poliphilo

Happy solstice, folks!

Doesn't the first half of summer go fast! Seems only yesterday I was saying, "ooh, look at the snowdrops!" and now we're on the turn and the days are getting shorter.

When I was doing the full pagan thing I always thought of midsummer as sad. I must have written yards of gloomy ritual verse about dying kings and what-have-you.

The sun stands still in the height of heaven,
All things must pass away.
The days of summer stretch ahead,
All things must pass away.
Welcome the days of flowers and fruit,
All things must pass away.
Welcome the days of leisure and love,
All things must pass away.
Now is the wedding of Earth and Heaven,
All things must pass away.

Yup, that's one of mine.

And here's a seasonal piece of news. Archaeologists have run tests on a collection of seven 4,500 year old skeletons dug up near Stonehenge and found- from the levels of strontium in their teeth- that the people they once belonged to grew up in South West Wales.

The Stonehenge bluestones also come from South West Wales. Suggestive, huh?