Horoscope: Ground Hog Day

Brighid, the ancient hag of winter, kindles
sacred fires to melt earth’s white blanket

transforming you as she did Galatians and Brigantians
long before Patrick danced green among the Celts

Her healing waters wash away toxic patterns that tax and consume,
erase attitudes that build you into what you are not.

Old Brighid, young Maiden-Mother-Crone cum
Christian saint blesses houses on her feast day, the Cross-Quarter Day

when winter passes halfway through, when once
candles made sacred at Candlemas lit houses and villages,

morphed into the Feast of Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary,
until St. Brigit’s decanonization. Her fire, snuffed.

A ground hog rippled across the ocean.

 

c. 2013 Bernadette Wagner 

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Bernadette Wagner

Regina Bernadette Wagner is an award-winning writer, a community activist and a singer. Her work has been published in newspapers, magazines, chapbooks and anthologies, on radio, television,...