Episode 2: Beltane - A Guided Meditation and a Poem for the First of May

This podcast is an offering for Beltane: the ancient Celtic festival that falls on the first of May in the northern hemisphere, marking the beginning of summer and the height of the year's creative power.It began as a personal piece of practice: a way of working with the Beltane ceremony of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids as an interior journey rather than an enacted ritual. But Beltane has a way of wanting to be shared (it is, after all, a festival of union, of things coming together) and so here it is.The podcast has two parts.The first is a guided meditation of around twenty minutes, written as a continuous flowing piece. It draws directly on the imagery and spiritual framework of the OBOD Beltane ceremony: the sacred grove, the calling of the four directions and their guardian animals, the lighting of the twin fires of sun and moon, the standing between opposites, and the welcoming of the Mabon: the bright child of creative energy that the tradition says is born whenever two polarities fully meet. The meditation is intended as a complement to the ceremony itself for those who work with it, and as an accessible introduction to its themes for those who don't. All ceremony material remains the intellectual property of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids, and is used here with gratitude. For more about the OBOD visit druidry.org.The second part is W.B. Yeats' poem The Song of Wandering Aengus, read aloud. Written in 1897 and drawn from Irish mythology, it tells of Aengus, the god of love and poetry, who catches a glimpse of a shining girl beside a river and spends his life walking the world in search of her. It is a poem about the nature of inspiration itself: elusive, transformative, worth every step of the long search. It needs no introduction, really. It is simply one of the most beautiful poems in the English language, and it belongs here, on this day, after this journey.Together the two pieces trace something of what Beltane is at its heart: the meeting of inner and outer, the kindling of creative fire, and the luminous quality of following what calls to you, even when you cannot quite see where it leads.The meditation is best listened to with eyes closed, in a place where you won't be disturbed, with enough time to let the imagery settle before you return to the day. The poem will find you wherever you are.Happy Beltane.