Hail all! For the third Sunday of June, I have another poem for you. It’s about my other favorite tree, the Yew (Taxus baccata). With it, there’s a picture of some yew trees from Ireland, which I took when I visited there on a research trip in 2019.

Enjoy!

The Yew

The Tree of Trees for triumph I praise,
that fimbul rood and focus of Spirit
a gift of the Gods for the gain of Midgard.
A lustrous light, it is life in death
when cold and snow surround our ken.
For the noble Norse and numerous others,
it is majesty, main, and myth-saturated;
for the steadfast English, ’tis the estate’s joy.
Hail to the Yew, holy and ancient—
for serious seekers, a most sorcerous wood.
’Tis fire’s keeper and a force of nature,
with deep green needles—it dreams of eternity
as the world’s witness, watching through centuries—
and orange-brown heart, awesome in might,
and bright red berries, a boon in the fall
and blessing of sweetness, yet bearing poison
in the kernel within, a clash of opposites.
The gallows of the god who gained the runes,
its heavy presence hinders evil,
its limbs live after as luck-filled tines,
and its eternal spirit teems with those runes,
even as itself is an awesome Rune.
It goes slow in growth, seeking good skies;
even as a shurb, it shines with magic.
Yet once it’s large, it waxes in might,
an intense, overpowering titanic essence.
’Tis a small part come of the Superworld
and set in the ordinary as a sign that points
to the inviolable Center, to the invisible Pole.
Identified with Yggdrasil, what does this mean?
The nine bright words this needle ash bears,
from Hel below in lands of darkness
to Asgard above in awesome splendor.
And you yourself, like the Yews on earth
contain these worlds in your total being,
as well as its wights—a wondrous zoo—
the eagle, the serpent, and all the rest.
So hang in spirit on this holy tree
and make yourself into this mainful beam—
or rather, realize that this rood is within
to gain its mysteries, the greater and lesser,
to make it a joy on your mortal estate.
As the olden bow of archers past,
it sent forth their arrows to find their targets;
send forth your will with its fimbul staves.
Work with its wood, gain wode with it,
for the mightiest magics of majesty and growth,
for poetry’s power, and plenty else—
just look within and journey deeply
into the Sacred Heart of the holy Yew.

Copyright © 2023 Eirik Westcoat

Hwæt! This poem first appeared on my Patreon in September 2022. If you’d like to see great poems like this one much earlier than the rest of the public—plus lots more exclusive material that will never appear on this blog—just subscribe to my Patreon site.