*scroll down for a Joan Baez YouTube video*
A friend did send
An article about
Thracian deities
Thrace part of
Bulgaria, Turkey, and Greece
Just south of Romania
My father’s birthplace
My friend did send
When I complained
That her Celtic gods and goddesses
Were so much more interesting
Than the Romani ones
Of course, the Romani ones are from India
But there is the Eastern European part of my blood
That calls out to other deities
So being a Fire sign
I was interested in the Fire goddess
Later to become St. Marina
Daughter of Domna (Queen)
Who comes with her own folk song:
“Oh, Domna, Domna, Domna queen!
Domna queen and swallow!”
And the nerd in me
The wannabe folksinger in me
Can suddenly see
Can suddenly hear
The high trilling of none other
Than Joan Baez
Singing and strumming
“Dona, Dona, Dona, Dona”
A song claiming to be a Yiddish folksong
Even though the words
Match up with the Thracian mythology
Of a black sheep being sacrificed
To the Domna
And a swallow, like the swallows
Of San Juan Capistrano
Are elements echoed in the song
“On a wagon, bound for market
Is a calf with a mournful eye…”
And
“Why don’t you have wings to fly with
Like the swallow so proud and free?”
Most interesting of all
After the Eastern European countries shifted
Joan Baez performed her song in
The new country with
The old name of Czechoslovakia
Many of the people saying they were
Long-familiar with the myth
So I apologize to some of you
Wading through my nerdy piece of blogetry
But hoping that my fellow nerds
Will feel the delight
Of discovering cultural insight
Of history repeating itself
But in a lovely way
Not a doom but a boon
Of the beat going on…
© 2017 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)
IMAGE: Swallow (Pinterest, no attribution)
https://youtu.be/BqzGZ5AaeSs YouTube video, Joan Baez singing Dona, Dona, Dona (spelling changed to Donna somewhere along the years)
poeturja 