Brigid, goddess of Fire and Light has another aspect – that of water.
One legend has it that a crystal drop from Brigid’s mantle touched the earth and became a deep clear lake. I love this image. I think of Brigid’s blue lake as a kind of mysterious bowl that holds different ways of experiencing time. If I throw in a hook I might catch time in the round as I experience it as seasonal cycles. Ah, I have caught a January feeling through a partridge. One more hook brings up a childhood loss – memory of a loved one that has become a beloved forest bathed in peace. Am I reeling in a future that releases me from a haunted house? A beloved cousin has suddenly surfaced from the deep. In Brigid’s Lake time does not flow like a river even when I experience it that way – Time is simply there as unexplored potential waiting to be lived.
The following poem was written just after I had an experience with Turkeys that pulled me out of my mind – totally embodied – I lost all sense of Time and differences. The Present and Oneness was all there was.
Vision at Dawn
In the gray
Dawning,
emptied
and forlorn,
she spies
First Turkey
strutting by
the window –
beaded ebony eyes,
a flash of crimson.
Six more follow,
heads held high,
serpentine necks,
feathered chests,
bobbing bodies,
talons spread
to break a fall.
Gathering at the
feeder she joins
the group.
Only this Vision
Matters –
Mind is still.
Body sings.
Transformed,
mighty wings appear.
Turkeys chortle,
welcoming her home.
Yesterday at dusk the deer appear at the edge of a frozen brook; they find a crack in the ice – a pool of open water. This morning a thaw, temporary respite. Ashes melt old ice. No wind. The moment I see the first turkey I become one, casting off my bone weary winter self. A miracle of sorts, that one can shed mind’s conditioning even for a moment, to join these gentle birds.