Today’s official 31 Days of Magic post, for the Strategic Sorcery community around Jason Miller, would be to cook a magical meal. But I won’t be home until tomorrow night, so that will have to wait until then.  Today is a “free day”, and the action in this case for me is to “write a poem”.

This evening, I’m acting as the giver of the toast at a combination dinner, dance, and ritual for the EarthSpirit Community at their annual “Stag King’s Masque” at Feast of Lights.  The old hotel where this event used to be held has closed, and as a consequence it’s being held at the Hotel UMASS in Amherst, Massachusetts. And for the first time in forever, dinner is included as part of the celebrations.

The feast is nominally the winter ball of the Stag King — annually chosen and annually feted at this Masque, which celebrates midwinter, wildness, and the growing light as the darkness of the winter solstice is left behind.

Sometime shortly before this post went live, I stood, and called the assembly to attention, and brought them to their feet, thus:

Ladies and gentlemen,
beings of grace and power and purpose,
masked revelers, honorable courtiers, and nimble-footed dancers:

Come, take your feet, rise in honor of our gracious host,
The Lord of these winter revels. 

Here we stand, in the very garden of mid-winter,
with the blossoms and sweet scents of icicles in our nostrils.

We feast this night under spreading branches,
but there in the distance, a growing Light,
glimpsed through the shadow of mighty Antlers!

Beings of grace and power, attend!
Grant him health, long life, prosperity!
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Stag King!

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