Melangell sails the Irish sea
to the wilds of Wales,
flees a marriage and seeks time
alone among a storm of hawthorn,
feeds on hazelnuts and dandelions,
gathers lady’s mantle each morning
to sip their dew, plunges her hands
in the river, freezing and fresh,
sleeps on moss in the cave-close stone,
delights at birdsong, seeks
the sacred in hunger and rain.
One warm day, her quiet disrupted,
hot breath of men and hounds
approach, jaws wide.
Teeth gleam, foam sputters,
tails swish as they scrabble
for a hare with brown legs
bounding, a great roar of wet fur
and whiskers –
the hare leaps
into the folds of Melangell’s cloak.
Defiant stands the saint,
draws a circle around herself.
Dogs and men can go no further.
Melangell strokes the hare’s ears,
soothes his clanging heart,
whispers “you are safe now”
as howls recede on the wind
and the valley becomes sanctuary.
You can still glimpse it
on sun-sparkled days when bluebells
sway and oak leaves rustle
from squirrel-scurry-scamper
and you take the soft hare
of your life into your arms,
whisper into those long ears
blessings all down her trembling
length and remind her that
she too no longer needs to run.
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One of my favorite children’s book was The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown. I was that mother/person who kept sort of reinventing herself as was needed for children, family, work. Reading this gave a clarifying and restful image of my current space/dwelling/ indwelling. I am both the hare and St Melangell offering myself sanctuary. I am no longer like the mother or the hare – no longer reinventing myself nor running and I have drawn my circle around myself in my inner and also a physical sanctuary. It’s not a fortress neither am I hiding. Cultivating silence, stillness, learning and exploring online while living my day to day task oriented life much less hurried and less driven by external demands.
What a lovely tale brought to life via Christine’s poetry.
I am only now at age sixty learning to take my life into my own
caring hands, and speak to my trembling self that I no longer need to run.