A Grove of Green Men

 

The Green Man

I walked among the trees
I wore the mask of the deer

(remember me, try to remember)

I am that laughing man
with eyes like leaves

When you think that winter

will never end

I will come. 

You'll  feel my breath, warm at your neck.
I will rise in the grass, a vine caressing your foot.

I am the blue eye

   of a crocus
  opening in the snow

  a trickle of water,

  a calling bird,
  a shaft of light

  among the trees.

You will hear me singing
among the green groves of memory,
the shining leaves of tomorrow.

I'll come with daisies in my hands,

we'll dance among the sycamores
once more

(1997)

I'm not sure why, but I've felt a compulsion lately to make Green Men masks.  I've made, probably, thousands of Green Men masks in the past 30 years.  I guess that's my claim to fame - I've helped to populate the world with masked Green Men.  It's a messy job, but someone had to do it.  Some of my masks have been copied so many times by other mask makers that I'm practically generic.

The Green Man is such a potent, positive symbol of the renewal of life.  In the company of the Green Man ** one finds the male as healer and renewer, instead of warrior............and a pretty darn good symbol for our time as well.  May we all find ways to dance with the Green Man!

 The Green Man by sculptor Toin Adams