(3.7) “Galahad and the Grail” – The Wasteland, Section 2
(3.7) “Galahad and the Grail” – The Wasteland, Section 2 (this post is in process and incomplete at this time)
Book Three: “The Achievement of the Grail“ (by “book” is meant a large section in this installment of Guite’s Arthuriad).
Stave Seven: “The Wasteland” (a “stave” is an old-fashioned term for the stanza of a poem, a verse in a song, or a chapter in a long story; this chapter has three sections: Galahad and Gawain; Into the Wasteland; and The Three Trials).
“The King Arthur mythical tales echo something real about sin, redemption, and the hope that was broken in us and in the world that can be made whole again.” (Malcolm Guite).
What is a ‘Wasteland’ in the King Arthur legends? The Wasteland was a stretch of land that was haunted by a curse, a bewitched place where creation was broken, not functioning as the Creator intended. The Wasteland is a place where creation is groaning and yearning to be healed. Dr. Guite describes the Wasteland this way in this chapter of his book… “A cursed place full of horrors, dried up springs, madness everywhere, without hope, love or grace;” “A wasted land where every field lay grey and barren, all unhealed;” “There was scarce a blade of grass, where noxious fumes choked its travelers;” “Where there were withered and leafless trees with hollow trunks;” Where sterile silence reigns and without birdsongs;” “A Kingdom of the Dead, as though kind nature left her throne, and for the kinship once we’d known left nothing but a heap of stone and left us all, all alone in dreariness and dread;” “Where all is silent and bleak, and cannot tell the living from the dead;” “It seemed the sun shrunk to a disc around which dark grey fog swirled.” So the Wasteland was a place of lifeless devastation, a desolate region in which nothing was green or growing. The Wasteland was a mirror opposite of Shalom, which is a place where there is flourishing, completeness and wholeness, a land where there is natural harmony, fulfillment, health, and abundant well-being; a place that enjoys the vitality needed to thrive and flourish; a land of tranquility, freedom from disquiet and disorder, reconciliation, and integrity where everything functions together as it should.
Section 2: Into the Wasteland:
The Broken Relationship Between Mankind and Nature. The single-minded Knights of the Grail fearlessly faced the trials of the cursed wasteland, with all its barren land on every side, its absence of grass, the poisonous smells that choked them as they rode through the desolation. The trees were all withered and leafless, leaving only hollow trunks. The Wasteland contained no sounds of life, no choruses of birdsong or the wind’s whispering through the foliage. Galahad noticed that there was a disturbing absence of life, of nature’s music, of flowing streams and waterfalls, as if nature and mankind could no longer dance together in freedom and harmony. In the Wasteland, there was brokenness between man and nature, and only memories of when “one life flowed through them and me, we made such poetry and we held each other dear.” Galahad grieved that he was no longer at one with nature and unable to share her life flowing in his veins.
The White Stag. All three rode together through a dark grey fog that rose from the ground, making the sun look shrunken and dimmed. They decided to stop by a dry riverbed and immediately felt a mounting sense of deep dread. After some hours observing the deadened stream that was once full of living waters, Galahad was the first to suggest moving on before they all froze in despair. They rode upstream from the barest trickle in search of its source, and Galahad help up the maiden’s gift of the precious pearl. And from its light they witnessed a vision of the White Hart as it drank from a colorful stream. The White Stag seemed to beckon the three discouraged knights to continue following him on their mysterious way up the dry streambed. Finally, the White Hart stopped, tapped the ground, told them, “This is the place,” and disappeared from their sight.
Music at the Well. At the White Hart’s direction, the Knights discovered a dry well surrounded by three seemingly dead trees. But the few sad drips from the well’s spout was pure, as if the well’s stones were weeping. Galahad is struck by the thought that they were led there to heal the cursed stream that used to run freely from the well. So Sir Bors took out the harp that the healed maiden had given him earlier, and as he played, the Naiad water-spirit came back to life, the music filling the glade like a rippling wellspring. The Naiad responded to Galahad’s song that requested her presence. The water-spirit sang as if from a dream, asking if she can trust these unknown knights. Galahad sings his response to her, explaining that he has been sent to heal the land and his grandfather King Pelles. Galahad then continued singing his song to the Naiad about when he had defeated the fearful Necromancer and healed his sister in another stream.
The Three Trees. As soon as Galahd stopped singing, another beautiful Naiad appeared above the well. But this water-spirit was full of sorrow as she wept before them, telling Galahad that every stream is cursed in this Wasteland, and every spirit in nature has fled deep into the earth. She spoke of a wound that can not heal, and yet she continues to feel a love for this land. Galahad encourages the Naiad that their Quest when successful will bring full healing to the land, and that these three knights before her need her help to cross through the Wasteland, lest the fiends of hell choke their prayers and return them to the dust. The Naiad promises to help them, since “we are interwoven – we are children both of earth and sea and fashioned in God’s mystery.” She pointed the three knights to the three hollow trees nearby, and spoke of them as sacred Oak, Ash and Thorn trees. They flourished once, the Naiad tells them, and deep down are still alive, “waiting for better times to thrive, waiting in dreamless sleep.” She spoke of the trees needing the watered stream to live, and the leaves of their renewed branches will be needed by the knights to find their way to the Grail Castle. If you carry their newly blossomed leaves, they will carry you through the Wasteland, the Naiad tells them.
The Song of the Trees. The Naiad asks the knights to revive these three sacred trees through the music of the harp and the song, and their bitterness from the spell will end with the love that has remained in their heart. Percivale then spoke of how he has loved these trees especially, and how he and his sister would sing of the Oak, the Ash and the Thorn trees. He spoke of how his mother taught him and Dindrane a special song that might revive them here and now. The Naiad then requested that song while she raises the sunken stream, and Bors started playing his harp as well. The song asked something of each of the three trees… for the Oak to make a ship, and the Ash to grow beside the well to keep its water pure, and the Thorn tree to grow deep roots and then flower in order to bring the Spring to the Wasteland. Percivale then sang of the Thorn tree’s holy ministry of once composing the Savior’s crown and blossoming on His brow. Finally, Percivale sang of the holy Trinity blessing and protecting them in their Quest.