Author: gideonheugh

Winter now your soul

Winter now your soul. Make good of the cold.
Do not carry on as normal—
as though the long nights were not telling you
to fold into your roots, to quit your reaching,
to clear your schedule and curl
into a ritual of hushening ease.

Winter now your soul. Make good of the cold.
There is no use in clinging on—
let yourself let go; settle into deep sighs
under thick blankets, the candles summoning
dulcet shadows on the wall. Empty is not devoid,
it is the space to breathe, the hollow for the seed,
the sanctuary in which you can slowly
regather yourself.

Gideon Heugh

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Do you have a practice of ‘wintering’? How do you plan to slow down during this fallow season?

I’ll be taking an extended break from social media at some point, and using the long evenings to light candles, read more, take time to reflect, go to sleep early.

If you want something to help ground your wintering, then it’s not too late to grab a copy of my Advent devotional, ‘Darkling‘.

Whatever you do, I hope you have a beautiful winter.

Gideon

Autumn Soup

We walk the lanes, our breath before us,
the earth and the sun at grateful angles.

The ease of your steps, the brightness
in your eyes is a lesson. Hands held, laughter, taking time as it is—
the being here that makes life worth the trouble.

Each day is new colour in the leaves.
We point this out to each other,
cross the roads carefully.

There is little purpose to our strolling,
nor should there be. The delight of this world
is gratuitous; the design of beauty merely
to be beautiful.
I don’t need to tell my daughter
how wonderful this is.

We stumble upon the chestnuts,
hundreds of them, a new ground,
some of them split open in invitation.
I show you how to avoid most of the spikes
(you can’t get around getting hurt completely)
and we fill our pockets—just one more,
more and more.

I stir this feeling into a pot of soup;
living simply is a comfort food.

Gideon Heugh

Blackberries

What does God want with me?

I used to believe
it was something grand –
seismic, even. It would probably,
almost certainly, involve success,
and acclaim.

How wonderfully wrong I was.

All I have to do
to satisfy heaven’s desire
is go and pick blackberries
in the rain.

Gideon Heugh

It’s Midsummer’s Eve. A time when magic gathers thickly. When light is sugared and warm and the dark has an aura of what-if. The year’s waning begins, but not before the waxing gives one final flourish.

There is rumour of God leaping from branch to branch in the greenwood, fay and unpredictable—Christ-as-Puck, weaving spells upon the twilighted. You will be told unconvincingly that it was just a dream.

Who knows what you could become when Spirit is in his mood. Who knows what could burn away in Midsummer’s bonfire if you let it. Cast off; leap over; take that twinkle in your eye and run with it.

Grace is the Faerie Queen, sultry, seeking, tasting the air to catch the scent of your yearning so she can roll in the grass with it. Go now with hot daring. Go and be transformed.

Gideon Heugh

God is not the lion—
fearsome and aloof,
living only for its own;
God is not the lamb—
farmed according to our appetite,
slaughtered for the mouths
of the Sunday privileged;
God is the worm—
quietly making an remaking
the ground beneath our feet,
creating, often unseen, the fecundity
out of which abundance
might grow.

Gideon Heugh

Naming God

Spring is becoming,
and the sap is on the move.

Thoughts acquire new muscle of green;
forget-me-nots are blooming –
the infinite made urgent.

Let us kneel before the primroses
and think of death. Without it,
where all this life?

Winter is no tyrant. It is the mother
laying herself down for her child.

Gideon Heugh

Adoration for Imbolc

Hail the quickening of the year;
Hail the growing curve showing
On the belly of the earth;
Hail the awakening, the light returning,
The heart-brightening restoration
Of Spirit’s hunger for the new.

Hail snowdrops and spring cleaning;
Hail the dawnful farmers looking
To the arrival of the lambs;
Hail the beginning, the blackbird singing,
The gorgeous expectancy that the ground
Will say amen to renewal.

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Imbolc is a Gaelic festival celebrating the coming of spring. It originates from an Old Irish word meaning ‘in the belly’. At this time of year, the pregnancy of nature begins to show.

It is also known as ‘Feile Brighde’ – the quickening of the year. Halfway between the winter solstice and spring equinox, the promise of new life can be felt.

For Christians, it is Candlemas – a festival of light.

This year, it happily happens to coincide with the Lunar New Year.

A blessed Imbolc and Candlemas to you, and a happy New Year!

Gideon Heugh

Rumours of Light, my second collection of poetry, is out now.

It’s about
wonder
longing
grief
hope
despair
beauty
and love.

It’s about opening yourself to the immensity of your own soul; finding the divine waiting in the darkness; and collapsing into the gorgeousness of the world around us.

It’s a love letter to the world; a lament for what we have lost; and a reminder of what it means to be alive.

My prayer is that the book will sit with you within the heavy times that we’re living in. That it will whisper to you whatever it is that you need to hear. And that it will be an open window; a glimmer of dawn; a rumour of light for you.

You can get your copy here.

Love and gratitude,

Gideon Heugh

What does God want with me?

I used to believe it was something grand –
seismic, even. It would probably,
almost certainly, involve success,
and acclaim.

How wonderfully wrong I was.

All I have to do
to satisfy heaven’s desire
is to go and pick blackberries
in the rain.

Gideon Heugh

Love is strong because it is vulnerable; it overcomes because it serves; it is powerful because it rejects power.

Love doesn’t climb ladders to get ahead, it gets to work at ground level.

Love doesn’t wait for daylight, it sets up camp in the dark night of the soul and builds a fire.

Love doesn’t dominate, segregate or accumulate; it would rather get nailed to a cross in a posture of inclusion than take up a sword to conquer.

Love wins because it is willing to lose.

Gideon Heugh