Candlemas, or ‘imbolc’ as it was called in the bronze age and the time of the celts and in the pagan traditions… is the festival of fire, inspiration and poetry. This day, this second day of february marks the midway point between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox, and like generations before us we choose to celebrate the slow return of light, the pregnancy of the barren earth and of the animals in their stalls, a promise of spring…

It is a time to rekindle hope in the desertplace, to stand at a point of liminality between the deeply earthy and the most ethereal, and here to remember the entwining of the divine into one human story... a small child is recognised in the templeplace.

On this night, twelve friends old and new gather and under the stars and full moon we speak old words, we read poetry aloud with the candleflame and the starglow, and hold the hot vanillamilk in our hands as we look up: we look up.
And she pours out seeds for each of us full to overflowing in our palms, dreamseeds for the year ahead. Some people let them sift through their hands into the grass in the stillness, some drop them down one by one saving just a few to eat, one girl hurls them into the deepblack at the bottom of the garden.
And the gentle wind is whipping now in the dancing flames, the people place their candles in the soil with the little lights still all around and leave them out there as they step into the lightwarm; some are still watching the silent fireflies there.

The earth turns on, and here we are again, anew.