A Fire in my Head

How do those of us with a "fire in our head" and a hunger in our heart fit ourselves to the "regular world"? Or do we?

I think this question is asked and answered somewhat in Irish poet William Butler Yeats’s poem “The Song of Wandering Aengus.”  When I first read this poem years ago, I loved it for its music and its fanciful, romantic quality.  It had lovely images and a magical aspect which was appealing.  I loved the way it sounded on my tongue when I read it aloud.  But now that I am older and just a bit wiser, I believe that I understand the poem in its fulness . . . what Yeats is saying through the medium of the poem is far more meaningful than the surface details which are fairy-tale like.

The Song of Wandering Aengus

I went out to the hazel wood,

Because a fire was in my head,

And cut and peeled a hazel wand,

And hooked a berry to a thread;

And when white moths were on the wing,

And moth-like stars were flickering out,

I dropped the berry in a stream

And caught a little silver trout.

When I had laid it on the floor

I went to blow the fire aflame,

But something rustled on the floor,

And some one called me by my name:

It had become a glimmering girl

With apple blossom in her hair

Who called me by my name and ran

And faded through the brightening air.

Though I am old with wandering

Through hollow lads and hilly lands.

I will find out where she has gone,

And kiss her lips and take her hands;

And walk among long dappled grass,

And pluck till time and times are done

The silver apples of the moon,

The golden apples of the sun.

-William Butler Yeats

What could the glimmering girl represent in this poem . . . Yeats (or the persona of the poem) has grown older, yet he is still entranced with beauty and simplicity and rapture, and is still able to relate to what the girl symbolizes, the things of the spirit. Just because he has grown older, he doesn't feel he must give up enchantment.

Others may grow old in their heads (or spirits), but he still has a fire in his . . . and why not? Let the others settle, he will still pursue his dreams. He will be vibrantly spiritually alive until he dies physically.

If this "fire" is part of our very nature, what do we give up when we deny it or don't seek to assuage it with what we are longing for?

Where is your "hazel wood," that place apart where you can be yourself or even rediscover yourself whenever you are lost?   For me, it is usually out in nature that I find the harmony that is often lost in the "civilized" world . . . an elemental world filled with simple yet fanciful things . . . a place where goodness is possible . . . where beauty can restore and re-tune the spirit . . . where I only need a hazel wand and a berry to catch a silver trout.

Food for thought as to how the modern culture has it all wrong:

Often people attempt to live their lives backwards;  they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want, so they will be happier.    The way it actually works is the reverse.   You must first be who you really are, then do what you need to do in order to have what you want.               

                                                                          ~Margaret Young


After you have taken care of things of the spirit, you will find that what you want will have changed.  And your chance of fulfillment and contentment will be far greater but with less cost.  


A person who isn't spiritual doesn't accept the things of God's Spirit, for they are nonsense to him.  He can't understand them because they are spiritually evaluated.
-I Cor. 2:14 (ISV)


Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.   -Proverbs 4:23

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Ancient Stones

the deserted village of Slievemore on Achill Island, Ireland  ©A.Rutherford

In many, many places all across Ireland, out of all the dreaming, planning and building, living and loving in a place, only the stones remain.

Slievemore is one such village on Achill Island, off the northwest coast of Ireland.  Achill is one of the best places to just go and be in Ireland.  The remains of the village are perched high upon the south slope of  Slievemore (Sliabh Mór) mountain, and consists of the remains of about 100 stone cottages set along what must have been a pathway or road that extends for about a mile.  These cottages at one time would have been thatched, and would have housed a thriving community.  For generations these people lived out their lives amongst the spectacular scenery of this place, until something happened.  No one is quite sure, but the consensus is that the Great Famine of 1845-49, created by the potato blight, caused the villagers to slowly die off from hunger or disease.

Despite its tragic history when you go there today, there is an overwhelming sense of peace.  The village is far from any neighboring towns, yet it is not a lonely place.  It is a place I return to because it is a blessing to me.  For me, Slievemore is one of those “thin places” the old ones in Ireland used to speak of . . . those places in the landscape which are sort of thresholds where two worlds meet . . . the temporal and the eternal . . . the inner and the outer . . . the spiritual and the physical . . . the past and the present.  

The aspect of patience conveyed by the stones and the sky strikes a chord with me.   It's like the earth is saying, "I've got all the time in the world. Be here with me now."   And to connect to that timelessness is either healing and invigorating, whichever one is in need of at the time.

The Deserted Village 

I have come here to this place to be alone,

And for my restless spirit seek some calm.

I lay my hand to rest on ancient stone

And feel the captured sun upon my palm.

My fingers trace the crevices and moss,

The tangled vines speak like some ancient braille.

The softly moist breezes play and toss

Time’s curtain to the side like a veil.

I see mystic forms flit along the lanes

That mark the intersections of their lives.

I hear empty echoes of their joys and pains,

These stones their only vestige that survives.

Ruined houses sit in order row by row,

As if some meaning once was there,

But now between the cobbles grasses grow

And leave the world no trace of their despair.

Each morning mists rise from atop the mountain

Which sheltered life and love along these lanes.

Each evening mist rolls down again,

To rest like a blessing on what remains.

With benediction too I leave this place,

And carry with me memories as a grace.

                                                               ©.A.Rutherford

The Irish poet William Butler Yeats took an old stone ruin near Galway, a square, four storied Norman castle keep, and restored it to a place where he could settle and write, but still be in touch with the continuity of Irish history.  I guess you could say he built his own “ivory tower.”

He created this inscription which was placed on the front wall:

I, the poet William Yeats,

With old millboards and sea-green slates,

And smithy work from the Gort forge,

Restored this tower for my wife George,

And may these characters remain

When all is ruin once again.

That's becoming part of the flow of history, to be sure . . .

Of course, for people of Faith there is a more sure foundation . . .

Psalm 118:22-24 

 22 The stone that the builders rejected
      has now become the Cornerstone.
 23 This is the Lord’s doing,
      and it is wonderful to see.
 24 This is the day the Lord has made.
      We will rejoice and be glad in it.

Isaiah 26:4 
 4 Trust in the Lord always,
      for the Lord God is the eternal Rock.

And yeah, I gather stones from various places I visit as mementos . . . I guess no one looking at them sitting on my shelves would know where they "belong" or what memories they “contain,” but that doesn't matter to me.  *smile*

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Making a Space for Solitude

the Lake Isle of Innisfree, County Sligo

Making a space for Solitude is difficult . I'm finding that there is a distinct difference between having time for solitude and making a space for solitude.

Over the years of being deeply committed to my teaching career,  I created a pile of things for "when I have more time," I am now, of course, carving out more and more time in a day for the things I need or want to do . . . . one of which is having more interior time, but it’s easy to forget about all the "stuff" you have to hack through to carve out a meaningful space inside yourself.

I am visualizing it as a quiet bower deep in a forest, a lovely retreat but surrounded by undergrowth which keeps quickly regrowing so that every time you try to enter that bower, you have to hack your way in again.

Reminds me of Yeats' poem “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”—

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, 

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; 

Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee, 

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, 

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; 

There midnight's all a-glimmer, and noon a purple glow, 

And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day 

I hear the water lapping with low sounds by the shore; 

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray, 

I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Gosh, how I had always romanticized that poem. So a few years ago on a trip to Ireland, when I was in County Sligo, I ferreted out the location of this island of the poem and hired a local man to row me across to the middle of the lake and leave me on the island for an afternoon. 

At first I had been disappointed that it was so small and overgrown, but after I climbed to the top of the small hill in the middle of the island and had sat there a while amongst the waist high ferns, listening to the water lapping against the shoreline, delight came over me and I thought to myself this is just big enough *smile*   Of course, this experience has become for me a wonderful metaphor for the place inside yourself where you can retreat, surrounded by the "moat" of silence.  It doesn’t take much interior real estate to be just enough.

In Anam Cara,  John O'Donohue uses an interesting word to describe solitude, ascetic (page 141).  I looked ascetic up to see if there was more to the word than what I knew . . .

              The adjective "ascetic" derives from the ancient Greek term askēsis (practice, 

              training or exercise). Originally associated with any form of disciplined 

              practice, the term ascetic has come to mean anyone who practices a 

              renunciation of worldly pursuits to achieve higher intellectual and spiritual 

              goals.

Hmmmmm ....."disciplined practice"..."higher intellectual and spiritual goals"  . . . all that sounds kinda heavy .......... when what I am after is an "unbearable lightness of being" ........ sure that's intellectual in a way and certainly spiritual ......... but it's joyous too ......... a place/space where my heart sings.

Although O’Donohue says ascetic solitude is difficult, just like all things that require self-discipline are, yet he argues for its necessity, especially in our modern culture.  Listen as he explains it here:

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Nota bene:  Anam Cara is the Gaelic for a friend of the soul, not in the modern meaning of soul-mate, but rather a special connection between two people that is formed on a mutual deep understanding and trust.  It is a bond in which each nurtures the other and cherishes the other more highly than oneself.

John O'Donohoe, who is a poet, a philosopher, and a Catholic priest, explains the anam cara relationship this way:  "You are joined in an ancient and eternal union with humanity that cuts across all barriers of time, convention, philosophy, and definition.  When you are blessed with an anam cara, the Irish believe, you have arrived at that most sacred place: home."  And if you have ever had that person or those persons who are indeed a friend of your soul, then you surely know what a blessing the anam cara friendship is.


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