Samhain/All Saints

October 31, 2013 — 1 Comment

The Celtic holiday Samhain is still celebrated by some on October 31. The city of Dublin is embracing the ancient holiday in new ways.  Poetry is a way to create connection with the future and also with the past.  Some poems and songs survive from anonymous authors, while ancient Greeks are preserved in drama, ode and epic.  Translation is a tricky thing, especially when translating Pagan rituals to Catholic practices.  My ancestors, the O’Byrnes, came from County Meathe where Samhain was and is celebrated.  I hope someday to visit Dublin to see these Irish in action with their ancient tradition.

Since I am in Tucson, with a strong and popular All Souls’ Day party I plan to add poetry this year by attending the reading on Friday night at the U of A Poetry Center by our new poet laureate.  He is from the border, our own very specific and special place. This border has been directly responsible for plenty of death, and plenty of opportunity.  In a spiritual sense our border has never been real, but artificial, setting a trap, catching little prey.  It makes crime irresistible to the desperate. It works to incentivize illegal behavior. If the dead are visiting this week they will have no trouble crossing the border, even though they may have died trying.  I look forward to the experience.