Tunes 21

Download : https://cousinsilas1.bandcamp.com/album/quadrants-1-part-2

In The Blue Quadrant - Walter Fini

On the moor

The words here come from the chapter describing a Samhain shamanic ceremony in my book The Dragon Whisperer's Son, and as ever, @APi_ZZ has come up with the most perfect, and moving, music to accompany them. The Bird Mother was the most ancient goddess of the Caucasian races, in acknowledgement of the vital role of the birds in fertilising the lands. 

Words, spoken vocals and cover art by Annie Dieu-Le-Veut
© Copyright Annie Dieu-Le-Veut, October 2024 

Music and cover titling by APi_ZZ 
© Copyright APi_ZZ (Andreas Pirner) October 2024 


Words: 

Samhain began, as it did every year, on the stroke of midnight when the bright star of Antares was directly over the Fairy Stone. The Fairy Stone was a huge, white obelisk and it was covered with tiny inscribed sigils that were barely visible under the thickly-encrusted green moss of ages. 

No human alive could remember how the Fairy Stone came to be there – and quite probably no-one who was dead either. It was only the dragons of the misty black Mountains of Memory who kept that knowledge safe from prying ears.

A cold breeze was gusting around the crowds of locals milling there amidst the blue, smokey fragrance from the bonfires. The flaming pine logs were dripping with sweet aromatic resins as they fired crackling sparks of brilliant orange into the dark-clouded skies. 

Scarlet elf cap mushrooms peeped through a damp carpet of gold, russet and bronze leaves covering the hard, muddy ground. The trees they had fallen from were now standing bare and shivering, entirely naked, but bravely ready to face the first gales of winter.  Frosted cobwebs, stretching between their branches, twinkled under a full silver moon.  An owl hooted.

In front of the Fairy Stone stood a large wooden platform. It had been charred black, and then scored with white Xs, Vs and spirals to turn it into an altar, carved in the shape of an eagle so gigantic that it was as if the constellation of Aquila had fallen from the star-studded vaults above. Standing astride the altar was a giant effigy of a woman. She had a pointed head and the beaked face of a bird of prey. Her breasts were huge and egg-shaped, as were her protruding buttocks.  Her arms, outstretched as if in flight, were entwined with wriggling serpents. It was the Bird Mother. 

Each family was going forward, one at a time, to the Bird Mother's altar with their offerings of lit candles for the Naming of the Dead ceremony. Tears glistened in their eyes as the recited with gratitude the names of all those who had before come them.  It wasn't long before there were so many candles jostling together that the altar began to mirror the glittering blackness of the night skies. 

Afterwards, hearts were so full and heavy with remembrance that each preferred to just sit silently with their own thoughts, their solemn faces upturned towards the stars to watch Orion, the Lord of Winter, arise from his watery Underworld to reclaim his rulership over that half of the year. 

Then they were content in their hearts that throughout the cold dark days to come, new starseeds would be nurtured in the warmth of the womb of Earth; that the silver spindle connecting their revolving seasons to the starry mills slowly grinding above would hold firm with their prayers and offerings; that eventually new stargates would open like vast glittering palaces, and that the end of the beginning was done so that life could become and spiral on forevermore.

From The Dragon Whisperer's Son by Annie Dieu-Le-Veut,  ISBN 978-1-9163795-6-5. Buy it on Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/yss89t58

Samhain

For my good mate Gooza.

Track has been remixed as of 10/01/2025.

Gooza

elec piano + casio keyboard

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music by Marco Lucchi
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2 ottobre 2010

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to Henri Bergson

[2011] Durée réelle

Electronic Visionary Music.
Contact: wa.fini@me.com