Pagan Fire

The day came when none of us work off the farm.  The day was some grey, it had rained overnight, a good day for burning.  We'd previously dismantled the old big hot house that appears as the bones of some beached whale or something in many of our photographs, and there was semi-rotted wood with nails to dispose of.  Burn in a barrel.

About half was done before the barrel was full of charcoaling embers.  The night would bring a full moon, the first full moon after the equinox.  Quite the appropriate time for Pagans to have a Fire.

Not that I'm averse to a bonfire for the sake of a party.  A party is a worthy cause.  But a party, like a gathering, or a show, or a vacation, or a religious ritual, or anything contrived, is not life.  Life is the daily, the small, the repetitive, the cyclic.  Life is how freely we give, how graciously we accept, sometimes how tenaciously we fight.  Live for a living.

This is our second spring fire so far this year, with at least two more needed -- one to finish what needs burned in the cornfield, and one to finish burning the remains of the hot house, and both to clean off for what comes next for both areas.  Six adults, and sometimes a seventh, can have a lot of projects going at the same time.  Not much remains idle.  Nothing is for show.  We don't do a lot of rituals, and mostly we rely on work and flow, not magic.

I stayed with the barrel as the fire burned down, everyone else went on about their tasks for the day.  It would sprinkle a bit of rain sometimes although the forecast said it was over.  The bare trees on the hill against the grey sky looked amazing to me, their pattern of lines branching and scalloping.  Youngest adult reappeared to water the dog.  #3 came on her way to graze in the garden for her rabbits and took a moment to feel the fire's warmth.  The day had turned cool after being t-shirt weather yesterday.  Husband went back and forth getting the correct tools to put the gas tank back on the rototiller.  I could hear the rain coming each time before it would get to me, but always very light.  The creek roaring.  The neighbor's 5 Pyrenees barking -- so that I knew husband was checking the mail then.  Various birds calling, lots of crows.

But then there was a sound like a bumble bee against a glass, except it moved around, and it took me a good while to figure it out.  There was one crow with a broken voice.  Flying around and around me.  Hello crow with the broken voice, hello.

Even after the two fires needed to finish in the corn field and the hot house, there's plenty other to burn.  We need to clean out the ditches.  I'd like to begin the transformation of the front.  It never all gets done.  What a small life it would be if we could finish it.