Festival Memories
DRAGON MEMORIES
THURSDAY
No vehicular access…the mayor only person with keys! Warm, friendly key bearer arrives…the final barrier lifted,….rain..green and white tent in sacred grove of trees…its happening..four years of dreaming it up and it is now actually physically manifesting!! Wave of excitement from exhaustion…….two white tents, chairs, trestles, cut grass….sleep over..bell tent put up by Emma and gentle giant in wild wind, bottle of red wine with Lyn and tent shaking windy sleepless night….
FRIDAY
Rehearsal …no sound, false promises from sound engineers , medieval rock star hand mikes?, green cloaked Druid, priestess friends arrive, Sue and Anya and Georgina and Elizabeth, pink and green clitoris/womb egg nest, Les dear friend. Willow dragon arrives with wooden teeth and heart shaped tail…..
Medieval declaration programme banners with red and green ribbons made as a dream by Steve and Sarah
SATURDAY
Breathtaking beauteous banners before the castle, red, green,and black blowing in the wind, AND THE SUN IS SHINING!!!! ONE DAY OF BLESSED SUNSHINE JUST WHENWE KNEW IT WAS NEEDED……PRAISE BE !
White and gold banners mark the spaces, this is where the egg was found , this is where the baby will be born, coppicewood college pole lathing , strumming of medieval instruments, white faced owl and birds of prey, medieval spinners and dyers, willow makers, giant willow dragon, the restaurant by the river, most beautiful place in Wales to sit and drink tea looking upstream…to where the last dragon floated away….European exchange flags…dragons painted by Irish and Polish children hang in the trees…emails had come in from Prague and Krakow…
Reg and Wendys red and gold Spirit of the Last Dragon firey, fierce, recycled.
Gentle childrens facepainters, hand puppet makers, dragon wing makers, the pig roaster, the non erected tent, the non set up sound system, the stress, the running around to get the re-enactment group do what they were meant to…the wrong place for the too small tent, the twenty minutes late start with vans and cars jammed up and stressed and angry Maggie..the three cheers for the sound men, getting the community to set up the fence, the sound men row with the security men
Jono and Les save the day,,on walkie talkies all day sorting out problem after problem over car and pedestrian access……
Wheres the programmes and the monitoring forms and the people counting at the gate??
Oh my God this is a disaster…this is so stressful…where are they…will anyone/everyone do what they are meant to?
Were off…only one mike… Haydn the King of Our Hearts and Guardian of the Castle Keys, beautifully robed Attic Players recite alongside him….thirty children dance their school class dance of the Last Dragon with ribbons flying and tears stirring, the choir sings ‘This is our Once a Year Day’ on that one mike, masked children, the mayor turned up in smart suit…and cut a (wrong coloured bronze…couldn’t find the red and green) ribbon and acknowledged the Portuguese and the Dublin trip.
Banners and flags and dancers and children lead the way down to the medieval fayre…..
It’s a magical dream!!!
Coppicewoodland, white owls and birds of prey…willowsculptures, dragon eggs being made from fired ceramics, instruments being played…Christian monks singing hymns, restaurant table and chairs next to wondrous river as white water cascades….happy, harmonious, gentle…..
The white and green tent awaits its arrival in its tree circle sacred grove…the chairs await the audience……
11.30…..Green masked and orange/red shawled priestesses await with black,white and green flags…I have on my dragon headdress….we process in slow gliding silence…hand harp playing….circular bell chiming and reverberating….flags gently waving. We pass two green hooded beings seated outside Paddys house…as if guarding a sacred arch entry between the world of magic and everyday …we glide across the high street….we enter the place the shop window/the stable/ the hidden entrance to the safe keeping of the Holy Egg.
We thank Narda for her gentle care…..she is quietly pleased and proud…..we return…gliding… the egg carried by a limping, wounded priestess…..bells and harp and white flag with red Heart of the Dragon clearing the way of traffic and modern life….the green hooded beings are thanked for their guardianship….and we glide to where the tale is being told….of how the last dragon was killed and how we found the story and called to the dragon and how the egg was found/returned to us on a coracle last midsummer…..and how it was guarded…damn and blast the sound gives up a quarter of the way through so we all have to shout …..as we priestesses parade to show off how big the egg is now….how it has grown over the year…..we glide down the track…photographed by many…..as we weave and harp and flag flutter and bell ring our way to the sacred grove…the egg is placed in its safe green and deep pink womb like nest…..
Throughout the day children are to come and place an ear to the egg to hear the heart beat, to make a wish, to leave a treasure. They have Entered the Story……
‘This festival is to grow into an oak from an acorn’ Owain tells me.
And at 2pm…hundreds and hundreds are gathered around the castle, standing, sitting, watching, waiting….Ken Jones, white haired and bearded, in multicoloured cloak tells of the history of the castle….built by theWelsh…The head of Carmarthenshire is introduced by Haydn….and (prematurely) the keys to the castle are handed to Owain Glandwr, who tells of taking Carmarthen before his taking if Emlyn…..and the battle begins.
Owain..passionate, funny, crowd puller, entertainer,gets crowd to cheer and boo, challenges and his frightening henchman with dark eyed and teeth lays into Norman/English occupiers. Terrifying shield bashing, sword smashing, head thrashing….
And eventually with much cheering and jeering Owain, the victor, takes the castle..the dragon flag is raised.
And hundreds ..nay two thousand stream through….the Christian monks guitar play and sing, the fiddle player fiddles…the willow dragon grows, the little ones wear dragon wings made alongside the dragon hand puppets, the face painting, the gold scales appear on the Spirit of the Last Dragon…the food runs out several times, the lunch tickets for the participants, the sun shines…Jono and Les tend the track..Steve and Sarah tend the gate, professional security men with fluorescent names…The river flows….the white water cascades, the filmmakers film..
Claaire Hamilton plays harp and tells Bretton tale (with incessant sound problems)…a female bard…..I change into Tiamat…silver robe over green and red and dragon headdress…starving,blaming, attacking sound engineer as I wait behind screen for arrival of procession… I haven’t eaten he blames….Its not my problem…I lash out a fire breath…
Aberporth band arrives so quickly…military, loud, precise and triumphant…drums, brass trumpets, horns, Debbie leads the way…the streets of Emlyn (I was later told) teeming with people…As the Dragons Arrived
Red ones, yellow ones, cardboard ones, floaty ones, winged ones, serpenty ones….
The community choir sings TwelveLine Story (though we cant hear it) and I belt out as Tiamat (mike not working) and greet and acclaim the four thousand years old myth of Her spliced to create heaven and Earth and a new world order…two thousand years later…booted out of heaven..and all but destroyed by the heroes and saints with their patriarchal stories…and now…Spirit of Last Dragon is killed by warriors…But She Will Return and the Heart of The Dragon Will Beat Again…Spirit is carried to egg and lays around it…Guardian of the Past for the Future…..
The crowd heaves…a dragon falls on Debbies shoulder, dislocation of an old trapeze injury… Red Cross first aid tent, then hospital….
Claire Hamilton tells Merlin and Red and White Dragon with Harp invocations (more sound disasters) and then Attic Players run forward with red and yellow flags for the Last Dragon musical….no sound whatsoever…I and Shann Honey are ripping our hair out….
I step in and tell performers to come out of marquee and project and forget technology…..crowd cheer, were all on the same side…the musical runs, with only the dragon unable to rise to the occaision!! Maggies piano is blown, and Red is Her Blood into anthem is aborted..…However it’s a great script and moving show Owais mum cries and the performers are lively, loud and look lovely!
Break…Maggie crying, me fuming, hot food at Harrisons helps…
Stalls are being put away …24 Carrot wife asks me to pay the bill just as I am in dark midnight blue velvet introducing Dragons Blood about to begin the evening performance
Calm evening audience…A few minutes of magic…Creation Story, Vivid Black..Maggies magical voice….my mike goes (later find out it’s a flat battery)…I am given another which lasts a few minutes before it too goes…I liberate myself throw mike to one side…’if I have to rip my throat out I will tell these stories with no more fuck ups’…I send that rage into the story …at the VERY PLACE where the Last Dragon was killed…white water on evening river….I feel the jaw clenching, teeth snarling blind fury of battle, of injustice, I tell the tragedy of the story of the Last Dragon being killed…
The light begins to dim….the Welsh bagpipes begin to play…the priestesses are dressed in black veils and masks….lanterns are held
And only two weeks later …after Owain had seized the castle…the English returned and in the dark of night, they crept up to the castle to seize it back…..
We walk…I am holding it all, the fury of the blood curdling of war, the injustice and wrong doing of slaughtering Her people …an arrow is fired…..battle cries are heard….the occupiers have returned….The last Dragon is killed….
Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people have streamed in for final evening fire sculpture…..
I rant Into the Dungeons…no mike…a cheer…Maggie sings Hush Hush Scottish Lullaby of persecuted peasants whose homes are razed to the ground…The Dragon burns…black billowing smoke…golden twenty foot high flames….it is beauteous and tragic beyond belief….I read the tribute to Stefek as the Heart explodes into thousands of sparks, the silver and gold fireworks go off….truly breathtaking and spiritual and moving…
Haydn and I read oldest British poem of warriors shield beingshattered….
The bagpipes play as the flames dim and the darkness descends…..I am so moved and satisfied and deeply fulfilled …then Christina tells me we were fifteen minutes early and people are complaining because they arrived after it had all happened….what an emotional rollercoaster…
Come back to see what happens with the egg tomorrow…
I walk down with Glenn