Long ago at the fairies' hour
In the sliver between day and night
            Somberly carrying
            The Once and Future King
You let him die the death of a knight

                 And then you faded from view
                 You did what you had to do
                           Morgaine of Fate

 

Men clad their hearts in armor
Kingdoms rose - Empires fell
        Now they desperately clutch
        At the Blessed Lady's touch
And to drink from the Sacred Well

                Bring to our lips the Chalice
                The vessel of the Goddess
                          Morgaine of the Lake

There gleam again through the mists
Magic groves on the distant shore
        Maiden, mother, and crone
        Their spells and chants intone
That the four elements be restored

                Cup of water, earthenware,
                Fiery sword, and wand for air
                        Morgaine of the Fairies

 

Slice a tart, juicy apple
Reveal the Kore's seeds in a star
        Earth wisdom's never gone
        Nor is mythic Avalon
We may find it where we are

              Please join with us again
             'Tis the hour to begin
                       Morgaine of No Fear

 

Ever clearer in our vision
Through the cauldron of Cerridwen
        Triple Goddess is reborn
        On this long-awaited morn
The veil between the worlds grows thin

              Pick up your harp and play
              A new ballad for this day
                       Morgaine of Miracles

 

 

 

     James:   This painting was as elusive as Avalon in the mists.  It originated through Becca’s request for a strong feminine piece.  Once I had put the five women there, we studied the painting and asked ourselves, “Who are these women?  What are they doing here?”  One afternoon, having lunch on our Tuscan patio, Becca began talking about the significance of the cauldron.  Consulting our references, she exclaimed, “The cauldron of Cerridwen!”  OK, I would paint a cauldron.  That set the Celtic tone.  The head-to-toe pose of the central woman had not set well with me, and I immediately realized she could be rising out of a cauldron.  Then we realized who she was – Morgaine!    So I painted Camelot in the background while Becca researched the history of the legend.  When I brought it home finished to hang on the wall, Becca reacted with a reserved look on her face.  “Not finished yet,” she proclaimed.  We spent evenings gazing at it, until the characters told us who they were – the red woman is the Crone, Venus the Mother,  the yogini is the Maiden/Virgin.  Aha! the Triple Goddess!   Then the yogini’s hand in the air needed something . . .   Excalibur!  We did several rounds of this (adding the Holy Grail, plate, crystal wand, apple)  until – finally – we both agreed it was finished.       

     Morgaine, through a sensual encounter with the Triple Goddess, transforms herself.  She comes through the cauldron into human form to help those who want to return to Avalon, in other words, to regain the Earth wisdom of the higher dimensions.  There’s so much imagery, I almost wish it were a larger piece.   Yet, once again, I feel privileged in righting a misrepresentation of a beautiful pagan witch.   Morgaine, as a pagan priestess, would have had a tolerant approach toward other religious belief systems, yet the Christianized myth demonized her, as it has been for so many pagan women, priestesses, and goddesses.  They were feared as  “wicked old witches”.  Not anymore!  Here’s to your return, Morgaine!

     Becca:   I had substantial time to study the Arthurian legend - I read several versions of the King Arthur story as well as the 877 pages of The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley – all the while contemplating the painting and fielding ideas with James.  By the time I wrote the poem (at Samhain, no less!), I had reached the conclusion that the significance of the sword in the stone, Excalibur, Guinevere’s and Lancelot’s adultery, Nimue’s  bewitching of Merlin,  Morgaine’s motives for challenging Arthur, and many other events in the epic had been shaped to fit a Christian context.  We know that history is written by the victors – and legends, too.    Marion Zimmer Bradley’s feminist and Celtic point of view reveals the story of the triumph of a Roman Catholic patriarchy over the Druidic spiritual tradition and pagan tribal society.  It was the “fate” of Morgaine, as a Druid high priestess, to defend the old values of Earth wisdom and goddess worship.   “Long ago” when the magical realm of Avalon was wiped out, knights in armor fought, religious “kingdoms rose”,  political “empires fell”.

     My poem takes place when the long night of the dominator culture is ending.  Once again, we are at the “fairy hour” (twilight), the pause between day and night and life and death, when fairies can work their magic.  Fairies customarily included pagan gods and goddesses, tribal ancestors, or adepts at herbology, clairvoyance, working with elementals, and other occult practices.  In a pagan matriarchy, sexuality and femininity were celebrated.  In my poem, references to the yin, receptive, nurturing womb run in parallel to their more literal and traditional meanings:  the vessel, chalice, sacred well, cauldron.  The Chalice also relates to the Holy Grail.  It is one of the Holy Regalia of the Druids, which I mention: cup for water, plate for earth, sword for fire, and wand for air.   “Druid” means “oak-wise”, so I mention the “magic groves”.   To destroy the Earth religion, the Church cut down their sacred oak groves.  Apples, sacred to Venus and the namesake of Avalon, have five seeds in their center.  According to Barbara Walker in The Women’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets,  “Just as Kore the Virgin was hidden in the heart of the Mother Earth.... and represented the World Soul, so her pentacle was hidden in the apple.”  Cerridwen is the Celtic goddess of death and transformation.  The Celtic oral tradition was held by the bards, who called themselves “sons of Cerridwen”, Merlin being her most famous son.  Her cauldron yielded reincarnation, regeneration, and inspiration.  At the end of the poem, Morgaine revives the Celtic tradition by “picking up her harp and playing”.  

     I imagined the poem like a ballad for one of these bards, and so chose syllabic verse reminiscent of a limerick, rhyming abccb dd e.  It turned out to be five stanzas long, in keeping with the tantric number 5,  I guess.

     I address the poem to Morgaine using some of her names.  She was regarded as a “Fairy”  (“Fay”).  Latin fatare = enchant, and Old French faer =  fear (as earth spirits were later feared), so those words name her, too.    As high priestess, she would also have been  “Lady of the Lake”.  Her final sobriquet invokes her power of “miracles”, which we could use during our time of transition, our own “fairies’ hour”.