Wiccan women, most naught but girls,

Gathered to dance and call upon him

Call to the storm, to the wild one who rides

Call to the bringer of passion

One of their number, mother not maiden

Drew herself back from the fire

Deep in the darkness a smile on her face

Memory stirring inside her

Grey was her hair, and lines girt her eyes

Laughter and pain both had marked her

Well she remembered the dance and its end

Thoughts of her lovers did beckon

Sneering she listened the young ones who called

As if passion would ever be bound!

Calling for wildness their youth can’t contain

A storm no child could weather

Away from their dancing her steps drew her deep

The darkness of summer nights calling

Memory of soldiers she’d loved long ago

Love and loss swirled within her

Thunder shattered the chanting and dance

Lightning raped the black night

Revealing a hooded form standing astride

Eight hooved monstrous stallion

An eye lit the darkness, a grin wild and mad

A hand scarred and strong held before her

Wild and wicked, his grin promised all

Thundering heart, she accepted

Young ones still with their circles and chants

Sought to bind the lord of all passion

Madness rode on the storms wild winds

Grey haired lover before him

Scars she traced in the lines on his face

Scars she kissed cross his chest

Grey the hair that he seized in his fist

Laughing the lips that he kissed

Nine nights did I hang to learn of the runes

He whispered as he swiftly undressed her

Issa (ice) he traced on her heart

Naduz (needfire) her belly

Ansuz (inspiration) she breathed in a kiss

Wunjo(joy) as she took him

Nine deaths and lives she knew in his hands

Nine screams she howled to the storm-winds

At the rituals end they found her at last

Sleeping and smiling in the forest

Naked and wrapped in a full soft blue cloak

In a clearing churned flat by great hooves

The fury of storm can’t be caught in a spell

Nor the passion of madness contained

Careful who call him lest he answer you too

Don’t call what you cannot sustain

For those who have been caught in Odin’s passions at other times than war.  Love and battle both are born in the storm, and to give yourself ecstatically and utterly is to either is to know him.

John T Mainer