Bridgid’s Spring on Iona
A draft by Kate Jones
On that bright Ionian afternoon a tug came from inside, a prompt; an impulse, “This is the time!” I left my plan to another day, turned and started up the hill. I unlatched the wooden gate to the field and latched it again behind me. Carefully climbing over the slippery bits I soon stood at the crest – the highest point on the island. It was breezy and green. I reveled in the view of the great Atlantic Ocean and the vault of sky giving a rapturous perspective of scale and time.
No one was at the cap of the hill. No one was anywhere around. Passing the surveyor’s post depicting longitude and latitude of this highest point I walked a bit further just touching the downslope of the other side. Suddenly it was there, flooding into my eyes, the tranquil triangle of Brigid’s Spring.
This enchanted storied spring, written about in Gaelic lore for hundreds of years was here, welcoming me to her side. Nestled in the embrace of the old stones and the green tender grass where the peaceful deep blue waters reflected the soft breeze rippling gently across its surface.
My heart rotated slightly in my chest as I huddled down on my haunches to be closer to its edge. Dipping my hands in the pool, I bathed my face with its freshness, like clear air enveloping and refreshing my spirit. Silently they appeared across the quiet space. Two women in long skirts came and settled low to the ground, then three, then twelve. They came silently, suddenly appearing across the intimate distance of the spring. Beautiful young women, rosy fleshed with reddish-hued hair woven into braids. Reverently they assembled squatting, kneeling, sitting on the ground. Wrapped in muslin cotton skirts they settled. In this holy place women sitting quietly together on the earth outside of time by the water’s edge.
A day earlier I had cut two locks of my hair and tied each with a piece of twine. I took one from my pocket and held it gently in my hands. It rested there like a delicate feather.
A prayer of gratefulness flooded my heart as I saw the face of my father over my left hand and my mother’s face over my right. Behind them stretched the ancestral souls moving back to an infinite horizon. I thanked them for all they have suffered and all they have celebrated that has brought me to Brigid’s Spring. I thanked them as tears wet my cheeks, sensing the long lines of those who have walked here before me reaching back through a thousand yesterdays.
Gently I placed the small bundle of hair on the surface of the waters. It floated slowly, like a leaf over the little waves. I breathed and watched its journey until it nestled into a mossy place by another shore.
Something is letting go but what, I do not know. I am arriving to a new crossing point, a new threshold, an “in-between” suffused with not-knowing. From this in-between I sit by the waters and take rest. Only the in-breath, only the out-breath as my metronome anchoring me to time.
I looked up and out and beyond the spring of Brigid’s fresh water to the wide and wondrous salty sea beyond, stretching to the western horizon. As the sweet and salt waters came alive to me, the women, the young and wholesome women, began to sing quietly:
“Be the rhythm of the water”, they sang gently.
“Be the rhythm of the water.
“Be the rhythm of the water.
“And I’ll pass it on to my daughter.
“I’ll pass it on to my child.”
Tears came again, welling up and spilling into the spring. Tears of grief? of loss? of awe and wonder? Tears yet not knowing why.
The singing gave way to savoring the silence between us. After a while I thanked the young women for their prayer, for their song. They smiled with wide warmth and welcome, affirming our communion at the well. I turned and slipped away from our circle.
The late afternoon sun was streaming over the green grassy hill. I nearly skipped down the hillock and out the gate singing the simple song. So joyful. So free. So wondrous.