{"id":350,"date":"2013-12-21T15:44:33","date_gmt":"2013-12-21T23:44:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/?p=350"},"modified":"2013-12-21T15:46:05","modified_gmt":"2013-12-21T23:46:05","slug":"canticle-for-the-winter-solstice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/?p=350","title":{"rendered":"Canticle for the Winter Solstice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\">I plan to read this poem at tonight\u2019s Solstice event at <a title=\"Gallery Bookshop in Mendocino\" href=\"www.gallerybookshop.com\/?\" target=\"_blank\">Gallery Bookshop in Mendocino<\/a>. Obviously it was written in a year other than 2013. We\u2019ve had no rain all month, and none in the extended forecast, so face the likelihood of a drought year. I think of this piece as a kind of prayer.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Canticle for the Winter Solstice<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I honor the rain that plummets from a leaden sky<\/p>\n<p>on this day when the dying sun returns to life.<\/p>\n<p>I honor the wet earth where fungi lift<\/p>\n<p>the smells and secrets of their darkness<\/p>\n<p>into forms potent with wildness<\/p>\n<p>and fallen leaves grow slimy with decay.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I honor the sudden green suffusing<\/p>\n<p>the face of the sun-scorched hill,<\/p>\n<p>like the blush of knowledge in a woman\u2019s face<\/p>\n<p>after her first coupling.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I honor the flame of candle and hearth<\/p>\n<p>that draws to itself the breaths<\/p>\n<p>of all whose lives have sometime crossed,<\/p>\n<p>mingles and transmutes them into warmth<\/p>\n<p>and sends them out into the rain<\/p>\n<p>where they caress the tender growing tips of trees.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I plan to read this poem at tonight\u2019s Solstice event at Gallery Bookshop in Mendocino. Obviously it was written in a year other than 2013. We\u2019ve had no rain all month, and none in the extended forecast, so face the likelihood of a drought year. I think of this piece as a kind of prayer. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,59,8,7,17,55],"tags":[169,60,403,168],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=350"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":354,"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350\/revisions\/354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maureeneppstein.com\/mve_journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}