Wandering Aengus, by W B Yeats....what magical force prompted Mark to send me this poem on 6th October. The poem had a profound effect on me then, like a love potion - I fell in love with Mark immediately.Since his death, the poem has risen to attain a mythical status in my life, transporting me back to a dream shared and a love lost.
Being very romantic, Mark would have identified with Wandering Aengus.
It’s ironic that now I am the one who has become Wandering Aengus.
I go out into the bush and wander alone.
I sit by the creeks and watch the wildlife.
I am at home here, solitary, surrounded by nature.
Magic is all around us, no matter where we are – the city, suburbs, the country, desert, forest - but out in the bush is where I feel it most. The Australian bush is often a harsh environment but it pulses with a fiery and ancient heartbeat; natural forces are undiluted by human interference here.
Wandering Aengus is a soulful character.
Like him, I caught a glimpse of a dream, then it vanished from my life.
Perhaps I too will become ‘old with wandering, through hollow lands and hilly lands’ before I find out where my true love has gone.
The poem so poignantly describes lost love.
Wandering Aengus caught a glimpse of ‘a glimmering girl’ who ‘faded through the brightening air’. He spent the rest of his life gently holding onto the hope of finding her again, of bringing the dream out of fantasy world and into reality, ‘to kiss her lips and take her hand’.
This is not the sadness of a broken heart.
Instead it is a delightfully innocent and romantic optimism, hopeful with the possibility of one day living the dream, believing that magic and mystery are alive and at work in our lives.
To live in the magic and mystery, that is the life of a yogi, a mystic, a seeker. This is what our hearts long for...not to have all our desires fulfilled, but to love deeply and to live life fully in all of its magic and mystery.
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