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It's always a somber note in the otherwise joyful May Festivities.

The May song “Unite and Unite”, originally from Cornwall, accompanies a processional dance that usually includes the Hobby Horse. Its verses recall the regular Maytide doings in the town of Padstow, where the song is from: gathering flowers, weaving garlands, singing, dancing.

One verse remembers the soldiers: local boys who should be here, and part of the fun, but instead are off in foreign parts, fighting someone else's war.

O where are the young men that now here should dance?

(For Summer is a-come unto day)

O some, they are in England, and some they are in France

(in the merry morn-ing of May).

At one point, the procession pauses, and the Hobby Horse—around here it's usually the Green Man—dies. Then—this being May and the point thereof, after all—he springs back to life, and the procession continues.

These decades past, here in Paganistan—this is, after all, a living tradition, not a museum piece—we've updated the verse to match the current war(s).

O where are the young men that now here should dance?

(For Summer is a-come unto day)

O some are in Afghanistan, and some are in Iraq

(in the merry morn-ing of May).

I regret to say that our youngest coven kid knows only these lyrics. Always, another war.

This year, alas, yet more new words. How long, O Lady, how long?

At what season is Mabh—our beloved Earth—at her fairest?

Well, of course she has her beauties in every season, but many would say “in May.”

You'd have to be dead not to feel it. (Or maybe not: who knows what the dead can feel?) See the young green of the new leaves springing, the fresh yellow-green that you'll never see at any other time of year. Smell the bewitching fragrance of the blooming trees, with their promise of deliciousness to come. Hear the courtship songs of the birds. Feel the wind on your face: warm now, unbelievably. Savor the tang of the oniony wild ramp, the morel's earthy meatiness.

All this, with—savor it—no mosquitoes.

All winter long, we've been closed in with the stinks and discomforts of winter, with never a lick of privacy to be had.

So, here's irreducible Beltane.

First, wear green.

Early, early, early on May morning, go out to the woods.

There collect what's wild and green and growing. That's called gathering May. If, in the process, you happen to make a little surreptitious love, so much the better. That's gathering May, too.

Bring home the May (and you really do have to sing as you do this).

Deck yourself, the door, the table, with the magical greenery that you've gathered.

Then to the feast, and all the joys of the Day.

The magic here is self-evident.

 Hurray, hurray, the First of May:

outdoor f**king begins today.

Imagine: you live, in what is essentially a one-room house, along with your spouse, your kids, your parents, grandma, and an unmarried sibling or two.

Maybe even the cow.

All winter long you've been stuck in there with them all.

The whole smokey, stinky, crowded winter, with nary a moment of privacy.

Finally, after all those months, it's—almost—warm enough to slip off to the woods for some long-awaited quality time and a little surreptitious love-making.