heart's desire

What things soever ye desire,
when ye pray,
believe that ye receive them,
and ye shall have them.

Mark 11:24



You shall receive whatever gift you may name, as far as wind dries, rain wets, sun revolves; as far as sea encircles and earth extends.

Culhwch and Olwen, from The Mabinogian



The true heart's desire is an integral potentiality, a germinated seed waiting to manifest... We must cancel our old and immature wishes by calling them back and revoking them, along with any other idle wishes we may have uttered and since forgotten. Then the way stands clear.

Caitlin Matthews


If you know you want it,
Have it.

Gita Bellin

the day after ... and books

Our Christmas was quiet and sweet this year, I think because we kept it simple and I did a good job not taking on more than I could manage. Having the horses has made that job easier: the daily barn routine is unceasing, chores that can't be put off. Yesterday it rained heavily here, and for most of the day the horses were inside. There was something especially sweet about our regular walks to the barn to keep them supplied with hay and water as the day unfolded.


Two books have shepherded me through this holiday and I'd like to talk about them here.




Dot Jackson's Refuge was published this year by North Carolina's Novello Festival Press, "the nation's only public library-sponsored literary publisher. An imprint of the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, NFP seeks to enhance awareness of the literary arts and expand opportunities for readers and writers from within our community and beyond it."

I was in Southern Pines doing a feed store run when Dot Jackson was interviewed on NPR. By the time I listened to the interview and the excerpt she read on the air, I turned the car around and headed directly to the Country Bookshop to buy a copy.

Refuge is the story of Mary Seneca Steele, a Charleston woman who flees an unhappy marriage with her two children to find grace and beauty in a mountain cove. Embraced by her father's family, she also finds a fierce and once-in-a-lifetime love with her cousin, Ben Aaron Steele.

The novel is beautifully written, beautifully paced, and offers characters so well-drawn I feel as if they are distant relatives of my own. I haven't yet put the book on a shelf - not quite ready to have it out of arm's reach.

If you like literary fiction, lyrical language, and a wonderful story, support both Ms. Jackson and Novello Festival Press and go buy this book. I love it that Novello is bringing books like this into the world.

The second book needs no introduction. Charles Frazier's Thirteen Moons is on the New York Times Bestseller list and has had a tremendous amount of fanfare the past few months.




I loved Cold Mountain and have waited patiently for Frazier's new novel. I bought it the day it came out and hoarded it like a rare bottle of wine until Christmas eve. I admit that I am still reading, and not very far into the book at this writing. But I'm doing the thing I do with books I end up loving -- only allowing myself to read a few pages at a time in order to savor every word and image.

This book is lighter than Cold Mountain but every bit as well written. It makes me want to go on a week-long writing retreat to work on my own books. I highly recommend it.

One of my resolutions for 2007 is to get contracts on my three novels. Another is to get the word out about novels I read and love - the ones that engage and inspire me. I especially want to support "new" writers by getting out to the local bookstores to buy books in hardcover, early on, and make a point to tell folks about the books that move me.

Help me do this by making your own recommendations in comments here, or emailing about books you come across and love.

the day before the day before

Everything that lives is holy.

William Blake


The only beloved is the living mystery itself.

Kathleen Raine

winter solstice

Today is the shortest day of the year. A wonderful chance to consider the long shadow you cast in the sunlight of mid-day. An opportunity to notice the light that might exist in darkness ... and how you will find that light and turn it on.

From today's Writer's Almanac email:

In the northern hemisphere, today is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year and the longest night. It's officially the first day of winter and one of the oldest known holidays in human history. Anthropologists believe that solstice celebrations go back at least 30,000 years, before humans even began farming on a large scale. Many of the most ancient stone structures made by human beings were designed to pinpoint the precise date of the solstice. The stone circles of Stonehenge were arranged to receive the first rays of midwinter sun.

I'd love to make a stone structure to do the very same thing.

We treat our dogs, cats, and horses on the evening of the solstice, and we also gift the wilder animals that share space with us. Deer and the birds, others we rarely see, like opossum and raccoon. Walking the perimeter of our property with candles in the dark of night is one of my favorite walks all year long.

Inside, we enjoy a special meal, open a family gift, and spend time together with music. I often think how affected we are by the shortening of daylight, and how many of our phrases associated with struggle and despair use images of night and morning. The long dark night of the soul. In the light of day. The sun will come up tomorrow. Etc.

Many solstice rituals focus on celebrating the lengthening of the days following the solstice, but I think the longest night is a reason to celebrate all on its own. The longest night is a wonderful time to string lights everywhere, light candles, build a fire, snuggle in with books, music, pets, children, one another. A long quiet night to let all things creative simmer and come to the surface. The perfect time to write down the thing you want to let go of or leave behind as the light of dawn approaches. We write ours down on slips of paper and burn them, and on New Year's Eve we take the christmas tree out, make a bonfire, and do it again, just in case there's something we forgot. :)


Two poems we always read out loud as part of our solstice ritual:


The Shortest Day

So the shortest day came and the year died,
And everywhere, down the centuries of the snow-white world came people
Singing - dancing - to drive the dark away.

They lighted candles in the winter trees.
They hung their homes with evergreens.
And burned beseeching fires all night long to keep the year alive.

And when the new day sunshine blazed awake,
They shouted "Reveille!"

Through all across the ages you can hear them - echoing behind us.
Listen.
All the long echoes sing the same delight, this shortest day.

As promise wakens in the sleeping land,
They carol - feast - give thanks and dearly love their friends
And hope for peace.

And so do we - here now - this year - and every year.

Susan Cooper



Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Robert Frost

tagged: the five things you don't know about me

Peggy Payne over at her Boldness Blog has tagged me. So here goes, the five things you don't know about me:

1. I am pretty darned clueless about computers and blogging. I had to look up what tagged even meant.

2. I don't know how to make something in this post a link, making it difficult to tag anyone else!

3. My husband is not only a landscape photographer but a brilliant software architect, so he might be able to teach me.

4. This came up the other night while we were eating dinner here at home: I was once a baton twirler who also twirled fire.

5. I once aspired (for a relatively brief period in my life) to become Jon Bon Jovi's hair stylist and go on tour with him.

So!

Time to tag people:

http://drachenthrax.blogspot.com/

http://teacupmantis.blogspot.com/

http://thedarksalon.blogspot.com/


And the SIXTH thing you don't know about me: if I really try, I can figure almost anything out. :)