The Sheep’s Spring Butter Is Medicine, Hunger Came First, Poetry

“The Sheep’s Spring Butter Is Medicine” and “Hunger came first” are two poems that go hand in hand as are imbued with Romanian folklore and myths. I loved, loved, loved writing them.

The Sheep’s Spring Butter Is Medicine

“Genuflected in the circular sheepfold, beside a temple,
fir-trees the shepherd’s green church,
footprints and hooves build a mosaic underfoot
the artist, a keeper of time or maybe his sheep
turned kid.
Lock-free door,
‘we guard ‘gainst bears only up ‘ere’,
wind sings or hymns resound,
tea hums, brewed over dried-dung and pine-needle fire.
Time stands still.

Bread made of dew and husks,
baked over excited kindles
sweet steam embracing,
coiled on a stick with a fiery eye that pokes eternity.
The shepherd’s shadow dips smoked bacon in spring butter,
world’s wisdom drips from his fingers
making the fire speak.
‘The sheep’s spring butter ‘s med’cine’, he sounds more to the mutt by the door
who grunts, body asleep, soul and ears ever awake.
Heavy books told me what the shepherd knew, as his forefathers,
spring herbs are potent, filled with life’s juices and earth’s zing,
herbs scoured for spells, for sweet dreams, but gifted for butter and milk.

The sheep’s spring butter is medicine, for the sheep’s from God,
like this earth,
but the goat, the goat’s from the hinder side.
Yet that’s a tale for another time.”

Copyright © Patricia Furstenberg. All Rights Reserved.

Listen closely, and hear how the bells hanging around sheep’s necks, and of various sizes, form a righteous hierarchy in harmony with the shepherd’s flute, the song of forest streams, the rustle of wind o'er leaves and grassy planes.#FolkloreSunday #Im4Ro #Romania pic.twitter.com/uuiP5NONpt

— 💙💛Patricia Furstenberg, Author (@PatFurstenberg) April 9, 2023

There is an old belief, that those who look after bees and sheep will be forever lucky.

My thoughts seem to gravitate towards the pastoral life, especially sheep, at Easter time – last year I wrote extensively about the sheep’s tradition and symbology in Romanian culture – it is a fascinating tale dripping with history, folklore (how the sheep and the goat came to be), literature, the lamb’s symbology at Easter time, and culinary delights. I recommend that you read it. You will enjoy it, even if you don’t eat sheep, but especially if you do.

In Romania, shepherding goes back thousands of years, sheep being a great source of food and clothing. Would the shepherds have consumed lamb meat? I think they would have… While the spring butter prepared by shepherds was considered a delicacy and a medicinal meal. It was held in high regard even by voivodes, local prices, as the sheep’s diet at springtime would have been abundant in medicinal plants…

🐑 to tell what kind of winter will follow, care for the sheeps in a sheepfold on the night of Demetrius Saint. If by morn' a sheep as white as snow will stroll outside, Jack Frost will come wt heavy snow. If a black sheep leaves first, winter will be kind #Superstitiology #Im4Ro pic.twitter.com/R6eGQA2dfj

— 💙💛Patricia Furstenberg, Author (@PatFurstenberg) January 29, 2023

Hunger Came First

“Hunger came first
as day slashed the nightfall with its fiery dagger
and spirits still chased the lost souls.
One last pang
one last hope
Hunger came first.

The goat came next,
nimble on the first rays of sun, as sharp as hell,
a strand of grass sticking out of its mouth,
silvery horns arched backwards, night trailing behind.
The goat came next,
shrouded in its beastly scent–
the promise of a full tummy.

The poet came last,
a night’s last breath into the day,
shadowed existence,
ghostly appearance,
eyes sunken on wobbly feet.
Eyes burning with poetry.
And hunger.

Hunger came first,
The goat came next,
The poet crawled from his misery
The verse of how the goat was the devil’s,
as the lamb belonged to God,
looping through his ear.

Then hunger floated away
from the shadow that had once been a poet,
a poet who chased a goat away.

The hunger and the goat went first.
The poet remained.
For eternity.”Hunger came first
as day slashed the nightfall with its fiery dagger
and spirits still chased the lost souls.
One last pang
one last hope
Hunger came first.

The goat came next,
nimble on the first rays of sun, as sharp as hell,
a strand of grass sticking out of its mouth,
silvery horns arched backwards, night trailing behind.
The goat came next,
shrouded in its beastly scent–
the promise of a full tummy.

The poet came last,
a night’s last breath into the day,
shadowed existence,
ghostly appearance,
eyes sunken on wobbly feet.
Eyes burning with poetry.
And hunger.

Hunger came first,
The goat came next,
The poet crawled from his misery
The verse of how the goat was the devil’s,
as the lamb belonged to God,
looping through his ear.

Then hunger floated away
from the shadow that had once been a poet,
a poet who chased a goat away.

The hunger and the goat went first.
The poet remained.
For eternity.”

Copyright © Patricia Furstenberg. All Rights Reserved.

Enjoy simple wayside shrines from the Village Museum of Bucharest for the Orthodox Easter Thursday and some quaint wooden doors for the Thursday Doors challenge over on Dan Antion’s blog:

The Sheep’s Spring Butter Is Medicine and Hunger Came First, new poetry first published online in April 2023 on Sparks of Calliope this beautiful Journal of Poetic Observations edited by Randal A. Burd – and I couldn’t be more excited!