Talismans

 

Talismans

My ancestor came from the East. 

In his old country, there is a bottomless lake.

The water is black as ink and you can hear voices calling you from within.

Young girls often swim there, but they are not afraid.

The Old Country, which my ancestor fled, belongs to women.

They own the magic.

The name they give you can save you or doom you.

My ancestor wore his name as a talisman.

Nothing can happen to you as long as you have that name.

His name, Boža, can mean one of two things.

Either he is the one who loves God.

Or he is the one that God loves.

Either way, he is safe and young witches can’t touch him,

nor can the bottomless lake tempt him on a hot day.

I am sure he met things more dangerous than witches and lakes.

There were wars and uprisings, so he fled inland.

Here the land is tame and rivers are slow and lazy.

We still carry his name as a talisman.

Our surname has morphed and now it means Christmas.

My first name is Nataša, from Dies Natalis.

My first name also means Christmas, only in Latin.

I will give you a moment to think about that.

Now, you might believe in divine intervention.

Or you might say that life is full of meaningless coincidences.

My mother was in the second group.

She liked the way my name sounded, so she chose it for me.

I am in the third group.

I believe language can play strange tricks on you.

Which is why I married into mountain folk from the West with a unique family name. 

They swore to me their name means nothing

and I thought this would make a nice change.

Yet, I believe language can play tricks on you when you are not careful.

So, I did my research.

Unlike most people here, my husband’s tribe was named after a woman.

Grojana was a grape-bearer, she brought abundance and beauty.

She turned grapes into wine.

Not bad magic, that.

In the country where names can doom you or save you

you can do worse than be named after a wine-maker. 

GloPoWriMo Day 14