The Oaten Bride (7) Poem by David McLansky

The liquid spells of the earth
Are chanted in the dark with mirth
Naked the jagged stone
In the moonlight on the loam
The dancers, silver, sparking wet
Make the shadows pirouette;
Leaping, stamping, joy-inspired
They circle round the burning fires;
And though the night is cold with mist
They spin with heat and leap and twist,
Glistening wet with perspiration,
Possessed by songs of celebration;
For by this rite of sacrifice,
The village pays the Oat God's price.

A sudden gust sweeps the sky;
How brilliant shines the night-time eye;
The dancers shout in voices joyous,
Her screams are heard above the chorus;

A thread of blackness veils the moon
A sign of pleasure from the groom;
The holy rites now sanctified,
The Earth in Spring will sprout alive.

The dagger planted in the Earth
By Oaten God at his birth
A jagged shadow, a reddened tongue,
Marks the yearly rite as done.

The Bride sprawls on her marriage bed,
Dark crimson is her maidenhead;
Her blood now paints the jagged stone;
The seeded Earth sleeps now reborn.

They set her in a briny bog
Beneath some fallen oak tree logs;
A peat-man found her boneless hide:
Two thousand years, black, mummified.

She failed to make the Spring oats grow,
They withered in a sleeting snow;
She lay indifferent to the earth;
Her leather skin a human purse.