Sarn Ellen

I started in my meditation spot in the backyard. I faced west, toward the forest. After stretching a bit, I saw a path I had never noticed before, leading into the wood. I set off, and walked for awhile along this path, seeing a spot in the distance where the forest opened into a large field. When I finally got to the edge of the forest, I stopped and looked at the field. The grasses were very tall, waist-high, but someone had maintained the path, and it meandered through the field in a westerly direction. I continued walking. It was quiet, and the sun gave the landscape a bright clarity that spoke of childhood summers. I could hear birds in the distance, whistling. Occasionally a bee flew around my head or nearby. Otherwise, it was quiet. I could see mist in the distance, across the field.

After walking for some undefined period of time, I realized it was late afternoon. It was still sunny, but was also raining slightly, and an amazing rainbow decorated the sky.

I kept moving until the sun was very low on the horizon, when I finally reached the mist. By now I had realized this was not just mist; it was fog, so heavy that I could see no farther than my next step, and occasionally not even that. I began walking with my head down, peering intently at the path, steering myself back onto it when I accidentally strayed. The rain had stopped, and the moist air was warm, pleasantly so. I could sense that it was getting dark and by the time the ground began to slope upward, it was definitely nighttime. Somehow, however, I could still see each step in front of me.

After a short while, the fog stopped as quickly as it had started. The suddenness of its cessation gave me an eerie feeling that it had been a protective fence. A very large new moon lit the sky, shimmering with a luminescent, silvery glow. I could almost see individual moonbeams heading down to bathe the earth.

As I headed up the path I saw a cropping of rocks further ahead. I had to walk along several switchbacks before reaching it, though. Although my path was on the edge of a large hill or small mountain, I didn't feel frightened. The hill was steep enough for switchbacks, but with them, the path was actually very gentle and relatively smooth.

Finally I reached the cropping and surrounding the cropping lay a wide area, apparently designed for relaxing and enjoying the view. And what a view! It reminded me of a valley that once surprised me when I circled around a hill in Ireland, just before reaching Dingle. (Ireland taught me what the word ‘green’ really means.)  I could still see the path meandering through the valley, reaching off to the other side where an ancient-looking stone circle sat, gleaming phosphorescently in the moonlight.

At first I couldn't see how to get down to the lower path, and then gulped when I saw that the path I had been traversing went nearly straight down the side of the mountain, with no switchbacks this time. For the first 50 feet or so it was *incredibly* steep. I was worried whether I could make it down the narrow trail without falling. After that first 50 feet, though, I could see that the path down to the valley became very gentle.

As I began down that first, steep portion of the trail, I was pleased to find that there were handholds placed into the sides of the mountain. Some of them were large, longish rocks that appeared to have been shoved into pre-dug holes in the side of the mountain, which was more earthy than stony. Others were large branches that had also been shoved into similar pre-dug spots, each of which had a large eyelet carved in their outer edge and a rope tied through the eyelet. The rope was pulled down some feet to another such branch sticking out of the mountain, providing a bit of a "banister" on which to cling in spots of the trail that were less stable or a little too close to the edge for comfort. I wondered briefly how often they had to be replaced due to rotting.

I made it to the bottom and walked across to the valley. When I got to the stone circle, the stones were perhaps 12 to 15 feet tall. I walked through them and saw a large stone altar and just beyond the altar a large stone seat upon which a lady was seated. She had long, curly, reddish-blond hair flowing out over a shimmering blue, full-length cape. The cape was fastened at the top with an intricately engraved silvery clasp. Peaking out from the cape was a long red gown, and I was surprised that it didn’t clash with her strawberry hair.

When she saw that I had arrived she got up and walked around to the front of the altar. At that point all I could think of telling her was that I wanted to learn the secrets of the land. As I said this, I felt an immediate rush of sensation as if I had dived head-first into a fuzzy blackness. I also sensed her approval.

A deep feminine voice, full of grace and self-confident power, spoke inside my head. "Follow me." We walked for a short distance further to the west, until we reached the edge of a bluff, overlooking what seemed to be an immense expanse of land. I saw myriad valleys filled with trees, and off in the distance, more tree-filled mountains. I sensed light within and around many spots, lines radiating the land.

Then, out of the corner of my eye I saw the lady raise her arms and I felt the ball of light she created or conjured. It radiated through her and from her and rose into the air. At this point, the energy feeding this ball was emanating from me and pouring through me and I realized that I was a conduit, as were all living things around me. As the ball rose, the light poured over the entire landscape and what had been vaguely sensed lines and spots of light were now clearly recognized parallel manifestations of the marks within this ball of energy. Involuntarily I dropped to my knees but again heard the full, feminine voice in my head, "Get up. That's not necessary."

I stood up and it suddenly dawned on me as I looked at the patterns across the landscape that they had also been present back at the stone circle. I considered going back to investigate, when yet again I heard the voice, "You don't need to go back, you will always be there. It is who you are. If you want the patterns, look to yourself for they are written all over you, too." Then I glanced at the lady’s cloak clasp and saw that the patterns on the landscape were identical to the intricate patterns on her clasp, indeed were the same as those on the rocks, and all over me.

Eventually the lights faded and she was gone. The sun was rising behind me and when I turned, I was amazed to find myself back on the path just outside the forest. I walked back eastward, hardly noticing the forest this time, and ended up back in my backyard shrine.

Later that evening, for no reason whatsoever I broke out into tears, just crying full heartedly and wondering why I was crying, because I wasn't feeling sad, just very, very full. Odder still, I have cried a couple of times that way in the past few days and when I do, I get the strange feeling that I am feeding the earth.