Hopscotch Spells by Annelinde Metzner

  In my work with the folklore and music of children’s games and circles, I’m enchanted by how many bits of magic are interwoven into everyday children’s games from many, many years ago. Our childhood closely intersects with the deep, witchy, magic world of spells, talking animals and whispering spirits.

POEM: “Hopscotch Spells”

One, two, three, O’lary,
four, five, six, O’lary….

I’m pulled like a slingshot’s band
   back to those childhood, everyday spells.

Ally, ally, in-come-free!

Each day, we’d open the screen door
   and hurry to our witches’ college,
   pursuing a degree in the Child’s School of Magic.

One potato, two potato, three potato, four!

What drew us to each other this way?
The circle of street kids, our pals,
   our fists beating out the rhythms,
   our jumps and our skips conjuring powers.

Hey diddle diddle, the Cat and the Fiddle…

The spells’ energy leapt one to another,
   fingertip to fingertip,
   morphing into astonishment and joy.

The Cow jumped over the Moon!

The sparrows spoke our language,
   the stray dogs winked an eye,
   a lucky rabbit leapt into our path
Out the door we’d fly, expectantly,
 all of five years old,
   utterly devoted to the hand-claps, the circles, the jumps,

Miss Mary Mack, Mack, Mack
all dressed in black, black, black…

the ducking under bridges, the rhythms made upon our knees.

silver buttons, buttons, buttons,
all down her back, back, back…

We taught each other meticulously, as children do,
   sister to sister, cousin to cousin,
   all of us students of our own enchantment.
Devoted to our soul’s purpose,
   our grasping hands reinforced, each day,
   the magic inherent in the human circle.

Sally go ’round the sun,
Sally go ’round the moon…

Our enchantment stretched to include everything!
We found a way into the future.

Honey cakes and wine!

My grandparents’ farm in the Catskills afforded me space and freedom in places where the worlds of wildlife and magic spoke to me.  It was also a time to learn the old ways from my ancestors, who were small farmers and skilled artisans.  While scattering my Tante’s ashes in the old kitchen garden, I realized how much of my own being had been passed down to me.

Poem: “Prithee”

Summertime, in her spare moments,
Grossmutter follows the dirt road 
down to her kitchen garden to tend her plants.
I, a little girl, stop at the old apple tree, 1956,
Elsie’s hand in mine, as we follow the dirt road.
“Prithee, let no bird call!” cries my Tante,
smiling down at me,
quoting Edna St. Vincent Millay for my very young ears.
My niece and I follow the same dirt road
carrying Elsie’s ashes down to the kitchen garden.
Grossmutter, 1940, saves her seeds
and lays out the garden close to the house.
Marjoram, sage, oregano, squash, potatoes.
Down at the stone wall, red ripe currants for jelly.
“We must have flowers for the table,” cries Elsie, 
as we carry back an armload in my little arms and hers.
“Ee-oh-lay!” cries the wood thrush all the while,
as Amy and I scatter her ashes here and there in the garden.
The Veery calls as well, from east and from west,
the vast mysterious songs filling the morning air.
Grossmutter brings in the last of the tomatoes,
right to the woodstove to ready in jars for the cellar.
Apples fill the cellar bins, and a crock of sauerkraut,
all to keep the family for the cold, cold winter.
My niece remembers this sacred walk,
through the fields to the apple trees,
when she was a child, and she walked with me.
We scatter ashes all through the kitchen garden,
veery and thrush in a cacophony, a crescendo.
“You have made the world too beautiful today.
Prithee, let no bird call.”

Poem: “Serpent”

I guess I was eleven
the day my fifth-grade classmate
brought his pet snake for Show and Tell.
Walking home at the end of the day,
we all stopped to wonder.
He let me hold the snake!
I felt the sinewy muscles flexing every part
of the long body,
no part ever holding still.
I was in love.
“She likes snakes!  And she’s a girl!”
I knew right then that I was changed.

Years later, that warm, Spring day on the farm,
I came upon my eleven-year-old niece,
basking on the stone wall,
a garden snake on each stone. 
Twenty-five of them, all enjoying the sun.

And today at the Nature Center,
the ranger calls to the snake, “Come on out!”
With utmost respect she waits for the five-foot snake
to nose its way out to freedom.
The snake curls and curls around her wrists,
her arms, between her legs, up her sleeves,
hunting for places to hide.

Our legacy!  Ancient one, symbol of regeneration,
I feel the ancestors loving you through the ages.
Eve tried her best to show us how to keep you,
serpent, way-shower, traveler between the worlds.
Still now, oh serpent,
you are with me, dancing.

Poem: “The Four Grandmothers”

“Hey, little girl, We know you!” cackled the four Grandmothers
as I approached their meadow,
though now I am seventy, arthritis slowing my gait.
Reverently seven of us family members 
had stepped along the woodland trail,
with the ashes of my brother.
“Hey, right here!  Remember us?” the Grandmothers cried,
as we neared my brother’s oaken hunting perch. 
And right there, by my brother’s tree,
the entrance to my meadow, my secretest spot,
where, at eleven, I came to seek these Grandmothers,
opening each of my senses as I stepped,
myself a maiden, a wood nymph,
naked as a jay bird, ripe as an apple
and pure as the snow.
“Hey, little girl, where have you been?” 
But I have been here, with You, my Holy Ones,
devoting my life to You.
It all began right here!
Initiating me, guiding me that long-ago day 
to seek Your presence, to reach out to You,
and yes, astonished, I am here again today.
Slowly we each cast the ashes full of memories,
and sang a few songs,
all as I gazed across the field 
deep into my ancient sacred site.
Goldenrod bent Her head in the warm September breeze.
The mullein reached out with Her great soft healing.
The Saint John’s Wort offered Her deep peace.
“You expected less than this?” teased the old Grandmothers.
Into my ancient meadow of awakening,
and upward to my dear brother’s perch,
I gazed and bowed in wonder.

Often at our local circles for Lammas or Beltaine, children will fit right in, instinctively “getting” what the raising of spirit is all about.

Poem: “Goddess Girl”

Violet is a Goddess Girl.
She sings, she dances, she rejoices
   with all the glowing energy of her seven years.
Violet comes to our Goddess Gathering
   singing “The Seven Herbs of Spring.”
She gathers herbs at our feet,
   gifting them among us, 
   a true Goddess of Abundance.
Violet stops here and there around the circle
   for a hug.
Each of us gets a dandelion for our hair.
She looks up at me as I lead a song,
   with that look that says “I will remember this,”
   that look children get 
   when they feel the promptings of their soul.
Violet hears the heart-felt sharings of each woman there,
   the joys and the pain.
We circle and sing to end our gathering,
   releasing the loving spirits,
   and a young voice calls out,
   “Blessed Be!”

     Here are a few photos from magic times out of time in my own childhood.  To all of us and the children within us.

All poems by Annelinde Metzner, with excerpts by Edna Saint Vincent Millay in the poem “Prithee.”