The Long Haul

Butter-and-eggs

“I think of the long haul”
says the sparkling jewelweed outside my window,
curling her brilliant orange flowers
into tension-sprung seeds, so sensitive to passing touch.
“Do you feel it on the breeze?”
I feel it on the breeze, a quiet zephyr,
luxuriating across the wide meadow,
heralding icy months not far away.
“We’re in this for the long haul,’
say the hummingbirds, quite relaxed,
zipping from blossom to blossom,
storing up energy to fly,
to fly! across the Gulf to Mexico.
“Think of the long haul,
the wide expanse of time,”
says the barn owl, spotting a wee mouse.
“It’s our time, and guess what?
It’s your time too.”
Late at night, heat lightning explodes,
incandescent over the horizon, without a sound,
reminding us to paint our lives long and wide.
It’s time, it’s our time,
the long haul, long and wide,
you and I.



Annelinde Metzner
Catskill Farm
September 4, 2015

Milkweed for the monarch butterflies

Yarrow and strawberry

 

The Procession of the Geese

 

Once again I'm at my parents' grave,
    a joyous journey, not too far-
    to bring bright Autumn flowers.
I settle in on my camp chair,
    relishing the quiet,
    that timelessness we receive so hungrily
    when our ancestors are near.
Maple leaves rustle in the wind.
And then-
Gazing across the mowed grass,
    they come into my awareness.
Almost silent,
    all in a row, eyes on the ground,
    pecking here and there for a worm-
The Procession of the Geese!
Oblivious to me, oblivious to the graves,
    uncaring of the names or the dates,
    in a long parade they step,
    with the occasional honk,
    intent on finding food.
"Here is some life for you!" they call,
    webbed feet stepping purposefully
    through the grass.
"Regenerate, and keep going!"
All sixty of them call to me,
    in the voice of Life itself.

Annelinde Metzner

September 28, 2022

In September

In September the forest, green as ever,
is like a lover crooking her finger one last time.
She sways, she is still soft and green,
her Earth is still warm...
And somewhere unseen, on the other side,      
is the gray gargoyle Winter, 

the stone gollum with a funny grin,
skipping rocks on the water, biding her time.
She comes up to me in the morning and
brushes a bony finger against my chin,
saying “feel this- remember me?”
The hairs stand up on my chin, and
I gasp at her unstoppable impertinence.
I shake her off and turn away, pretending she’s not there.
Up on the hillside, the maples and birch
sway, supple, green as ever,
singing their sweet seductive siren song of Summer.
Behind a slab of granite, Winter
points her bony stone finger
and laughs.


Annelinde Metzner
September 6, 2009

 

 

For Layne

 

For Layne     

Taka, taka Doom, taka Doom!
The woman of ancient times throws her head back,
transported by her drum.
Doom taka Doom!
“Rhythm shapes matter,” the scientists say.
Priestesses already knew!
Cybele holds her drum and smiles.
Play, Layne, Play!
Create the world anew each day!
The drummer women of old
never relinquished their power
to the conquering barbaric hoards,
power amassed as millennia of music.
Play on, Layne, play on!
Doom taka Doom, taka Doom!
Watch us now, and leave us, Layne,
with this one great legacy,
the ritual rhythm of the drum.
As the Goddesses of old revive and renew,
so do you, so do you!



Annelinde Metzner
October 31, 2013


Layne Redmond (1952 to 2013) was a great teacher of the frame drum, and author of “When the Drummers Were Women, A Spiritual History of Rhythm.”   She passed through the veil in 2013 in Asheville, North Carolina.

Layne Redmond with her tambourine

Layne with frame drum

The Earthen Cloak

 

 

 

Each afternoon, the storms come in,
    first the mysterious rumble from far away,
    then the closer crash,
    until each day ends in a swirl of thunder, mist and rain.
The Appalachian forest, the rain forest,
    loves this daily soaking, Her element.
Mushrooms are abundant,
    spiderwebs glisten with raindrop jewels.
I am blessed with a Quaker friend,
    guardian of the forest,
    who patiently and delightedly walks me
    uphill in the wet leaf mulch,
    among the trees,
    from grave to grave.
These are the burial sites of the self-determined few,
    the ones who find the right bush, the right tree,
    taking time to warm to the chosen spot
    years before they go.
How life continues here,
    how it goes on!
A potter's grave, trimmed with pot-lids of all colors.
A painter's grave, happy to rest in beauty for all time.
A writer's grave, poems etched in the marker stone.
I sit at the stone fire circle
    as the sunbeams shine through the leaves.
A sacred ground, a blessed place,
    made of you and me,
    made of all of us. 

 

Annelinde Metzner

August 12, 2022

 

 

 

Community Garden

 

Community garden in Black Mountain NC

Community garden      

Do you love your little patch of Earth?
Does She feel you kiss her warm brown skin as you step?
Every day, do you thank Her for how she feeds you?
Go to the garden, and sink your fingers into Her living soil,
her rich humus full of life, and giver of life.
Plant some plants, plant some seeds!
What is a seed, what is it for your life?
Are there seeds, small sprinkles and dark, firm pods
planted in you, in your mind, in your heart?
Go to the garden, plant and share!
Watch each day for the new surprises She has in store.
Greens and all colors, and all for you to eat!
Grow just enough for yourself, your family,
and give some away.
Give some away until the joy of Her, of our Mother Earth
drips from your fingers like the juice of new grapes,
‘til the joy of Her sparkles in your eyes.
Give this away too, so whomever you meet
feels that energy, the energy of Her,
of Life, of resurgence and rebirth,
of all that returns when we bend just a little,
and plant.

Annelinde Metzner
Community Garden
May 23, 2013

Broccoli

Hoop garden

Herbs at the community garden

Gardeners hard at work

Kale in July of 2022

The Language of the Sacred

 

 

Oh, the world now!
People walk head down, glued to the phone screen.
On the radio, death, cruelty and shock.
The talk among people is loud, raucous,
   assuming the worst of each other.
And yet-
There is on Earth a language
   stronger than conflict,
   closer than computer screens,
   more tender than music.
All beings have this language,
   all speak it.
Once in a while you're taken by surprise,
   and you remember that you know this well-
   the language of the sacred.
It's a dark place, quiet and still,
   yet open like a window to all the world.
It's a prayer flag, it's a baptismal font
   in the lap of the Goddess.
It is a rattle of awakening, of clearing and cleansing,
   and we all have it,
   the Language of the Sacred.

Annelinde Metzner

Womenspirit Gathering

May 21, 2022

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sara La Kali

 

 

Sara in Her chapel

Sara la Kali                                                     

On May twenty-fourth, your feast day,
Romani people in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer
pilgrimage to be with You, 
dark Daughter, Sara la Kali.
Immersed in the mystery of the candle-lit chapel,
the people come and come and come,
men in black leather, long-haired women,
ordinary people moved by Your being.
Mournful, passionate with Your love,
a woman’s voice, low, sings with longing for You.
Sara la Kali, You arose here from the sea,
fresh from the womb of the Goddess and God,
carrier of the sang real, holy blood and grail.
They arrive in a hush to kiss Your cheek.
Layer upon layer they dress You in finery,
promises of blessings to all of us in need.
And then on this day, You come out into the world!
Men in black on fine white horses,
colorful flags held high in Your honor,
wade far out into the raging waters,
awaiting Your passage back to the sea.
Sara!   If we had known of You,
Sara, passion of the two great beings,
Sara, love child, Magdala and Yeshua,
where would we be today, our Kali,
our Kali of Europa, born to us all,
and in the white and rushing waters,
swept away.

Annelinde Metzner

June 14, 2012

Today is the feast day of Saint Sara, beloved by all Gypsies, especially in this place where Mary Magdalene was said to have come ashore after escaping from the Holy Land across the Mediterranean.  Feel how every year, the waters roil up when Sara la Kali is brought to the sea.  I view Sara as the daughter of Jesus and Mary.  Some say there is a long lineage there, the "Sang Real," the Sangraal, or to paraphrase, the Holy Grail.

Experience the Feast day of Saint Sara, May of 2008, here. 

Worshipping Sara by the sea

Gift to the Sea

 

 

I walk along the pier, over the marsh grass,
until watery Yemaya, the Sea, is beneath me.
I have brought gifts!
This cowrie shell necklace, bought when I was fourteen,
from a wandering African merchant at the music fair.
"These are sacred cowrie shells!"
she informed me with a smile and a knowing look.
Every beach I've visited since then,
I have soaked the necklace and all the shells
in the waters of the sea,
bringing the necklace home more sacred than before.
Each year some cowrie shells fell away into the sea.
And on this day I return them all to Her.
With a song and a blessing, I toss the necklace
into Her arms, the calm and silvery waters.
"For You!" I cry to Yemaya.
I pour Her some blackstrap molasses, Her favorite,
sweet as the Mother of All Life.
The black cloud swirls and vanishes into the waves.
As I gaze entranced over the rail,
a grey fin appears,
rising and falling right under my gaze,
the love of a dolphin infusing my presence.
A blessing and a thank you from Our Sister in the sea. 

Annelinde Metzner

May 6, 2022

Hunting Island, SC

Greening

 

Suddenly I awaken, early April,
and a diaphanous green veil
has draped over the weeping cherries,
the first to bloom with delicate, drooping grace.
Like a green bride, like Salome dancing,
the tiny new leaflets shyly appear.
Soon the new greening will climb stately
up the sides of Lakey Mountain.
On the dogwood trees, creamy flowers,
not yet full grown,
but already gracefully held by each small stem.
With joy, the catbird
repeats, repeats her thoughts,
new, always fresh and new.
The slightest breeze sets the leaves dancing.
The bumblebee awakens, floats into my vision.
O Goddess of regeneration,
Rebirth is Your watchword!
Welcome, welcome!
I breathe deeply of Your fresh greenness. 

 

Annelinde Metzner

April 6, 2022 

 

 

 

Fiddlehead Ferns

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wake Robin

 

Red Trillium

Blood-red trillium,
      with your sumptuous variegated leaf patterns,
      arising in big colonies early, so early in spring
      amid dry leaves and old twigs,
Triple Goddess, you sprout from the dry earth
      innocently, as if it were every day
      ancient knowledge comes forth into our sight.
You lie barely visible at our feet,
      one of the old ones, short and well-adapted
      to the forest floor, a gnome
      with a new red cap.
But no pretty pink here, nor lacy white.
      You are of the blood of the Earth Mother herself,
      and even Her rich warm blood has beauty,
      and she will not hide this, our Mother.
      She bleeds, and Her blood is beautiful.
Wake Robin, wake us to know
      where e’er we walk, She feels and knows.
      We kiss the Earth, but She bruises, too,
      in bloodroot, in trillium, in fracking, in clearcut, in war.
Wake, Robin, don’t be a fool!
      Here is Life’s own rich display, ineffable,
      the upward thrust, the very orgasm of Spring.
She is here today, for you, for us,
      crowding upward for us here,
      but once only.

Annelinde Metzner
Flat Creek North Carolina
March 23, 2012





 

Yellow trillium

  

Botanical Gardens in Asheville, NC

  

Red Oleander

 

Red Oleander

A salamander pale green as the new leaves of May

opens its orange lung-sac, brilliant, to the sun.

Three times at every pause!

In the breeze, red Oleander bends on her long stem, celebrating.

I am drawn down a quiet lane by the scent of jasmine

beguiling my heart, a path toward joy.

The dear Earth wafts up into me,

warm as fresh-baked bread,

filling my womb with Her love.

With my feet in the sand,

I pull Her love up into me,  to power my days.

Mother holds me tenderly, the mourning dove

in her palmetto-basket nest, giving, giving,

we Her babies, Her vast dream,

we Her future and Her now.

The black fin of a dolphin arises from the sea, ancient as days,

loving Her into the fathomless tomorrow.

Annelinde Metzner

Folly Beach

May 2010

Spring in Appalachia

She Heard Me

 

 

          
I sang all my songs to Mama Yemaya,
     our Mother the Sea,
     on that bracing and welcoming day at the beach.
How the great water glistened,
     each droplet responding, reflecting,
     rejoicing under our Father the Sun.
Pelicans dove straight down from on high.
Wee children hopped and squealed in the tide pools.
I sang and sang.
I think She heard me!
Our vast and unknowable Mother,
     Womb of All Life.
I think She heard me.

 

Annelinde Metzner

February 13, 2022

 

 

 

 

 

Sycamore Fig

 

Sycamore Fig fruiting

I know you by your absence, my adoration,
     your familiarity.
Great tree, Ficus Sycomorus, twenty meters tall,
     twice that in width,
     reaching out your wide expanse to protect us,
     our Ancient Mother.
Asherah! Asherah! I remember you as Goddess,
     nurturing us, fostering all beings,
     and in that life, in that dream,
     You were our altar.
Heart-shaped leaves, a canvas for artists through the ages.
Your abundant fruits!  Flowering year-long,
     they ripen green to yellow to richest red,
     proof of your divinity.
Each fruit-fall, a ton, ripens at Your leisure,
     at all times of the year, as it pleases You.
When You, Asherah, were Goddess at our altar,
     were those thousands of rich red fruits
     all the proof we needed?
At our altars, two thousand years ago and so much more,
     You fed us all, monkeys and humans, elephants and bats.
In Egypt, they painted You everywhere,
     as we suckled at Your holy breasts.
"Destroy their altar, break their images,
     and cut down their Asherim!"
     cried Moses, the teachings of the advancing hoards
     echoing down through the ages.
The good red fruit, Your menstrual blood,
     Your woman-power, Your all-giving grace,
     Your place of honor by the altar
     is now lost to us all.
Oh our Mother! Asherah! Sycamore Fig!
I am there again, singing,
     with my sistrum and my drum,
     dancing with all my people
     to the beat of the tambourine.
Roots wide-spread underground, 
     Your massive canopy overhead,
     I feel You reverberating,
     happy under our feet as we dance.
Oh Asherah, Sycamore Fig! African Queen,
     Queen of Trees, beloved of Egypt,
     adored in the Holy Land,
     in those holiest days before Yahweh and his swordsmen
     set out to destroy You....
You fed us all.
I feel Your wide-splayed roots
     and your luscious wide canopy
     growing holy and happy once more,
     fruits as red as my blood,
     in the ageless and undying altar of my heart.




Annelinde Metzner
January 1, 2020

Asherah

Egyptian mural of Tree Goddess

Beautiful trunk of the Sycamore Fig

Birds enjoying the sacred fig tree