Rousseau, he’d always known, would blubber and give in.
So, like a sentinel, he could not sleep. The night was full of wrong,

Earthquakes and executions. Soon he would be dead,

And still all over Europe stood the horrible nurses

Itching to boil their children. Only his verses

Perhaps could stop them: He must go on working: Overhead

The uncomplaining stars composed their lucid song.

—
Lay Your Sleeping Head, My Love
Lay your sleeping head, my love,

Human on my faithless arm;

Time and fevers burn away

Individual beauty from

Thoughtful children, and the grave

Proves the child ephermeral:

But in my arms till break of day

Let the living creature lie,

Mortal, guilty, but to me

The entirely beautiful.
Soul and body have no bounds:

To lovers as they lie upon

Her tolerant enchanted slope

In their ordinary swoon,

Grave the vision Venus sends

Of supernatural sympathy,

Universal love and hope;

While an abstract insight wakes

Among the glaciers and the rocks

The hermit’s sensual ecstasy.
Certainty, fidelity

On the stroke of midnight pass

Like vibrations of a bell,

And fashionable madmen raise

Their pedantic boring cry:

Every farthing of the cost,

All the dreadful cards foretell,

Shall be paid, but not from this night

Not a whisper, not a thought,

Not a kiss nor look be lost.
Beauty, midnight, vision dies:

Let the winds of dawn that blow

Softly round your dreaming head

Such a day of sweetness show

Eye and knocking heart may bless.

Find the mortal world enough;

Noons of dryness see you fed

By the involuntary powers,

Nights of insult let you pass

Watched by every human love.

Something for your Weekend…
The Linkage

The Poet’s Eye

The Lyrics of Roy Harper

Art: Bouguereau
Still dealing with some visual problems…
Gwyllm

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Linkage:

Start Your Own Cult…!

(Over his impressive career, he has started several cults, and seen at least two through completion and Removal to other Planes of Existence.)

Cooking with Viagra®.

The world’s most delicious recipes featuring Viagra, Cialis, Levitra, and other popular erectile dysfunction drugs.

Molecules with Silly or Unusual Names

The title sez it all…

’80 Mbytes of storage for under $12K!’

The past seen dimly through the eyes of advertisement!

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The Poet’s Eye – Brian Inglis
Drugs did not simply satisfy expectation; on occasion, they could nourish it. In the 1790s Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who had been prescribed laudanum—opium in an alcohol solution—for the relief of pain, found that it altered his perception; it could give him optical illusions—about distances, say:
The poet’s eye in his tipsy hour

Has a magnifying power

Or rather, the soul emancipates the eyes

Of the accidents of size
Laudanum could also start reveries in which his imagination appeared to carry him away, as if in a dream, but leaving him with sufficient consciousness to be able to direct, to some extent, the course they were taking. In one of them, he composed Kubla Khan.
Laudanum and laughing gas

Why comparable experiences had not been familiar before, remains a mystery. Opium had been used in Europe since medieval times; chiefly as a sedative, but doctors had come to realise that its effects could vary greatly. ‘It causes sleeping, and watching’—Dr. John Jones wrote, in a treatise published at the beginning of the eighteenth century—’stupidity and promptitude in business, cloudiness and serenity of mind. It excites the spirits, and yet quiets them; it relaxes, and weakens, yet it enables us to undergo labours, journeys, etc.; it causes a furious madness, yet composes the spirits above all things.’ But its vision-inducing potential was not grasped until Coleridge’s experience, and not generally known until the publication in 1822 of Thomas de Quincey’s Confessions of an English Opium Eater, with his description of what happened when he first took laudanum—tincture of opium in alcohol— for rheumatic pains in the head:
in an hour, O heavens! What a revulsion! what a resurrection, from its lowest depths of the inner spirit ! What an apocalypse of the world within me! That my pains had vanished was now a trifle in my eyes; this negative effect was swallowed up in the immensity of those positive effects which had opened up before me, in the abyss of divine enjoyment thus suddenly revealed. Here was a panacea … here was the secret of happiness, about which philosophers had disputed for so many ages, at once discovered; happiness might now be bought for a penny, and carried in the waistcoat pocket; portable ecstasies might be had corked up in a pint bottle; and peace of mind could be sent down by the mail.
Agony of mind was soon to follow—as Jones had warned; ‘great and even intolerable distresses, anxieties and depression of spirits’. So intolerable were the withdrawal symptoms that many respected citizens who had begun to take opium as Coleridge and de Quincey had done, for the relief of pain, were unable to break the habit. Some, laudanum destroyed; others, like William Wilberforce and Wilkie Collins, managed to come to terms with it, taking large but not increasing doses. But laudanum did not provide them with visions. It merely kept the distresses, anxieties and depressions at bay.
Might there not be other drugs, though, which could expand an artist’s horizon, without enslaving him? Shortly before the turn of the century Humphry Davy, the discoverer of nitrous oxide, found that ‘sniffing’ gave him a feeling of ecstasy; ‘nothing exists but thought’ he told himself as he awoke; ‘The universe is composed of impressions, ideas, pleasures and pains!’. Soon, ‘the laughing gas’ and ether were being dispensed at ‘frolics’, which became a popular pastime. In parts of Ulster, ether became so popular that its consumption took on the proportions of an epidemic, whose consequences were entertainingly described by K. H. Connell in his Irish Peasant Society, from contemporary accounts. The atmosphere of some towns ‘was “loaded” with ether. Hundreds of yards outside Draperstown, a visiting surgeon detected the familiar smell; market days smelt “not of pigs, tobacco smoke or of unwashed human beings”; even the bank “stove” of ether, and its reek on the Derry Central Railway was “disgusting and abominable”.’
The Ulstermen appear to have been using ether as a cheap alternative to alcohol; a tablespoonful—enough on which to get pleasantly, though briefly, inebriated—cost one penny. But some people used it as a vision-inducer. ‘You always heard music, and you’d be cocking your ears at it’, as an ether-taker put it; or you would ‘see men climbing up the walls and going through the roof, or coming in through the roof and down the walls, nice and easy’. What a man experienced after taking it was limited, apparently, by his capacity for experience. As De Quincey put it, if a man took opium whose talk was of oxen, he would dream about oxen—’if he were not too dull to dream’. For a few individuals, though, ether or laughing gas provided sensations which they would treasure throughout their lives. In his Varieties of Religious Experience, William James was to recall how they could ‘stimulate the mystical consciousness to an extraordinary degree’, and though the truths might fade, ‘the sense of a profound meaning having been there persists’.
The Forbidden Game

The gases, however, could be dangerous in inexperienced hands; and many experimenters could get little but hilarity out of them. An alternative possibility as vision-inducer was Indian hemp, introduced into France by the men of Napoleon’s army of the Nile, and taken up for experimental purposes in the 1840s by Jacques Moreau, a Parisian doctor who thought it might help in the treatment of patients suffering from mental illness. Trying it out on himself, he found it put him into paroxysms of uncontrollable laughter, and then gave him visions of an entirely pleasurable kind. ‘It is really happiness which is produced’, he wrote,
“and by this I mean an enjoyment entirely moral, and by no means sensual, as might be supposed—a very curious circumstance, from which some remarkable inferences might be drawn… for the hashish eater is happy, not like the gourmand or the famished man when satisfying his appetite, or the voluptuary in the gratification of his amative desires—but like him who hears tidings which fill him with joy, or like the miser counting his treasures, the gambler who is successful at play, or the ambitious man who is intoxicated with success. “

Dr. Moreau shared the delights of his discovery with the members of the Club des Hachichins, founded in 1844, Dumas, Gautier and Baudelaire being among its members. Gautier described his reactions to the drug two years later in the Revue de deux mondes: ‘frenetic, irresistible, implacable laughter’ succeeded by grotesque hallucinations, fantasies of droll dreams confusedly danced about; hybrid creations, formless mixtures of men, beasts and utensils; monks with wheels for feet and cauldrons for bellies: warriors, in armours of dishes, brandishing wooden swords in birds’ claws; statesmen moved by turnspit gears; kings plunged to the waist in salt-cellar turrets …
Baudelaire’s account was more clinical. People trying hashish for the first time, he observed, would complain that it had little effect, which might be attributed to their resistance. But it would suddenly hit them with ‘a sort of irrelevant and irresistible hilarity… as painful as a tickle’. Occasionally this led on to weakness and stupor, but for some people, ‘a new subtlety or acuity manifests itself in all the senses’, and this was when hallucinations set in. ‘External objects acquire, gradually and one after another, strange new appearances; they become distorted or transformed. Next occur mistakes in the identity of objects, and transposals of ideas. Sounds clothe themselves in colours; and colours contain music.’
Such experiences could be very satisfying; ‘the universality of all existence arrays itself before you in a new and hitherto unguessed at glory’. But in the end, for Baudelaire, they were regressive in their effects. The hashish-eater, he decided, ‘completely confounds dream with action, his imagination kindling more and more at the spectacle of his own nature corrected and idealised, he substitutes this fascinating image of himself for his real individuality—so poor in strength of will, and so rich in vanity’. And, the morrow! the terrible morrow! All the body’s organs lax and weary, nerves unstrung, itching desires to weep, the impossibility of applying oneself steadily to any task—all these cruelly teach you that you have played a forbidden game… The especial victim is the will, that most precious of the faculties. It is said, and it is almost true, that hashish has no evil physical effects; or, at worst, no serious ones. But can it be said that a man incapable of action, good only for dreaming, is truly well, even though all his members may be in their normal condition?
Other experimenters with hashish were to reach a similar conclusion; among them the American Fitzhugh Ludlow—though he stressed that it was not the drug, but man’s reliance on it, that caused the problems: ‘the soul withers and shrinks from its growth towards the true end of its being beneath the dominance of any sensual indulgence’, so that though the bondage might continue to be golden, there was all the while erosion of strength.
Not all the devotees of hashish experienced Baudelaire’s ‘terrible morrow’. A few were able to smoke it and examine its effects as dispassionately as they might have examined the effects of tobacco; among them the young Charles Richet, later to be a Professor of Physiology in Paris, and a Nobel prizewinner. Richet observed, as others had done, that for anybody under the influence of hashish, time could appear to stand still—or at least to pass more gradually; and in 1877 he presented a plausible explanation. Man’s mind, he pointed out, is full of indetermined and incomplete ideas, intertwined. Disentangling them took time; and ‘as time is only measured by the remembrance of ideas, it appears prodigiously long’. What hashish did was speed up the process:
“in the space of a minute we have fifty different thoughts; since in general it requires several minutes to have fifty different thoughts, it will appear to us that several minutes are passed, and it is only by going to the inflexible clock, which marks for us the regular passage of time, that we perceive our error. With hashish the notion of time is completely overthrown, the moments are years, and the minutes are centuries; but I feel the insufficiency of language to express this illusion, and I believe, that one can only understand it by feeling it for himself.”
But such detachment was rare among the members of the Club des Hachichins and their successors; and they had given hashish a reputation as a vision-inducer which experience, for the majority of people who tried it, failed to justify. It had been the atmosphere of the Club des Hachichins, and the personalities of its members, which had lent Indian hemp its potency, rather than any quality in the drug.

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The Lyrics of Roy Harper….

On Summer Day
thought I saw a swallow land

Upon my hand on summer day

I thought I saw my true love standing

In the sand

One old may day

I thought I hear the dolphins sing

‘You gotta bring her back

On summer day’
See her run along the tide line

Where the trade winds blow

Feel the breath of summer

In her hair, oh!

Underneath the shooting stars

I’ve wished and would you know

I thought I saw a swallow land

Upon my hand

On summer day
I thought I saw a swallow land

Upon my hand on summer day

But here in cold midwinter’s night

Another light has come to play

Steals across the misty sky

And bye and bye

She’ll maybe stay
Can there ever be again again

Another spring

Will the birds forever hold us

On the wing

Light the fire in our home of hearts

And hear me sing

I thought I saw a swallow land

Upon my hand on summer day

—
The Plough
The demons catch me

On the stair

And I don’t know where, I am

I don’t know how I got there

Where was I going?

What was I doing?

Before that same thought

Reached down and caught

Hooked me in the gut

Cursed me from every angle

As I was pulled out

Of the water again

And began to suffocate in pain

Desperately grappling

To untie the knot

That I can’t even get hold of

That I can’t see but only feel

What am I doing?

How the hell did I lose her?

How could i?

Why did I say things I didn’t mean?

Where have I just been?

The house creaks

In the silent parting

Of the day after day

Of no one

Not a sound

Why was she so mean?

Was it because she felt she could be

Because she felt she was right?

O what a prick I am

What a shite

And what am I holding?

O… Yes, it’s a plug

Why can’t she understand?

Because she’s never been left

She’s my drug

And now cold turkey

Where was I going?

To put it on the lamp

That’s right

I wonder whether she’s looked up

And seen the plough tonight

—
Evening Star
There’s a lady who knows you know

All the to’s and the fro’s they go

When they’re changing their minds

As the passion unwinds

But she knows as she watches

Over the evening star

That they’ll all be together

No matter where they all are
There’s a prince on a mountain top

And the mystery fills his cup

With the call of the wind

And a beautiful child

And she knows as she watches

Over the evening star

That they’ll all be together

No matter where thay all are
And she knows as she watches

Over the evening star

That we’ll all be together

No matter where thay all are
—
I am a child
I am a child

I am a sanctuary

Wild at my mother’s knee

Freedom has a piece of me

Every night I run away

Loose the nooses and drift astray

Chasing dreams into outer space

Trying to face

The day
Living life

Against the law

Forcing us all to endure

Sneaking home to close the door

Every night we run away

Loose the nooses and drift astray

Chasing dreams into outer space

Trying to face

The day
Every night we do our best to lose it

Skinning up and chasing better days

Getting up and moving to the music

O dance my darling lady fair

My darling mayflower

Show me just how much you dare

Forget our daytime labour
We’re in the wind

You feel us in the breeze

Teaching leaves

To grow the trees

Smoothing

Daytime memories

And every night we run away

Loose the nooses and drift astray

Chasing dreams into outer space

Trying to face

The day

18 hours of New Music On:
Radio Free EarthRites: Music For The Heart Of The World

Turn On Cut n Paste Into – Your Internet Radio Player!

-o-o-0-0-O Radio Free Earthrites! O-0-0-o-o-

87.194.36.124:8000/radio

87.194.36.124:8001/radio-low

87.194.36.124:8002/spokenword

On The Menu:

Lucy In The Sky…

The Links

2 Koans 4 U

Poetry: Herman Hesse

Free As A Bird

Art: The Divine Mr. Watts….
Yep, we are back and almost at full steam (some image crap-ola still going on) O, I am feeling just a bit rusty, and feel like I have been pulled through a hedge backwards…
But, we are up, and I have to thank our friend Doug Fraser for all his efforts, patience, and kindness in bringing the site and Turfing back on its feet.
When I get the new picture function working (it is not accepting new illustrations), we will have photos from the last week. Lots has been going on.
We shall tell all in good time O’ Gentle Reader, in good time.
Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm
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Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds…

=en_US&fs=1&”>

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The Links:

Heliocentrism is an Atheist Doctrine

Leviticus Fashion Tips…

Pagans are the Rodney Dangerfields of religion

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2 Koans’ 4 U
A Philosopher Asks Buddha
A philosopher asked Buddha: `Without words, without the wordless, will you you tell me truth?’
The Buddha kept silence.
The philosopher bowed and thanked the Buddha, saying: `With your loving kindness I have cleared away my delusions and entered the true path.’
After the philosopher had gone, Ananda asked the Buddha what he had attained.
The Buddha replied, `A good horse runs even at the shadow of the whip.’

—

Hyakujo’s Fox
Once when Hyakujo delivered some Zen lectures an old man attended them, unseen by the monks. At the end of each talk when the monks left so did he. But one day he remained after the had gone, and Hyakujo asked him: `Who are you?’
The old man replied: `I am not a human being, but I was a human being when the Kashapa Buddha preached in this world. I was a Zen master and lived on this mountain. At that time one of my students asked me whether the enlightened man is subject to the law of causation. I answered him: “The enlightened man is not subject to the law of causation.” For this answer evidencing a clinging to absoluteness I became a fox for five hundred rebirths, and I am still a fox. Will you save me from this condition with your Zen words and let me get out of a fox’s body? Now may I ask you: Is the enlightened man subject to the law of causation?’
Hyakujo said: `The enlightened man is one with the law of causation.’
At the words of Hyakujo the old man was enlightened. `I am emancipated,’ he said, paying homage with a deep bow. `I am no more a fox, but I have to leave my body in my dwelling place behind this mountain. Please perform my funeral as a monk.’ The he disappeared.
The next day Hyakujo gave an order through the chief monk to prepare to attend the funeral of a monk. `No one was sick in the infirmary,’ wondered the monks. `What does our teacher mean?’
After dinner Hyakujo led the monks out and around the mountain. In a cave, with his staff he poked out the corpse of an old fox and then performed the ceremony of cremation.
That evening Hyakujo gave a talk to the monks and told this story about the law of causation.
Obaku, upon hearing this story, asked Hyakujo: `I understand that a long time ago because a certain person gave a wrong Zen answer he became a fox for five hundred rebirths. Now I was to ask: If some modern master is asked many questions, and he always gives the right answer, what will become of him?’
Hyakujo said: `You come here near me and I will tell you.’
Obaku went near Hyakujo and slapped the teacher’s face with this hand, for he knew this was the answer his teacher intended to give him.
Hyakujo clapped his hands and laughed at the discernment. `I thought a Persian had a red beard,’ he said, `and now I know a Persian who has a red beard.’

___________________

The Poetry of Herman Hesse…
Dream
Guest at a monastery in the hills,

I stepped, when all the monks had gone to pray,

Into a book-lined room. Along the walls,

Glittering in the light of fading day,

I saw a multitude of vellum spines

With marvelous inscriptions. Eagerly,

Impelled by rapturous curiosity,

I picked the nearest book, and read the lines:

The squaring of the circle-Final Stage.

I thought: I’ll take this and read every page!

A quarto volume, leather tooled in gold,

Gave promise of a story still untold:

How Adam also ate of the other tree…

The other tree? Which one? The tree of life?

Is Adam then immortal? Now I could see

No chance had brought me here to this library.

I spied the back and edges of a folio

Aglow with all the colors of the rainbow,

Its hand-painted title stating a decree:

The interrelationships of hues and sound:

Proof that for every color may be found

In music a proper corresponding key.

Choirs of colors sparkled before my eyes

And now I was beginning to surmise:

Here was the library of Paradise.

To all the questions that had driven me

All the answers could be given me.

Here I could quench my thirst to understand,

For here all knowledge stood at my command.

There was provision here for every need:

A title fill of promise on each book

Responded to my every rapid look.

Here there was fruit to satisfy the greed

Of any student’s timid aspirations,

Here was the inner meaning, here the key,

To poetry, to wisdom, and to science.

Magic and erudition in alliance

Opened the door to every mystery.

Those books provided pledges of all power

To him who came here at this magic hour.
A lectern stood near by; with hands that shook

I placed upon it one enticing book,

Deciphered at a glance the picture writing,

As in a dream we find ourselves reciting

A poem or lesson we have never learned.

At once I soared aloft to starry spaces

Of the soul, and with the zodiac turned,

Where all the revelations of all races,

Whatever intuition has divined,

Millennial experience of all nations,

Harmoniously met in new relations,

Old insights with new symbols recombined,

So that in minutes or in hours as I read

I traced once more the whole path of mankind,

And all that men have ever done and said

Disclosed its inner meaning to my mind.

I read, and saw those hieroglyphic forms

Couple and part, and coalesce in swarms,

Dance for a while together, separate,

Once more in newer patterns integrate,

A kaleidoscope of endless metaphors-

And each some vaster, fresher sense explores.
Bedazzled by these sights, O looked away

From the book to give my eyes a moment’s rest,

And saw that I was not the only guest.

An old man stood before that grand array

Of tomes. Perhaps he was the archivist.

I saw that he was earnestly intent

Upon some task, and i could not resist

A strange conviction that I had to know

The manner of his work, and what it meant.

I watched the old man, with frail hand and slow,

Remove a volume and inspect what stood

Written upon its back, then saw him blow

With pallid lips upon the title-could

A title possibly be more alluring

Or offer greater promise of enduring

Delight? But now his finger wiped across

The spine. I saw it silently erase

The name, and watched with fearful sense of loss

As he inscribed another in its place

And then moved on to smilingly efface

One more, but only a newer title to emboss.

For a long while while I looked at him bemused,

The turned, since reason totally refused

To understand the meaning of his actions,

Back to my book-I’d seen but a few lines-

And found I could no longer read the signs

Or even see the rows of images.

The world of symbols I had barely entered

That had stirred me to such transports of bliss,

In which a universe of meaning centered,

Seemed to dissolve and rush away, careen

And reel and shake in feverish contractions,

And fade out, leaving nothing to be seen

But empty parchment with a hoary sheen.

I felt a hand upon me, felt it slide

Over my shoulder. The old man stood beside

My lectern, and I shuddered while

He took my book and with a subtle smile

Brushed his finger lightly to elide

The former title, then began to write

New promises and problems, novel inquiries,

New formulas for ancient mysteries.

Without a word, he plied his magic style.

Then, with my book, he disappeared from sight.

—-
I Know, You Walk–
I walk so often, late, along the streets,

Lower my gaze, and hurry, full of dread,

Suddenly, silently, you still might rise

And I would have to gaze on all your grief

With my own eyes,

While you demand your happiness, that’s dead.
I know, you walk beyond me, every night,

With a coy footfall, in a wretched dress

And walk for money, looking miserable!

Your shoes gather God knows what ugly mess,

The wind plays in your hair with lewd delight—

You walk, and walk, and find no home at all.

—-
How Heavy The Days

How heavy the days are.

There’s not a fire that can warm me,

Not a sun to laugh with me,

Everything bare,

Everything cold and merciless,

And even the beloved, clear

Stars look desolately down,

Since I learned in my heart that

Love can die.

—

A Swarm Of Gnats

Many thousand glittering motes

Crowd forward greedily together

In trembling circles.

Extravagantly carousing away

For a whole hour rapidly vanishing,

They rave, delirious, a shrill whir,

Shivering with joy against death.

While kingdoms, sunk into ruin,

Whose thrones, heavy with gold, instantly scattered

Into night and legend, without leaving a trace,

Have never known so fierce a dancing.

—

Without You

My Pillow gazes upon me at night

Empty as a gravestone;

I never thought it would be so bitter

To be alone,

Not to lie down asleep in your hair.
I lie alone in a silent house,

The hanging lamp darkened,

And gently stretch out my hands

To gather in yours,

And softly press my warm mouth

Toward you, and kiss myself, exhausted and weak-

Then suddenly I’m awake

And all around me the cold night grows still.

The star in the window shines clearly-

Where is your blond hair,

Where your sweet mouth?
Now I drink pain in every delight

And poison in every wine;

I never knew it would be so bitter

To be alone,

Alone, without you.
____________

Free As A Bird

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__________

It is all about Love in the end. No matter what you gained, spent. Who are You? What hearts did you touch?

G

It has been asked,

“How should those who enter

The path apply their minds?”

All things are originally uncreated

And presently undying.

Just let your mind be free;

You don’t have to restrain it.

See directly and hear directly;

Come directly and go directly.

When you must go, then go;

When you must stay, then stay.

This is the true path.

A scripture says,

“Conditional existence is the site

of enlightenment, insofar as you

know it as it really is.”

– Niu-t’ou Hui-chung (683-769)

__________
A Small Entry:

Steel Cathederals – David Sylvian

Seijo’s Two Souls

Poems of Ikkyu

—-

We are here because we came to do something. We came to take care of this place and make sure the ones that come after are greeted with Love. It boils down to this: What did we do to change it for the better?
More Love,
Gwyllm

________________________
David Sylvian – Steel Cathedrals (Part 1)

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_________________________

David Sylvian – Steel Cathedrals (Part 2)

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___________________________
Seijo’s Two Souls
Chokan had a very beautiful daughter named Seijo. He also had a handsome young cousin named Ochu. Joking, he would often comment that they would make a fine married couple. Actually, he planned to give his daughter in marriage to another man. But young Seijo and Ochu took him seriously; they fell in love and thought themselves engaged. One day Chokan announced Seijo’s betrothal to the other man. In rage and despair, Ochu left by boat. After several days journey, much to his astonishment and joy he discovered that Seijo was on the boat with him!
They went to a nearby city where they lived for several years and had two children. But Seijo could not forget her father; so Ochu decided to go back with her and ask the father’s forgiveness and blessing. When they arrived, he left Seijo on the boat and went to the father’s house. he humbly apologized to the father for taking his daughter away and asked forgiveness for them both.
“What is the meaning of all this madness?” the father exclaimed. Then he related that after Ochu had left, many years ago, his daughter Seijo had fallen ill and had lain comatose in bed since. Ochu assured him that he was mistaken, and, in proof, he brought Seijo from the boat. When she entered, the Seijo lying ill in bed rose to meet her, and the two became one.
Zen Master Goso, referrring to the legend, observed, “Seijo had two souls, one always sick at home and the other in the city, a married woman with two children. Which was the true soul?”

Bells and Robes
Zen Master Unmon said: “The world is vast and wide. Why do you put on your robes at the sound of a bell?”

_________________

Poems of Ikkyu

I Hate Incense
A master’s handiwork cannot be measured

But still priests wag their tongues explaining the “Way” and babbling about “Zen.”

This old monk has never cared for false piety

And my nose wrinkles at the dark smell of incense before the Buddha.
A Fisherman
Studying texts and stiff meditation can make you lose your Original Mind.

A solitary tune by a fisherman, though, can be an invaluable treasure.

Dusk rain on the river, the moon peeking in and out of the clouds;

Elegant beyond words, he chants his songs night after night.
My Hovel
The world before my eyes is wan and wasted, just like me.

The earth is decrepit, the sky stormy, all the grass withered.

No spring breeze even at this late date,

Just winter clouds swallowing up my tiny reed hut.
A Meal of Fresh Octopus
Lots of arms, just like Kannon the Goddess;

Sacrificed for me, garnished with citron, I revere it so!

The taste of the sea, just divine!

Sorry, Buddha, this is another precept I just cannot keep.
Exhausted with gay pleasures, I embrace my wife.

The narrow path of asceticism is not for me:

My mind runs in the opposite direction.

It is easy to be glib about Zen — I’ll just keep my mouth shut

And rely on love play all the day long.
It is nice to get a glimpse of a lady bathing –

You scrubbed your flower face and cleansed your lovely body

While this old monk sat in the hot water,

Feeling more blessed than even the emperor of China!
To Lady Mori with Deepest Gratitude and Thanks
The tree was barren of leaves but you brought a new spring.

Long green sprouts, verdant flowers, fresh promise.

Mori, if I ever forget my profound gratitude to you,

Let me burn in hell forever.
(Mori was a blind minstrel, and Ikkyu’s young mistress)

_______

______
Unblocking boarded up windows, of what was probably once a grow house before we lived here… light pours into the basement, and I rediscovered David Sylvian today and met Amber Asylum in my wanderings as well.
Light pours into the basement, revealing half completed paintings, forgotten art

Light pours into the basement, spilling over photographs – a mythical past

Light pours into the basement, earth smells and silence

Light pours into the basement, stillness follows….
For Your Pleasure…

David Sylvian lyrics, music, images.
Enjoy.
Gwyllm

_____________
Pollen Path
Welcome me father

On the north shores of Lapland

Welcome me father

Who knows no name

Welcome me mother

The earth here is yawning

My body is shaking

For want of a flame
Down here

Got to laugh

The kick back is lightening

Drowning

Got to laugh

This whole thing is frightening
I follow the pollen path

The pollen path
Welcome me father

The lava is rising

Welcome me mother

And give me your name
We’ve drunk from this wellspring

Too long, too long

Dividing the hours

To measure the time
We’ve lived with this heartache

Too long, too long

Numbering

What’s yours, what’s mine
We’ve harboured this sadness

So long

Nursing a voice

To sing us our songs
Raising a voice

To sing our songs
_______

David Sylvian – Orpheus

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Darkest Dreaming
Stay tonight

We’ll watch the full moon rising

Hold on tight

The sky is breaking
I don’t ever want to be alone

With all my darkest dreaming

Hold me close

The sky is breaking
I don’t ever want to be alone

With all my darkest dreaming

Hold me close

The sky is breaking

—
God Man
Welcome to Sun State

The language of light

The energies impulse

The loud, dark, iron

The purpose of history

In Eurasian Steppes

From threshold to threshold

Astonishment
You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

God Man
You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

God Man
From different maps

Dead bees on a cake

You’re sweeping the forest

Man, it’s getting late

The milkweed is growing

Through cotton grass

You borrowed the car

But you didn’t ask
You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

God Man
You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

God Man
You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

God Man
And everything’s dark

Then you’re wrapped up

Born into brightness
You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

You’ve misunderstood the place where you stand

—-
Brilliant Trees
When you come to me

I’ll question myself again

Is this grip on life still my own ?

When every step I take

Leads me so far away

Every thought should bring me closer home
And there you stand

Making my life possible

Raise my hands up to heaven

But only you could know
My whole world stands in front of me

By the look in your eyes

By the look in your eyes

My whole life stretches in front of me

Reaching up like a flower

Leading my life back to the soil
Every plan I’ve made ’s

Lost in the scheme of things

Within each lesson lies the price to learn

A reason to believe

Divorces itself from me

Every hope I hold lies in my arms
And there you stand

Making my life possible

Raise my hands up to heaven

But only you could know
My whole world stands in front of me

By the look in your eyes

By the look in your eyes

My whole life stretches in front of me

Reaching up like a flower

Leading my life back to the soil

________

A CRAZED GIRL
That crazed girl improvising her music.

Her poetry, dancing upon the shore,

Her soul in division from itself

Climbing, falling she knew not where,

Hiding amid the cargo of a steamship,

Her knee-cap broken, that girl I declare

A beautiful lofty thing, or a thing

Heroically lost, heroically found.
No matter what disaster occurred

She stood in desperate music wound,

Wound, wound, and she made in her triumph

Where the bales and the baskets lay

No common intelligible sound

But sang, ‘O sea-starved, hungry sea.’

-W.B. Yeats…

______
A different direction today…
For Rebecca

The Charge of the Goddess

Ichycoo

A visit with William Butler Yeats…
Bright Blessings,

Gwyllm
—–

For Rebecca

So… this is my sister Rebecca. She is a couple of years my senior… (I am the youngest of 3 and the only male out of our original familial configuration) Today is her Birthday, and I just wanted to pass on my wishes. love, and appreciation of her.
She is a cultural creative in her endeavors… Through the education & theatre work she did in Poland in the late 80′s, to the womens spiritual groups she helped develop in the Czech Republic in the 90′s, to her work with abused women, theatre work, and so much more. She has worked at making this world a better place in her own way for a wonderful long time. She is also a triple Gemini… 8o)
She has two beautiful daughters, Deva and Sooooz, who I don’t see enough, (another story) and a group of friends spread across the world from Z Budapest to Jean Houston and many in-between.
She has been my friend for many years. There is a difference between just being sister and brother, when you can step forward out of the family patterns, and establish something else. I don’t always agree with her on all her views (and vice versa), and from what I can tell, this is okay with her.
So, Rebecca if you are out there, have a beautiful day, and thank you for blessing my life with your presence…
Much Love From All Of Us!
G

—-

Something For Rebecca on this day:

Charge of the Goddess

Traditional by Doreen Valiente, as adapted by Starhawk:
Listen to the words of the Great Mother, Who of old was called Artemis, Astarte, Dione, Melusine, Aphrodite, Cerridwen, Diana, Arionrhod, Brigid, and by many other names:
Whenever you have need of anything, once a month, and better it be when the moon is full, you shall assemble in some secret place and adore the spirit of Me Who is Queen of all the Wise.
You shall be free from slavery, and as a sign that you be free you shall be naked in your rites.
Sing, feast, dance, make music and love, all in My Presence, for Mine is the ecstasy of the spirit and Mine also is joy on earth.
For My law is love is unto all beings. Mine is the secret that opens the door of youth, and Mine is the cup of wine of life that is the cauldron of Cerridwen, that is the holy grail of immortality.
I give the knowledge of the spirit eternal, and beyond death I give peace and freedom and reunion with those that have gone before.
Nor do I demand aught of sacrifice, for behold, I am the Mother of all things and My love is poured out upon the earth.
Hear the words of the Star Goddess, the dust of Whose feet are the hosts of Heaven, whose body encircles the universe:
I Who am the beauty of the green earth and the white moon among the stars and the mysteries of the waters,
I call upon your soul to arise and come unto me.
For I am the soul of nature that gives life to the universe.
From Me all things proceed and unto Me they must return.
Let My worship be in the heart that rejoices, for behold, all acts of love and pleasure are My rituals.
Let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honor and humility, mirth and reverence within you.
And you who seek to know Me, know that the seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery: for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without.
For behold, I have been with you from the beginning, and I am That which is attained at the end of desire.

____________

Okay okay okay… Yes, it is a bit of nolstalgia, but hey, its fun!

(Small Faces Promo for Ichycoo Park)

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A visit with William Butler Yeats…

AN ACRE OF GRASS
Picture and book remain,

An acre of green grass

For air and exercise,

Now strength of body goes;

Midnight, an old house

Where nothing stirs but a mouse.
My temptation is quiet.

Here at life’s end

Neither loose imagination,

Nor the mill of the mind

Consuming its rag and bone,

Can make the truth known.
Grant me an old man’s frenzy,

Myself must I remake

Till I am Timon and Lear

Or that William Blake

Who beat upon the wall

Till Truth obeyed his call;
A mind Michael Angelo knew

That can pierce the clouds,

Or inspired by frenzy

Shake the dead in their shrouds;

Forgotten else by mankind,

An old man’s eagle mind.

—
THE CURSE OF CROMWELL
You ask what — I have found, and far and wide I go:

Nothing but Cromwell’s house and Cromwell’s murderous crew,

The lovers and the dancers are beaten into the clay,

And the tall men and the swordsmen and the horsemen, where are they?

And there is an old beggar wandering in his pride — –

His fathers served their fathers before Christ was crucified.

i{O what of that, O what of that,}

‘i{What is there left to say?}
All neighbourly content and easy talk are gone,

But there’s no good complaining, for money’s rant is on.

He that’s mounting up must on his neighbour mount,

And we and all the Muses are things of no account.

They have schooling of their own, but I pass their schooling by,

What can they know that we know that know the time to die?

i{O what of that, O what of that,}

i{What is there left to say?}
But there’s another knowledge that my heart destroys,

As the fox in the old fable destroyed the Spartan boy’s

Because it proves that things both can and cannot be;

That the swordsmen and the ladies can still keep company,

Can pay the poet for a verse and hear the fiddle sound,

That I am still their servant though all are underground.

i{O what of that, O what of that,}

i{What is there left to say?}
I came on a great house in the middle of the night,

Its open lighted doorway and its windows all alight,

And all my friends were there and made me welcome too;

But I woke in an old ruin that the winds. howled through;

And when I pay attention I must out and walk

Among the dogs and horses that understand my talk.

i{O what of that, O what of that,}

i{What is there left to say?}

—

THOSE IMAGES
What if I bade you leave

The cavern of the mind?

There’s better exercise

In the sunlight and wind.
I never bade you go

To Moscow or to Rome.

Renounce that drudgery,

Call the Muses home.
Seek those images

That constitute the wild,

The lion and the virgin,

The harlot and the child.
Find in middle air

An eagle on the wing,

Recognise the five

That make the Muses sing.

—-

(Sir William Russell Flint – The Girl with the Sickle)

Well, it looks like a move is coming soon, we bought a new webhosting package, and will be moving soon to the new addy. I will keep you posted. Morgan Miller and I will be sharing space on the new server, and more than likely collaborating on some new projects, so stay tuned.
Hung out last night with our friends Ed n Janice, as well as their friend Carol having mojitos’ and food late into the evening. lots of laughs and giggles.
Rowan finished up with his SAT test, and just bounded into the house. All quiet has now fled.
I talked to Tim from The West Cork Writers Group via Skype. Amazing really, to have this technology to communicate around the world!
More coming, though it may be in bits and bobs due to the move.
Blessings, Gwyllm
Sunny Afternoon

DMT and Hyperspace

Poetry From The Gaelic

The Kinks – A Well Respected Man

Artist: Sir William Russell Flint

________
Sunny Afternoon….

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__________
(Sir William Russell Flint – Waves)

DMT and Hyperspace
by Peter Meyer
In this section and the following one I shall present a view which

elaborates on interpretations 2, 6 and 7. This is speculation but

nevertheless provides a preliminary framework for steps toward an

understanding of what the use of DMT reveals to us.
The world of ordinary, common, experience has three spatial dimensions and

one temporal dimension, forming a place and time for the apparent

persistence of solid objects. Since this is a world of experience it

belongs more to experience than to being. The being, or ontological nature,

of this world may be quite different from what we experience it as.
Psychedelic experience strongly suggests that (as William James

hypothesized) ordinary experience is an island in a sea of possible modes

of consciousness. Under the influence of substances such as LSD and

psilocybin we venture outside of the world as commonly viewed and enter

spaces which may be very strange indeed. This happens as a result of

changing our brain chemistry. Why then should we not regard ordinary

experience too as a result of a particular mode of brain chemstry? Perhaps

the world of ordinary experience is not a faithful representation of

physical reality but rather is physical reality represented in the manner

of ordinary brain functioning. By taking this idea seriously we may free

our understanding of physical reality from the limitatons imposed by the

unthinking assumption that ordinary experience represents physical reality

as it is. In fact physical reality may be totally bizarre and quite unlike

anything we have thought it to be.
In his special theory of relativity, Albert Einstein demonstrated that the

physical world (the world that can be measured by physical instruments, but

is assumed to exist independently) is best understood as a four-dimensional

space whch may be separated into three spatial dimensions and one temporal

dimension in various ways, the particular separation depending on the

motion of a hypothetical observer. It seems that DMT releases one’s

consciousness from the ordinary experience of space and time and catapults

one into direct experience of a four-dimensional world. This explains the

feeling of incredulity which first-time users frequently report.
The DMT realm is described by some as “incredible,” “bizarre,”

“unbelievable,” and even “impossible,” and for many who have experienced it

these terms are not an exaggeration. These terms make sense if the world

experienced under DMT is a four-dimensional world experienced by a mind

which is trying to make sense of it in terms of its usual categories of

three-dimensional space and one-dimensional time. In the DMT state these

categories no longer apply to whatever it is that is being experienced.
Some persons report that it seems that in the DMT experience there is

information transfer of some sort. If so, and if this information is quite

unlike anything that we are used to dealing with (at least at a conscious

level), then is may be that the bizarre quality of the experience results

from attempting to impose categories of thought which are quite

inapplicable.
The space that one breaks through under the influence of a large dose of

DMT has been called “hyperspace” by Terence McKenna and Ralph Abraham and

by Gracie & Zarkov. I suggest that hyperspace is an experience of physical

reality which is “closer” to it (or less mediated) than is our ordinary

experience. In hyperspace one has direct experience of the

four-dimensionality of physical reality.
Parenthetically we may note a mildly interesting case of historical

anticipation. In 1897 one H.C. Geppinger published a book entitled DMT:

Dimensional Motion Times, Development and Application (reprinted Wiiley,

1955), an appropriate title for our current subject. However, he was, of

course, quite unaware of what the initials “DMT” would later come to mean.
When reflecting upon his mescaline experiences Aldous Huxley suggested that

there was something, which he called “Mind-at-Large,” which was filtered by

the ordinary functioning of the human brain to produce ordinary experience.

One may view the human body and the human nervous system as a cybernetic

system for constructing a stable representation of a world of enduring

objects which are able to interact in ways that we are familiar with from

our ordinary experience. This is analogous to a computer’s production of a

stable video display — for even a simple blinking cursor requires

complicated coordination of underlyng physical processes to make it happen.

In a sense we are (or at least may be thought of as) biological computers

whose typical output is the world of everyday reality (as we experience

it). When our biocomputational processes are modified by strange chemicals

we have the opportunity to view the reality underlying ordinary experience

in an entirely new way.
Einstein’s four-dimensional space-time may thus turn out to be not merely a

flux of energetic point-events but to be (or to be contained in a

higher-dimensional space which is) at least as organized as our ordinary

world and which contains intelligent, communcating beings capable of

interacting wth us. As Hamlet remarked to his Aristotelian tutor, following

an encounter with a dead soul (his deceased father), “There are more things

in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

Should we be surprised to find that there are more intelligent,

communicating, beings in the higher-dimensional reality underlying our

ordinary experience than we find within that experience?

—————————————————————————
The “elves”
Hyperspace, as it is revealed by DMT (revealed to some, anyway) appears to

be full of personal entities. They are non-physical in the sense that they

are not objects in the three-dimensional space to which we are accustomed.

Some of the beings encountered in the DMT state may once have been living

humans, but perhaps such “dead souls” are in the minority among the

intelligent beings in that realm.
In his classic The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries, W.Y. Evans-Wentz

recorded many tales provided to him by local people of encounters with

beings, variously called fairies, elves, the wee folk, the good people, the

gentry, the Sidhe, the Tuatha De Danann, etc., who inhabit a realm normally

beyond our ken. The belief in this order of beings was firm among the

Celtic peoples of Britain and France at the time Evans-Wentz conducted his

studies (c. 1900), but has since been largely supplanted by the beliefs

instilled in the public by the rise of materialistic science and

technology. Evans-Wentz collected numerous reports of elf-sigting, such as

the following (which is part of an account given by a member of the Lower

House of the Manx Parliament):
…I looked across the river and saw a circle of supernatural

light, which I have now come to regard as the “astral light” or

the light of Nature, as it is called by mystics, and in which

spirits become visible… [I]nto this space, and the circle of

light, from the surrounding sides apparently, I saw come in twos

and threes a great crowd of little beings smaller than Tom Thumb

and his wife. All of them, who appeared like soldiers, were

dressed in red. They moved back and forth amid the circle of

light, as they formed into order like troops drilling (pg.113)
Reviewing his data, Evans-Wentz writes:
We seem, in fact, to have arrived at a point in our long

investigations where we can postulate scientifically, on the

showing of the data of psychical research, the existence of such

invisible intelligences as gods, genii, daemons, all kinds of

true fairies, and disembodied [i.e., deceased] men. (pg.481)
He then goes on to quote an earlier researcher:
Either it is we who produce these phenomena [which, says

Evans-Wentz, is unreasonable] or it is spirits. But mark this

well: these spirits are not necessarily the souls of the dead;

for other kinds of spiritual beings may exist, and space may be

full of them without our ever knowing anything about it, except

under unusual circumstances [such as a sudden change in brain

chemistry]. Do we not find in the different ancient literatures,

demons, angels, gnomes, goblins, sprites, spectres, elementals,

etc? Perhaps these legends are not without some foundation in

fact. (Flammarion, quoted at Pg.481)
Evans-Wentz concludes (pg.490) that a realm of discarnate, intelligent

forces known as fairies, elves, etc., exists “as a supernormal state of

consciousness into which men and women may enter temporarily in dreams,

trances, or in various ecstatic conditions,” such as, we may add, the

condition produced by smoking DMT.
I suggest that the fairie world studied by Evans-Wentz and the objective

space into which one may enter under the influence of DMT are the same.
From Psychedelic Monographs and Essays #6, p50

_______
Poetry From The Gaelic….

(a favourite poem starts this selection, that I have shared before…. I hope you enjoy! G)
Time, the deer, is in the Wood of Hallaig

-Sorley Maclean
The window is nailed and boarded

through which I saw the West

and my love is at the Burn of Hallaig,

a birch tree, and she has always been
between Inver and Milk Hollow,

here and there about Baile-chuirn:

she is a birch, a hazel,

a straight slender young rowan.
In Screapadal of my people,

where Norman and Big Hector were,

their daughters and their sons are a wood

going up beside the stream.
Proud tonight the pine cocks

crowing on the top of Cnoc an Ra,

straight their backs in the moonlight –

they are not the wood I love.
I will wait for the birch wood

until it comes up by the Cairn,

until the whole ridge from Beinn na Lice

will be under its shade.
If it does not, I will go down to Hallaig,

to the sabbath of the dead,

where the people are frequenting,

every single generation gone.
They are still in Hallaig,

Macleans and Macleods,

All who were there in the time of Mac Gille Chaluim:

the dead have been seen alive –
the men lying on the green

at the end of every house that was,

the girls a wood of birches,

straight their backs, bent their heads.
Between the Leac and Fearns

the road is under mild moss

and the girls in silent bands

go to Clachan as in the beginning.
And return from Clachan,

from Suisnish and the land of the living;

Each one young and light stepping,

without the heartbreak of the tale.
From the Burn of Fearns to the raised beach

that is clear in the mystery of the hills,

there is only the congregation of the girls

keeping up the endless walk,
coming back to Hallaig in the evening,

in the dumb living twilight,

filling the steep slopes,

their laughter in my ears a mist,
and their beauty a film on my heart

before the dimness comes on the kyles,

and when the sun goes down behind Dun Cana

a vehement bullet will come from the gun of Love;
and will strike the deer that goes dizzily,

sniffing at the grass-grown ruined homes;

his eye will freeze in the wood;

his blood will not be traced while I live.

—
Be As A Tree…
Martin O’ Dierain
Man who makes poems,

Keep back their true import,

Conceal by three

Be as a tree,
Gather in all that’s known,

Man who makes poems,

Don’t stir, don’t bend

Before this present tempest.
Stay steady,

Unswaying,

Watching the weather

Until the right day.
Let the wind disarray,

Maker of lays,

All your outer foliage;

Your trunk don’t budge.
A tree is alone

In the wood’s midst,

Among people a poet

Above all is loneliest.
A tree is steadfast

In its portion of land,

Poet, set yourself, man,

Take a stand!
Save your frame,

Gather your knowing,

Focus in every way

Prepared for the poem.
Maker of poems,

You are half womanly,

Be male, be whole,

Be as a tree.

—
All That Came In That One Coracle
Aonghas Dubh MacNeacail
cast every stone to the ground,

let the weeds grow wild –

there’s a breath remains in the earth
still the tongue with force,

keep the mind oppressed –

the body will not be a corpse
every current

will carry a vessel
put a seed, like memory,

into the vessel
like the breath of a people

in the vessel
carrying a home

in the vessel
from high derry

of tenacious oaks

a seed-candle came

in the slender coracle
a dove was vessel

for the seed

that came across

the bald-browed sea
that seed burst out

on slope and lawn,

its green green leaves

like a dancer, bold
that was the stream

spread through the land
a people’s words

went through the land
the power of knowledge

went through the land
the leaves of knowledge

through every land
and though the light

had lost its peak,

in the grey mist trail

of the black black flame

of empire states,

the seed’s cargo

flowed underground
the smallest threads

of flowing veins

kept the fluid voice

through a cave of pain,

the unquenchable voice

sang a nursing sun

for the bloom of light
and did you count,

bold dove,

in your slender ship of skin,

the leanest days

that fell on us

since you sailed out

across the moil, with

your great embroidered book

wrapped in your language,

impenetrable shield

against devastation
and though the shepherd went,

though the ploughman left,

this ruin remained, like a husk

awaiting its seed
and see, over here, between

birch wood and salmon sea,

all the glass and stone

rising like new blossoms,

the golden light of next year,

fort of hopes, fort of promise
_______
The Kinks – A Well Respected Man

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________
(Sir William Russell Flint – Madamoiselle Sophie)

Just got home, took a shower, tried to talk to a friend in Ireland via Skype, had problems… try again soon.
I put this together for the fun of it, pulling this and that from hither and yon.
I hope you enjoy it, and by the way, give Radio Free EarthRites a listen to, lots of new music!
Gwyllm
Links O’ The Day

Water Boys Touring The New Album

From Iceland: The Cottager and his Cat

Keats For A Summer Afternoon…

Art: Gustave Dore (The Poe Series…)

_______
Links O’ The Day:

why settle for the lesser evil? ’08

Another Example Of Capitalism Run-Amok…

REG HENRY: Adam, Eve and a fig leaf to cover science

_______
Water Boys Touring The New Album

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_______

From Iceland: The Cottager and his Cat
Once upon a time there lived an old man and his wife in a dirty, tumble-down cottage, not very far from the splendid palace where the king and queen dwelt. In spite of the wretched state of the hut, which many people declared was too bad even for a pig to live in, the old man was very rich, for he was a great miser, and lucky besides, and would often go without food all day sooner than change one of his beloved gold pieces.
But after a while he found that he had starved himself once too often. He fell ill, and had no strength to get well again, and in a few days he died, leaving his wife and one son behind him.
The night following his death, the son dreamed that an unknown man appeared to him and said: ‘Listen to me; your father is dead and your mother will soon die, and all their riches will belong to you. Half of his wealth is ill-gotten, and this you must give back to the poor from whom he squeezed it. The other half you must throw into the sea. Watch, however, as the money sinks into the water, and if anything should swim, catch it and keep it, even if it is nothing more than a bit of paper.’
Then the man vanished, and the youth awoke.
The remembrance of his dream troubled him greatly. He did not want to part with the riches that his father had left him, for he had known all his life what it was to be cold and hungry, and now he had hoped for a little comfort and pleasure. Still, he was honest and good-hearted, and if his father had come wrongfully by his wealth he felt he could never enjoy it, and at last he made up his mind to do as he had been bidden. He found out who were the people who were poorest in the village, and spent half of his money in helping them, and the other half he put in his pocket. From a rock that jutted right out into the sea he flung it in. In a moment it was out of sight, and no man could have told the spot where it had sunk, except for a tiny scrap of paper floating on the water. He stretched down carefully and managed to reach it, and on opening it found six shillings wrapped inside. This was now all the money he had in the world.
The young man stood and looked at it thoughtfully. ‘Well, I can’t do much with this,’ he said to himself; but, after all, six shillings were better than nothing, and he wrapped them up again and slipped them into his coat.
He worked in his garden for the next few weeks, and he and his mother contrived to live on the fruit and vegetables he got out of it, and then she too died suddenly. The poor fellow felt very sad when he had laid her in her grave, and with a heavy heart he wandered into the forest, not knowing where he was going. By-and-by he began to get hungry, and seeing a small hut in front of him, he knocked at the door and asked if they could give him some milk. The old woman who opened it begged him to come in, adding kindly, that if he wanted a night’s lodging he might have it without its costing him anything.
Two women and three men were at supper when he entered, and silently made room for him to sit down by them. When he had eaten he began to look about him, and was surprised to see an animal sitting by the fire different from anything he had ever noticed before. It was grey in colour, and not very big; but its eyes were large and very bright, and it seemed to be singing in an odd way, quite unlike any animal in the forest. ‘What is the name of that strange little creature?’ asked he. And they answered, ‘We call it a cat.’
‘I should like to buy it–if it is not too dear,’ said the young man; ‘it would be company for me.’ And they told him that he might have it for six shillings, if he cared to give so much. The young man took out his precious bit of paper, handed them the six shillings, and the next morning bade them farewell, with the cat lying snugly in his cloak.
For the whole day they wandered through meadows and forests, till in the evening they reached a house. The young fellow knocked at the door and asked the old man who opened it if he could rest there that night, adding that he had no money to pay for it. ‘Then I must give it to you,’ answered the man, and led him into a room where two women and two men were sitting at supper. One of the women was the old man’s wife, the other his daughter. He placed the cat on the mantel shelf, and they all crowded round to examine this strange beast, and the cat rubbed itself against them, and held out its paw, and sang to them; and the women were delighted, and gave it everything that a cat could eat, and a great deal more besides.
After hearing the youth’s story, and how he had nothing in the world left him except his cat, the old man advised him to go to the palace, which was only a few miles distant, and take counsel of the king, who was kind to everyone, and would certainly be his friend. The young man thanked him, and said he would gladly take his advice; and early next morning he set out for the royal palace.
He sent a message to the king to beg for an audience, and received a reply that he was to go into the great hall, where he would find his Majesty.
The king was at dinner with his court when the young man entered, and he signed to him to come near. The youth bowed low, and then gazed in surprise at the crowd of little black creatures who were running about the floor, and even on the table itself. Indeed, they were so bold that they snatched pieces of food from the King’s own plate, and if he drove them away, tried to bite his hands, so that he could not eat his food, and his courtiers fared no better.
‘What sort of animals are these?’ asked the youth of one of the ladies sitting near him.
‘They are called rats,’ answered the king, who had overheard the question, ‘and for years we have tried some way of putting an end to them, but it is impossible. They come into our very beds.’
At this moment something was seen flying through the air. The cat was on the table, and with two or three shakes a number of rats were lying dead round him. Then a great scuffling of feet was heard, and in a few minutes the hall was clear.
For some minutes the King and his courtiers only looked at each other in astonishment. ‘What kind of animal is that which can work magic of this sort?’ asked he. And the young man told him that it was called a cat, and that he had bought it for six shillings.
And the King answered: ‘Because of the luck you have brought me, in freeing my palace from the plague which has tormented me for many years, I will give you the choice of two things. Either you shall be my Prime Minister, or else you shall marry my daughter and reign after me. Say, which shall it be?’
‘The princess and the kingdom,’ said the young man.
And so it was.

_____
Keats For A Summer Afternoon…

Ode on a Grecian Urn
Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness,

Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,

Sylvan historian, who canst thus express

A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:

What leaf-fring’d legend haunts about thy shape

Of deities or mortals, or of both,

In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?

What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?

What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?

What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;

Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d,

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:

Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave

Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;

Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;

She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,

For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!
Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed

Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;

And, happy melodist, unwearied,

For ever piping songs for ever new;

More happy love! more happy, happy love!

For ever warm and still to be enjoy’d,

For ever panting, and for ever young;

All breathing human passion far above,

That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy’d,

A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.
Who are these coming to the sacrifice?

To what green altar, O mysterious priest,

Lead’st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,

And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?

What little town by river or sea shore,

Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,

Is emptied of it’s folk, this pious morn?

And, little town, thy streets for evermore

Will silent be; and not a soul to tell

Why thou art desolate, can e’er return.
O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede

Of marble men and maidens overwrought,

With forest branches and the trodden weed;

Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought

As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!

When old age shall this generation waste,

Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe

Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,–that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”

—
Original version of La Belle Dame Sans Merci, 1819
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

Alone and palely loitering?

The sedge has withered from the lake,

And no birds sing.
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

So haggard and so woe-begone?

The squirrel’s granary is full,

And the harvest’s done.
I see a lily on thy brow,

With anguish moist and fever-dew,

And on thy cheeks a fading rose

Fast withereth too.
I met a lady in the meads,

Full beautiful – a faery’s child,

Her hair was long, her foot was light,

And her eyes were wild.
I made a garland for her head,

And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;

She looked at me as she did love,

And made sweet moan.
I set her on my pacing steed,

And nothing else saw all day long,

For sidelong would she bend, and sing

A faery’s song.
She found me roots of relish sweet,

And honey wild, and manna-dew,

And sure in language strange she said –

‘I love thee true’.
She took me to her elfin grot,

And there she wept and sighed full sore,

And there I shut her wild wild eyes

With kisses four.
And there she lulled me asleep

And there I dreamed – Ah! woe betide! –

The latest dream I ever dreamt

On the cold hill side.
I saw pale kings and princes too,

Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;

They cried – ‘La Belle Dame sans Merci

Hath thee in thrall!’
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,

With horrid warning gaped wide,

And I awoke and found me here,

On the cold hill’s side.
And this is why I sojourn here

Alone and palely loitering,

Though the sedge is withered from the lake,

And no birds sing.

—
The Human Seasons
Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;

There are four seasons in the mind of man:

He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear

Takes in all beauty with an easy span:

He has his Summer, when luxuriously

Spring’s honied cud of youthful thought he loves

To ruminate, and by such dreaming high

Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves

His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings

He furleth close; contented so to look

On mists in idleness–to let fair things

Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook.

He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,

Or else he would forego his mortal nature.

A CHOICH ANAMA
Dhe tabhair aithne da t’ ainghle beannaichte,

Caim a chumail air an staing-sa nochd,

Comachadh crabhaidh, tabhaidh, teannachaidh,

Chumas a choich anama-sa bho lochd.
Teasruig a Dhe an t-ardrach seo a nochd,

Iad fein ’s an cuid ’s an cliu,

Tar iad o eug, o ghabhadh, o lochd,

’S o thoradh na farmaid ’s na mi-ruin.
Tabhair duinn, a Dhe na fois,

Taingealachd an cois ar call,

Bhi coimhlionadh do lagh a bhos,

’S to fein a mhealtuinn thall.

—

THE SOUL SHRINE
God, give charge to Thy blessed angels,

To keep guard around this stead to-night,

A band sacred, strong, and steadfast,

That will shield this soul-shrine from harm.
Safeguard Thou, God, this household to-night,

Themselves and their means and their fame,

Deliver them from death, from distress, from harm,

From the fruits of envy and of enmity.
Give Thou to us, O God of peace,

Thankfulness despite our loss,

To obey Thy statutes here below,

And to enjoy Thyself above.
The Soul Shrine is sung by the people (From The Hebrides) as they retire to rest. They say that the angels of heaven guard them in sleep and shield them from harm. Should any untoward event occur to themselves or to their flocks, they avow that the cause was the deadness of their hearts, the coldness of their faith, and the fewness of their prayers.

__________
We are moving soon, so download your copy in the next copy of days!

A late day entry… This and that, stuff of dreams, ancestors, and the welling up of the waves of time. Summer has descended upon the Upper Left Coast, and it is all pretty nice.
Sat outside last night watching the wind buffet the crows’ nests up in the oaks at the front of our neighbors house. You could hear the young complain as they were tossed back and forth. Nothing like sea-sick crows… for complaining.
The Hummingbirds are back, as are all the other little ones. You can see them, and especially hear them flit about the yard. It is all rather nice!
Blessings,
Gwyllm

——-
Tasty Bits:

Celtic Woman – The Voice

The Hags of the Long Teeth

English Pronunciation!?!

Peatbog Faeries – Crusty Mary

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Celtic Woman – The Voice

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The Hags of the Long Teeth

Long ago, in the old time, there came a party of gentlemen from Dublin to Loch Glynn a-hunting and a-fishing. They put up in the priest’s house, as there was no inn in the little village.
The first day they went a-hunting, they went into the Wood of Driminuch, and it was not long till they routed a hare. They fired many a ball after him, but they could not bring him down. They followed him till they saw him going into a little house in the wood.
When they came to the door, they saw a great black dog, and he would not let them in.
“Put a ball through the beggar,” said a main of them. He let fly a ball, but the dog caught it in his mouth, chewed it, and flung it on the ground. They fired another ball, and another, but the dog did the same thing with them. Then he began barking as loud as he could, and it was not long till there came out a hag, and every tooth in her head as long as the tongs. “What are you doing to my pup?” says the hag.
“A hare went into your house, and this dog won’t let us in after him,” says a man of the hunters.
“Lie down, pup,” said the hag. Then she said: “Ye can come in if ye wish.” The hunters were afraid to go in, but a man of them asked: “Is there any person in the house with you?”
“There are six sisters,” said the old woman. “We should like to see them,” said the hunters. No sooner had he said the word than the six old women came out, and each of them with teeth as long as the other. Such a sight the hunters had never seen before.
They went through the wood then, and they saw seven vultures on one tree, and they screeching. The hunters began cracking balls after them, but if they were in it ever since they would never bring down one of them.
There came a gray old man to them and said: “Those are the hags of the long tooth that are living in the little house over there. Do ye not know that they are under enchantment? They are there these hundreds of years, and they have a dog that never lets in anyone to the little house. They have a castle under the lake, and it is often the people saw them making seven swans of themselves, and going into the lake.”
When the hunters came home that evening they told everything they heard and saw to the priest, but he did not believe the story.
On the day on the morrow, the priest went with the hunters, and when they came near the little house they saw the big black dog at the door. The priest put his conveniences for blessing under his neck, and drew out a book and began reading prayers. The big dog began barking loudly. The hags came out, and when they saw the priest they let a screech out of them that was heard in every part of Ireland. When the priest was a while reading, the hags made vultures of themselves and flew up into a big tree that was over the house.
The priest began pressing in on the dog until he was within a couple of feet of him.
The dog gave a leap up, struck the priest with its four feet, and put him head over heels.
When the hunters took him up he was deaf and dumb, and the dog did not move from the door.
They brought the priest home and sent for the bishop. When he came and heard the story there was great grief on him, The people gathered together and asked of him to banish the hags of enchantment out of the wood, There was fright and shame on him, and he did not know what he would do, but he said to them: “I have no means of banishing them till I go home, but I will come at the end of a month and banish them.”
The priest was too badly hurt to say anything. The big black dog was father of the hags, and his name was Dermod O’Muloony. His own son killed him, because he found him with his wife the day after their marriage, and killed the sisters for fear they should tell on him.
One night the bishop was in his chamber asleep, when one of the hags of the long tooth opened the door and came in. When the bishop wakened up he saw the hag standing by the side of his bed. He was so much afraid he was not able to speak a word until the hag spoke and said to him: “Let there be no fear on you; I did not come to do you harm, but to give you advice. You promised the people of Loch Glynn that you would come to banish the hags of the long tooth out of the wood of Driminuch. If you come you will never go back alive.”
His talk came to the bishop, and he said: “I cannot break my word.”
“We have only a year and a day to be in the wood,” said the hag, “and you can put off the people until then.”
“Why are ye in the woods as ye are?” says the bishop.
“Our brother killed us,” said the hag, “and when we went before the arch-judge, there was judgment passed on us, we to be as we are two hundred years. We have a castle under the lake, and be in it every night. We are suffering for the crime our father did.” Then she told him the crime the father did.
“Hard is your case,” said the bishop, “but we must put up with the will of the arch-judge, and I shall not trouble ye.”
“You will get an account, when we are gone from the wood,” said the hag. Then she went from him.
In the morning, the day on the morrow, the bishop came to Loch Glynn. He sent out notice and gathered the people. Then he said to them: “It is the will of the arch-king that the power of enchantment be not banished for another year and a day, and ye must keep out of the wood until then. It is a great wonder to me that ye never saw the hags of enchantment till the hunters came from Dublin.–It’s a pity they did not remain at home.”
About a week after that the priest was one day by himself in his chamber alone. The day was very fine and the window was open. The robin of the red breast came in and a little herb in its mouth. The priest stretched out his hand, and she laid the herb down on it. “Perhaps it was God sent me this herb,” said the priest to himself, and he ate it. He had not eaten it one moment till he was as well as ever he was, and he said:
“A thousand thanks to Him who has power stronger than the power of enchantment.”
Then said the robin: “Do you remember the robin of the broken foot you had, two years this last winter.”
I remember her, indeed,” said the priest, “but she went from me when the summer came.”
“I am the same robin, and but for the good you did me I would not be alive now, and you would be deaf and dumb throughout your life. Take my advice now, and do not go near the hags of the long tooth any more, and do not tell to any person living that I gave you the herb.” Then she flew from him.
When the house-keeper came she wondered to find that he had both his talk and his hearing. He sent word to the bishop and he came to Loch Glynn. He asked the priest how it was that he got better so suddenly. “It is a secret,” said the priest, “but a certain friend gave me a little herb and it cured me.”
Nothing else happened worth telling, till the year was gone. One night after that the bishop was in his chamber when the door opened, and the hag of the long tooth walked in, and said: “I come to give you notice that we will be leaving the wood a week from to-day. I have one thing to ask of you if you will do it for me.”
“If it is in my power, and it not to be against the faith,” said the bishop.
“A week from to-day,” said the hag, “there will be seven vultures dead at the door of our house in the wood. Give orders to bury them in the quarry that is between the wood and Ballyglas; that is all I am asking of you.”
“I shall do that if I am alive,” said the bishop. Then she left him, and he was not sorry
she to go from him.
A week after that day, the bishop came to Loch Glynn, and the day after he took men with him and went to the hags’ house in the wood of Driminuch.
The big black dog was at the door, and when he saw the bishop he began running and never stopped until he went into the lake.
He saw the seven vultures dead at the door, and he said to the men: “Take them with you and follow me.”
They took up the vultures and followed him to the brink of the quarry. Then he said to them: “Throw them into the quarry: There is an end to the hags of the enchantment.”
As soon as the men threw them down to the bottom of the quarry, there rose from it seven swans as white as snow, and flew out of their sight. It was the opinion of the bishop and of every person who heard the story that it was up to heaven they flew, and that the big black dog went to the castle under the lake.
At any rate, nobody saw the hags of the long tooth or the big black dog from that out, any more.

________
English Pronunciation!?!
If you can pronounce correctly every word in this poem, you will be speaking English better than 90% of the native English speakers in the world. After trying the verses, a Frenchman said he’d prefer six months of hard labour to reading six lines aloud. Try them yourself.

Dearest creature in creation,

Study English pronunciation.

I will teach you in my verse

Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.

I will keep you, Suzy, busy,

Make your head with heat grow dizzy.

Tear in eye, your dress will tear.

So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,

Dies and diet, lord and word,

Sword and sward, retain and Britain.

(Mind the latter, how it’s written.)

Now I surely will not plague you

With such words as plaque and ague.

But be careful how you speak:

Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;

Cloven, oven, how and low,

Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,

Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,

Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,

Exiles, similes, and reviles;

Scholar, vicar, and cigar,

Solar, mica, war and far;

One, anemone, Balmoral,

Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;

Gertrude, German, wind and mind,

Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,

Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.

Blood and flood are not like food,

Nor is mould like should and would.

Viscous, viscount, load and broad,

Toward, to forward, to reward.

And your pronunciation’s OK

When you correctly say croquet,

Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,

Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour

And enamour rhyme with hammer.

River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,

Doll and roll and some and home.

Stranger does not rhyme with anger,

Neither does devour with clangour.

Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,

Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,

Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,

And then singer, ginger, linger,

Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,

Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,

Nor does fury sound like bury.

Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.

Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.

Though the differences seem little,

We say actual but victual.

Refer does not rhyme with deafer.

Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.

Mint, pint, senate and sedate;

Dull, bull, and George ate late.

Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,

Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,

Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.

We say hallowed, but allowed,

People, leopard, towed, but vowed.

Mark the differences, moreover,

Between mover, cover, clover;

Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,

Chalice, but police and lice;

Camel, constable, unstable,

Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,

Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.

Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,

Senator, spectator, mayor.

Tour, but our and succour, four.

Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

Sea, idea, Korea, area,

Psalm, Maria, but malaria.

Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.

Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,

Dandelion and battalion.

Sally with ally, yea, ye,

Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.

Say aver, but ever, fever,

Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.

Heron, granary, canary.

Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.

Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.

Large, but target, gin, give, verging,

Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.

Ear, but earn and wear and tear

Do not rhyme with here but ere.

Seven is right, but so is even,

Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,

Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,

Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation (think of Psyche!)

Is a paling stout and spikey?

Won’t it make you lose your wits,

Writing groats and saying grits?

It’s a dark abyss or tunnel:

Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,

Islington and Isle of Wight,

Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough,

Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?

Hiccough has the sound of cup.

My advice is to give up!!!

___________

Peatbog Faeries – Crusty Mary

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