Tend Towards

Heathen's Haunt in the Hackbrey

Oh, Ludanne, how tempestuous the seasons have been since the days of our secret rendezvous in the fields of the Hackbrey.

It seems that in that long year apart the seasons have stretched on for millennia, and the forces of their scorn have ascended to the holy heights that ancient events described as prophetic enlistments of the Gaia mother's wrath. 

I remember it well. I recall so fondly how in the last weeks of Autumn, aeons ago, in distant dreams you came upon me, that lowly child lost in the lurches of lament and curled into himself, tearing and shivering in the creeping cold of descending evening on the heart, approaching winter in the final season of his optimistic youth.

You extended your warmth to me, slipped your coat around my forlorn, heartbroken form, and sat with me. 

Perhaps it was then that I knew I loved you.

In that eve in the fall, you led me to the Hackbrey - oh, what a mythical place it was. The mystery of the moors and fields across, as the moon was rising in the splendour of her shine, my hand in yours, your fingers curled into my fingers as you pulled me along to our own hidden dimension in the alcove of the trees out by the edges of the glimmering water. When I was struck by the majesty of the sylphane fane, you kissed me.

Perhaps it was then that I knew I loved you.

You halted me, and the magic of the Hackbrey was eclipsed by the divinity of your lips on mine. You kissed me again, and though our clothes were long-forgotten, strewn aside, I was not cold. The chill of the night did not touch us there. You were not cold.

And in that final night of Autumn, aeons ago, I knew that I loved you.

Winter found you missing, like a phantom of the summer shine that only caught up with a retreating memory in the dying of the light for a moment. Winter was colder. The hoar of the frost grew into jagged spires of ice that pierced at the remembrance of you. The rime set in on the soul in that sickly season. 

I often visited the alcove of Hackbrey, having decided to name it for what we had done there, and how it affected me so. Heathen's Haunt. We were heathens, you and I, and the beauty of it haunted me all throughout the lonely winter years. Your touch on my skin still remained for the longest time, but the frost was absolute, and seeped into the trailing warmth you left behind, diminishing it - extinguishing it completely.

And then the spring - once so beautiful and such a relief from the toil of winter - had brought with it the storms. In my head, the storm of you, the crashing thunder and the lightning of the passions we shared at Heathen's Haunt, and the flood of cold that drowned me out in winter.

Spring was storm season, and the Hackney flooded. The fields turned to marshes, and the alcove on the water had been submerged while the forces of nature washed away the remains of our sin that it had preserved in winter. The torment of the deluges rained down upon me in that secret place, and I feel I drowned. I still gasped for air, kicking to stay afloat while the wind pushed me back under. 

Summer was dry. I was a miasma that set in lethargy and thirst, having removed the waters from yesteryears. The alcove had perished, and Heathen's Haunt had suffered for our sins in the fires of damnation in that natural hell. 

Though, I was unscathed. I was not warm. The heat of the summer did not touch me then. You were not warm.

In those final moments of Summer, I knew I did not love you.

Now, as the leaves descend in their days to the ground, I remember fondly our secret rendezvous in the fields of Hackbrey, Ludanne. The tempests of the seasons have passed, and in the calm of the floating Fall, those prophetic enlistments of the Gaia mother's wrath have ceased. 

Come for me, Ludanne, like you did long ago. I will wait for you in Heathen's Haunt in the Hackbrey. Let us defile the earth as we did once, so I may once again know that I love you.