Samhain is a time to honor our ancestors.

Time to lay out a feast and invite them to dine, to share their presence with us while the veil is thin.

So, in respect for those who came before, I have made a small Ancestral Gallery of Witches. Give them a smile, tip your hat, light a candle and say thank you for blazing the trail and holding open the gates of Elfhame.  It took a lot of courage, in those old days, to walk between the worlds.

My original plan was to give space to thirteen of our forebears in one blog post, but i realized, not everyone would know them, so I shall make a series of posts with three in each — a good magical number. It is amazing to discover these great teachers and mentors all over again and to remember how they kept magic alive for all of us, sometimes at great personal risk.

We come closer to our time with the Grand Dame of the Witches and the Grandfather of modern Wicca. The last is an inspired poet of the kind Robert Graves spoke of in his pivotal classic The White Goddess. Poets have been and still are some if the most potent interpreters of the witchcraft stream…

They were all born at Midsummer. The uncanny patterns continue…

All Hallow E’en — The Wild Ride

In the hinder end of harvest, on All Hallow E’en,

When the Good Neighbors do ride, if I rede right,

Some buckled on a bane-wand, and some on a bean,

Aye trottand in troops from the twilight;

Some saddled on a she-ape, all graithed into green,

Some hobland on a hemp stalk, hovand to the height,

The King of Pharie and his court, with the Elf-queen,

With many elfish incubus was ridand that night.

Montgomerie (1515)

Margaret Murray:

Born: July 13, 1863/ Entered Faery: Nov. 13, 1963

Margaret Murray, author of The Witch Cult in Western Europe and The God of the Witches, was an Egyptologist who seems to have become obsessed with the idea of the Sacrificed King as described by James Frazer in The Golden Bough. Her search for evidence for this practice took her all the way back to the Stone Age where cave paintings of dancers masked as stags seemed to justify her thesis that there had once been an Old Religion in Europe, based on fertility rituals, in which dancers dressed as animals, particularly stags, and in which the Rite of the Sacrificed King was practiced to insure the production of crops.

Though her ideas have been proven groundless, her wonderful imaginative re-creation of an Old Religion in harmony with the nature, is frequently cited as the great inspiration behind modern Wicca as many were determined to bring back an ancient and extinct way of life.

Here she reveals what I feel is a true connection:

From The God of the Witches

Descriptions of fairies given by eye witnesses can be found in many accounts of the Middle Ages and slightly later. The sixteenth century was prolific in such accounts. John Walsh, the witch of Netherberry in Dorset, consulted fairies between the hours of twelve and one at noon and at midnight, and always went among the “hills” for the purpose. Besssie Dunlop in Ayrshire saw eight woman and four men, “the men clad in gentleman’s clothing, and the women had all plaids round them and were very seemly-like to see”; she was informed that these were “from the Court of Elfame”; she had previously received a visit from the Queen of Elfhame though without knowing at the time who her visitor was; she described the Queen as “a stout woman who came in to her and sat down on the form beside her and asked a drink at her and she gave it.” Alesoun Peirsoun, in Fifeshire, was ” convict for haunting and repairing with the good neighbors and the Queen of Elphane, and she had many good friends at that court which were of her own blood, who had good acquaintance with the Queen of Elphane.’  In Leith, Christina Livingstone affirmed “that her daughter was taken away with the Fairy folk, and that all the occult knowledge she had was by her daughter who met with the fairy.” Aberdeen was full of people who were well acquainted with fairies….”

The God of the Witches contains many evocative descriptions of these small, dark people of Bronze Age Britain who still walked around in the 17th century. When I first read this book back in 1979, I was totally smitten by it too.

Hail to Margaret Murray for planting the seeds!

Gerald Brousseau Gardener:

Born: June 13, 1884/ Entered Faery: Feb. 12, 1964

Origins of Wicca:

Gerald Gardner launched Wicca, the first religion based on the Old Religion of fertility and witchcraft described by Margaret Murray,  shortly after the end of World War II. He went public with his creation following the repeal of England’s Witchcraft Laws in 1951.  Gardnerian Wicca is a path of initiation, in which one’ s magical progress is marked by the attainment of degrees. Much of their information is secret and bound by oaths, which means it can never be shared with those outside the coven.

Gardnerian Witches identify  with their lineage, which is always traced back to Gardner himself and those he initiated.

The Book of Shadows:

One of Gerald Gardner’s most compelling magical creations was the  Book of Shadows. In reading about the original Book he made, it is clear the man was utterly inspired, for he tried to craft it like a Medieval Illuminated manuscript, filled with paintings and calligraphy — a very magical item like an ancient tome found in some  Medieval ruin charged with sorcery. Within a Gardnerian group, each member copies the coven’s  Book of Shadows and then adds to it with their own information.

His imagination was influenced by Charles Leland, Aleister Crowley, SJ MacGregor Mathers, and the books of Margaret Murray whose Old Religion he intended to re-create. I think he was also affected by the tribal rituals he must have seen when he worked in Malaysia as a civil servant, and a heavy dose of Arthurian Legend.

Gardnerian Wicca in the Public Eye:

Gardner was an educated folklorist and occultist, and claimed to have been initiated as a young man into a coven of New Forest witches by a woman named Dorothy Clutterbuck. When England repealed the last of its witchcraft laws  Gardner went public with his coven, much to the consternation of many other witches in England. His active courting of publicity led to a rift between him and Doreen Valiente, who had been one of his High Priestesses. Gardner formed a series of covens throughout England prior to his death in 1964.

Being initiated into the witch cult does not give a witch supernatural powers as I reckon them, but instructions are given, in rather veiled terms, in processes which develop various clairvoyant and other powers, in those who naturally possess them slightly. Some of these powers are akin to magnetism, mesmerism and suggestion, and depend on the possibility of forming a sort of human battery, as it were, of combined human wills working together to influence persons or events at a distance. they have instructions
on how to do this by practice…

Witchcraft Today — with introduction by Margaret Murray

Kathleen Raine

Born: June 14, 1900/ Entered Faery: July 6, 2003

Is this a lament for the loss of the Faeries?

The Wilderness

I came too late to the hills: they were swept bare
Winters before I was born of song and story,
Of spell or speech with power of oracle or invocation,

The great ash long dead by a roofless house, its branches rotten,
The voice of the crows an inarticulate cry,
And from the wells and springs the holy water ebbed away.

A child I ran in the wind on a withered moor
Crying out after those great presences who were not there,
Long lost in the forgetfulness of the forgotten.

Only the archaic forms themselves could tell!
In sacred speech of hoodie on gray stone, or hawk in air,
Of Eden where the lonely rowan bends over the dark pool.

Yet I have glimpsed the bright mountain behind the mountain,
Knowledge under the leaves, tasted the bitter berries red,
Drunk water cold and clear from an inexhaustible hidden fountain.

Kathleen Raine

I though to include the British poet Katheleen Raine not only because of her beautiful poetry, but because of her sensibilty. She seems to express a natural, even unconscious inclination towards witchcraft.

She is influenced by Yeats, himself a great forefather of magic and the mysteries –  which would alone would count her among our ancestors –  but she has also had a great attachment to the land. I think I may not be alone in sharing this quality with her.

Kathleen  was an independent scholar writing on William Blake and W. B. Yeats.
Known for her interest in various forms of spirituality, most prominently Platonism and Neoplatonism, she was a founder member of the Temenos Academy.

The story of her life is told in a three-volume autobiography that is notable for the author’s attempts to impose a mythical  structure on her memories, thus relating her own life to a larger pattern. Creating meaning out of life by the use of mythology and poetic inspiration is a very witchy thing to do.

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Samhain is a time to honor our ancestors.

Time to lay out a feast and invite them to dine, to share their presence with us while the veil is thin.

So, in respect for those who came before, I have made a small Ancestral Gallery of Witches. Give them a smile, tip your hat, light a candle and say thank you for blazing the trail and holding open the gates of Elfhame.  It took a lot of courage, in those old days, to walk between the worlds.

My original plan was to give space to thirteen of our forebears in one blog post, but i realized, not everyone would know them, so I shall make a series of posts with three in each — a good magical number. It is amazing to discover these great teachers and mentors all over again and to remember how they kept magic alive for all of us, sometimes at great personal risk.

The Jackman’s Song

by Ben Jonson

The Faiery beame upon you,

The starres to glister on you;

A Moone of light

In the Noone of night,

Til the fire-Drake hath o’re-gone you.

The Wheele of fortune guide you,

the Boy with the Bow beside you,

Runne aye in the Way,

Till the Bird of day,

And the luckyer lot betide you.

The Faery Seers

Thomas the Rhymer

Thomas Learmonth of Erceldoune:

Born 1643,  Taken into Faery Dec. 13, 1713

True Thomas lay on Huntlie Bank

A furlie he spied with his e’e

And there he saw a Lady bright

Com riding along by the Eildon tree…

***

He has gotten a coat of the Elven cloth

And a pair of shoes of velvet green

And in seven years that have gone and passed

True Thomas on Earth was never seen…

From: The Ballad of Sir Thomas the Rhymer

True Thomas was a Faery Seer who was visited by the Queen of the Faeries and seduced away into Elfhame to live for 7 years. When he returned to the mortal world, he had the gift of prophecy. Many of his  predictions have true.

We are very lucky that the ballad  telling the tale of his adventure with the Queen of Elfhame has come down to us, over these 300 years, in an extremely intact form, for it is a most precise initiation into Faery, rivaled only by Tam Lin, a ballad of equal antiquity, that some scholars think is an extension of  the tale of Thomas the Rhymer.

If you want the keys to Faery, the entire texts of Thomas the Rhymer, and Tam Lin, are here:

Initiatory Faery Ballad: Tam Lin

Thomas Rhymer: An Exploration of A Faery Ballad

The page will come up. You just have to scroll down to find the ballads.

Reverend Robert Kirk: Born 1644/Taken into Faery 1697

OF THE SUBTERRANEAN INHABITANTS

1. These siths or Fairies, which they call sluaghmaith or the good people: it would seem, to prevent the dint of their ill attempts: for the Irish usually bless all they fear harm of, and are said to be of  middle nature betwixt man and Angel, as were daemons thought to be of old: are intelligent Studious Spirits, and light changeable bodies, like those called Astral, somewhat of the nature of a condensed cloud, and best seen in twilight. Their bodies are so pliable through the subtlety of the spirits that agitate them, that they can make them appear and disappear at pleasure…

The usual method for a curious person to get a transient sight of this otherwise invisible crew of Subterraneans, if impotently and over-rashly sought, is to put his foot on the Seer’s foot and then the Seer’s hand is put on the inquirer’s head, who is then to look over the wizard’s (seer’s) right shoulder. [This method is one] which has an ill appearance [for it implies] as if by this ceremony an implicit surrender were made of all between the wizard;s foot and his hand before the person can be admitted to the art of Seership.

From: Robert Kirk: Walker Between the Worlds, edited by R.J.Stewart

Reverend Robert Kirk was 17th century clergyman who was always at the edge of controversy. His main task had been to translate the psalms and Bible into Gaelic. Besides that, as a seventh son of a seventh son, he had the Second Sight. He communed with the Faeries, wrote a book about them called The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Faeries.  He  talked about them openly from the pulpit of his church.

The people of hos parish thought he was taking chances, for he had broken a taboo of secrecy imposed by the faeries on those who witnessed their doings. When his body was discovered on the Fairy Knowe, or hill, the traditional dwelling of the faeries, it was rumored to be just a “stock”, a simulacrum left by the good people who had taken the real Robert Kirk to live with them under the hills.

We are being blessed, that a film about the life of Robert Kirk by Scottish director Michael Ferns, will be released around Yule.

You can see the trailers and read my interview with Michael here:

Kirk! An Interview with Film Director Michael Ferns

Kirk! Official Trailer

Isoble Gowdie:  Tried for Witchcraft in 1662

I shall go into a hare,

With sorrow and sych and meickle care;

And I shall go in the Devil’s name,

Ay while I come home again.

Hare, hare, God send thee care.

I am in a hare’s likeness now,

But I shall be in a woman’s likeness even now.

The year 1662 seems to have been a great year for Faery contact in Scotland, for all three of these Faery Seers, had their most intense experiences at that time. It coincided at a time when fairies were thought to be disappearing from the land a,nd that a vast and amazing store of cultural lore was threatened with extinction.

This process was being accelerated by the seizure of political control by Protestant extremists under Cromwell’s Commonwealth. Unlike the more tolerant Catholics, the Puritans, Presbyterians, and others, viewed anything that smacked of Paganism as  idolatry and suppressed it. This included the Faery Faith, and it was said that the Methodists had driven the faeries out of Wales.

Isobel Gowdie was tried for witchcraft in 1662. Historian John Callow told her story to a rapt audience in London in 2005. As a poor woman, changing into the shape of a hare or a raven, gave her entry into the glamorous Faery Hall where she attended feasts and danced in elegant clothes. In her raven form, she stole food and trinkets. She left a broomstick beside her sleeping husband and flew up the chimney to attend the Sabbat. In the end, she had wagered with the Devil to destroy a man she didn’t like, and her magic was so effective that she turned herself in to the authorities as a way to make her stop.

She voluntarily gave  detailed accounts of her experiences with her coven and her visits with the Faery Queen, whom she called the Queen of Elfhame. We are extremely fortunate that she did this, for otherwise her adventures would never have been written down for us to learn from, and be amazed at, three hundred years afterwards.

This interesting point of view comes from wikipedia:

It is unclear whether Gowdie’s confession is the result of psychosis, whether she had fallen under suspicion of witchcraft and sought leniency by confessing, or was she simply much smarter than her Christian inquisitors. It is also unclear whether there was some truth to her remarkable confessions. Her confession was not consistent with the folklore and records of the trials of witches, and it was more detailed than most. What draws attention to her remarkable case is the fact that her admission of witchcraft sounds very much like the actual shamanic practices that are still in use today. She did not pander to the distorted beliefs of the Christian church about witches and the worship of Satan. There is no record of her ever being executed.

John Callow suggested that guilt made Isobel confess. That she was, in a sense, addicted to magic, and it was going terribly wrong. I agree. There is a lot of psychological validity to this view as some if us have seen in our own lives. Faery Witchcraft is also a highly shamanic path. For want of a better word — if you don’t like the word “shaman” substitute “witch” and the picture comes clear.

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You Are Invited to a Faery Feast for Samhain

Two Halloweens ago, I was prompted to do special dinner for my Faery allies.
I had just arrived back in the States after nine years living in England, and was staying with a couple of old friends, Mark and Corby,  who were also very powerful witches. There had been many magical rituals done in that house over the years on a regular basis, so the atmosphere was perfect for me to re-settle with my Faery co-walker and  other friends who had come over the ocean with me.

I will just say that, contrary to tradition, I have never found bodies of water to be a barrier to magical contacts if they are strong.

As I was saying before I so rudely interrupted myself, I had been back in Seattle for about a month when I was seized with the desire to have a feast for the Siddhe on Samhain. What came to me first was the traditional color scheme: black, white, and red.
Then I had a shopping list given to me along with instructions on how I should prepare the feast.

The results were astonishing!

Sharing the Magic!

This year, the Faeries have encouraged me to share this ritual with the community in the hopes that this Samhain we may all participate in a Faery Feast together. They literally PROVED to me that they loved this feast and want more magical people to discover how easy it is to connect with Faery in a real way. This empowers them to bond with us more strongly so that we can help Mother Earth in her struggle with human error.

This year is great because Samhain is on Monday and the Full Moon is on Sunday, November 1st.

A Table for a Feast:

Do this in a mindful way to charge your feast with magical power.

* A table laid with a black cloth
* Red dishes or paper plates for any odd number between 3 and 13.
* Wine goblets for that many
* Forks and red napkins for that many
* Three to nine black candles
* Amber and benzoin incense
* A white cake baked from scratch

(I actually took the day off from work to make this cake. It takes quite a while and you need to concentrate your desires into it as you make it. I got my recipe from Joy of Cooking)

* Candles for the cake
* A bottle of good red wine
* Something with blackberries. I used blackberry brandy.
* Birch Twigs for purification placed decoratively on the table
* A bouquet of red roses. White will work as well if you prefer. It’s a different feel.

Maia

Plan to stay up until dawn. A good Hostess or Host does not abandon their guests.

On All Hallows Eve make the cake. You will not eat any of it. It is for them.
Set the table
You will have to anoint the black candles with rose or lily oil, or any oil that associated with Samhain, or transitioning to the Otherworld, better known as Death.

Candle Anointing Technique:

* Pour oil into dominant hand, getting your fingers wet
* Hold tapered candle in the other hand
* Beginning at the bottom of the candle smooth the oil, going in a spiral, along the length to the top. Do this for each candle.

At Midnight:

The order isn’t important. These are just what you need to do:

* Put the cake in the center of the table and light the candles
* Light the black tapers.
* Burn the incense
* Pour wine into each goblet
* Cut the cake and put a slice on each plate
* If you have a bowl of blackberries, put them on the table. If its brandy, put a bowl of brandy o the table.
* Pour a glass of wine for yourself

Read a poem aloud, something by Taliensin, Yeats, or Fiona Macleod is good. A story, a witchy song or chant, play some Celtic music especially tunes by O’Carolan. Choose according to your relationship with the Siddhe.

I like Thomas the Rhymer. You can find the text to that ballad here:

Thomas Rhymer: An Exploration of A Faery Ballad

Now just be with them. Be open, receptive.
My two friends were supposed to keep watch with me, but in the end one of them begged off, so there were two of us. Mark and I sat quietly until about 3AM, when an incredibly lovely, healing energy came down over the table. We both felt it. We basked in this energy until the first light of dawn and then went to bed.

The Flowers of Annwn

The next day, I cleared the table.
There is a tree in the back garden at that house where Mark and Corby left offerings, so I put all the cake under there and poured the wine and the bowl of blackberry brandy.
(You can have any left over wine or brandy for yourself, just not the cake.)

Two weeks later, the most amazing thing happened. Corby had been the first to look outside and whet did he see, but three big, red amanita muscaria mushrooms growing just outside the branches of the tree where I had left my offerings.

“It’s the Flowers of Annwn!” he shouted. “The Lords of the Underworld have answered!”

Here are pictures of all of us with the  mushrooms.

Do you have any idea how awesome that is? I am not a mushroom eater so I still have some dried pieces of it to use talismanically.I would probably take too much a get sick or some

thing. But amanita muscaria’s connection to Faery is legendary. These mushrooms are also sacred to the ancient goddess, Elen of the Ways, the antlered Goddess of the woods.

When I did this spell I was deep into writing  magical fiction and concentrated heavily on receiving artistic inspiration as I made the feast. The five full outlines and three first drafts of some great novels, one novella and full first draft in one month is a testament to the power of this ritual.

Since, as in everything, you get what you give, make this the same feast you would give to your favorite people, because that is what the Faeries can be to you.

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The Power of Bardic Poetry

In the early 1990′s I taught a workshop called Into the West: A Course in Celtic Shamanism, that included ritual work centered around an ancient poem by the great Welsh bard, Taliesin called The Spoils of Annwn. It is probably one of the most  powerful initiatory poems ever created. If you work with it, image by image, you will be taken on a journey to Otherworld, by ship, to capture the Holy Grail. Many teachings and gifts come from contact with the Grail; gifts of wisdom, healing, and artistic creativity, especially the power of poetry, and the ability to bring forth Tales from the deep mind of the Collective Unconscious.

I am printing a translation I have never seen before. It would take ages to unearth the one I used to use  found in the works of John and Caitlin Matthews that is much more traditional.

This one is very well done! The keys are not in the words themselves, though they must sing to be effective. What you must focus on with any of the Arthurian stuff particularly, are the IMAGES. the more clearly you form images in your mind, the more you bring them to life. When you get really good, you can enter into them and the journey becomes a reality in the Otherworld of Faery.

A Small Interpretation

It is in Annwn ( pronounced An-ah-oon) that you will find the Mabon, here called Gwair. He is imprisoned, held by a chain, in the Spiral Castle, by Awrawn, (Awr-ah-oon) King of Annwn who is also Lord of the Underworld or the Dead.

In the poem below, King Arthur brings his men to release the Divine Child from the Annwn, and to seize the Grail, or, Cauldron of Rebirth. The symbolism of the Cauldron is that of the Great Mother. Gwair is  divine because he is the son of the Goddess. Gwair was captured and held in the Underworld by Awrawn, thus depriving the earth of his vital force, the lack of which contributes to the desolation of the Wasteland.

I believe this poem contains the vestiges of an ancient ritual in which Gwair is released and returned to the land of the living by Arthur, who also brings the great Goddess back in the form of the Grail. This ritual was done to insure the harvest and to protect the fertility of the land.

Demeter and Persephone / Mabon and Modron

There are parallels between the Mabon and Modron story and that of Demeter and Persephone, but whereas the Mother/Daughter myth is fully Pagan and untainted by Christianity, the story of Mabon and Modron has come under its influence. Keys to the understanding of this dynamic, and that of the Grail Legend generally, are these:

1. The Grail legends describe a spiritual and social battle between Faery and encroaching Christianity.

2. The need to heal the Wasteland is implied when it is not spelled out.

3. There is a conflict between the old ways of honoring the Goddess Sovereignty and respecting her rites so as to insure the fertility of the land, and the deliberate destruction of the ways of the Goddess by the Christian ecclesiastics who are determined to spread their influence into Her territory to redeem the land, in their terms,  under the rule of Christ as God.

With these underlying concepts in mind, it is easy to see that the Goddess is symbolized by the Cauldron of the Grail, and her Divine Son is the pre-Christian Son  who must bring life back to the land through some kind of rite of scared marriage or, as is most likely in the Arthurian saga, to replace the aging and enfeebled  King, wounded by a Christian relic — the Spear of Longinus.

So, here is the great shamanic poem — the first work of literature that mentions King Arthur, as he attempts to steal the Cauldron of Annwn.

The Spoils of Annwn

I will praise the Lord, the Sovereign, the King of the land,
who has extended his rule over the strand of the world.
Well equipped was the prison of Gwair in Caer Siddi
according to the story of Pwyll and Pryderi.
None before him went to it,
to the heavy blue chain’ it was faithful servant whom it restrained,
and before the spoils of Annwn sadly he sang.
And until Judgement Day our bardic song will last.
Three shiploads of Prydwen we went to it;
except for seven, none returned from Caer Siddi.

I am honored in praise, song is heard
In Caer Pedryfan, four-sided,
my eulogy, from the cauldron it was spoken.
By the breath of nine maidens it was kindled.
The cauldron of the Head of Annwn, what is its custom,
dark about its edge with pearl?
It does not boil a coward’s food; it had not been so destined.
The sword of Lluch Lleawg was raised to it,
and in the hand of Lleminawg it was left.
And before the door of the gate of hell, lanterns burned.
And when we went with Arthur, renowned conflict
except for seven, none returned from Caer Feddwid.

I am honored in praise, song will be heard.
In Caer Pedryfan, island of the strong door,
noon and jet-black are mixed.
Bright wine their drink before their warband.
Three shiploads of Prydwen we went to the sea;
except for seven, non returned from Caer Rigor.

I, lord of learning, do not deserve lowly men.
Beyond Caer Wydr they had not seen Arthur’s valor.
Three score hundred men stood on the wall;
it was difficult to speak with their watchman.
Three shiploads of Prydwen wen went with Arthur;
except for seven, none returned from Caer Goludd.

I do not deserve lowly men, slack their defense.
They do not know what day…,
what hour of the midday God was born,
who…
They do not know the Speckled Ox, thick his headring,
seven score links in his collar.
And when we went with Arthur, disastrous visit,
except for seven, none returned from Caer Fanddwy.

I do not deserve lowly men, slack their attack.
They do not know what day…,
what hour of the midday the lord was born,
what animal they keep, silver its head.
When we went with Arthur, disastrous strife,
except for seven, none returned from Caer Ochren.

Monks crowd together like a choir of whelps
from the battle of lords who will be known.
Is the wind of one path? Is the sea of one water?
Is fire, irresistible tumult, of one spark?

Monks crowd together like a pack of wolves
from the battle of lords who will be known.
They do not know when darkness and dawn separate
or the wind, what is its path, is its onrush,
what does it destroy, what land does it strike?
How many lost saints and how many others?

I will praise the Lord, the Great Prince.
May I not be sad, Christ will endow me.

Underworld by Eric Kincaid

My Mabon Mystery

September, 1995

Today I gave Her blackbirds. To me She gave a dark heart.

She is Binah, the Sorrowful Mother. She points to the earth.

Her tears fall on the earth and go down under the ground

bringing with them Her pain and sorrow.

The Child is in my heart

radiant and crowned

But below me is a starry cave in the dark center

of the earth. Down there

is a radiant child wrapped in a strong blue chain.

Gwair! Mabon! The Divine Son of the Goddess.

I follow a mischievous child

down a dark, L shaped corridor.

I sense mirrors, shimmering.

We enter a wide cavern. Along the walls

are the effigies of dead heroes.

Light comes through a crevice in the ceiling

and shines on a beautiful Goddess

bathed in blue and starry light

with the Child upon her lap.

“I am the Divine Mother at the center of the earth.

I am the Mother of the Wild Beasts.”

Antlers flicker on her head to be

replaced by a large gold crown.

“I am Lady Sovereignty.”

She hands me a golden vessel

filled with rose-gold light.

I pour its contents over me.

A vista opens in the wall —

all green and lovely. Tinkling sounds

and birdsong.

A sweep of stairway –

a tower in the distance

high upon a hill — Glastonbury Tor.

I go up the winding stairway.

The tower shifts and then revolves.

It flickers. Stars begin to spiral around its top.

Day has turned to night.

I enter a vast lit hall with a

checkerboard tiled floor.

I sense a host of beings

at the far end of the vast room.

I must walk very slowly.

Above the chandeliers tinkle

and give off a radiant, holy light.

I walk against a force — laboriously I move forward.

the room begins to spin widdershins –

I feel swept away by its motion.

Dizzy.

It stops and I am moving toward a Faery Host.

Suddenly my steps are swift.

The Faeries part and then I see

a Queen upon a high throne

of such radiance and beauty I cannot speak or move.

A huge shaft of light goes

up from her body to the top

of the tower and out to the

spiral of stars.

This is the Triune Goddess in Her

Heavenly aspect.

“Where is the child?” i ask.

I am beckoned to come close to her.

The light is almost blinding.

I am lifted up the shaft of light

like an elevator

and find myself at the top of the tower

looking out over the silent, peaceful world.

The top of the tower becomes a great basin

in which I float.

A silver ladder falls from the sky.

I grab it and moved into Oneness…

Oh the power of the Faery Magic! May the Green Light of Faery fill Your Life with Abundance!

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Celtic Trees of the Equinoxes

Blodeuwedd by Emily Brunner

Ogham

Those of you who have been following this blog have probably noticed that I am a great lover of trees and would naturally be drawn to the poetry of Celtic Ogham, the Sacred Tree Oracle of Ireland.

Ogham was used as a writing system, similar to Runes and are perhaps as ancient, coming from times when priests divined the future by the flight of geese, the entrails of men and animals, and the way the twigs and branches of the trees crossed the sky. There are thirteen trees, one for each lunar month, and they correspond to a letter — or a sign for a sound that makes up a word. Each tree is appropriate for the time of year in which its month falls. For instance, at Samhain, the Celtic New Year, the month of November is marked by Birch. Birch rods were used for purification. As the people moved through the gate of the year,they were flogged with birch branches to drive out undesirable energies. Thus they were enables to go through the dangerous dark time of year in a state where the darkness would not be able to find them or  stick to them.

Each tree was symbolized by a series of marks drawn on sticks. they could also be made with formations of the hands and fingers, and it has been said that the Druids used hand ogham as a form of sign language to keep their messages secret from the Romans.

ogham staves

Whitethorn, Blackthorn, Flower Maiden, Owl

As we move into Autumn, we move closer to Faery, and the veil is thinnest on the approach to Samhain.

Thorn trees line the paths into Faery. The entrances are graced by the Hawthorn, Maythorn, or Whitethorn, of Beltane. At the end of the road is the Blackthorn that marks the path into the Underworld.

Hawthorn, or Whitethorn, was once used to decorate May poles. At one time Hawthorns were believed to be Witches who had transformed themselves into trees. Witches have long danced and performed their rites beneath the thorn.

The Whitethorn is sacred to the Faery Queen, the Welsh Triple Goddess Olwen of the White Track, as well as the Flower Maiden, Blodeuwedd. These are all goddesses of transformation who stand at the gates of the year when darkness blossoms into light, and light  bleeds into darkness.

Though the Maythorn is white,  seeds of darkness are within it, for the bird with which it is associated is the Night Raven and its color is “Terrible”. It is also the sister of the trickster magpi, the cloven hoofed goat, the imitative cuckoo, and the dragonfly.  This symbolism suggests that  deep within the forces of  youth, life, and beauty, hides the germ of betrayal and death. Birth is but the beginning of a journey that leads to the same grim destination, no matter what twists and turns the path takes to get us there.

Blossoms

The Whitethorn (or Maythorn or Hawthorn) blooms brightest during the season of Beltane.  In April, May and June, it is full, bushy, strongly perfumed, and buzzing with a thousand bees drawn to the nectar that that heady fragrance shows off. Under the gauzy femininity of the Whitethorn in flower, are branches studded with long, sharp, penetrating thorns. The thorns are masculine: protective and phallic.  Flowering in Spring, the Whitethorn is associated with fertility; it stimulates eroticism, and encourages the fulfillment of desire. Its pallor brings it under the rulership of the Moon, long the Queen of Romantic Love, and Mother of Souls. The Moon in this role can also be compared with the Queen of the Bees that harvest the honey of the Whitethorn.

Thorns

Thorns are about penetration, breaking through the surface and letting blood. When we open to the Faery, sometimes we must let a little blood, get over our fears of pain and letting go. While the thorns of the Whitethorn symbolize sexual union, those of the Blackthorn symbolize death.

I also recall the paths between the graves in Highgate Cemetery being bordered with Whitethorn, the primary Faery tree. So again the mixing of light and darkness within the same symbol.

In 1997, I went into the depths of Cornwall looking for Modron’s Well, a sacred well of healing and wish granting. I had to walk about three miles before I came to a path that wound between frothy white bushes of Maythorn in full bloom. The sound of the bees was so loud and the scent of the may so strong, that I was in a light trance by the time I got to ruin of Modron’s Chapel and the Wishing Well, I was well into Faery. I know well the power of the Goddess in her white gown of flowers and thorns.

Straith

The Blackthorn tree is esoterically known as both the Mother of the Woods and the Dark Crone of the Woods. The sharp thorns were reputedly used by English witches to pierce poppets in their curses, called the “pins of slumber.”

As we enter the dark time of year, the Blackthorn, or Sloe Tree, begins to throw its shadow over the path. As we touch the lintel of the gates to Faery we will feel a blast of cold air, and we may hear the howling of wolves far off in the snow and darkness at the other side of Samhain. The blackbird and the toad attend the Blackthorn. In the same sense that darkness lurks at the heart of the light in Spring, so does light shine in the heart of the Blackthorn, for one only has to hear the gorgeous song of a blackbird in contrast to that of Night Raven, and to know that the Sacred color of Blackthorn is “Bright”. In folklore, the toad is said to have potent jewel in its forehead capable of dispensing lucid dreams.

The sloes, or British Plums that are the fruit of the Blackthorn are left to putrefy and transformed into Sloe Gin — a form of resurrection from dissolution, similar to that of John Barleycorn.

The night of the Blackthorn is that of the Old Moon, lit up by fires that mark the road into the Underworld of Faery where the Dark Goddess dwells with all her reckoning power. There we find Emain Macha fortress of the Goddess of Death, the Black Man of the forest with his book of souls, and his black dog that is said to be the devil. We find the Old Mother of the Woods — the classic Witch of Grimm’s fairy tales. As a thorned tree, Blackthorn is also protective. It can be used as a hedge, or its strong branches woven into fencing, to keep animals inside a pasture and the predators out.

Flower Face: Blodeuwedd

In between the betwixt and between, of the White and Black thorns is the Flower Maiden, Blodeuwedd. She has been very important to me in the last few years, appearing in the oddest places in my writing and my dreams. When I first went to England I found this poster in a small village in Somerset. It was past its time so I took it home and have it still.

Company of Strangers: A Wife Out of Flowers

The story of Blodeuwedd, from the Fourth Branch of the Mabinogi: Tale of Math Son of Mathonwy,  in a nutshell, is this:

Lleu Llaw Gyffes was placed under three curses by his mother the Goddess, Arianrhod, and the last of these dictates was that he will never have a human wife.

Thwarting the Great Goddess’s rage, King Math, and Lleu’s uncle Gwydion, created a  beautiful wife for Lleu out of nine flowers, among them broom, meadowsweet, and oak.   She was called “Flower Face” or  Blodeuwedd. Since she was not human, Lleu was able to marry her and escape his mother’s curse.

One day, when Lleu was away from home visiting Math, Blodeuwedd saw a nobleman, the Lord of Penllyn, Gronw Pebr, passing by. She invited him in, to stay for a while. ( it would be rude not do so). They fell in love, and this led to the desire to kill Lleu.

Lleu had strong protection. There was only one way he could be killed, and that was his special secret. But clever Blodeuwedd tricked him into telling her what the conditions were, and they were these: He could not be killed indoors or outdoors, on horseback or on foot; and only by a spear forged when people were attending mass could inflict a fatal wound.  Yet even this killing could only take effect if he had one foot on a bathtub and one on a goat (the bathtub being placed on a river bank, but under a roof) and by someone using the sacred spear.

Gronw sepnt a year making the spear just as he was instructed by Blodeuwedd.

When the year was up,  Blodeuwedd managed to persuade Lleu to show her the odd position, of standing with one foot on a goat and one in a bathtub,  in which he might be killed. Suspecting nothing, he did so. Gronw, who had been waiting in ambush, threw the spear  at him. However, rather than dying outright Lleu turned into an eagle and flew away, sorely wounded.

Gronw then took Blodeuedd as his wife, and with her, Lleu’s land.

Llues’ uncle Gwydion went in search of him, and following the guidance of a magical pig, found him in his eagle form, and still suffering from his wound, at the top of an oak tree by a lake. He called him down from the tree with three stanzas of poetry called englyn Gwydion, that transformed him back into a man. Gwydion took him home where Math nursed him back to health. When he was fully recovered, Lleu sought revenge on Gronw and his wife.

Blodeuwedd heard of this and fled, taking her maidens with her. They were so frightened, that they walked backwards to make sure nobody attacked them from behind. Unfortunately, they ended up falling into a lake. Only Blodeuwedd survived. Gwydion captured her, and instead of killing her, turned her into an owl saying:” You will not show your face to the light of day, rather you shall fear other birds; they will be hostile to you, and it will be their nature to maul and molest you wherever they find you. You will not lose your name but always be called Blodeuwedd.”

Gronw offered Lleu land or money as payment, but Lleu would only accept one resolution: that he throw a spear at Gronw in the same way that he had been attacked. Gronw accepted, but asked that a large stone be placed between him and Lleu as a sheild. Nevertheless, Lleu threw the spear right through the stone and killed Gronw. After this, he took back his lands, and later succeeded Math as king of Gwynedd.

Goddess of Dark and Light, the Thresholds of the Year.

Blodeuwedd has within her the same light and dark qualities as the Whitethorn and Blackthorn trees that mark the way into Faery. Made of the flowers, she is the essence of Springtime fertility, youth, and beauty. At the core of this beauty lurks the seed of betrayal and death, for she was created to foil the curse of the Great mother, Arianrhod. This betrayal turns on Lleu as he is struck dead with a blackthorn spear. (The myth says he becomes and eagle, but birds are so often symbols of the soul in art, and in tales, that people who become birds can be thought of as dead.) Her transformation into an owl throws her through the Blackthorn gate and out into the night.
In this she is similar to Lillith — the Demoness who usurped the power of man and was banished for it into the outer darkness.
One can  follow Blodeuwedd as she grows. First she is the Whitethorn at the head of the Faery path at Beltane, then she dips into shadow as her blossoms fall and leaves and haws cover her in red and green. In Autumn, she  flies through the gates of the  Equinox to become the Owl of Samhain.

The owl as oracular bird, omen of death, calling unseen from the darkness, is found in many folk traditions.

The Eternal Unfolding of Darkness and Light

The thing I love about this Goddess, and all of the Celtic goddesses, is how they are all inclusive: the sweetness and light are not allowed to stand alone, making them insipid and flat. Rather, they bear the seeds of mystery, a dark glamor that gives them a disturbing, yet vital quality. One never knows exactly how to read these Goddesses. Something always remains aloof. Though there is seeming  danger here, there is also the promise of knowledge of life beyond mortality, of living consciousness that transcends bodily existence as spirit living in dimensions of the Unseen, and yet bound to return again in the time of  flowering.

Not of mother and father
Did my Creator create me
But of nine-formed virtues,
Of the fruit of fruits,
Of the fruit of the primordial God,
Of primroses and blossoms,
Of the flower, wood and tree.
Cad Goddeu

The owl has a flower face…

Related article:

How to Communicate With Trees

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Kirk!

Film Director Michael Ferns

Michael Ferns

We Faery Witches have every reason to be excited about the upcoming film Kirk! about 17th century Scottish Faery Seer, Reverend Robert Kirk. He is such an important figure because, in a time when people believed in the reality of faeries and spirits, he recorded his experiences on the edge of the Otherworld first hand, and even read them from his pulpit in the church.

I was very pleased when Mr. Ferns  kindly agreed to share his creative process with us and his inspiration for the film. If the film is as remarkable as he is, it will be fabulous.

Interview with Michael Ferns

Arlene:

Can you tell a bit about yourself and your background in films, or what you want to express as an artist?

Michael:

I am 17 years old, living in Stirlingshire, Scotland, in a village in the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park. I have been passionate about filmmaking since a young age and have directed, shot and edited many contemporary short films. I have received grants from Lottery U.K. and various other organisations. I have also been very much supported by my local film society, Strathendrick Film Society. At the end of this month, I begin a BA degree course in Digital Film and Television at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (RSAMD).
I am fascinated by the scope that the medium of film has to communicate ideas and stories. I aim to captivate an audience through a powerful blend of vibrant visuals and strong, engaging plots.

Arlene:

What drew you to the story of Rev.Robert Kirk?

Michael:

I had been aware of the story of the Reverend Robert Kirk for many years prior to the conception of ‘Kirk’. The village of Aberfoyle, where the real Doon hill sits, is only a few miles away from my home. I felt that the legend of Kirk was filled with intrigue, excitement and emotion, making it ideal material for a feature film. The producers and I were surprised to find that Kirk’s story was largely unknown to the wider local community which inspired us to take the project forward. On collaborating closely with the writers, we came to the conclusion that we would not attempt to convey any particular one of the many versions of the legend, but would bring our own dramatic interpretation to the screen which we felt held much human interest in the sense that it explores the emotional relationships of the key figures, Kirk and his wife, as well as those of some fictitious characters. We stuck pretty closely to Kirk’s ideas on the Secret Commonwealth, conveyed though the imaginary character of Mary, a local girl who has a strong link with the faery world. We feel that the film is true to the spirit of Robert Kirk and his ideas without being faithful in all respects to the legends.

Arlene:

Is Robert Kirk a prominent figure in Scottish history, or does he have a cult following? Has interest in him evolved with certain currents in society and Scottish culture?

Michael:

I think that Kirk’s story, besides within the immediate surrounding of Aberfoyle, is better known by those in the States with an interest in Scottish folklore. There are a few books and websites on the subject but currently, it does not have strong following within Scotland. However we are hoping that ‘Kirk’ will change that!

Arlene:

Is much really known about him, or is it mostly speculation?

Michael:

From my experience and that of the writers’ experiences when researching the legend for the screenplay, it appears that details of the story vary between sources. I believe a lot of the finer details to be speculation which is why the plot of ‘Kirk’ is only loosely based on the legend.

Rev. Kirk's church

Arlene:

What is your understanding of Kirk’s faery experiences? Do you believe him? Or not?

MichaeI:

I  am as yet, undecided on my feelings towards Kirk’s faery experiences. I strongly believe that he was truly convinced of the existence of the Siddhe and that he was an intelligent, sane man. At the time he lived, belief in a spiritual faery world was widespread, legends and folklore dating far back into history from Celtic times and before. It was the way in which people made sense of many everyday happenings, the forces of nature, the rhythms of life and death. Christianity existed alongside this in Scottish communities and many did not see a contradiction. However, ‘The Establishment’ (i.e the Church and the educated classes) in the 17th century was beginning to condemn what they regarded as superstition, possibly because it was outside their sphere of influence.

I believe that the Reverend Robert Kirk was a man who was very much in touch with nature and the local people.

Arlene:

How do you think the people around him dealt with his revelations at the time?

Michael:

‘Kirk’ strongly explores this theme, showing three separate reactions to Robert Kirk’s revelations through the three supporting characters. Mary, the local girl who has had her own supernatural experiences, is convinced of the futility of any attempt to give their beliefs credibility. Abigail, Kirk’s wife, is concerned about his immortal soul and his standing in the Church. The Reverend Young sees Kirk’s writing as a challenge to the established Church and genuinely believes his beliefs to be blasphemous.

Arlene:

I notice the angle you pursue is for Kirk to convince his wife of the truth of his experience. Do general social issues come into it? What of the religious issues? Were they executing witches at that time?

Michael:

The film focuses mainly on the personal relationships. Social and religious issues are dealt with only through the three principal characters (see above). The film does not delve deeply into the wider context.

Arlene:

The settings look gorgeous! I think it says in the blurb that they are historic settings. Did the land effect your vision? Did you have to go to certain places to invoke the Faeries?

Michael:

The scenery is just Scotland! We live in a very beautiful part of the world and I wanted to emphasise how closely rural Scottish communities’ lives were intertwined with their natural environment. And hence how their folklore and supernatural beliefs linked to natural phenomenon. Kirk’s faeries centered around the tree atop Doon Hill, which provided a gateway, as the film describes “from their world to ours”. Kirk felt the faeries’ presence most strongly there but folklore tells of other local places and faery hills in the area and Mary alludes to some of these.

Although it was not feasible to shoot on the real Doon hill (only exterior wide shots were shot there) we felt that its beauty and presence would have to be recreated to do justice to Kirk’s story. We searched far and wide to find a suitable replacement for both the Doon hill faery tree (Loch Lomondside) and the village of Aberfoyle (Culross conservation village).

Arlene:

Doon Hill

Is there anything else you would like your audience to know about you or why you felt so strongly to make this film?

Michael:

There were many reasons I made this film. First and foremost was the desire to share the captivating story of this charismatic, free-thinking Scot, who I felt had been neglected by the Scottish history books. I also of course saw an opportunity to create a moving, personal story for an audience. The period element to the film was important to me as it is my first experiment with this genre. I too feel passionately about young Scottish artists – writers, actors, musicians, make-up artists, technicians – being given the chance to explore and develop their art and to showcase their talents. And last, but not least, I aspired in some way to be an ambassador for Scotland, by giving its stories, characters, history and scenery a wider platform.

Best Wishes,
Michael Ferns
Director ‘Kirk’

Photos by Philip Coppens

Link to the trailer:

Kirk! Official Trailer

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Wow! there is so much amazing stuff coming out of the U.K. lately! This is official trailer for Kirk! about the 17th century Scottish seer, Reverend Robert Kirk, and his visits with the Siddhe.

The Director, Michael Ferns,  agreed to an interview with me about the story behind the film, and her interest in the subject of Robert Kirk. This will be closer to the end of the year, so watch for it!

For anyone interested in Faery Witchcraft, Robert Kirk is a very important figure.

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michaelfernsfilms
August 23, 2009

LOOSELY based on the true story of the Reverend Robert Kirk of Aberfoyle, a scholar and minister of religion, who believed in the Secret Commonwealth of Elves and Faeries. Our film shows how passionately he wanted his wife to also believe, and the drastic action he took to fulfill this mission. Set in the 17th Century, and filmed in the beautiful locations of Loch Lomond, Ardyll Woods Cashel Forest Rowardennan, and Culross conservation village in Fife. This romantic and mystical tale will please audiences of all ages.

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LOOSELY based on the true story of the Reverend Robert Kirk of Aberfoyle, a scholar and minister of religion, who believed in the Secret Commonwealth of Elves and Faeries. Our film shows how passi…

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The Secret Commonwealth

in 1692, Reverend Robert Kirk hand wrote a notebook about on Scottish folkloric Faery Tradition not long before his mysterious death. The  notebook was called “The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and Fairies.”

Legend has it that Robert Kirk walked between the worlds and had finally entered into Faery and was never seen again. That his experiences with these beings was real is proven by the evidence of his writings for he gives many Magical Instructions, descriptions, experiences,  and answers the questions of good and evil that concern Christians about Faery.

Author and Faery Seer, R.J.Stewart translated Robert Kirk’s notebooks annotating it with a great deal of his own knowledge.  It is a must read for those who wish to work with the Faery. It is called: Robert Kirk: Walker Between the Worlds.

For Bob’s book go here: R.J.Stewart Books

He sent me an email to find this exciting trailer on Youtube. What an amazing subject! Us Faery Seers may finally have our day!

Kirk!

For related books click the widget for Amazon!

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Faery Teachings

For those who wish to understand the Faery teachings that are the core of the Winterspells School of Faery Witchcraft. some understanding of the Faery race that I work with might be helpful. This is especially so if you are still under the influence of Christian viewpoints regarding Above and Below. Heaven and Hell and all the moral issues that govern these directions.

The Celtic Creation Story of the  Tuatha deDanaan is very similar to John Milton’s Paradise Lost in which Satan enlists the aid of a Lucifer to foment a rebellion against God the Father.

The  War in Heaven

There were five great Archangels that guarded the throne of God: Michael, Raphael, Gabriel, Uriel (or Ariel), and Lucifer. Lucifer, whose name means Lightbearer, was the most beautiful of all. His station was at the left hand of God. Some poets sang that tale that Lucifer was God’s first son, brother of Christ. In Paradise Lost, he claims equality with God.

When God created Adam and Eve, He was quite pleased and wanted to give the human race  dominion over all other creatures on Earth. Lucifer did not agree. At that point, the human race was not very clever, or beautiful, but was rather brutal, dark, and lumpish like the clay from which it was formed.  The other Archangels, especially Michael, championed the human race. Lucifer was not worried about this, for was he not the most brilliant of the Archangels? He had created the most glorious palaces in Heaven, rivaling the creative power of God.  His arrogance incensed the other Archangels so that they declared war against Lucifer; such pride and arrogance had no place in Heaven!

Archangel Michael marshaled and army to fight on the side of God and His master plan; Lucifer gathered an army to strive against it. Eventually, Michael won and cast Lucifer, and all his angelic followers, out of Heaven.

Heaven being above, Lucifer and his angels  toppled  down, down , down, drawn into the gravitational field of the Earth. On the way  down, Lucifer’s crown, with its great emerald, fell off of his head  and was lost in the depths of the Underworld.  Lucifer and his angels feel into a great chasm, an abyss, that opened in the Earth, finally landing at its center.

There they found themselves in green land with its own sun, moon, and stars, a mirror image of the Heavens above. There they built great magical cities and ruled the earth in might and splendor.

These were the original Faeries, the Fallen Angels, ruled by Lord Lucifer. In Christian times, the Light Bearer came to be called the Prince of Darkness because he dwelled in the shadows under the earth, exiled with his subjects, the Tuatha deDanaan, who were feared as enemies of God.

The Tuatha deDanaan are the true Keepers of the Emerald that fell from Lucifer’s crown. The green jewel has been called the Emerald Tablet, the Philosophers’ Stone, the Holy Grail.

Perhaps it has always simply been the green Earth.

The Lighbringer’s Gift

There is a tradition that says that Lucifer’s angels took on the task of improving the human race, for “they looked upon the daughters of man and saw that they were fair…”
They mated with humans, and because of that their children were endowed with the fire of divinity, capable of awakening to their divine nature. This legend is behind the Grail Quest and the seeking of the Philosophers’ Stone. Of course, they are one and the same thing.

Lucifer is not Satan. Satan is the Opposer, the block that seeks to hold consciousness in ignorance of its divinity by keeping it locked at the material level. There are those who enjoy the realm of Satan for this very reason. According to Celtic tradition, Satan rules the Way of Evil, God rules the Way of Good, and much like nature in which they so deeply participate, the Faeries follow the Middle Way, neither entirely good, nor entirely evil, they do what they must in the moment.

In Thomas Rhymer the Faery Queen says to Thomas:

See you not yon narrow road
So thick beset with thorns and briars?
That is the road of righteousness,
Though after it but few enquire.

And see you not that broad, broad road,
That winds about the lily leaven?
That is the road to wickedness
Though some call it the Road to Heaven.

And see you not that bonny road,
That winds about the ferny brae?
That is the road to fair Elfland
Where thou and I this night mawn gae.

The middle way,  the sword bridge, the path of mystery and magic.

Images by Gustave Dore/ Paradise Lost

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Hail to the Corn King and the Harvest Queen!

In the Northern Hemisphere, early August has been the time to harvest the grain. The celebration is called Lammas in contemporary Witchcraft, and honors the spirit of the grain as it is made into bread and beer for the sustenance of the people. This celebration is as old a agriculture.

We celebrate Lammas on August first, but it was really celebrated on the Full Moon  after the turn of the month. I imagine that the light of the moon was needed to complete the harvest far into the night, and that the lunar tides were observed in planting and harvesting. The Full Moon is like the end of Summer, after fullness is waning and emptying in preparation for the coming darkness.

This year we have an eclipse of the Moon in Aquarius. Aquarius is represented by the Water Bearer, the Grail Bearer, the giver of life.  A Lunar Eclipse means the shadow of the Earth passes over the Moon. It is a time whens spirits are said to descend. For me it is an image of acceptance of sacrifice to the matrix of life.

We can celebrate by being conscious as we eat our bread today. I like to feed the birds. Perhaps you can donate bread to the food bank in you area. Being mindful that our food is a gift from Mother Earth on a global level will help to shift human consciousness about our relationship with the planet from exploitation to recognition that She provides our very lives to us.

I decided to bring back this old post of mine because this song celebrates Lammas as no other.

This is from the Golden Bough by James George Frazer:

“We have seen now that corn-spirit is represented sometimes in human, sometimes in animal form, and that in both cases he is killed in the person of his representative and eaten sacramentally….the harvest suppers of our European peasants have furnished unmistakable examples of the sacramental eating of animals as representatives of the corn-spirit. but furthur…the new corn is itself eaten sacramentally, that is as the body of the corn-spirit…

In Wermland, Sweden, the farmer’s wife uses the grain of the last sheaf to bake a loaf in the shape of a little girl; this loaf is divided among the whole household and eaten by them. Here the loaf represents the corn-spirt conceived as a Maiden. just as in Scotland  the corn-spirit is similarly conceived  represented by the last sheaf made up in the form of a woman and bearing the name of Maiden…

In La Palisse in France, a man made of dough is hung upon the fir tree which is carried on the last harvest wagon. The tree and the doughman are taken to the mayor’s house and kept there until the vintage is over.

Then the close of the harvest is celebrated by a feast at which the mayor breaks the dough man in pieces and gives the pieces to the people to eat.”

When I was 15 this song came out and changed my life. It caused an explosion in my soul. The Earth was alive! It had been alive for our European ancestors who harvested the fields with compassion for old John Barleycorn, the personification of the grain.
I was never a city person, but grew up in Leicester, Massachusetts, a town with one road bordered by a gas station, an Italian restaurant, the library, and a cemetery from the Revolutionary War. (An interesting aside: when I was back there in Sept 2006, the graves of British soldiers were decorated with Union Jacks in honor of the British soldiers.) I loved the corn fields where, in the summer nights, the ripe stalks stood tall and dense as a forest, rustling, whispering to each other, accompanying  the mating calls of the crickets and frogs. Not far from the corn fields,  apple trees  bloomed cloud pale under the moonlight; the vast blueberry fields were bushy with ripe  fruit, fragrant in the summer heat.  The beauty of the tilled land was alive and full of spirits.
Like all great Faery tales John Barleycorn Must Die, with its subtext of human sacrifice for the sake of the land,  awakened  my Witchblood, and there was no going back to Christian consciousness alone.

The Spirit of the Grain, John Barleycorn Must Die

John Barleycorn

There were three men came out of the west
Their fortunes for to try,
And these three men made a solemn vow
John Barleycorn must die.

They’ve ploughed, they’ve sown, they’ve harrowed him in
Threw clods upon his head,
And these three men made a solemn vow
John Barleycorn was dead.

They let him lie for a very long time
Till the rains from Heaven did fall,
And little Sir John sprung up his head
And so amazed them all.

They’ve let him stand till Midsummer’s day,
Till he looked both pale and wan.
And little Sir John’s grown a long, long beard
And so become a man.

They’ve hired men with the scythes so sharp,
To cut him off at the knee,
They’ve rolled him and tied him by the waist,
Serving him most barbarously.

They’ve hired men with the sharp pitchforks,
Who pricked him through the heart
And the loader, he has served him worse than that,
For he’s bound him to the cart.

They’ve wheeled him around and around a field,
Till they came unto a barn,
And there they made a solemn oath
On poor John Barleycorn

They’ve hired men with the crab-tree sticks,
To cut him skin from bone,
And the miller, he has served him worse than that,
For he’s ground him between two stones.

And little Sir John and the nut brown bowl
And his brandy in the glass
And little Sir John and the nut brown bowl
Proved the strongest man at last

The huntsman, he can’t hunt the fox
Nor so loudly to blow his horn,
And the tinker, he can’t mend kettle nor pots
without a little barley corn

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