Celtic and Faerie Lore
Two doll-sized faerie men took shelter from the freezing wind beneath a bush. As the wind whipped at the bush’s branches above them, one faerie man murmured to his friend, “Particular weather we are having.”
His companion nodded. “It would be no surprise to me if we had a blizzard in July or August.”
Both men shook their heads before vanishing to a warmer place.
I feel the fabric of magic in autumn. Under the autumn twilight of the sun, it is easier for me to slip unaware into the faerie lands.
I was standing on top of a steep slope, looking down at my small stone circle that rests upon the embankment above a swiftly flowing stream. I noticed my small circle of stones shining golden beneath the twilight of the autumn sun. As I watched, each stone’s skin was shimmering, then breathing and stretching into a slow, lumbering, clockwise dance.
Suddenly, a blue jay screamed. A crow chuckled. I blinked, and the stones grew still. But the magic remained with me like strands of a broken spiderweb brushing across my skin.
In our small town library live two brownies. Their names are Tabitha and Josh. They are very shy, so rarely, if ever, are they seen. They love books and love to care for them. I am told that most, if not all libraries and bookstores – especially used bookstores – have at least two faerie folk in residence. These are mostly brownies, but are sometimes brees, occasionally gnomes and, even more rarely, elves.
By way of thanks to the faerie folk, all they ask is that you respect the libraries and bookstores. Do not misfile or mistreat the books. Be kind to the library and bookstore staff. The faerie folk also ask that if you should ever see them in a library or bookstore, please do not make a big deal of it. Just a cheery wave or a quiet hello is all the faeries ask.
Albert and Grace are Brees, a type of fair folk who stand about 4 to 6 inches in height. Albert has bright blue eyes with curly, light brown hair tucked beneath a green pointed hat, which is decorated with a wide blue hat band from which a yellow feather peaks out. He wears a bright yellow shirt and brown pants and has gone barefoot today in order to feel the moist, green grass beneath his feet.
Grace, Albert’s wife, has hazel eyes and long, shining blonde hair with a windswept look to it. Grace calls it her wild, back to nature look. She is wearing a long, green dress with yellow Celtic-looking intertwining vine-like trim on the neck of her dress and also on the sleeves and hem. Grace, like Albert, is barefoot today in order to feel the green earth beneath her feet.
Albert remarks, “There are some indoor faerie folk, but they are more shy.”
Grace adds, “Even the ones in your own house.”
Albert rubs his chin. “Outdoors, a faerie has more options about staying and meeting you or running away. The poor faerie may feel more confident speaking with you if they are not feeling trapped in a room. A first time ‘getting to know you’ type of introduction between a human and a faerie is always best held outdoors.”
Grace agrees, standing on her tippy toes and taking a couple of little dancing skips. “And it is good for the human to bring us a gift,” she adds with a beautiful smile.
“What type of gift?” I inquire.
“Whiskey,” Albert suggests in a firm voice, grinning broadly.
“No, you silly goose!” Grace declares, playfully slapping Albert’s arm. “Bring us a bowl of cream or a piece of buttered bread or even a handful of birdseed. We do not need these things ourselves, but we do like to share them with our animal friends. And be sure to tell us you have brought the gift in honor of us.” Graces pauses, tucking a lock of hair behind her pointed ear. “And be quiet and listen. We just may say thank you and start a conversation.”
“Or we may not say a single word to you the first time or even the second or third time,” Albert declares, before disappearing with a friendly wave goodbye.
“Oh, you,” Grace laughs at her husband’s antics. “Keep trying,” she adds. “And your persistence may begin a friendship with a faerie.” Grace blows me a kiss and, with a delicate curtsy, disappears.
Tom and his wife, Deirdre, a doll-sized brownie couple, stand beside the stream watching the other faerie folk play in its freezing waters. Shivering in the cold wind, I ask them, “Do you know what’s coming?”
Deirdre replies, “Do you ask this question because your new leaders do not believe in the suffering on Mother Earth?” My frustration causes me to choke up.
“Worse weather,” responds Tom. “More suffering for everyone. Not just for humans, but for all of us.” He pauses, “You know, we faerie folk pray for humanity to finally ‘get it’ – that you are not separate from Creation. When will humans realize that you need Mother Earth as much as she needs you? We are all connected to one another, and we need each other. Even we faerie folk are connected to you humans and you to us.
“You must understand, every part of Creation is important from the smallest creature to the largest mountain. It is all worth protecting, worth saving. Everything put here on Mother Earth by the Mother – Father Creator has the right to exist. Who is man to decide otherwise?
“You ask what is coming? We believe Hope is coming. We faerie folk believe, against all odds, that human hearts will suddenly wake up to Mother Earth’s suffering. Then you will know we are all part of one another. We are all brothers and sisters of Creation, basking in the love of God.”
Tom falls silent. Then with a shrug, he adds, “I am a bit overheated.” Gesturing to the freezing cold waters of the stream, he offers, “Want to go swimming with us? We can all use a cooling off.”
I shake my head no and thank them for the talk. Deirdre gives me a playful wave as I rush back to the warmth of my house, escaping the bite of the freezing wind.
While we watched birds eating at the bird feeder, Malcolm, a small faerie man, told me, “We must learn to walk upon our Mother Earth in the stillness of our spirit.”
He paused, reflectively watching the birds. “We must walk gently upon her as birds leaving their tracks in the snow. The tracks are there for a brief time until they melt away, leaving no sign of their passage. Learn to still your spirit so that even the birds trust to eat seed out of your hands. Then you will walk gently upon Mother Earth, doing her no harm and living in peace with Creation all around you. That is how our Mum and Da Creator meant for us to live.”
Then Malcolm became a bird and flew away.
“In the beginning, when Creation was young, humans, faeries, animals, trees and rocks, we all spoke the same language,” said the fair-haired faerie woman named Anna, her mist gray eyes gazing back into the past. “There were a lot less misunderstandings back then.”
She paused, gathering her thoughts. Looking directly at me, she continued, “It was when we drifted apart, when we became for the first time ‘us and them people,’ when we shattered from one folk into many different tribes – that is when the misunderstandings began. They were at first small misunderstandings, which suddenly grew into terrible wars. It has been the same ever since, except the wars have become more terrible, with more innocent lives lost than ever before.”
She paused, wiping tears from her eyes. “If only we could learn how to speak to one another again, perhaps to understand one another again. Then maybe we could become one people again – humans, faeries, animals, trees and stones. Then war would exist no more.”
She smiled, and with a wave, disappeared into the hedge.
In the early morning, as the stars make their way to bed and the sun, yawning, begins his climb into the sky, morning greetings from the faerie folk cut through the dream cobwebs of my sleep. I try to dig down deeper into sleep, attempting to capture some tattered fragment of a dream that might become a blanket to hide under to protect me from their incessant early morning cheerfulness. But, like a determined cat, insisting that it is long past time to get out of bed, the faeries keep prodding me with their wide awake banter.
Unlike humans, faeries tend their flower and vegetable gardens beneath the early morning sky. Wide awake, they are already enjoying their day before even the sun rises from his sleep. I finally succumb to their expectations of the beginning birth of a beautiful morning and stumble from my bed to be reborn like the day.
On a sunny afternoon as the wind whispered through the leaves, my dog and I visited the stream down the hill from our house. I fell into a trance as I watched the water flow over the rocks in the bed of the stream, while my dog tried to chomp on every gnat and mosquito in mid-air.
Feeling as though I was being watched, I looked up from my water gazing to find two gnomes standing on the bank across the stream. After friendly greetings were exchanged, the female gnome with long braided blonde hair and bright green eyes told me her name was Wendy. The male gnome with dark hair and a beard was Ted. “Like the bear,” he added.
Wendy and Ted told me they lived on top of the hill where, a few years ago, a developer built some houses. I had the impression that the developer built his houses very near, if not on top of, their home. I asked Wendy and Ted, “Did it not make you angry when the developer did that?”
“Angry? Yes, at first,” Ted replied. “But now we only feel sad. Not for us, but for you and others who mourn the loss of the forest.”
Wendy, smiling sadly, added, “We are doing fine. We just pulled our home deeper into the Faerie lands. It is you and your neighbors who must suffer the loss of so many trees.”
“When Wendy and I first settled here so many years ago, this,” Ted gestured to the hill behind him, “was all old growth forest. The only humans we saw occasionally were the native folk, which you know today as the Cherokee, and they respected the forest.”
Wendy added, “Remember, Ted, there were also more of the native faerie folk. The Yunwi Tsunsdi were all around at that time.”
Ted nodded, “I remember, Wendy. These woods were full of those good folk.”
Wendy, in a soft wistful voice, almost a whisper, added, “And we lived in peace. We, the Yunwi Tsunsdi, and the Cherokee had no trouble with one another. We lived in harmony with each other and the land.”
Ted frowned, “Then the white settlers came and sent the Cherokee away on the long march, far away from their homes.”
“What about the Yunwi Tsunsdi?” I asked.
Wendy had tears in her eyes. “Many of the Yunwi Tsunsdi went with the Cherokee on their long march far away, for the Yunwi Tsunsdi see themselves as protectors of the Cherokee people. Many others of the Yunwi Tsunsdi could not bear to see their Cherokee Children treated so badly, and they retreated deeper into the forest, where they still remain to this day.”
Ted, looking about, remarked, “This hill sure has changed since we’ve lived here, has it not, Wendy?” Wendy nodded. “The white settlers cut down all the forest. Later, a group of settlers planted apple trees.”
“The apple trees were nice,” added Wendy.
“Yes, dear, the apple grove was nice, but they did not take care of it. Then they cut down the grove!” Ted declared, shaking his head. Looking me in the eye, he added, “Wendy and I have seen many changes on this hill, and we will see a few more changes before the old growth forest returns.” Maintaining his eye contact with me, Ted continued, “And the ancient trees will be back one day, and Wendy and I will still be here to welcome them and the Cherokee people back home.”
With that, Wendy and Ted bade me and my dog a good day and vanished into the hill.
“A new vegetable garden should not be planted with such grumbling and complaining,” sternly advised the small faerie man sitting cross legged on our front porch table. “The new plants should be reassured when they are being set in the soil that you have picked out the best plot in the garden for them to be planted. New plants should be planted with songs and poetry, not grumbling and complaining.”
“I guess we did do a bit of grumbling and complaining,” I remarked, thinking uncomfortably about my wife’s and my vegetable planting a few days earlier.
He nodded, “And it did not boost the new plants’ confidence one little bit when you mentioned how last year’s garden died a dismal death in that very spot.”
“We didn’t say that,” I protested feebly.
“You might as well have,” quipped the faerie man. “But do not worry. I and the others have been talking to them, telling them they will be okay.”
“Thank you and the other faeries for reassuring our plants.”
“No problem,” the faerie man smiled, “but do not be surprised if, during the night, some of your wee plants pull themselves out of your garden and sneak over and plant themselves in ours.” Laughing, he suddenly vanished from the table.
The Celtic Owl Blog 