Look to the earth. Trees are ablaze!
Alas for the creatures who have lost their dens!
Alas for the young who long for their brothers!
Alas for the babes who cry for their fathers!
Alas for the mothers whose sons will not attend their deathbeds!
Alas for the widows alone on ther cots!
Women keened on the battlefield. The sky was black with a thousand birds. Crows hovered above the blood soaked ground where men lay maimed and dying and women swayed and beat their chests and clapped their palms and ripped their hair and keened for their beloveds.
Dismal! O dismal!
Without a soft bed.
A cold, frosty dwelling.
O harsh and hard is death!
And my own dear man, so stubborn in battle.
The bright heart.
Hall without fire, without bed.
I weep and then I'll be silent awhile.
The crows circled. The infinite flap of their wings swooped through the keening women's cloaks and they shuddered. The crows floated on the heat of the women's lamentations and the blood warmed currents coming up from the Ulster battleground.
No flame.
No hard sword to warm my bed.
Long! Long! O dreadful yearning!
You are shapeless, your shield in the grave, and I
am loveless, oh!
The hall is grim tonight!
Crow has swallowed her gory drink.
Crow wallows in the blood of men, greedy forthe flesh I love,
while I, a heavy gried upon me, cling to me beloved.
My brothers grew lake hazel saplings.
One by one, they pass away.
Woe, woe is me that I am still alive!
Closer they dropped and tigher the ranks of the crows grew. They skimmed the smoldering trees, merged, and where there had been a thousand crows three ladies touched the ground. The war-weavers. The Morrigna. And the first to land was the Phantom Queen. Now her cloudy dress was tranquil. Hours before, it was the color of thunder. Its spin and huff and squall had nourished all the pettty squabbles on the battlefield. She was phantom, for few ever remembered why or how the battles had begun.
Frenzy came down next landing on the shoulders of a wailing woman. She was so airy, the keening woman never even noticed. The battle fury and rage were Frenzy's doing, the killing fear in the killing field was done. Now she bayed with the women and she stirred their alases and woes.
Macha, the third, hovered above the scene. She let her crow's mantale only gradually slip away. she had cast her charms to strengthen her faviortes in the battle. Now she snickered and cawed and her screams loosened their mortal hold on the dead.
The Phantom Queen glided across the field. She grasped the dangling thread of a widow's hood and yanked it gently. She split the thread in three. The sisters each picked up one thread, trilling and humming like the golden wrens above Rhiannon's head, they wove a fragile web from the mourning cloak around the battlefield. The brown threads gleamed gold with dew and dawn and a new peace.
The Phantom Queen turned to the brackish river to recieve the spirits of the dead back into her womb. Fenzy picked at the bones and flesh and drank from the pools of blood, until she had her fill and flew away. Macha soothed and reapaired the packed blood stained earth with ther soles and palms. Whever she scratched and stroked, heather, broom and flax appeared allowing the beauty to return.
The keening women dragged home their men's remains. Their ululations trailed across the heath, and only three dusty and dazed warriors were left to stumble home behind them.
Eternalsea, mother and tomb.
The war-weaver becomes the lover.
Death, the giver of life.
Now the destroyer's second task:
She rushes toward creation.
Macha ran to a hill that overlooked the sea. She ran across the winter hill and she ran like racing wind and racing laughter, no one could outrace her and she ran until she reached a valley where there was a house, the hold of a chieftain, a widower with three small, lonely boys.Macha knocked on the chieftain's door, and though he first feared the risen dead on this Samhain day, he welcomed her. He could not take his eyes from her and found he could not bear to be away from her. She was bird-boned and had violet hair that flowed around her face like black cream, in which one violed-black feather still remained.
Macha spoke not a word but set to work putting right Crunnchu's house. His wealth and servents had dissapeared. The richness of his land had been plunged into ravenous warriors' mouths His stores were emply and his motherless children were hungry. She stoked the fire, righted his rooms, and piled the table with warm, good foods. The children rubbed their bellies, and when they had eaten everything she kissed them and tucked them in their beds where they slept soundly. Crunnchu thanked her. She pointed her chin toward his bedcloset. He obeyed and she followed. He lay on his cot and he watched her. She turned three full circles to the right and right again and again and she blessed the house. She stripped her frock and she entered his bed Wordlessly Macha attended Crunnchu's bed and house. Noone resented her silence, her loving smiles healed the ruin.
She lovingly planted and harvested ruined gardens and orchards, she filled Crunnchu's storehouses to overflowing. she cooked and weaved. She cut the peat and chopped the kindling, she ran up the hill and down to the sea to gather Crunnchu's scattered flocks, and none could outwork her nor outrun her, not even the strongest, fastest horses, though they, and even the children tried in playful races to defeat her. Every night, Macha turned three circles right and right again, and day by day they prospered till one by one Crunnchu's wealth returned.
At midsummer, Macha's belly was fat and prosperous and kicking. Crunnchu prepared to attend the Lughnasad assembly of the high king and all the Ulstermen. Crunnchy promised to be home soon. Macha clung to him and spoke for the first time. She begged "Do not boast about me." At first Crunnchu believe he was hearing a breeze, he told her " You would be a difficult secret to keep." He embraced Macha and his children and departed.
Woe the bright heart dimmed with pride!
Boneless and shapeless his desires.
He tumbles toward the downward spiral.
Alas creation wears the skin of doom!
Harsh and hard the bed and cold the hall.
Mead and mild and music. Courts and councils and marriage bargins. Cakes and cattle and pigs and pies and sheep and dances and games. Chieftains and slaves and poets and druids and warriors crowded Ulster Assembly and gathered around a track where highbred horses raced. Turning to the man beside him Crunnchu said "My wife is faster than any horse alive, she can outrun the finest stallions. Ambition drove him to break his word to his gentle Macha. Crunnchu boasted more and more until word finally reached the High King, who called for Crunnchu to come before him. He asked "Are you merely a braggart?" But Crunnchu insisted that his wife could indeed outrun any creature alive. The high king sent a summons to Macha to appear at once.
Macha rubbed her kicking belly to show the messenger how soon her time was to come. she shook her violet hair and the violet-black feather slapped her face, she patted the plump cheeks of the three motherless boys and shook her head again. The messenger replied "Your husband will be shamed and kiled if you do not appear." Macha kissed the children farewell and followed the messenger. He placed her on his pony and took her to the ulster Assembly. She spoke not a word, but found Crunnchu with her eyes. Crunnchu smiled his encouragement and wagered with chieftains, poets druids and warriors. He wagered his wife could outrun the king's finest horses. Men laughed, cheered and shouted, they mocked Macha's heavy waist and Macha's eyes begged them to stop but none would return her gaze.
Her pleading gaze was lost in the merriment, she quivered at the starting line. Two of the king's horses hitched to his lightest chariot waited beside her. Macha's back was bowed with the weight of her belly, the horses were lean and restless. The high king shouted and Macha felt the crack of a stick across her rump. Macha ran neck and neck with the horses. The galloped so hard and so close that the charioteer's whip caught in Macha's violet hair. she thrust her bucking belly forward and ran her legs lengthening with each stride. Macha strained on and on, her gait quickened and her arms pumped like wings. Push and panting she ran adn the blue veins popped on her belly. The horses snorted and dropped back. Macha limped across the finish line and she collapsed. The birthwaters gushing from between her thighs.
Macha rolled on the ground and she wept without words the Ulstermen chattered in awe above her. Crunnchu cowered in the crowd, Macha screamed. She groaned and grunted and twins, a son and daughter, slid out along her wet legs. The babies howled. Macha's sight was blinded and she gasped and wheezed and spoke a second time.
Hear my curse, cruel bearded men of Ulster! You who would not help me! All you who hear my screams, you, who do not honor me! I curese you! For nine generations, in times of greatest peril, when enemies are at your door, you bearded men of Ulster will writhe, unprotected, uncomforted, for five long days, with stinging belly cramp and shooting back pain, legs spread helplessly, as weak as a woman in childbirth.
And Macha died.
Macha died and Crunnchu flung the winnings from his hand and pushed through the crowd around his wife on the dusty track. The tried to give him his howling babies and overhead, a flock of crows cawed and shrieked and croaked. Two ladies in back hoods and mourning cloaks swayed and beat their chests and ripped their hair and clapped their hands and keened.
Alas the lover's peace destroyed!
Bounty she brought out of ruin.
Woe you trespassers, usurpers and breachers of faith.
Soon begin the Pangs of Ulster!
Long-lasting evil.
Woe you men without mercy!
Make ready the bed of pain and agony!
The bed that recieves no life.
The Morrigna swaddled macha's body and her twin babies. Her violet-black feather was all they left behind. Chieftains and slaves and poets and druids and warriors and the high king watched horrified as the sky grew thick with a thousand black crows.....
In Connacht, fierce might Queen Medb gathered her army to take the Brown Bull of Ulster. The Phantom Queen glided through the great ranks. Her spin and huff and twirl and squall nourished petty agitations. Macha cast her charms for favorites and Frenzy raised her cry of wrath and rage and panic.
red and crimson and scarlet
scarlet and read and crimson
crimson and scarlet and red
Medb's warriors crossed the plain. They crossed the boarders of Ulster. Ahead of the hordes, Medb's painted women waved flaming torches. They beat war drums. They bawled the curdling war songs. Madb's army marched with clatter of swords and neighing of horses with armor and weapons raised and ready. At Emain Macha, at Macha's death place a child heard the roaring footsteps and trumpets and the crash and cries of advancing warriors, the sky going suddenly black with thousands of crows. The child ran to warn the others, but the bearded men of Ulster wer crumbling one by one. Each with a belly of stinging cramps and shooting back pains, legs spread wide and helplessly apart, as weak as women in childbirth.
