ON PAGAN ROADS

by David Arv Bragi

Author's Forward

Welcome fellow travelers. Herein you'll find a collection of fifty-three short tales and character sketches, told in verse form, about life in the 1970's, when long robed sorcerers, long haired rockers and long winded street preachers prowled the nation's back roads and back alleys in search of the Philosopher's Stone, or the Holy Grail, or at least a place where nobody had heard of disco music.

At that time Wicca was a smaller, more intimate community than the popular spiritual network of today. Largely underground and unknown to the public, we worshipped in discreet, family-like covens and groves, without the benefits of the Internet or the dubious benefits of a paid clergy. At worst, we reflected the petty feuds and conceits that you'll find most anywhere people congregate. At best, we kept alive a mystical flame that the Western World had long thought extinguished.

You can read any selection separately from the others, but if you read them in order they will tell a complete story. Although most of the tales are based on real incidents, all of the characters are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons is unintended. Better historians than I will write the definitive chronicles of Wicca; On Pagan Roads is simply one Witch's recollection of the days when the Mysteries of the Ages smashed headlong into the Age of Polyester.

I'd like to offer much thanks to my wife, Dolores J. Nurss (aka Dreamdeer), for the many hours spent reading, critiquing and cajoling these poems into print.

Happy trails;
Bragi
February 2004
San Diego, California

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I - THE ROAD PAGAN

1. A Prayer For The Great Street Preachers Of California
2. My Name
3. UFO #1
4. En Passant
5. Lost Within The Temple Of Night
6. Some Miles East Of Tucson
7. Desert Daddy
8. Cruces
9. The Worst Thing About Tuscatani Jail
10. Riders of the Sky
11. Solitary
12. Fatman In A Car Talking About Fornication In A Tent
13. Appalachian Moon
14. The Jolly Loanshark
15. Fat Skills

PART II - THE PAGAN IN NEW YORK

16. Night Ferry
17. Madonna
18. Weeping Down The Moon
19. Dealer's Choice
20. The Witch
21. Going Home
22. Necronomicon
23. Cherisse
24. War Of The Witches
25. Confession
26. Turtle
27. Three Mile Island
28. Trinity
29. Lelia
30. The Red Wolf's Tale
31. Farewell, The Lady Said
32. The Stream
33. On A Sunday Afternoon
34. The Wintry Quean
35. Herbal
36. Lady Of
37. The Rites Of Spring
38. Esbat
39. Witches Never Say Good-bye

PART III - THE END OF THE ROAD

40. Picket's Charge
41. The Chesapeake And Ohio
42. Shelter Journal
43. Shenandoah
44. Caught
45. Roanoke Island
46. Dixie Witches
47. The One Who Is Meant
48. Wednesday Morning November Fifth Nineteen Hundred And Eighty
49. UFO #2
50. Floating Witches
51. Kiva
52. A Prayer For The Hitchhiker
53. The End Of The Road

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