"Áine of the Gold Heart" words, music, vocals, & harmonium by Diane Rains. Hammered dulcimer by Stu Janis. Digital trumpets & drum by Sibelius software.
"Áine of the Gold Heart" words & music Copyright © 2020 by Diane Laura Rains. All Rights Reserved.
∞∞∞
At midnight on June 23 more than 60 years ago, I was born. On that night, many thousands of miles away, the people of Ireland performed a sacred ceremony celebrating their beloved Sun & Moon Goddess – Áine – who was also a Fairy Queen. This they had done for centuries, if not millennia.
For decades I knew nothing of this conjunction of remarkable events. Then… I saw something. I heard something. I felt in a shift in my perception of this realm and another realm. And everything changed.
Since then my spiritual and artistic path has been remarkably different from what I imagined. An assignment was set. Commitments were made. Then followed wonders and perils, joys and sorrows, all of intense and ponderous magnitude.
Has it been worth the toil, pain, and sacrifice? Oh, yes.
For in finding my Muse, I found a lost but still beating part of my own heart, in which the cliars of inspiration and hope yet burn brightly.
∞∞∞ LYRICS ∞∞∞
Áine of the Gold Heart,
Sunfire Queen of Fae!
Fair and radiant Áine Cli,
daughter of the Tuatha Dea!
Áine gives her people
precious grain to grow.
Her harp beguiles the gentle heart
and makes its poetry flow.
Áine’s many children roam the green hills.
It’s said she bore a fae-but-human race.
People of that land call her the Sweetheart of the Sidhe.
And her image shines like gold on the water’s face.
Áine is the Red Mare.
Áine is the swan.
Áine walks enchanted hills,
and brings the fiery dawn.
Áine will not suffer men’s injustice!
Her wrath ignited rolls like a blazing tide.
But she has a special fondness for the good man.
When a man earns her favor, on the Red Mare he may ride!
We dance with the Fair Folk on Midsummer’s Hill.
We walk the land with burning sheaves of grain.
We watch the Red Mare stride her emerald hills and paint them gold.
And the vital spark she lights never grows old!
Red Mare of Dawn, stride on!
Red Mare of Dawn, stride on!
Red Mare of Dawn, stride on!
Red Mare of Dawn, stride on!
