Do you remember in Peter Pan it was told that every time someone said they didn’t believe in fairies, a fairy died? I have a feeling there is something similar going on with the Unicorn, one of my favourite mythological beasts, which popped out from my bathroom tiles while I was having  a lovely mid-morning soak. I have always had an interest in the every day symbolism which occurs at any moment around me and yet this Unicorn completely took me by surprise…..

I was reminded of one of my all time favourite poems called The Unicorn, which I first heard when my mother read it to me when I was a small child. Written by E V Rieu, he knew something about the loss of magic in our society and as I re-read it today I got the full impact of the damage caused when we deny our own magical nature and that of our children. When we distill our life and our world into chemical components and view this as the only truth, we are cutting ourselves off from all but the very tip of our icebergs.

From as early as I can remember I have been thrilled by the thought of magic, the type wielded by wizards and witches, the other worldliness of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. When Aslan is sacrificed, yet resurrects through the use of ‘deep magic’ every cell in my body sings. It felt like a cruel blow to my imagination, if not my very person, when I was told by my father that magic didn’t exist and although a big part of my practical mind believed him, there was another side of me which refused to let go of a life without magic. Thats like saying life is devoid of meaning, which my father also told me, yet how can one live within that paradigm? The abyss lies there.

The Unicorn by E V Rieu

The Unicorn stood, like a king in a dream
On the bank of a dark Senegambian stream;
And flaming flamingoes flew over his head,
As the African sun rose in purple and red

Who knows what the thoughts of a unicorn are
When he shines on the world like a rising star;
When he comes from the magical pages of story
In the pride of his horn and a halo of glory?

He followed the paths where the jungle beasts go,
And he walked with a step that was stately and slow;
But he threw not a shadow and made not a sound,
And his foot was as light as the wind on the ground

The lion looked up with his terrible eyes,
And growled like the thunder to hide his surprise.
He thought for a while, with his paw in the air;
Then tucked up his tail and turned into his lair.

The gentle giraffe ran away to relate
The news to his tawny and elegant mate,
While the snake slid aside with a venemous hiss,
And the little birds piped: ‘There is a something amiss!’

But the Unicorn strode with his head in a cloud
And uttered his innocent fancies aloud.
‘What a wonderful world!’ he was heard to exclaim;
‘It is better than books; it is sweeter than fame!’

And he gazed at himself with a thrill and a quiver,
Reflected in white by the slow-flowing river:
‘O speak to me, dark Senegambian stream
And prove that my beauty is more than a dream!’

He had paused for a word in the midst of his pride,
When a whisper came down through the leaves at his side
From a spying, malevolent imp of an ape
With a twist in his tail and a villainous shape:

‘He was made by the stroke of a fanciful pen;
He was wholly invented by ignorant men.
One word in his ear, and one puff of the truth
And a unicorn fades in the flower of his youth.’

The Unicorn heard, and a demon of doubt
Crept into his heart, and the sun was put out.
He looked in the water, but saw not a gleam
In the slow-flowing deep Senegambian stream.

He turned to the woods, and his shadowy form
Was seen through the trees like the moon in a storm.
And the darkness fell down on the Gambian plain;
And the stars of the Senegal sought him in vain.

He had come like a beautiful melody heard
When the strings of the fiddle are tunefully stirred;
And he passed where the splendours of melody go
When the hand of the fiddler surrenders the bow.