Magick and the Land.

Growing up living in a freezing cold dilapidated old welsh farm house, I wanted out. I mean I loved the trees, the air, the mountains, but I wanted something. Something I couldn't put into words. Even though both my parents are welsh to say I was strongly discouraged from even speaking with the welsh accent (my Dad would clip me up the ear if and when he was around to hear me) let alone SPEAK welsh, would be an understatement. 
I have lived in England now for what feels like an age and yet it was this land that showed me my "welshness". The casual racism, the cultural jokes and utter ignorance of even basic welsh history can be trying, but it is the culture I miss. That and the land.

 My inner landscape is not rolling meadows and little streams, it is wild rushing waters and purple mountains streaked with livid yellow and black. It is filled the sound of the rushing wind. The smell of snow. The taste of water that makes all other water taste weird and wrong. I miss the weather. I miss how my feet feel when I have been walking on the land. I miss the way I am part of it and it is part of me at such a deep level I am at a loss to describe. I have been to other very very beautiful places all over the world, full of ancient magick and wonder. Yet I always have the strongest feeling that rather than Cymru owned me. I belonged to the land somehow.

 Sometimes it calls to me in my sleep, sometimes when I am awake. It is this odd sensation of like the flow of water against the body, a tide or current with greater or lesser force dependent on where and when I am. At first it simply drew me back. As time went on and my odd exile continued I found I could draw strength and magick from the flows as well as expend it resisting. The lullabies I sang to my babies were in welsh. I would swear in welsh, and coo and sigh in it. 

For some people I am not welsh enough. Yet I am at peace because I am welsh enough for me. I am dreaming of living in Cymru again. This does not depress me, or leave me sad of where I am. It fills me with hope.  

 
I do not own the landscape images in this blog, all rights reserved to arts.