The Longest Night or The Solstice Lament of the Druid An icy blast of winter wind blows through my bones to chill my soul on this, the longest night. I walk wet streets reflecting lights of holidays, of other's ways and miss my homeland's rites: The Burning Wheel, The Holly King, The Horned-Man Dance, The Mistletoe, The kiss that Solstice brings. The new-born God; Earth-Mother Goddess; of long-dead days' returning glory; of this the Druid sings. 1989 Gwydion Stone

Hey, I like this. The first three verses flow quite nicely. I stumbled a bit on the fourth, but it seemed to work better the second time through. Still, "The new-born God;" gives me a bit of a challenge. But overall, I like this a lot. jon

Rhythm wise, you mean? I have trouble with that one myself, but I never really got around to fixing it with something that made the same sense. In fact, I'm uncomfortable with the first and second lines of that verse.

No, the rhythm on that line is fine, four beats, just like the rest of the first lines. My struggle was more with context. I was not sure if it was a referance to the "Johnny-come-latley" gods eluded to in verse two, or if it refered to the season of winter itself. As in winter being new-born, pushing out the life of the three other seasons. Now that you mention it, line two does seem to be out of rhythm with the rest of the second lines, one beat longer. And the semicolons in the last verse seem to confuse me a bit. I'm not sure I see the relationships, at least not without haveing to chew on it a bit. jon

Ah, I get it. The reference is to the re-birth of the Sun(god) at Winter Solstice. The idea was later borrowed as the birthday of Christ. The modern version is seen in the baby New Year images. The semi-colons simply denote a list of features. I suppose they should be in the third verse also.

Welcome Hiram I thought of an old druid sitting with the light of the campfire reflecting in his eye. Toned to blue to suggest cold. I liked the poem it did suggest a graphic and was short. I think that's what breaks a poem. Good job.

Thanks, tjames. Actually it was inspired by a youngish Druid (me) walking the cold, rainy downtown Seattle streets during Christmas season one night, and being 3000 miles from any other Druids I knew. I felt very isolated and bitter. This was before I learned how to be as tolerant and co-celebratory with other folks ways as I wished they were with mine.

Wow, Hiram! Meaning your revelation...not your poem. Not much of a poem person but this one seems nice to me. I think verse one and two do very well at establishing the feeling. Sometimes, I guess, words seem to come easliy when feelings are involved. Makes me want to listen to Enya now (no disrespect intended).

"Actually it was inspired by a youngish Druid (me) walking the cold, rainy downtown Seattle streets during Christmas season one night, and being 3000 miles from any other Druids I knew. I felt very isolated and bitter." Then it worked, because that is exactly what I saw when I read it. jon

Yep, it's exactly what I saw, too. :-) (I got one right! I got one right!)

Thanks folks. Now I'm off to re-craft that last verse.