Enya: Once All Dreams Were Worth Keeping

Eithne Ní Bhraonáin (born May 17, 1961) is known worldwide as Enya, a transliteration of the pronunciation of Eithne in the Donegal dialect of Irish, which is Enya's native language. Born into the renowned musical Brennan (Bhraonáin) family, Enya sang briefly with her family's legendary band, Clannad, before embarking on a successful solo career with Nicky Ryan as her recording engineer and manager and his wife, Roma Shane Ryan, as her lyricist.

Enya's recognition has included four Grammy awards for Best New Age Album:

Shepherd Moons (1993),

The Memory of Trees (1997),

A Day Without Rain (2002),

Amarantine (2007).

"May It Be", composed by Enya for Peter Jackson's stunning cinematic presentation of J.R.R. Tolkien's elaborate adventure, "The Fellowship of the Ring", was nominated for a 2001 Academy Best Original Song award. The compelling yet gentle lyrics were composed by Roma in English with a twice-repeated phrase in J.R.R. Tolkien's fictional Elvish language, Quenya:

Mornië utúlië ("darkness has come").

Released in 2000, "A Day Without Rain", with its ethereal yet vivid imagery, distinctive and mellifluous vocals, and flowing music, gently conveys the quintessence of Enya's worldwide appeal. Essentially Enya's music and Roma's lyrics uncover the awesome moments which comprise earthly existence. The magic of everyday life awaits our awareness.

Floating with Enya's music and musing with Roma's lyrics have mellowed my journey and enhanced my sensitivity to the transcendent possibilities for expression, discovery, and insight throughout this earthly existence. Thoughts which I have considered, dreams which I have imagined, and feelings to which I aspire are echoed in Enya's and Roma's musicality. Especially "A Day Without Rain" transports me to ideal spheres where hope naturally seeks its level.

Six of the nine songs from "A Day Without Rain" are presented herein. My personal observations, which are amplified by a corresponding song, are included. Each song has invited me into a deeper understanding and a greater appreciation of the seeker's path. Each of us in our own way is a pilgrim, making sense of this wilderness in which we live and move and in which we seek our being.

The heart of the universe whispers through time's structures, inviting me to flow with the moment, to breathe in the seasonal stirrings which surround me.

If I surrender to this siren call, nothing is lost, for daily life separately proceeds in kilter, in its own way.

If I surrender, I gain the intimacy of insight which is conveyed by unity with each universal moment. “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength" (Isaiah 30:15).

If I listen to the whisperings of the universe, I clear away the tangles and webs which becloud my thoughts. With clarity and vitality, I return to tackle life's vicissitudes.

"Come away, O human child! to the waters and the wild . . . for the world's more full of weeping than you can understand" (William Butler Yeats, "The Stolen Child")

How I view happenings of the day and of my life is shaped by time.

A lasting love, a critical circumstance, a circumspect decision, an incongruous happenstance: all are colored, decided, measured, and weighed by the passage of time.

Nevertheless, within the human concept of time's transformative powers, how are my dreams in sleep shaped? How are they preserved?

Is it in the dark stillness of night that the true stirrings of my heart find expression?

Darkness lulls me to sleep while dreams wave their magic wands across my heart, leaving in their wake evanescent starry hopes which easily are speared by dawn's shafts into indiscernible fragments of puzzling vagueness.

Perhaps the true contours of my waking dreams, far from sleep's drowsy borders, are shaped and preserved in dark hinterlands.

Light exists in darkness, for black ensues from the absorption of all colors.

Undistracted in darkness, could perhaps my heart confidently release all of its inspiration in a parade of symbols during sleep, to be woven into my being with invisible threads which sometimes unexpectedly glisten in the day's light?

Do my deepest dreams always live within me, glimmering messages which sometimes flash through time's sturdy, stagnant walls?

The heart has its reasons, which flow from imagination's timeless, borderless repository.

Traces of me are retained by nature, which exudes the sighings of my heart.

The wind remembers my dreams and lifts them up into the sky where all dreams sparkle in nightly skies. In lands of midnight sun, dreams shimmer invisibly.

Unfulfilled dreams rain back to earth, where the cycle recurs endlessly until realization or dissipation.

Mementoes of a perfect happiness are evoked by nature's carefree treasures.

Everlasting love, oftentimes so ephemeral, weaves its tantalizing promise into night's starry dreams.

Moments, frozen in time, seem to be preserved in the air, which releases them unbidden.

Once, the universe was contained within a few gestures and words.

Once, I basked in the warmth of dreams through which I thought that I glimpsed eternity.

Once, love's truth was deep enough to shelter me, even in its absence, with its presence.

Once, stars followed me. When they fell, they were caught by love's halo and sparkled like diamonds in my eyes.

Once, an endless beating of two hearts as one echoed across the universe, weaving its spell into the fabric of every moment.

Once, wasn't I surrounded by forever?

To find the day from which all days come entails piecing together all the broken shards of glass scattered through life's journey.

As a pilgrim, I seek to view the mirror to the universe, which has been gifted to me at birth, from both sides: the side of dreams, lights, and possibilities and the side of choices, twists and turns, and shadows.

Along my journey, sometimes I need to take the road that seems to lead to nowhere, "the road less travelled by" (Robert Frost, "The Road Not Taken").

Along my journey, I hope that I notice "the way a crow" shakes "down on me the dust of snow from a hemlock tree" (Robert Frost, "Dust of Snow").

Perhaps most of all, whenever death's carriage finally approaches, despite "the dews" growing "quivering and chill" as I pass "the setting sun", I hope that I surmise that the horses' heads are turned "toward eternity" (Emily Dickinson, "Because I Could Not Stop for Death").

When I aim too high, I am blinded by devotion to the sun, whose blazing glory lures me away from the gentle grandeur of the moon and of earthly landscapes.

Just as the moon rules the tides beyond its darkened realm, so moonlight lingers in my heart even in sunlight. The notes of the moon's special song flow into my heart through dreams, which ebb into twilight's safe recesses, but do not die, with the sun's daily resurrection.

Love and other happenstances of the human heart sometimes seem to end too soon.

Yet, leaves fall and stories find completion according to a universal mystery play with acts and scenes beyond my ken. While believing in balance, I still prefer life in kilter to life out of kilter.

At journey's end, everything returns to the heart of the universe for renewal. Synonyms for the heart of the universe abound, including the Source, God and its equivalents in the world's religions, the Creator of All That Is, etc. Perhaps the most popular historical synonym, God is invoked in blessings preciptated by parting or separation.

Goodbye is a contraction of God be with ye, a popular, fare-thee-well greeting of the late middle ages, in the fourteenth century.

Adiós, meaning "to God", is the Spanish equivalent of adieu in French, which paralleled its English equivalent, Goodbye, as a popular farewell entrustment in the fourteenth century.

With love there are no true goodbyes, for the heart of the universe synchronizes all hearts.

While "The Celts" is featured on Enya's "Paint the Sky with Stars" album, not on "A Day Without Rain", it is included here because, for me, the music captures, exemplifies, and subsumes the mystical beauty of this universe in which we are expected to journey, willingly or unwillingly. All the insights of Roma Ryan's evocative lyrics and all the nuances of Enya's ethereal compositions are conveyed, for me, in this effervescent piece.

Whenever I listen to "The Celts" or recall its notes, I am reminded of a prayer, "I Weave a Silence on my Lips", written by David Adam. Born in Alnwick, Northumberland, David Adam entered at age 15 the dark, underground world of coal mines. After laboring for three years, David enrolled in Kelham Theological College for ministry training. His primary vicariates were served in Danby, North Yorkshire, and in Northumberland's renowned civil parish of the Holy Island, Lindisfarne. A prolific author, David has shared his own prayers, written in the Celtic pattern, in his writings.

"I Wave a Silence on My Lips", a prayer in the Celtic pattern, by David Adam:

I weave a silence on my lips,

I weave a silence into my mind,

I weave a silence within my heart.

I close my eyes to distractions.

I close my eyes to attentions,

I close my eyes to temptations.

Calm me, O Lord, as you stilled the storm,

Still me, Lord, keep me from harm.

Let all the tumult within me cease.

Enfold me, Lord, in your peace.

(David Adam, Border Lands: The Best of David Adam's Celtic Vision)

My special thanks to Derdriu for generously providing me with the perfect image of the heart of the universe by way of her beautiful hub, "Starry Clusterings: An Ecological Choka Poem." http://derdriu.hubpages.com/hub/Starry-Clusterings-An-Ecological-Choka-Poem

My special thanks to talented artists/organizations who make their fine images available on the Internet.

Copyright Tuesday January 24, 2012 by Stessily