valarltd | Your Samhain Sermon

It's Samhain again.

The Sun lies abed until nearly seven, where I am, and he retires earlier each evening. And he'll be lazier and lazier until the Solstice. I think it's because he's not himself, but rather a ghost, haunting us until his rebirth.

The trees are orange and yellow and red. Some are still deep green, others are nearly bare. Rough Brother North Wind shakes and rattles and does his best to strip them bare so he can dance among their nakedness.

The garden is still putting out cherry tomatoes and carrots. I expect we'll see a couple until Thanksgiving, but everything else has died. Time to mow it off and prepare for next year.

The wheel has turned decisively to Night. Mother Night spreads her long hair, all the stars caught in it like cold diamonds. Orion hunts his way across the sky, with his faithful hounds at his heels.

Cernunnos hunts the night sky tonight. Astride his jet black steed, his huntsmen likewise on horses or he-goats, accompanied by black dogs with eyes like saucers, he hunts the souls of the dead that have gone wandering in this last year. None see him pass in safety, and mortals may be taken along to the Land of the Dead.

For tonight, the walls between the worlds are thin. The living cross more easily, and our beloved dead return to remind us that they do not forget us so we should not forgeth them. As a pagan prayer for the dying says "We are here and the beloved dead await. Go from love into love."

Darkness and Love.
The Wheel Turns.