Dawn light began stealing
Through the cold universe to County Meath,Over weirs where the Boyne water, fulgent, darkling,
Turns its thick axle, over rick-sized stones
Millennia deep in their own unmovingAnd unmoved alignment.
(from A Dream of Solstice by Seamus Heaney)
Winter Solstice is the turning point I look forward to each year. The day after my daughter’s birthday, it is a lovely mid-winter reassurance that the light is coming. Solstice is derived from the Latin, sōlstitium, loosely translated as the apparent standing still of the sun. To ancient civilizations, it looked like the sun stood still at that moment when its rays shine directly over the Tropic of Capricorn, 23 degrees south of the Equator.
The importance of this astronomical event to the ancient Celts is reflected in a massive neolithic tomb in Newgrange, Ireland. In 2021, for the first time, due to COVID restrictions, anyone with internet access could enter the tomb, a place even older than Stonehenge and the Pyramids in Gaza, and observe the phenomenon. A lottery determines who will enter the chamber and experience the phenomenon as it was intended by our Stone Age ancestors, the farmers who created it about 5,200 years ago. In its roof is a little opening aligned to the ascending sun. When that single sunbeam shoots through the roof-box at around 9AM, it illuminates for seventeen minutes the burial chamber below, highlighting the geometric shapes carved in the ancient walls. It is a magic time, long before clocks and calendars and compasses measured time and the distance between us, signifying the turn towards a new year.
Newgrange appeals to sun worshippers and archeologists, ethnographers and tourists, astronomers and poets, and ordinary people like you and me. In the year before the pandemic changed everything, only 16 out of 30,000 applicants from as far away as the United States, were selected to experience the spectacle of solstice at Newgrange. Unfortunately, Irish weather provides no guarantee of sunlight, and clouds often keep the light out for those waiting for the longest night of the year to end. But this morning, for the few who won the lottery to attend, the sun broke through the clouds and the chamber lit up briefly. The rest of us can watch online the astronomical phenomenon that marks the shortest day and the longest night of the year.
It is a time when the ancients speak to us, reassuring us that no matter how dark the days, the cycle will always begin again. There’s light on the horizon.
This morning, I am far away from Newgrange, at home on the shores of Lake Chapala in Mexico. Such rituals are all around. The legacy of pre-Columbian civilizations can be viewed in a ceremony on the waterfront almost daily – La Danza de los Voladores, the origins of which are attributed to the Totonacapan region of Veracruz, which in 2009 boasted 38 of the 56 volador poles officially recorded in Mexico. First written about in 1612 by Franciscan chronicler, Fray Jaun de Torquemadam, the ritual is a powerful testimony to the tenacity of indigenous groups in adapting their customs and practices to the new order imposed by the Spanish and also in ensuring they live on from one generation to the next.
Far from Newgrange, on the sunny shores of Lake Chapala in Mexico, such rituals abound. The legacy of pre-Columbian civilizations can be viewed in a ceremony on the waterfront almost daily. La Danza de los Voladores originated in the Totonacapan region of Veracruz, which in 2009 boasted 38 of the 56 remaining volador poles officially recorded in Mexico. First written about in 1612 by Franciscan chronicler, Fray Jaun de Torquemadam, the ritual is a testimony to the tenacity of indigenous groups in adapting their customs and practices to the new order imposed by the Spanish and also in ensuring they live on from one generation to the next.
A handful of onlookers on the Ajijic malecon pause for a moment to watch, smart phones at the ready to record as the voladores, in traditional costume, begin their solemn procession to a 30m high pole between two trees. One by one, four men climb the pole to reach its summit, where they are closer to the sun god, each of them representing the cardinal points as well as the elements.
All is quiet until a haunting melody begins as the leader, the caporal, hoists himself up to perch atop a tiny wooden platform, the tecomate. Bending, balancing, hopping from one foot to the other, he plays his flute and beats on a tiny drum, turning to face north, south, east, and west, while the pole below him sways precariously in the breeze. No harness. No safety net. Only faith.
Then the moment we have all been waiting for – the flyers hurl themselves into the air. Headfirst, arms outstretched like wings, they allow the thin ropes tying them to the platform to unravel as they spin in ever-widening circles around the pole, streamers the color of the rainbow trailing behind them in the sky. The plaintive tune continues during their majestic descent, each man hoping to make 13 circuits – 52 representing the number of years on the Aztec calendar – imploring the gods to return the sun. Right before reaching the ground, a final flourish – a quick somersault. Legend has it that if they land on their feet, the Mayan gods will be pleased and bless us with longer days.
Mortals again, they land softly to quiet utterances of ‘bravo’ from a small group of spectators who know they just witnessed something sacred, something from another time, for all time. Legend has it that if they land on their feet, the Mayan gods will be pleased and bless us with longer days.
It is perhaps an act of faith that brings us together to celebrate an ancient light show in a tomb in Ireland or a sky dance above a magical town in Mexico. Together, on sacred ground, we are connected to the past and the future.
As sunlight flooded the ancient chamber in Newgrange, a livestream cohost whispered. “The long night is over. Let’s look forward now to brighter days and all good things to come.”
We too can take a spectacular leap, voladores, arms outstretched, to welcome the new year ahead.
Happy Solstice 2023.
