Oh that it would come to this!
250 episodes in and we’re finally doing some WB Yeats. Yeats is a hereditary enemy of Ars Magica authors, because he was part of the Celtic Twilight, the late 19th century / early 20th century movement which made our fairies all twee and weird.
However some of his material is useful: some of his characters can be stolen, and so for the next few episodes I’m going to be taking the bits that we can use from his collection The Wind Among the Reeds
The “Poem of the Wandering Aengus” is about a nympholeptic man. Nympholepts are (generally) men who have been initiated into mysteries by nymphs. He has been cursed to wander and waste his life seeking a fae maiden. When he started up he’ll be suitable as a player character or a useful as a contact, particularly for Magi who often need to know how to get to strange Faerie places.
This isn’t genuine Irish folklore. It’s, according to Yeats himself, based on a Greek story, so if you want to use the Wandering Aengus pretty much anywhere in Mythic Europe you go right ahead. The recording that follows was released into the public domain through LibriVox. Thanks again to the recorder and her production team.
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire a-flame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And someone called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done,
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
Games From Folktales 