Lá Bealtaine
The time of fire
The time of gold
When aos sí work their magic
In sunlit fields
Wearing new green
Gather the coltsfoot blooms
Floating them on spring water
A flower remedy
To heal the spirit
Of winter’s slumber
Harvest gold dandelions
For summer wine
While the early bees
Find their way
Making mead honey
May moon waxes
Gilding the twilight
Fairy frogs weave the night
Singing their spells
Between the stars
The bonfires blaze
Libations poured
For kin, kine, and crops
Light has come again
Blessing thee and me.
Aos sí is an Irish name for faeries or spirits of the earth and fields. Lá Bealtaine is the Irish for Beltaine. Celebrated on May 1st, between spring equinox and summer solstice, it includes dousing and relighting the hearth fires, blessing the cattle and fields, and other rituals for cleansing and fertility.
Oil of Litha
I gather the petals
wild rose pink
handfuls of fragrance
I gently press them
in my hands
release the magic
dropping them
into the jars of
clear almond oil
there they slumber
in the cool darkness
infusions of solstice
until one winter day
a few drops
remind of midsummer
delicate webs of sun
spinning poetry
of light to come
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