Finding the Pagan Way

I hope that I have not exhausted the reader as they followed my journey so far. I have never kept a diary, and I guess that I am simply reviewing my own past as I look at what paganism means to me. Also, because I write about faeries, a lot of people think I am in a fluffy world of my own.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Until I met my dear Tina Kavanagh, I followed a very logical, analytical path. I joined and studied many groups who were involved in the paranormal.

 

I read widely on psychology, hypnotism, anthropology, philosophy, religion, and anything even remotely connected with my obsession. I wanted to know how some people seemed to be able to do things which were considered impossible by science. I kept my feet firmly on the ground, and I refused to accept even the evidence of my own eyes unless confirmed by other evidence.

Then I met Tina, and my dry and dusty world was turned upside down.

I will pass on her advice to you, in a poem I wrote a little while back.

 

Don’t search,- Look.

So many many hours I spent in dusty rooms with dusty books,
I never touched the Earth,
My mind could reach the furthest edges of the universe,
yet never saw the sky.
Oh! What a fool was I, that I should never feel the earth ,
or gaze in awe upon the evening sky.
I search the ancient wisdom of the dead,
And never stopped to listen to the beating of my heart,
Or what it said.

My spirit withered like the crumbling parchments over which I peered and pondered ,
Like some dried up husk ,- My childhood lost , my youthful joy was choked by gloomy shadows of the past.
What kind of wisdom chills the bones and turns your feet to clay,
What kind of truth can suck the laughter and innocence of youth away,
and leave just tired old bones and sagging flesh that stink of misery and
pity and decay,
A fool was I , my weary eyes despised the cheerful light of day,
and wallowed in that dusty darkened world of candlelight,
And never saw how far away from life that I had strayed.

And then one day I stared into a pair of eyes of violet blue,
and little did I realise that Life would never be the same again,
How could I tell the strange, amazing things that they would do,
They burned into my very soul and tore my dust-filled world in two,
and in a single moment I had died and was reborn,
My childlike eyes looked up in wonder at the morning sky,
The long, long night had fled,
I listened to the joyful songs of birds at early morn.
The wisdom I had sought was there before me all along.
It whispered in the trees, I felt it on the veins of leaves,
I saw it in the flight of birds and heard it in their song,
I smelt in on the leaf-strewn forest floor,
I knew my search was over and I seek no more,
I felt within my very blood and bones , what I had sought for oh so long.
At last, my dusty world of darkness,- dead and gone.

I wandered barefoot on the glistening dew-capped morning grass, my mind was dazed ,my heart was full of joy.
The Earth flowed through my naked feet, She rose and touched the sky,
She brought me to the wisdom I had sought since I was young,
I knelt upon that sacred place and thanked the gods for what my love had done,
For Fortune smiled upon me when I listened to the words my she said..
She said, ”Don’t search, just Look , my love”,
and on the day I looked , my search was done.

Patrick Kavanagh
13/08/12

 

 

 

Tina is a natural medium, and she has seen spirits since she was a child. We became close friends and she gave me messages from my late wife Frances. Tina told me things that no other living person knew. I tested her carefully and I gave way nothing. As a past member of the Irish Society for Psychic and Spiritual Studies, I was experienced at dealing with mediums and ‘readers’.               I myself have read the tarot cards for over 45 years. I had learned from my mother,- who also read tea-leaves.

We were catalysts for each other, and we slowly began to explore the Pagan community in Lincolnshire. Tina discovered her Guide, Nicholas Black Elk, through a Reiki master in Hessle, Dean Kingett, and our journey took on many new paths. Tina persuaded me to go to a Spirit Drumming workshop, run in an amazing place called Cabourne Parva in Market Rasen, Lincolnshire. This was where I met Kevin Guy, a local Druid. Then our journey accelerated.

Tina started to sit in on my tarot readings and gave spirit messages, bringing comfort and release to many people. Then, guided by Nicholas Black Elk, we began to hold drumming workshops around Lincolnshire, and witnessed the amazing power for the drum for healing and guiding inner journeys. I had hosted a drumming circle in my own home for over a year at this stage, but with Nicholas behind us, we saw a whole new healing energy and vitality in the drumming. Nicholas taught me how to drum from the heart, through Tina, and a whole new world opened up for me.

Drumming from the heart, opened up so much for me that I was totally changed in a very short period of time. So much happened in this period that I will have to leave it until the next issue to avoid confusing the readers. It was through Drumming that I re-discovered the faeries and that is quite a tale in it’s own right.

 

 

 

Drumbeats

 

The drums are beating softly in the distance,

Like a peaceful heart. they draw me to them,

leaving life’s  conundrums far behind.

Like  poetry, with inspirations, much too large for words,

The rhythm opens up my soul and fills my mind.

 

As I sit and write, the rhythm of the drums still beat within my heart.

In the forest of my mind I see the shamans dance and whirl.

Orange flames that go so high, they almost reach the moonlit sky.

Somewhere in the Once, or in the Now, they beat their drums for me.

And now the healing magic of their chants is reaching out to me.

 

Wolves with emerald eyes are in the shadows.

I can hear the eagles piercing cry.

Brother Bear is everywhere, though Him I cannot see.

All the spirits of the native forest watching over me.

Lending me their powers, so I can live the life I never thought could be.

 

Poetry in every beat, and magic in the rhythm of the drums.

Through the cadence of his chants, I find the link, the shaman comes.

Healing for the body, for the spirit and the mind,

As I leave this world of  consternation far behind,

and  find again, the wisdom and the beauty that was meant for all mankind.

 

Patrick W Kavanagh

22/03/2014

 

 

 

Artwork by Boy So Blue Graphic Arts and photography

Photograph by Jayne Ruby Kirke