Michaelmas 2018: Embody the Dragon
This year, my younger son’s sixth-grade class got to build and embody the dragon at our school’s Michaelmas festival, which was held on September 28. This is a huge project and several very talented parents in our class took on this work. I’m so very grateful for their time and talents in this endeavor. Huge thank yous to Criss, Nar, David, Mike, and Brian, who sculpted the head; David, who fashioned the wings; to Sandra, who sewed the tail; to Sandra, Tamu, and others who helped the kids glitter the dragon skin; to Melissa and Brian, who helped the children make the hats/dragon spines; I know Neva was there throughout and I’m sure that I’m forgetting to credit others who helped.
This year, the class decided that their dragon would be white. No one could remember a time when the dragon was white. They wanted it to be sparkly and shimmering, so we spent a day painting with with spray glitter and gold and silver paints.
I think they said we used 40 yards of silk.
At our school, the traditional Michaelmas festival involves the fearsome dragon interrupting the peaceful village, while the villagers are dancing and singing. With a great booming of drums, the dragon enters the village and the villagers go running.
These lovely sixth graders are in the belly of the beast, so to speak, dealing with all the social and emotional and intellectual challenges that come with the age. Friendships change, they adapt to more difficult schoolwork, and the difficulties of individuation and finding themselves, and figuring out what matters to them—what side they stand on in all manner of issues great and small.
A brave knight, George (played by a high school senior), with the help of the Archangel Michael, faces the dragon. Michael imbues George with goodness and strength to tame the dragon.
Second graders and twelfth graders surround the dragon. With their will and their love, they subdue its threat and make it tame.
When I conquer within me fear and wrath,
Michael in heaven casts the dragon forth.
Firmly on the Earth I stand.
Michael’s sword within my hand.
When I conquer fear, the dragon’s chains I tightly bind.
Michael’s light is in my mind.
When I thrust against the monster’s might
Michael is at my side.
Harken all, the time has come!
When all the world at last the truth shall hear,
Then the lion shall lie down with the lamb.
Our lances shall be turned to reaping hooks,
Swords and guns be cast as plowshares.
Nations shall live in lasting peace.
All men unite as brothers.
My dear Asher is always so funny. He is a beacon of light in my life.
Second graders pose with the dragon that they helped to subdue. (They are studying the saints this year.)
On the one hand, it’s just a school festival—a bunch of kids, organized by grades, dressed in costume and performing in a pageant. On the other hand, it’s a massive effort full of heart, an event that affirms and builds community, pulling in people whose children have long-ago outgrown the school. It’s a place where innocence and courage are embodied, where we can urge and model stepping out to boldly stand up for our values and confront the things that threaten to make us weaker, fearful, and divided. There is no lack of dragons like that to confront in our world today.
Matthew Barton, writing in the introduction to a reader of Steiner writings and talks touching on Michaelmas, says this moment in which we live is awakening us “to the consequences of our own actions in many different spheres, asking us to exercise moral judgement and take responsibility for ourselves and the planet. To reconnect consciously. And increasingly it is becoming clear, in a way similar to the wider vistas that open up as leaves fall, that a battle is raging between these developing forces of sensitivity, awareness and responsibility and those—really there is not other word—demonic self-interest, social divisiveness and materialism, often, let’s not deceive ourselves, combined within each one of us. So the battle is with and within ourselves.”
I’m very fond of this festival. Here is where I wrote about Lucas’s sixth-grade Michaelmas dragon.
https://loveinthesuburbs.com/wordpress/michaelmas-new-dragons
March 25, 2024 at 11:25 am
5n1y1a
April 3, 2024 at 3:16 pm
beon44
April 11, 2024 at 12:47 am
34zh6b
May 11, 2024 at 12:57 am
ob1rd2
September 20, 2024 at 7:15 am
upk69q
October 3, 2024 at 7:28 am
oboue3