Midsummer Dreaming

Midsummer Dreaming

The grass was cool beneath our feet, as we watched the sun setting on this, the longest day. It was a long day, and the sun still heated the air, warm breezes rippling across the distant sea. And we cast our minds back, far into the past.

It was a day for the sun god, for celebrating the god at the height of his powers before they began to wane. The tribe gathered, and faced the setting sun, the last before this mighty king began to sicken, and grow pale behind the coming autumn mists. But now was a day of rejoicing, of dance and song.

And finally, as we raised our hands in farewell to the sun, a rose hue coloured the land and sea, and a breeze sprung up, fresh and cool as heat departed. The wind blows forth. The wind blows wherever it wishes; we hear the sound it makes, but we do not know where it comes from or where it is going.

And we cast our minds back, far into the past, a day before even the gods, in the dawn of life on earth.

A long day, but then it was a shorter day, and we waded in the pools left behind by the Devonian tides, leaving footprints in the sand. It was the day before, long, long before, in the distant reaches of deep time. Four hundred dawns made one year, and this was the longest day.

Small creatures swam in warm currents, and no human would step here for millions of years. Here were no gods to worship, no stuff of myth, but through it all, the warm breeze swept across the shallow waters, stirring the waters. The wind blows forth. The wind blows wherever it wishes; we hear the sound it makes, but we do not know where it comes from or where it is going. And we cast our minds back, far into the past, a day before the gods, before even the dawn of life on earth, the day of the making.

A shorter day, and where is night and day in this incandescent rock, spinning in the vastness of space around the sun? We are here in spirit alone, for flesh and blood would not long survive the eruptions of molten rock, and the firestorms that rage across the land. Electric flashes make night as bright as day, and there is no place for us to grasp, to settle beneath our sight; instead, an ever changing vista, as the world changes in the twinkling of an eye. It is the time of making, and through it all, hot currents of air sweep around the earth. The wind blows forth. The wind blows wherever it wishes; we hear the sound it makes, but we do not know where it comes from or where it is going.

And we return to our midsummer, to an earth firm beneath our feet, a longest day, but not the longest, for that will come in the future, when the earth grows old, and we are ashes scattered in the wind. But we feel the warm breeze upon our face, and she touches us, as she has touched this earth since its conception, through deep time, and on into the present day, and onwards into the tale to be told of days to come. But our midsummer is done for now, and our tale told, until next year.

And still the wind blows forth. The wind blows wherever it wishes; we hear the sound it makes, but we do not know where it comes from or where it is going.