i.

Up on the Ridge where the views inspire
the folks feel close to heaven
they are women and men and children
who like or greatly love to garden
to grow food for themselves and to share
under an open sky
out in the blustering breeze
to build benches boxes shelves and sheds
to sit and visit to store their harvests and tools
to lunch under the summer cool
or autumn splendour of maples or fruit trees
to delight in fireflies come dusk
to pick all the kinds of berries and grapes that grow
and come fall and the dark and the cold
to watch the dancing flames warming
them from the woodstove

Some have lived their whole lives on this road
and their parents before them
while others have come from away
only too glad to stay
the grey squirrels and Widow Wyile among them

ii.

The Widow Wyile has been musing
upon words and how they wiggle
or are wiggled, often by wiggly wigglers

All this time she’d thought she lived
in a hamlet above a town
and a nice and fine
little hám it is
stretched out the length
of a long ridge above two valleys
between two mountains
one north one south
nice and fine homes the folks have there
some old and some new
so many homelets for all manner of critters
that combine and commune their
many tunes of appreciation for the land
for the sun and the sky and each other
mmmmmm hmmmmmm

But in recent years the word
or rather perhaps the
designation
was relegated (oh no!)
to the recycling bin of local history
seeming perhaps too antiquated
or communal
two decades in to the electronic roller-rama
whiz-bang roundabout we grow ambiguous
dizzy with distance dancing in
the techo-crazy beguilement project
of the not-so-advanced twenty-first century

Virtually everybody around stepped
some way into digital rabbit holes
for a time and were not immune to the allures
of the wiggle word progress
which still befuddles many
or to fall for prophits (oh yes sic)
and the song of better faster more
more more more more

Yet far from all
for many would not fall at all
and many would not fall for long
knowing in their bones
that being was better than not being
allowed to do much at all for themselves
knowing too the value of earth-bound living

The Widow Wyile vowed she would not
forsake the hamlet of her heart’s content
for it is a gathering of households remembering
that they are children and men and women and
animals and plants and insects
creatures of the water, air and earth who weather
the times together in multigenerational
sensational community

iii.

In the rush and bustle of speaking to save
precious designated farmland
the Widow Wyile watched Wednesdays slip
her by even when the weather
was favourable for versery ventures
so as the weekdays became steadily shorter
and calendar pages diminished
she sometimes squeezed in
woods walks after frost
her feet crunching leaves crusted with ice
she relished crisp conifer air
the swollen rushing ravine stream
far below the path
way down the slick steep slope
filled her ears and soul
with welcome nature rhythms
as the year wound down

and puddles in the road froze
in pleasing concentric patterns

iv

The Widow Wyile bakes honey hearts
spicy soft dough
sticky soft dough
dough that wants her full attention
dough that stirs ancestral senses
dough she hasn’t made in years
and now she remembers why
tricky sticky
yet this honey dough
her grandmother made
every year with love
and maybe now she would too
shining yolked hearts
a glowing almond at each centre
ginger clove and cardamon
honey healing hearts
for Yuletide
for the closeness
of pine and candlelight
generations of children
festive baking grand-mothers
spicy sticky dough
honey bread honey hearts
holding families
together through time
honey soothed hearts
heal through the ages

v

The Widow Wyile wonders whither
the cherished notions of compassion
kindness and care go when loved
ones are gathered in to chests
rather than the human breast
wherein beats a steady heart
be it mother’s father’s
sister’s brother’s
friend’s family’s
the heart-to-heart connection
is where love begins
where feminine and masculine spirit
principles sprout and twine
becoming our full potential
the power of love sublime
of being divine
as we surely are
of being one
one being with a brimming breast
supple with succour
suffused with sympathy
sensitive with sorrow
sentient with wisdom
intent with goodness
every child and every adult
nourished by the capacity
of the human breast’s harbour
where compassion courage
and capacious understanding rest

vi

The Widow Wyile wends her way
with and throughout wondrous
though wiggly words in the dark of December
wet snow weighing down branches
while Grandmother Moon awaits
her gradual waxing into fullness
as Little Spirit Moon
Snow Moon
Chief Moon
Long Night Moon
she’ll be round and bright on Epiphany
this time around

meanwhile Mother Nature and Mother Earth
lovingly weave the weft and warp
of their world’s often fraying fabric
of their wayward wiggling children
wandering the dark while awaiting
the gradual return of the light

So many seem increasingly muddled
about their origin stories
their own true greater dimensional selves
reduced
caught up in false webs
emotional turmoil
viral distractions
pretending they can swallow
preposterous suppositions
even schemes wholesale
without losing themselves

The dark of late December
thinks Oma Wyile
is a wondrous womb of creativity
when we slow down our wandering
unleash our wondering
roam the many marvelous turnings
of nature within us
and without
which becomes blanketed in white
so we might relax
our over-ministering minds
to feel and see what is right
within and without
to muse upon the glowing
almond of our inner being
strong like ginger
rooted rhizome
of the earth
that knows its worth
medicine and spice
simple matters
like the truth all mammals
share of emerging
from the wondrous dark
creative mater space

vii

The Widow Wyile collects windfall
branches of evergreen for garlands
carefully snips holly branches for festoons
weaves a lopsided wreath
to grace her cherished hám
a little home on
a little one road community

She chops nuts and candied
mixed peel of citrus
to knead into her Christmas Stollen
that sort of like St- awe -lin
knead it all in
so later you can chew with awe
at how the many flavours
have come together
as have the many days
moons seasons
to bring us here to another
winter solstice when garland
graced doorways between worlds
gently swing and we feel
time is variable
as past and future mingle
flickering candle flame
light of our blessings
comforting us in the dark

Hamlets, Honey Hearts and Word Wiggles in the Dark of December, or Winding Down 2022 in 7 parts