Marcie Telander
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Home Studies

IN CELEBRATION OF BELTAINE IN OUR CONTEMPORARY WORLD Please read the Poem HOME STUDIES by Irish Belfast poet Mark Madden. Like the hummingbird, drawing sweet nectar from many disparate places, Mark has drawn iconoclastic Spirit and irreverent humor from ancient, perennial and contemporary sources of wisdom. He continues to create provocative poetry, win international Poetry Slams and work for peace in a city that has known some desperate seasons and dark, embattled times. 
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Poems

For You, In Gratitude
Newborn Poems
Poetry for Lughnasa
Le Petit Mort
Here's What You Need to Do
Home Studies
Winter Solstice
December Sauna
Into the Air  

Home Studies
by Mark Madden 

I have been a seeker after truth
These thirty years
Since the quickening of puberty
Studied all the ancient texts
The holy books of all the ages
Bhagavad Gita, Nag Hammadi
Tao Te Ching, Gilgamesh
Bible and Book of Shadows
Myths and rites across space and time
I have gathered and applied
With Graves, Jung and Campbell
I have pursued the white hart
Under the golden bough of wisdom.

I have watched through long vigil nights
In the old places
To greet a solstice dawn
In a cathedral of monoliths
I have led the Mayday romp
In mask and antlers
A woodland shaman singing
Questions to rabbit and squirrel
Watched the slumber of a city
From a hilltop bonefire.
I’ve argued with mechanics
Quantum or otherwise
Who know the structure of the engine
But little of the race.




 

I have been a diviner
After the sacred
I have taught the arts of spirit
Running light, charka work
The intricacies of Kabbalah
With the emphasis on daily practice
And the secondary nature of theology
As Blake, or Yeats, or Sappho would know
These things are within the gift of a poet
Poet the only title to my taste
No mage I, in my imagination
Just a witcher of words and a voice
That sometimes lifts in prayer.

I have been, and I am still
A seeker after light
With no terminus in mind
Because enlightenment is not a destination
Illumination never finally attained
Just a feeling you get sometimes
Which may be encouraged and allowed for
But, like a brushstroke from the otherworld
That slips sideways to the sun,
It cannot be held long by our reason
And so I offer out this widow’s mite
Of plain verse honestly spoken
With simple faith in the transformative
Power of words beyond
The brocade squalor of the mysteries. 
Mark Madden has written and performed poetry for two decades, as well as organizing events, festivals and slams. An experienced workshop artist, he leads cross community projects in literature and Digital Storytelling, mostly around the peace-walls of Belfast. His work has been published in magazines and anthologies, such as Revival and The Lonely Poet’s Guide to Belfast. He has published one collection on his own small press, Timely Demise of a Trendy Conformist, in 2006.


Mark has competed in many slams. In 2006, he was a finalist in the UK Slam Championship in London and has was runner up in the BBC Radio 4 Poetry Slam Finals 2009. Recordings of the event, as well as other poems, can be found on his blog:http://markmadden.blogspot.com/

As its May Eve, and in spite of fearing to blast you with too much verse, I'm also attaching my ancient MayDay epic poem, Jenny's Tale.  
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  • Home
  • About Marcie
    • Marcie's Notebook
  • Services
    • Offerings
  • Secular Ministry
  • Poems
    • For you, In Gratitude
    • Newborn Poems
    • Poetry for Lughnasa
    • Le Petit Mort
    • Here is What You Need to Do
    • Home Studies
    • Winter Solstice
    • December Sauna
    • Into The Air
  • How We Are Happy
    • Lovage and Hemlock
    • Thanksgiving
  • Classes/Presentations
  • Past Blogs
    • Essays for the Hungry Soul >
      • My Father's Day
      • Earth Year!
      • Living in Pandora
      • Feast of Imbolc
    • Earth Celebrations >
      • Celebrating May and the Month of the Bear
      • All Hallow's
      • Never pass up an opportunity to Celebrate!
      • Time to Cease your Labors for a Fairy Tale
      • Late Summer and Closer to the Bone
      • Dancing at Leghnasa
      • Inter-dependance Day
      • Beltaine - Bringing
      • Welcoming Spring
      • Winter Divination
      • Light Chasing the Dark
    • Wise Talk
    • Innersanctuary Meditations
  • Current Blogs