The Ugly Ducking comes Home

The Chieftains Candle - Pittee



When I sing before the fire at the Benwiskin Centre I will at some stage during the evening ask if there are any songs that people would like me to sing.  On occassion there are songs requested that I do not know.


Recently at one of the drumming workshop one participant kindly agreed to send me the gift of a CD by an artist whose work I did not know.  These arrived in the post together with a lovely card and a blessing.  Included in this card was part of a poem I love.  It is by the mystic poet Mary Oliver entitled "Wild Geese."


Here are some of the wonderful lines of this poem.


"Meanwhile the wild geese
high in the clear blue sky
are heading home again."


Wild geese have a special meaning in Irish history.  It was a time of abandonment.  It was a time when the Chieftains of Ireland went into exile in other lands.  Abandonment is one of my key life themes.  I am the one who identifies with the story of the ugly duckling who feels he does not belong but holds true to an inner knowing that is later revealed.


High in the clear blue sky of direct awareness the ugly ducking is heading home to the awareness of the beauty that he is and is alway destined to become.  This is why I love storytelling.  I get to go home to the real home where I truly belong and can never be abandoned - the home of the heart in at-one-ment with the longing and belonging of the soul.