Brighid means the Exalted One in Irish, and The Woman, is a
figure of intense power in Irish mythological and religious
imagination. In Ireland the mythological, the pagan, the local,
and the universal, the philosophical, the religious and the
topographical are mixed up. Time is not lost but put aside or
walked around as though it were laid out on a map, in an always
continuing whole, allowing for Tír na nÓg and notions beyond
usual physical laws to become mixed into the resources of Irish,
Gaelic and Celtic thinking. Such understanding is what draws
artists, musicians and sensitive people--wonder-filled--to the
treasure house of Irish tradition. February 1st or 2nd is a day
claimed by Celtic seasonal thinkers, who called the holiday
Imbolc to celebrate Bríd in the form of cailleach-becoming-
maiden who collects kindling to make fire in the winter that
will warm the Spring and make her young again. This holiday then
is understood through the stories of incredible Brighid. She was
the inventor of the mourning s