Feelin the flow

I've been working on an article for months. Well, not actively. I've been trying to work on it. I haven't been feeling the flow and I've been blaming the stress of event planning or of this thing or of that other thing. I think I just haven't tuned in to the Muses. I need a word with Apollo too.

Here is a devotional to the Man Himself. I'm going to sign off, light a candle and incense, tip a glass of wine, and get to work!

Orphic Hymn 34 to Apollo (trans. Taylor) (Greek hymns C3rd B.C. to 2nd A.D.) :

"To Apollon. Blest Paean, come, propitious to my prayer,
illustrious power, whom Memphian tribes revere,
Tityoktonos (Slayer of Tityos), and the god of Health,
Lykoreus, Phoibos, fruitful source of wealth:
Pytheion, golden-lyred, the field from thee receives its constant rich fertility.
Titan, Gryneion, Smyntheus, thee I sing,
Pythoktonos (Python-Slayer), hallowed, Delphion king:
rural, light-bearing Daimon, and Mousagetos (Leader of the Mousai, Muses), noble and lovely, armed with arrows dread: far-darting, Bakkhion, twofold and divine,
power far diffused, and course oblique is thine.
O Delion king, whose light-producing eye views all within, and all beneath the sky; whose locks are gold, whose oracles are sure, who omens good revealest, and precepts pure;hear me entreating for he human kind, hear, and be present with benignant mind;
for thou surveyest this boundless aither all, and every part of this terrestrial ball abundant, blessed;
and thy piercing sight extends beneath the gloomy, silent night; Beyond the darkness, starry-eyed, profound, the table roots, deep-fixed by thee, are found.
The world's wide bounds, all-flourishing, are thine, thyself of all the source and end divine.
'Tis thine all nature's music to inspire with various-sounding, harmonious lyre: now the last string thou tunest to sweet accord, divinely warbling, now the highest chord;
the immortal golden lyre, now touched by thee, responsive yields a Dorian melody.
All nature's tribes to thee their difference owe, and changing seasons from thy music flow:
hence, mixed by thee in equal parts, advance summer and winter in alternate dance;
this claims the highest, that the lowest string,
the Dorian measure tunes the lovely spring:
hence by mankind Pan royal, two-horned named, shrill winds emitting through the syrinx famed;
since to thy care the figured seal's consigned, which stamps the world with forms of every kind.
Hear me, blest power, and in these rites rejoice, and save thy mystics with a suppliant voice."

Poetic interlude

I adore Edna St. Vincent Millay. She has written some of my favorite poetry ever and tonight I'm sharing a few, just because we need a poetic interlude. It's been a while since the last one! Her poems also reference Persephone, ancient temples, bergamot, rosemary, Euclid, The Muses, and others.

An Ancient Gesture

I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
Penelope did this too.
And more than once: you can't keep weaving all day
And undoing it all through the night;
Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight;
And along towards morning, when you think it will never be light,
And your husband has been gone, and you don't know where, for years.
Suddenly you burst into tears;
There is simply nothing else to do.

And I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
This is an ancient gesture, authentic, antique,
In the very best tradition, classic, Greek;
Ulysses did this too.
But only as a gesture,—a gesture which implied
To the assembled throng that he was much too moved to speak.
He learned it from Penelope...
Penelope, who really cried.

Daphne
Why do you follow me?—
Any moment I can be
Nothing but a laurel-tree.

Any moment of the chase
I can leave you in my place
A pink bough for your embrace.

Yet if over hill and hollow
Still it is your will to follow,
I am off;—to heel, Apollo!    

Witch-Wife

She is neither pink nor pale,
And she never will be all mine;
She learned her hands in a fairy-tale,
And her mouth on a valentine.

She has more hair than she needs;
In the sun 'tis a woe to me!
And her voice is a string of coloured beads,
Or steps leading into the sea.

She loves me all that she can,
And her ways to my ways resign;
But she was not made for any man,
And she never will be all mine.

Not with libations, but with shouts and laughter

Not with libations, but with shouts and laughter
We drenched the altars of Love's sacred grove,
Shaking to earth green fruits, impatient after
The launching of the colored moths of Love.
Love's proper myrtle and his mother's zone
We bound about our irreligious brows,
And fettered him with garlands of our own,
And spread a banquet in his frugal house.
Not yet the god has spoken; but I fear
Though we should break our bodies in his flame,
And pour our blood upon his altar, here
Henceforward is a grove without a name,
A pasture to the shaggy goats of Pan,
Whence flee forever a woman and a man. 

Here is my favorite poem of hers, which isn't very "Pagan" tho I suppose being a feminist during that era was pretty darn Pagan:

Oh, oh, you will be sorry for that word!

Oh, oh, you will be sorry for that word!
Give me back my book and take my kiss instead.
Was it my enemy or my friend I heard,
"What a big book for such a little head!"
Come, I will show you now my newest hat,
And you may watch me purse my mouth and prink!
Oh, I shall love you still, and all of that.
I never again shall tell you what I think.
I shall be sweet and crafty, soft and sly;
You will not catch me reading any more:
I shall be called a wife to pattern by;
And some day when you knock and push the door,
Some sane day, not too bright and not too stormy,
I shall be gone, and you may whistle for me. 

Showtime at the Apollo

I walked by the Apollo theatre today on my way to Tarantella Class with Alessandra Belloni. Are you tired of me posting about her yet? Haha sorry. She's a wonderful teacher and I'm happy to have had the opportunity to take up studying with her once again. It's been about 8 years since I last took her classes. Was nice to know that I'm not all that rusty! The moves we did tonight were some of the same ones I used to trance on Saturday. I was very, very careful to keep the locks closed: There was no way I wanted to trance when I had to take public transit home right after!

So again, on the walk to the train, I was pondering the name of the famous theatre and who named it that? And why? Turning to the holy wiki:

Apollo Hall was founded in the mid-19th century by former Civil War General Edward Ferrero as a dance hall and ballroom. Upon the expiration of his lease in 1872, the building was converted to a theater, which closed shortly before the turn of the 20th century... However, the name "Apollo Theater" lived on.

Paisan! He was an Italian whose parent's had paused in Spain when he was born and moved to NYC a year later. In addition to being a soldier, he was the most famous dance instructor of his time.

He educated the wealthy and elite of New York society in the art of dance, and originated many dances that spread in popularity throughout the country. Ferrero became renowned as one of America's leading experts in dance. He worked part-time as a dance instructor at the United States Military Academy and was the author of The Art of Dancing in 1859.

He's from Italy, was a Freemason, and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn; I've hit the trifecta of this blog's mission statement! Italian! Magical! Brooklyn! lol My husband has been looking at me like I'm crazier than usual, especially since I was just doing a little touchdown dance. Dancing for the trifecta? I was at first, but forget that, I've hit the jackpot! books.google.com has a free copy of the book, The Art of Dancing !

Why is it a jackpot? Aside from the intro being almost entirely about him debunking "the church" on how dancing is the province of "the devil" there is a large section devoted entirely to ancient dances. Make no mistake, it's no "yay for Pagans!" tome: He's as judgmental as expected when it comes to the rites of Bacchus, but he cites ancient writers as sources and so far, backs up his theories with evidence. Sections include titles such as: "Dance among ancient Hebrews," "The Bacchic dances," "the Kybeslesis," "the Memphitic dance," "the Festinalia" and others, including one called "Cabalistic Hat" :-o He also includes various theories on who invested dance, naming candidates such as Castor and Pollux, or Rhea, communicated to her Priests and Priestesses in Crete.

I'm stopping the blog here so I can actually sit down and read the book! So far I'm enjoying it! Care to read along with me? The link will take you right to the book!

Inspiration

Warning!: Rambling stream of consciousness ahead!

Tomorrow night I'll be at the NYPL for the Find the Future Scavenger Hunt/Book Writing challenge. There are 100 items to find and write something about. ie: A draft of the Declaration of Independence. One challenge, sample or not, we don't know, is to write your own declaration and get 37 people to sign it. Tomorrow is also about inspiration and how the objects in the library, the past, can inspire you to create and shape the future. So naturally, my mind is on Inspiration itself.

How do ideas come to us? What is that flash, who turns on the lightbulb? Is it a bunch of random neurons firing? Is it one of 9 Ladies? Tonight I'm taking a look at the Muses since I will be spending the night in a cult site of the Muses, a Museum.

The Muses, their concept and attributes, are a multi-layered mystery. There were three, there were nine, they were collectively in charge of all arts and sciences, they had their own specialties, etc. Some say they began as water nymphs. Their cult centers in Boetia and at Delphi predate its dedication to Apollo.I've been reading various texts about Delphi and what was there before Apollo slayed the python. I have a thing for Dephi <3

Varro writes about Three Muses: Practice, Memory, and Song and how they are, respectively, born of the movement of water, sound on the air, and the human voice.

Who's your Daddy? Zeus? Jupiter? Apollo? Since the Muses were worshiped at Delphi before Apollo was, back when Gaia Herself ruled the area, it seems Apollo is out of the running on this one. There are other stories where Athena is involved, Pegasus, more water nymphs...

Funny how it comes back to water time and again. Today, many neopagan traditions look to the west, and water as the source of emotion and, as a friend just reminded me: The Stream of Consciousness. It's all about the water. We sing in the shower, we soak away our troubles in a hot bath...

Tomorrow night I'm going to try to blog from the library during the event! May all of The Muses be with me!

And on Sunday, I plan to continue to look at Inspiration itself and specifically how it was viewed in pre-Roman Italy. Sometimes we have to start with the popular lore, search for clues, then strip the layers! That's my mission here. Maybe it was inspired by The Muses ;)

"And so, have them for yourself, whatever kind of book it is,

and whatever sort, oh patron Muse

let it last for more than one generation, eternally."  -Catullus