#WindsdayWonders: 2024/06/26 -- A Midsummer Night's Retrospective

 

WINDSDAY WONDERS

Compiled & Edited by Rob Chappell (@RHCLambengolmo)

Editorial Associate: S. A. Sonnenschein

Vol. 3, No. 34: June 26, 2024

 

 

Longaeviology 101

Episode #4: A Midsummer Night’s Retrospective

 

Editor’s Note

                This week, we conclude our annual June series of articles and poems about the Celtic Otherworld and its chief denizens, the Fair Folk. Midsummer Eve has come and gone. Did you see any Elves dancing in the starlight last Sunday evening? Here are some poems, old and new, about the Fair Folk, to ring out the month of June.

 

In Norse mythology, Heimdall is the divine watchman of Asgard, the city of the Nordic deities. He stands at the gates of Asgard, at the end of the Rainbow Bridge (Bifrost), to ward off all evil creatures, until the Last Battle and the Day of Doom – Ragnarök! (Image Credit: Digital artwork by the Editor.)

 

“The Song of Heimdall”

By Lou Adanel, Staff Writer

 

By fire and by water, by rock and by stone,

I stand, and do not falter, nor break nor fall,

A steadfast guardian of all good things,

Watching, listening, waiting, ever vigilant.

 

The shadows of the world can never break me,

Nor will I ever fail to do what I must do:

My strength is unwavering, and my spirit is fire,

Though the world should turn to darkness and fade to dust.

 

The dark does not frighten me, nor does the cold,

For my heart is warm like the fire that burns within,

And my spirit is free like the wind that blows from the east,

And my mind is clear like the waters of a spring.

 

Though I stand alone in a world of shadow & storm,

And all lights are hidden in the darkness of the night,

The fire burning in my heart shall not be quenched,

Its flame will burn brightly, even the dark to light.

 

My vigil will continue, though all the world's light dim,

Though all life be quenched, and the whole world shall fade to gray,

And all that is left is the fire burning in my heart,

I'll fight to keep it burning, to light the way.

 

“A Faery in Armor”

By Joseph Rodman Drake (1795-1820)

 

He put his acorn helmet on;

It was plumed of the silk of the thistle down;

The corslet plate that guarded his breast

Was once the wild bee's golden vest;

His cloak, of a thousand mingled dyes,

Was formed of the wings of butterflies;

His shield was the shell of a lady-bug green,

Studs of gold on a ground of green;

And the quivering lance which he brandished bright,

Was the sting of a wasp he had slain in fight.

Swift he bestrode his fire-fly steed;

He bared his blade of the bent-grass blue;

He drove his spurs of the cockle-seed,

And away like a glance of thought he flew,

To skim the heavens, and follow far

The fiery trail of the rocket-star.

 

“Moonlight, Summer Moonlight”

By Emily Jane Brontë (1818-1848)

 

‘Tis moonlight, summer moonlight,

All soft and still and fair;

The solemn hour of midnight

Breathes sweet thoughts everywhere,

 

But most where trees are sending

Their breezy boughs on high,

Or stooping low are lending

A shelter from the sky.

 

And there in those wild bowers

A lovely form is laid;

Green grass and dew-steeped flowers

Wave gently round her head.

 

“The Faery Book”

By Norman Gale (1862-1942)

 

In summer, when the grass is thick, if Mother has the time,

She shows me with her pencil how a poet makes a rhyme,

And often she is sweet enough to choose a leafy nook,

Where I cuddle up so closely when she reads the Faery-book.

 

In winter when the corn’s asleep, and birds are not in song.

And crocuses and violets have been away too long,

Dear Mother puts her thimble by in answer to my look,

And I cuddle up so closely when she reads the Faery-book.

 

And Mother tells the servants that of course they must contrive

To manage all the household things from four till half-past five,

For we really cannot suffer interruption from the cook,

When we cuddle close together with the happy Faery-book.

 

“A Forest Child”

By Madison Julius Cawein (1865-1914)

 

There is a place I search for still,

Sequestered as the world of dreams,

A bushy hollow, and a hill

That whispers with descending streams,

Cool, careless waters, wandering down,

Like Innocence who runs to town,

Leaving the wildwood and its dreams,

And prattling like the forest streams.

 

But still in dreams I meet again

The child who bound me, heart and hand,

And led me with a wildflower chain

Far from our world, to Faeryland:

Who made me see and made me know

The lovely Land of Long-Ago,

Leading me with her little hand

Into the world of Wonderland.

 

The years have passed: how far away

The day when there I met the child,

The little maid, who was a fay,

Whose eyes were dark and undefiled

And crystal as a woodland well,

That holds within its depths a spell,

Enchantments, featured like a child,

A dream, a poetry undefiled.

 

Around my heart she wrapped her hair,

And bound my soul with lips and eyes,

And led me to a cavern, where

Grey Legend dwelt in kingly guise,

Her kinsman, dreamier than the Moon,

Who called her Fancy, read her rune,

And bade her with paternal eyes

Divest herself of her disguise.

 

And still I walk with her in dreams,

Though many years have passed since then,

And that high hill and its wild streams

Are lost as is that faery glen.

And as the years go swiftly by

I find it harder, when I try,

To meet with her, who led me then

Into the wildness of that glen.

 

Edward Plunkett, Lord Dunsany (1878-1957), pictured here in 1919, was a pioneering Anglo-Irish writer of drama, fantasy, and weird fiction. (Photo Credit: P:ublic Domain via Wikimedia Commons)

 

“On Reading Lord Dunsany’s Book of Wonder”

By H. P. Lovecraft (1890-1937)

 

The hours of night unheeded fly,

And in the grate the embers fade;

Vast shadows one by one pass by

In silent daemon cavalcade.

 

But still the magic volume holds

The raptured eye in realms apart,

And fulgent sorcery enfolds

The willing mind and eager heart.

 

The lonely room no more is there —

For to the sight in pomp appear

Temples and cities poised in air

And blazing glories — sphere on sphere.

 

Weekly Words of Wisdom

By Skylar Sonnenschein, Editorial Associate

As we celebrate the Midsummer Solstice, it is a good time for the beginning of new ventures. We are now at the apex of solar power and cosmic activity. Take advantage of the momentum and start something new now!

 

Stoic Proverb of the Week

Contributed by Amy Kendrick, Staff Writer

“For the mind can convert and change everything that impedes its activity into matter for its action; hindrance in its work becomes its real help, and every obstruction makes for its progress.”

à Marcus Aurelius: Meditations 5.20

Editor’s Note: This quotation has been paraphrased by Ryan Holiday, a contemporary Stoic philosopher, as “The obstacle is the way.”

                The quote I provided is attributed to Marcus Aurelius, and it comes from his personal meditation notebook, the Meditations, which was never meant to be read by anyone else. I would say that the phrase captures a key concept in Stoicism - that of turning adversity into an advantage. Stoics believed that hardship and setbacks could be used as opportunities for growth and learning.

                The Stoic Epictetus famously said, "It is not the things themselves that trouble us, but how we think about them." In other words, the thing in front of us isn't an obstacle in and of itself; it's our perception of it that makes it into an obstacle. So if we can change our perception, we can transform the obstacle into an opportunity.