I saw the neo-pagan band FAUN in concert on my birthday last year. It was a life-changing experience being the the same room with the band, so close to the music I love. I haven’t been to many concerts in my life for multiple reasons: cost, location, volume, crowds. But I bought earplugs. I wasn’t going to miss this. And then it ended up that the volume at this venue was PERFECT, so I didn’t need them after all. It was such a delight. The woman next to me ruined it a bit with her absolutely terrible timing of screams and whoops, though. I try to repress the memory of that and focus on Oliver’s face.

I reference 3 songs from the concert in my poem: Diese kalte Nacht, The Market Song, and Hymn to Pan.

(I am thrilled about this prompt, because I had to do a bit of research into which instruments the band plays—they’re nontraditional, very Old World—and in doing so, I learned Oliver had created a solo music album in conjunction with someone’s book of faerie drawings, which was out of print, which I then found on the author’s Etsy…the last one. So that’s on its way to me now. THANK YOU Maureen for this particular prompt today!)

Poem prompt: “Our daily resource is the online galleries of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, one of India’s foremost museums. It’s a pleasure to browse through the images here. I particularly liked these anklets that aren’t just jewelry but a sort of personal piggy bank, this portrait of the fabulously mustachioed J.M. Cursetjee, and this highly decorative flask, originally meant to hold gunpowder!

Finally, here is our optional prompt for the day. In her poem, senzo, Evie Shockley recounts the experience of being at a live concert, relating it the act of writing poetry. Today we’d like to challenge you to write a poem that recounts an experience of your own in hearing live music, and tells how it moves you. It could be a Rolling Stones concert, your little sister’s middle school musical, or just someone whistling – it just needs to be something meaningful to you.”

The Faerie Ring of FAUN

Deep in the pit the light shifts 
red to green to blue: 
sun to leaves to sky 
behind closed eyes. 

Witches scream to my right, 
maniacally cackling in delight. 
I curse their bad timing 
as they dance 'round the rim 
of the hole I find myself in 

and yet 
despite shoulders bending closer, 
stinging my wrists with strange fur 
and offering no words of help, 

I don't mind being trapped. 
I don't mind poachers approaching 
to airlift me back 
to the encroaching daily grind 

for tonight, in the pit, 
the faeries' music trickles down 
saving me
from week-in, week-out despondency.  

I sing along 
the song of the goddess,  
foreign words of winter and moonlight. 
I dance to a hurdy-gurdy, nyckelharpa, 
bouzouki, kontrabasharpa—

the strings dig into my skin 
and marionette me into the canopy 
to fly with the hypnotic fae. 
Mesmerized, enchanted, spellbound, 
in their thrall: I'll never be the same. 

Closing the night with a hymn
to Pan, I panic as
I have found my safe space among the bodies
and now must leave it. Yet
such insanity has mended my sanity.

I chose to dive into this sylvan pit.
I'd choose to dive again.