The taming of the Fey

I have often wondered why I am so enamored of fairy tales and enthralled by the everyday magic of the natural world.  My mother did try to bring me up properly, at least to her way of thinking, often criticizing my complete lack of interest in fashion, shopping, and other such 'skills' thought vital for a teenage girl growing up in Western culture.  While my classmates were swooning over boy bands, reading trendy magazines, or gossiping on the phone (yes, that was the most efficient and accepted form of communication in those days, I grew up in the years BG (Before Google)), I was out chasing butterflies, running barefoot, losing myself in field and fen, or reading something 'not of this world,' mostly science fiction and fantasy.  I now realize I was very lonely and probably should have been miserable in those days, for the world had cast me out and I had no one to talk to, gad about with, or to fall back upon for emotional support, either within my family or without, but I was neither lonely nor miserable, I simply betook myself to the wild places or ventured into a world of imagination and mist, and my childish heart found solace, interest, and fairies.  I truly was, 'a companion to owls and dragons,' but not in Job's sense whereas he was miserable and alone after tragic loss; I was alone because the world did not want me, but neither did I want the world, so I found a world all my own.  Deep down I was lonely, sad, and grieved but my silly heart knew it not, at least until I grew older (I have yet to 'grow up') and encountered real love and friendship and discovered what it was I had been missing, and only then did the tears come and the mourning begin.  It seems odd to mourn over something that never was, but the grief was just as real.  Most weep at a graveside at what they have lost; I wept for what had never been, for all the love and acceptance I might have had were stillborn.

So how do you tame a half wild, barefoot fey?  Can you civilize a creature that prefers the song of wind in the leaves to anything heard on the radio?  Is there hope for one who dances with the stars and sings with the frogs, who chases fairies and knows where unicorns dwell?  There is magic in the wild places and there is magic in the fairy tales, but there is a greater magic called Love, to which all the lesser magics point.  This Love is not what most modern thinkers call it: it is not lust, attraction, or infatuation.  Rather it is the magic that called the stars into being, that breathed life into existence, that keeps the world spinning and the sun shining; it is the love that bore the nails and the shame and the love that calls me not to be what I am but what I was meant to be.  It is not an easy or a fickle love, it is as unyielding as the tide and as fierce as the storm.  It is a jealous love, a love that will not be shared with lesser things.  And it is strong as death.  A love that demands my all but in return gives back far more than I gave.  A love that lives beyond time, beyond the world, beyond thought; a love that will endure forever, it has always been and will ever be.  I found it in the wild places, I found it in the stories, and at  last I have felt it in the hearts of men, but those loves are a reflection, an echo, a shadow of that Love which is the source of all light, and life, and music.  That is how you tame the wild creature, how you civilize the outcast, how you welcome home the vagrant.  That is how you catch a Fey.

"Set me as a seal upon your heart,

as a seal upon your arm,

for love is strong as death,

jealousy is fierce as the grave.

Its flashes are flashes of fire,

the very flame of the Lord.

 Many waters cannot quench love,

neither can floods drown it."

Song of Songs 8:6-7a (ESV)