Links with Literature

The most obvious literary link with Avalon is the tale of King Arthur. Arthur and Guinevere are reputedly buried in the Abbey and a grave is centrally located to mark this spot. The most famous text is Sir Thomas Malory's (1405-1471)'Le Morte D'Arthur' - the death of Arthur, 1485.

Other links include Alfred Lord Tennyson's epic poem' The Idylls of the King' ( 1856-1885) and 'The Lady of Shallot' with its famous curse upon the woman in the tower who espies Sir Lancelot through her mirror:

'Out flew the web and floated wide-
The mirror crack'd from side to side;
"The curse is come upon me," cried
The Lady of Shalott.'

Another source is the Welsh 'Mabinogion', collated from medieval manuscripts in eleven stories and translated in English in the mid 19th century by Lady Charlotte Guest - a 'foreigner' from Uffington, Lincolnshire who lived in Wales, learnt the language and helped revive Welsh culture.

John Keats too immortalised the romantic ideal of the lost and wandering knight in search of the elusive, faery child - temptress (Goddess perhaps) in 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci' - The beautiful woman without mercy. Here the knight loses his soul to her and is destined to wander the Lake for eternity. The atmosphere and setting of this poem dramatically evoke the 'sedge'that 'hath withered on the lake' of Glastonbury and the Grail quest for eternal life through woman/ love/ goddess.

More recently is the feminist reading of the grail legend with the protagonist as thePriestess of Avalon, Morgaine, traditionally depicted as a witch or sorceress determined to bring about the demise of Arthur but now rewritten by Marion Bradley as a strong and powerful Priestess. As a young woman reading this book for the first time, I was mesmerised by this tale of a woman's initiation into the secrets of the Goddess and the ancient lore. All female characters are given a powerful, real voice and at last the very patriarchal, Christian legend is retold in a way that revives a sense of the power and magic of the mysteries of Avalon, home of the goddess. An evocative, intense and life transforming book this book completely changed my perspective and my view of myself as a young woman, I cannot recommend it enough. The language alone is spell binding..and like my journey it begins by the ocean in Cornwall and ends at the Isle of Avalon.

'Behind her, as she took up the bronze mirror again, she saw her sister in the door. Viviane had taken off the breeches she wore for riding, and put on a loose gown of undyed wool; her hair hung down, soft and dark as the wool of a black sheep. She looked small and fragile and aging, and her eyes were the eyes of a priestess in the cave of initation, years away and in another world... Igraine cut off the thought, impatiently.' pg.19

''She turned her face toward the guesthouse. Should she go there and breakfast with the nuns, speak perhaps of the old days at Camelot? Morgaine smiled gently. No. She was filled with the same tenderness for them as for the budding apple tree, but that time was passed. She turned her back on the convent, and walked down to the Lake, along the old path by the shore. Here was a place where the veil lying between the worlds was thin. She needed no longer to summon the barge- she need only step through the mists here, and be in Avalon. Her work was done.'' pg.876

Enjoy xx

Pilgrimage to Glastonbury - Part 2

Wearyall Hill can be viewed prominantly from the Tor and it is to this spot that I walked next, following the path down the Tor past the White spring and Chalice Well gardens. Wearyall Hill is a spectacular spot with views toward the levels and the Tor as well as down upon the town of Street, now known for Clarkes Shoes. Upon the hill is the famous Glastonbury Thorn, according to legend sprung from the staff of Joseph of Arithmathea who visited Glastonbury in 63AD in an attempt to bring Christianity to Britain.( The idea of the sprouting staff has links with Shamanism and also lends itself to the imagery of the Ace of Wands in the Tarot). The thorn is said to bloom at Christmas and in Spring and is reknowned for its possible associations with Christ's crown of thorns and also Joseph's bringing of the Chalice or Holy Grail to Glastonbury. The original Hawthorn tree was cut down and destroyed by the Roundheads, but not before cuttings were taken and these planted around the town including in the Abbey Gardens. Whatever the truth of this legend today, it stands alone on brow of the hill blown and blasted by winds and decked completely with ribbons and healing votive gifts. I left my own ribbon as an offering and breathed in the special atmosphere of this wonderful natural spot. It certainly is magical with its direct view toward the Tor behind. This hill was once an island on the pilgrimage route to the Tor when sea levels were higher and the levels were wet and marshy. The idea of this sacred pilgrimage by boat up the River Brue around Wearyall Hill on the south side really captivated my imagination and increased my vision of the mystical nature of this place as the Isle of Avalon.

Upon the crown of the hill, I came face to face with a wild rabbit about to escape into the bushes but in time for me to get very close and feel a sense again of how strange it is that on these journeys one always has moments with animals or birds. I spent over five minutes very close to the rabbit who didn't seem bothered by my presence. Rabbit is a burrowning creature and in our Priestess of Kernow Wheel would most likely be associated with Earth in the North, but also has obvious associations with Easter.

''Rabbit (Coinean) and Hare (Gèarr) are symbols of fertility, intuition, rebirth, promise, fulfillment, and balance. He is the Goddess’ creature and represents the Moon, night and dawn. is also associated with abundance, rebirth and release and is symbolic of the ‘tween times, dawn and dusk. Their motions were used for divination. They’re also associated with transformation, receiving esoteric knowledge and intuitive messages.Read more: http://paganismwicca.suite101.com/article.cfm/rabbithare_tricksterfear_caller#ixzz0V3q3sjSS

I continued my walk down hill, through a copse of Horse Chestnut and Beech with shiny conkers and copper leaves strewn across the path, towards the river Brue across the main road through some of what is now an industrial estate to Bride's Mound. A wooden gate announced it had been erected by the Irish 'Friends of Bride' and here at last I felt a deep connection with Goddess and my own muse, Brigid. Bride's Mound is very unassuming and really now only a mound of long grass, bramble and bracken, but here I could again feel that direct association with an older landscape where this was once an island used by pilgrims from Wales and Ireland as a stopover vigil retreat before passing along the processional 'Perilous Way' or oak causeway to Avalon. It is a very peaceful spot, meditative and still, apart from the sound of birdsong. The site is dedicated to Bride, St Brigid, Brighde, who stayed here at the oratory of Mary Magdalene in 488AD. Two stone chapels were built and dedicated to her here.Legend also says that a community of women lived on Bride's Mound after the visit of St Brigid and a perpetual fire was kept there. In 2004 the flame from the perpetual fire at Kildare was brought back to Glastonbury, where it is kept alive today awaiting the restoration of Bride's Mound. A stone marks the site of the well and I was aware not only of the amount of hawthorn trees in the area, but also of one bedecked in clouties leaning over a small stream.There was an original holy well here, but it has since been lost and all that really marks the spot is the tree and a stone some distance away in the field. I spent a while there in my own reflective meditation thanking the goddess for guiding me to this special place and imagining myself as a pilgrim in vigil here in ancient times gazing toward the Tor beyond. There were a number of feathers on the top of the mound in a circle showing how well visited this site is and how rituals are often performed here. It felt like a special journey and I had not visited here before...now my relationship with goddess and landscape was really starting to create a web of links and synchronicites.

Blessed bexx

Photos - Glastonbury Tor Oct 09

Autumn Pilgrimage

Autumn is here...you can smell it in the air.....it reaches for us in wraithes of smoke and soaks our feet with dew...it is here in the swathes of leaves and the shafts of cascading sun through mottled green and copper leaves. The shimmering of dawn on the grey sea. The sense of needing to bask in the last rays of sun on the cliffs before they are hooded by mist.

I have just returned from a much needed pilgrimage to Glastonbury. The Tor too bathed in the melting mellow sun of Autumn as I approached it up Bushy Coombe between hedges of rosehips and hawthorn. The prayer wheels at Shekinashram as you enter the path welcome you and imbue a sense of sacredness. You walk with the meditative steps of a pilgrim, your awareness sharpened, your heart beating in unity with the blithe notes of birdsong. I have climbed the snake path many times, but I felt really peaceful on this particular journey. The golds, russets and burnt siennas of the trees juxtaposed with the blue of the sky. No cloud in sight; a clear, shining day. I was blessed.

I climbed the serpentine slopes, my breath heaving with the hard trudge uphill; my sights set on the tower above. The reward for the trek is the fantastic view over the Somerset levels and beyond to the Bristol Channel. Below hugged close to the church of St John and the Abbey ruins is the town of Glastonbury with Windmill hill to the right and Wearyall Hill and the famous Glastonbury thorn to the left. St Brigids Mound is beyond. Chalice Hill before you with the Chalice Well gardens and their famous healing springs. The Tor towers over all...St Brigid - the Mother Goddess-is here carved above the arch milking her sacred cow and on the other side what look like a pair of scales weighed by an Angel like the sign of Libra. The Tor is always wracked by winds which adds to its slightly gloomy atmosphere.. it is cold and shadowy inside and you are reminded that it is a place of execution..the last abbot was hung, drawn and quartered here in a Christlike martrydom. The Tower is dedicated to St Michael and is 14th century, replacing the older church dedicated to St Michael which was destroyed by an earth quake on the ironic date of September 11th, 1275. Here it seemed to me there was a union of male and female energies coiled in the labyrinthine womb of the mound and united in the Tower...like the energies depicted on
the Tarot card of the same name. There are always people here leaning against the tower basking in the sun..pilgrims meditating, locals walking their dogs. Two buzzards glided on the air as I stood there...soaring the eddies...and a butterfly spread its brown and gold wings in the
sunshine. One woman was from Michegan...she seemed into mother earth as she was asking about Blackthorn and its fruits. I enlightened her as to where to find it....most hedgerows! and a few others who didn't know that its fruits were - sloes!! Cornwall was also the topic of conversation ironically as one couple were on their way to Cornwall but their van had broken down....synchronicity that this was the topic I first overheard being discussed when I sat down!

I sat in the melting sun and soaked in what could be the last beams, gazing out to the levels bronzed and dusky in the mellow Autumnal light. Here there is a true sense of inner fulfilment, a goal achieved..the goddess slumbering and coiled beneath you and Bridgit here as Mother Goddess of fertility milking the green earth. the berries of the Hawthorn were like red sparkling jewels glossy and rich...the Hawthorn linked to Bridgit and the turning cycles of the goddess with its white blossoms in Spring and red berries in Autumn. This union of red and white echoed by the red iron oxide Blood spring in Chalice Well gardens and the White Spring at the foot of Well Lane. According to Legend Joseph of Arimathea visited Glastonbury and buried the two cruets containing the sweat and blood of Christ here in the site of Chalice Well gardens and this is the source of the springs with their healing properties.

I sat and meditated, back to the tower along with my fellow pilgrims...meditating on what had led me back and feeling blessed and grounded by this homecoming...back to Avalon and her mysteries. (To be contd)

Blessed Be xx

Poems by Paganlite

The Lie of the Land

Out on the island gulls splatter suffocated air
It is pale dawn
The glassy ocean
Rolls, shards, splinters
And somewhere deep
It surfaces
Seal hooded
Nuzzling rocky clefts
Nudging this winkling of tears
A muted calling
The pebbled shore knocks its shoal of eggs loose
Right to the heave of my door
Beached high
In my mind’s turning a shadow
Wafts
Fragile shell
Bone silver
Dipped in dew
My lungs are straining caves
Breathing you in the cut air
Behind the shutters of my eyes you lie
Still balanced above me
Rocking with the waves spitting on my pane
Your golden iris open as a star
Your lips embroidering
Seamless letters on my throat’s shore
Forever forever forever


29/09/2009

Wracked

We are still the same here
Wracked by trite syllables
Tapped in code
On the ocean drawl
We cling to wreckage
Survivors of your cunning craft
Shored on sticks of memory
And other inky stains
Blotted envelopes, bedraggled cards
Drowned caskets
You screamed a shallow warning
Like some rag rent cormorant
Hermited at sea
On a cool cape of moon
Barren as urns

I am not raided by your bone rattle
My heart’s shell clammed close
Tight lipped
Anemones hid red eyes between webbed toes
And guppies open jawed flashed scales
Between the barnacled ventricles of my heart
I have been dry as a salt pan for weeks
Mobilising ribs into a shoal of forgetting
My mouth’s purse babbling on
Currents pulling in deep
My ears lopped off
Hollow gilled
Hooked by strained lines
Flung on brine with no weight
To anchor them
My seal pelt skinned
Hung out and nailed
Flapping on blistering winds
My tongue a stone
Knocking knocking
In the addit of my mouth
Waiting a break in the tide


Tuesday, 29 September 2009


Beachcombing

I comb the pebbled shore for bits of you
Your smile a curve of wood sea smooth rimed
Your laugh a bubble of oystercatcher bursting on calm skies
Your iris the flame of lichen on freckled boulders
Your touch the glide of a sail feathering waves
Your taste the salt on the spray
And the last trail of sweet peas
Your heart the deep pulse of tides
Your voice the seal’s call
Out out on banished rocks
Bereft
Mewling
In the midnight deep

Tuesday, 29 September 2009


Thankyou to Rene and Carol Anne Duffy for the inspirationxx

Full Moon 12 degrees in Aries - 07:09am Sunday 4th October

Full moon approaches again and over the past few nights the sky above Mousehole has given me a dramatic display of indigo sky with the moon nearing fruition between the sweeping silver clouds. Full moon is a potent and powerful time: sow seeds now as plants grown from seed at full moon are stronger. The moon is in the fire sign of Aries giving access to our inner fire, our temper, impatience, passions. We are urgent to get back on track, re-centre in ourselves, but can lose empathy. It is a time to do what truly makes us feel vital and alive, to initiate projects, set boundaries and buffer our temper. As a Moon in Aries woman myself I am very aware of my inner fire and emotions which can run very high. I feel for me Moon in Aries is a force for action, an impulsive need to create,to sow the seed of ideas, to follow my muse, to be independent and create my own path. It is an emotional placing for the moon: my moods are intense but also quick to fire and just as quick to ebb away...unfortunately leaving wreckage in their wake at times but good as an energiser: I get things done quickly. I feel inspired to be true to myself. I love travel, adventure and the freedom to be. I don't like feeling stuck in one state and have a restless fire inside, eager for movement and a zest for life. I like challenges and inspiring others, but I can also find my emotions have driven me to pursue a more independent existance..I have challenged the statue quo often where I feel injustice. Moon in Aries is a warrior energy and needs focus. The challenge for a moon in Aries person is to learn the lessons of the sun sign Libra....applying the drive and inspiration of Aries to learn dynamic group co-operation and greater emotional balance. Aries is a great driving force for action but we must not rush in like fools where angels fear to tread ...think about the needs of others and work together toward our goals.
Aries Moon falling two weeks after Autumn Equinox is very symbolic for us at this time for in Aries we need all the energy and enthusiasm to harvest our thoughts, decisions and ideas and then to sift through each and only bring the good ones to the table.


Spend some time sky gazing tonight, breathe the full moon deeply into your belly and make a wish....be adventurous, try something different,trust your instincts, be healed and inspired!


Blessed Be