Meters, Magic, and the Five Directions

Welcome to the Direction of East!

Dear Magical Being,

Here in the East, we focus, sometimes in detail, in the magical mysteries of language’s Meters: the patterns of rhythmical words.

You can find power, wisdom, strength, healing, and devotion there, whether you invite rhythm into your reading or writing of poetry, your ceremonies, or your healing journeys.

Diagram of the Five Directions with their alements and associated meters, from Annie Finch’s Five Directions Framework

The most ancient, matriarchal societies used multiple meters as a tool for raising energy, tending knowledge, strengthening identity, healing, and connecting with the divine. This is what poetry has done since millenia before the dawn of writing. And this is what metrical words still can do, as we take on permission to open our bodies, hearts, wills, and spirits as well as our minds to their unabashed enchantments.

In this Direction, you will see me using the phrase Speak It Thrice, sometimes with a hashtag. This is a reminder that rhythmical words are designed to be spoken aloud, heard aloud, felt in our bodies. Saying meters aloud three times is the best way I have found to do this.

You will also notice that I usually pluralize Meters to remind us that, while most of us were raised under the thumb of a hierarchal system with only one meter on top, in fact it is only in the dance of metrical multiplicity that meter’s full joys await us.

“Meter,” “mother,” and “matter”come from the same proto-Indo-European root. You might not know it to look at much contemporary poetry, but Meter, our magical mother, still matters—in fact, the Meters matter more than ever. The Five Directions Framework invites it to matter more: to poetry, to ourselves and our lives, and to our world’s chances of survival —even triumphant transformation!—through an unprecedented era.

This Direction invites you into that journey..

Will you join me at play in the fields of meters and magic? Will you tap with me down into your own unique poetry witchery? Whether you’re a poetry lover, a poet, a witch, or anyone in between, you are invited to join the conversation! Thanks for being part of the circle!

Yours in love, magic, and poetry,

Annie Finch