The Birch Lady And The Wounded Patch

There are eyes upon me
In this wood of mists
This wood of birch

I look around
Try to seek them out
My friend watches me
Unsure

That's when I see her
Pale, slender and full of grace
She moves among the birches
And I follow

As fast as I dare
I run through the bracken
heather
and rocks
To the birches where I saw her
Then I stop

A fleeting glimpse
And I'm chasing again

She leads me to birch
where three grow in a triangle
where branches hang with brooms
And the grass grows dark within

This is her place
I feel her once more as
I open myself to the forest
And bitter Yuletide cold

She's not happy about the people
That meet by the oak tree
So I promise her action
And no harm from me

The trees seem to relax
The winter seems less cold
As I make my way back up
To the wound tree

When we leave the woods, we're followed
Sometimes you see it and sometimes you don't
A large black hare that shifts in our wake.

A week later we come back
Our minds fixed on surprise attack

First we stop by
The birch lady's place
Make goodwill offerings
Of bread men, cider and cake

Then we wend our way
Up the twisted path
To the wounded tree
In its wounded patch

One by one I hammer them in
And my friend walks the ground
As I sing their runes
She carries incense around

I sing to cleanse
I sing of strength
I sing of fury and storms
I curse
I protect

Then comes the point
When the place is taken back
The forest swells up
Reabsorbs this wounded patch

This time we when leave
Nothing follows us on
As we make our way to seas of grass
And circles of ancient stone