A Moment in Time

Posted on the exact moment of the Summer Solstice June 20, 2025 10:42 PM EDT

Rhiannon already knew about 
beginnings in endings 
and endings in beginnings. 
She needn’t have acted surprised.  

It was simply a moment in time 
that circled around 
and moved forward and back
and backward and forth

like the waxing and waning of the moon,
and the rising and setting of the sun, 
and the turning of the earth 
and the spinning of the stars. 

She already knew about 
all of the cycles and all of the spirals;
when buds become blossoms 
then fruit on the branch,
and lambs become sheep 
and chicks become hens 
and colts become horses 
that carry a Prince 
who encounters a Goddess 
who births him a babe
who is stolen away 

and returned another day. 

---

[In the First Branch of the Welsh Mabinogion, Prince Pwyll and his men encounter a mysterious woman on a white horse. They repeatedly try to catch up with her but fail to do so.]

‘Groom,’ said Pwyll, ‘I see the rider. Give me my horse.’ Pwyll mounted his horse, and no sooner had he mounted his horse than she rode past him. He turned after her, and let his spirited, prancing horse go at its own pace. And he thought that at the second leap or the third he would catch up with her. But he was no closer to her than before. He urged his horse to go as fast as possible. But he saw that it was useless for him to pursue her.

Then Pwyll said, ‘Maiden,’ he said, ‘for the sake of the man you love most, wait for me.’

‘I will wait gladly,’ she said, ‘and it would have been better for the horse if you had asked that a while ago!’

The maiden stopped and waited and drew back the part of her headdress which should cover her face, and fixed her gaze on him, and began to talk to him.

‘Lady,’ he said, where do you come from, and where are you going?’

‘Going about my business,’ she said, ‘and I am glad to see you.’ 

From the Mabinogion, translated by Sioned Davies, Oxford UP, 2007

Image: The Lover’s Card from Joanna Powell Colbert and Latisha Guthrie’s Herbcrafter’s Tarot.

With gratitude to my friend and fellow poet, the lovely and talented Ann Beer who inspired this piece.