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Wolf Priest
I make a poor priest for my god
vacillating between confusion and indecision.
I fail to shape the story that has shaped me,
fearing the freedom I want to embrace,
too often choosing to live in the safety of the cage
than walk into the Outer Unknown.
Visions are given and I shrink away.
My god, my god, why have you not forsaken me?
I run from my holy calling groping and struggling
to understand my life and purpose,
when I should be content to celebrate
a mystery that cannot be solved.
My god, my god, do not abandon me
until I have preached the gospel
I am called to preach.
Make my voice worthy of the song.
Oh! Shift me to my Feral Self,
make me Wolf Priest in your pack.
Witch me Witch me into my waiting life!
Witch me into Ecstasy!
Teach me the wisdom and way of the Wolf -
the fearless celebration of being alive!
Can I be savage and still be compassionate?
Can I fight and not wage war?
Can I exist in community and live in the Wild?
All these things the Wolf can do.
I want this! I want this, my god,
my god, my wild wild god!
Hated
Hunted
Wolf’s Head
My love is outlaw
My religion is heresy
My politics are suspect
I am a moral outcast
a social criminal
I dwell beyond the city gates.
I live my life by outlaw rules -
there are very few.
I exist where shamans dwell
where magic swirls like a mist at dawn
I dance the rising of the sun to the drumming
of the god’s own heart
I live in Forever
Forever lives in me
Only in the greenwood can brothers be free
A band
A tribe
A pack
running singing rutting in the Wild
Wolf Witches
Wolf Priests
howling the gospel of Freedom
Sirens in the wood singing past the city gates
calling forth The Change in the panting anxious young
Singing the sad sad song of lament for the old
who have spent a lifetime ignoring the call
knowing now with irresistible certainty
their time is past
and will never come again
They will never live The Dream that was offered
never feel the safety of souls laid bare
never know the ecstasy of initiation
or the thrilling rush of teeth sinking into experience
and ripping it apart
leaving shreds of memory trailing on the ground
Gone gone forever gone
I am done with civilization
Uncivilized
Uncouth
Clothed in the wind
Loping Leaping Yelping in the night
My god, my god
tell me your name and I’ll know mine
Witch Priest Wolf Priest
shirtless
hair blowing billowing hanging
like a curtain down my back
touching dragon centaur horned moon
My magic paints me
lives in my blood and on my skin
I age
My feral self is harder to hide
as fur sprouts in strange places
My mane glints silver in the sun
as I lope towards some Elder’s chair
waiting in the distance
some resting place for old poets
to sit all day and play with words
telling a lifetime of stories to the young
who will listen to them all
They will want to be like me
and I will cry wanting to be one of them
young and stupid and ready to do it all
all over again
making the same magnificent mistakes
becoming the same old fool
over and over and over again
until I finally grow tired of the game
and let it all fall away
Just melt back into God.
Even now in my heart
I am still that shirtless nineteen year old
walking the woods with pen and ink
rooting for poems under the trees
Night falls
and I stare out the café window
at the sacks of dreams walking by
There is a hint of spring tonight
and the frozen blood begins the
long slow boil to summer passion
Soon nothing will keep us inside
Clothes will fall away and we will
roam the streets with only a nod to modesty
Even the dull will hear the faint sound of drumming
and the sweet music of the pipe reaching from the wood
Most will refuse
but some will come
Groping loping they will fly to the Wild
to taste a waiting life
One taste of raw flesh and
there is no going back to safety
I know this dance
this killing dance
and I would never have it
any other way
Let us be damned and die
but let us taste the blood of life
in all its heady sweetness
I will gladly wither to dust
if I can live one day
one precious day before
I go to join the fallen in Paradise
© Jim Wise
Image: Gray wolf (Canis lupus).
As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain.
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