Paganism – Page 2 – Serendipities

Crow Folks: Things Needed in Darkness

November 12, 2023
by Alexandra

This dark moon, my journey led me back to the more usual place, where I met the Three Daughters of Ernmas outside a cottage, around a great cauldron. When I asked what message they had for me to bring back this time, they reminded me that this was the last moon cycle, dark to dark, before the light started coming back. After the next dark moon there will be a brief dark period, but the solstice falls near the first quarter, so the light of the moon will be growing at that time, at least. I asked what I was to do, and they showed me a candle flame lit in the darkness, and told me they would guide me in writing a triad. So that's what I have for you all, today.

The first element of the triad at first was really obvious — a candle — but then they showed me that it wasn't just a physical candle, but also a feeling. As they made the feeling swell in my chest, I recognized it: Hope. A light in dark places, indeed. And a tiny flicker of warmth, in the hand holding the candle, and the hope in my chest. The second one came as a visual, a map with lines and markings on it like a sports playbook or like many of us have no doubt seen in fantasy or historical movies. That made sense to me more as a thing that was needful in the metaphorical darkness of a difficult time — plans show us the way forward. The third item it took me a little while longer to understand, because I was shown a person sitting beside an extinguished cooking fire out in a field; it wasn't until I realized I was feeling a ruana around myself that I was not actually wearing that it became clear and I could feel their approval. A good cloak, I thought, but no, they wanted all three things to be the same format of three words, and for some reason the type of cloak felt very important, so: a cloak of wool. It's better than any other type of fabric for damp chill. And the last line ties them all together in a slightly different way than the first: all three will keep your blood warm. "Blood" was clear in the imagery they gave me. It was clear that the candle and the cloak both could literally keep your body warm, but also that hope and a battle plan were necessary to keep you alive, to keep your blood flowing through your veins and not cooling as it congealed. So not just the darkness our eyes see, then: also the darkness in our hearts, which affects many of us at this time of year.

Samhain Season Reflections

November 3, 2023
by Alexandra

I had vague plans for Oíche Shamhna — beyond the usual handing out candy as my husband took the kiddo trick or treating — but after an October where I was sick and then my husband got sick and stayed sick, and then I finally got the new covid vaccine (which, predictably, tanked me for a week), plans did not solidify and materialize beyond brief prayers.

Normally, that would have upset me, and I would have felt guilty for not being a better descendant to my ancestors and devotee to my deities, but instead I woke up on the first of November having had a profound dream, and very shortly after waking I was visited by a messenger from the High Court associated with the Chesapeake Bay watershed. I hadn't done work, but work had come to me. The dream featured Angrboda — a jotun goddess(1) who is perhaps best known as the other parent of Loki's most famous children: Hela, Fenris, and Jormungandr — teaching me to spin seidr with flax. I will need to go see her again to get the rest of it cemented in my mind, but the flax I bought online that day is coming in the mail. The messenger had news of a more personal nature for me (which is still something I haven't quite gotten used to), acknowledging the fulfillment of a contract.

If you had told me ten years ago that in ten years' time I would be up to my neck in Otherworldly conflict and politics, I wouldn't have believed you. Sure, I interacted with my Local Fair Folk then, but primarily the less powerful ones that wander about a bit, not the Gentry. But here I am and here I'll stay for good or ill. As John Beckett said recently: "sharpen the swords you have". This work is the sword I have, and I'll do it to the best of my ability, though I'll caution anyone else considering following this path that this is not a job you can just quit.(2)

In the intervening decade, I've interacted more and more with the Gentry — first those closest to my house wherever I was living, and then as time went on and I became more involved with the Court and Queen I serve in the Otherworlds, I was finding that I needed to "check in at the embassy" in every new territory before I did more than the smallest instinctive magics, which meant needing offerings for the local Gentry every time I went to any kind of pagan event, from a major conference like Mystic South or Sacred Space, to a small backyard holiday gathering at a friend's house.

And as I've done these check-ins, I've met more and more courts(3) who seem to be embroiled in the Otherworldly conflict that is part of The Great War, The Storm, Tower Time — whatever you'd like to call it. (I've taken to calling it the "Strife-Storm", recently, because it does seem to shift and build and release like weather. Although I was one of those who talked about it back in March under the term "Great War", that didn't fit as well once I took it out of Irene Glasse's metaphor and applied it to the Otherworldly conflicts I was seeing, but I didn't have better words back then! We'll see if "Strife-Storm" sticks, because I do really want a term to talk about the conflict itself, within the sort of larger context of Tower Time.) Part of my work for my Court is connecting with some of these courts I'm encountering, and doing some work to establish something like diplomatic ties that are grounded in this world, as well.

I've been tasked with keeping up these connections with semi-regular contact and offerings, and the picture on this blog is of my recently reorganized shrine, with most of the main courts I interact with all brought together. There are candles, and a few "tokens" (the pins and ring, all symbols of pledges made) and one little statuette of a husband and wife gnome kissing... That was a very specific request from the King and Queen of the High Court associated with the. I had asked how they wanted to be represented on my shrine; let it never be said that the fae don't have a sense of humor! The candle I used (and will continue using) for the Pleiades Cycle is on top of a box of trinkets and jewelry which has been the center point of my fairy shrine for most of the past decade. The rose candle is for the Queen of my immediate local area, and the two large candles are for the Monarchs of Spring and Autumn of the High Court associated with the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

In my last blog about the Strife-Storm, I mentioned battles, and those are ongoing but either less frequent, or I am less frequently aware of my part in them, which is more of a relief than anything else. Waking up feeling drained, tired, and sore with bruises I don't remember having is one thing; getting flashbacks of battlefield carnage I never saw with my physical eyes is quite another, and I'd very much prefer the first. But in general things seem to be more at an uneasy standstill by me. I heard reports of weirdness elsewhere during the last solar eclipse, which I suppose makes a certain amount of sense, as the forces my allies are fighting against seem to be held at bay by solar energy. I do not know what to expect in the coming dark season, but it's always best to be prepared. And that's really what this week ended up being, for me: a time to contemplate the work of the summer, and to prepare for the work of the winter.

Review of Outside the Charmed Circle

This book was the community pick for the Fellowship Beyond the Star book club for October, suggested by Ron Padrón (of White Rose Witching), and I'm super glad he suggested it (and that it got the second most votes and was therefore next) because I really enjoyed it! I shared one quote that really resonated with me on Facebook when I was partway through the book, and I didn't quite manage to finish the whole thing by the book club date, but I have now and I thought I'd review it for ya'll!

The book is a little under 300 pages, including the foreword by Michelle Belanger (but not including the appendices and the bibliography), written in a sort of lightly academic style that is still pretty accessible. Magdalene makes sure to define new terms for every chapter, and while some of it will be very familiar to those who've done some university-level gender studies, that kind of background isn't at all required to follow her arguments. Her writing is clear and concise, while still leaving room for it to be heartfelt and hilarious at turns.

The first two chapters set us up: introducing the author, the book, and the general terms that will provide the framework for everything else. Magdalene also explains what the "charmed circle" is, a term she borrowed from Gayle Rubin's 1984 essay "Thinking Sex": cultures attribute positive and negative values to sexual attributes, and those that are positively valued are said to be the "charmed circle" of sexuality in that culture, with their opposites, (ie, anything "queer" in our modern western society) falling outside that circle. The third chapter discusses embodiment, and both how magic is embodied (the body being our first magical tool) as well as how gender and sexuality are embodied, and how trauma and disability can disrupt and complicate things (plus some very good suggestions for grounding when they do). Chapter 4 rounds out the first section, with some more gender theory, and a section titled "Opening a Discourse About Gender Essentialism and Other Cans of Worms" that is just pure gold - and, alas, too long to reproduce here in total, but here's a snippet: "Let's talk about 'masculine' and 'feminine' energies, or perhaps we can call them 'active' and 'passive' energies, or positive and negative polarities. While we're at it, we can talk about the equation of masculinity with active, positive and projective qualities, and the consequent equation of femininity with passive, negative, and receptive qualities... but hey, that's not exist, right?" (p.105) Chapter 5, titled "Queerness and the Charmed Circle", returns to the definitions of both queerness and the charmed circle itself, concluding "to be queer is to be intrinsically Other, standing outside the charmed circle of societal approval for the sake of living an authentic life." (p.144)

Chapter 6 gets us into the meat of this and the practical applications, discussing sex magic, in the context of queer sex and embodied magic, and — importantly — consent. This chapter includes a ritual that's a bit longer than the exercises sprinkled throughout the other chapters, though honestly I felt like this chapter has the potential to be another entire book, should Magdalene wish to elaborate further! Continuing on, Chapter 7 is titled "Form Follows Function: Toward A Consent-Based Magical Praxis", and it's in this chapter that I found the quotation I just had to share on Facebook: "If those of us who work with gods, spirits, powers, and our fellow practitioners aren't basing our communities and our praxis in consent, we have no claim to any sort of spiritual advancement or wisdom. We're merely overgrown toddlers who haven't learned that other people, other beings - human or other, corporeal or not, living or dead or something else - don't exist for our convenience, to sate our desires. They have their own agency, just as we do, and understanding that agency should be the core of any interaction, magical or mundane." (pp.181-82) If you want my bare-bones honest opinion, this book is worth buying for that chapter alone. Chapter 8 discusses consent as it applies to our work and relationships with spirits and deities, and I think anyone who is thinking of entering into any kind of contract or devotional relationship with a deity should read it. I don't think enough of us stop to consider our own consent in these relationships, but it matters. Deeply. This chapter covers not only how and when to say no, but also what kind of responses you might get back, and what to do if things go sideways. It is another chapter that could easily be expanded into another entire book — one I would gladly buy for the Fellowship library so I could hand it off to new pagans! Chapter 9 gives several examples of ways to adjust your practice to be more consent-based, and the pros and cons of each, and includes a quick reminder of what cultural appropriation is and how to avoid it. Chapter 10, titled "Greater Than One: Thoughts on Politics, Power, and Community", explains why gender, sexuality, magic, witchcraft, and paganism are all political, and why we can't abstain from political discussions as we build and maintain our communities. It also tackles questions of diversity, inclusivity, the paradox of tolerance, and what it means to lead. The final chapter is short, and is both conclusion and a consideration of what else, what next. Because the work is never done.

I really enjoyed this book and I'm very glad it exists — so much of what I found within its pages was validating and inspiring. If I had to list drawbacks, I can think of only three, and all three make sense in the context of the author herself and that the material, by necessity, had to remain streamlined. First, the magic this book focuses on is predominantly ceremonial magic, which appears to be what Magdalene herself practices, but it is not the backbone of my own practice, so there were points at which I either had little interest in a suggestion or I agreed but while coming from a very different angle. Secondly, the lists of queer deities were very brief and not at all exhaustive (in fact, on of my favorite queer deities, Heimdall, was absent). Very few pantheons were included, but I imagine this was both an attempt to draw on her own experiences (instead of being encyclopedic) and also to give enough space to talk about why the deities included should be considered queer, instead of just giving a list with no justification or explanation. (Llewellyn, if you're reading this, I would LOVE an edited encyclopedia of queer deities, though. Just sayin'.) Thirdly, and this is the smallest of all, in the section on deity relationships and consent, Magdalene rightfully points out that pagans as a whole seem to accept more toxic behaviours from our deities than we would from our romantic partners, and while that is very true in my experience (and ought not to be), I think a little discussion of complicated familial relationships might round out that analogy, because there certainly are deities that I would walk away from if I could, but I can't completely avoid them because of a larger web of relationship — much more like a problematic uncle than a toxic boyfriend. Other than those three little nitpicks, I wholeheartedly recommend this book to any "p-word" community member (that is: Pagans, Polytheists, and magical/occult Practitioners) who is queer, who is trying to be a better queer ally, or who holds any kind of leadership role in their own community.

Crow Folks: Dreaming of Stars

October 19, 2023
by Alexandra

So. I did this journey originally last Friday, on the dark moon, and I expected I'd have something written up for y'all later that day or Saturday at the latest. But what I ended up with was just so different from everything I've gotten from Na Morrigna before that I took a few days to digest it and then asked for clarification and it took me another few days (of other magical work and mundane busyness) to understand the clarification, and then yesterday I started to draft this in my head but didn't have the time and spoons to type it out... So here I am, almost a week late, with an unusual offering for this moon's Crow Call: a journey script. I finally understood that I'm not supposed to answer all the questions or do all the homework, what I'm supposed to share is the quest itself. When you have time and space to do so, please try the journey below, and then let me know what your experience is like either in the comments here, or on FB, or send an email! I think we're all meant to do this work together.

Begin in stillness, and quiet, and darkness. Find your center, and align yourself with earth and sky. As you stare at the darkness behind your eyes, feel and see as mist swirls up from the ground, obscuring everything around you. After a moment, it begins to part, and you can see a path beneath your feet, and grass on either side. Continue forward as the mist evaporates, until you find yourself on a dirt path through a grassy field, in front of a large doorway made of two large standing stones covered by a lintel stone. The path continues through the doorway, but on the other side you see not a grassy field in the daylight, but a forest at night. As you look at it, feeling a cool breeze coming out through the doorway, a crow flies over your head and then ducks under the lintel and disappears through the door, cawing at your to follow. Circle the doorway to look at it from the side or the rear if you like, but when you are ready, come back to the side where you can see the forest, and go through.

Once you are through, give your eyes a moment to adjust, and use your other senses to observe your surroundings. You might notice that it's colder here, and that your steps crunch through dry leaves. What other sounds can you hear, as you continue down the path? What can you smell? And now that your eyes have adjusted to the dim light, what can you see?

The path ends at a wide circular clearing with a clear pool of water, rimmed in ice, in the center of a circle of oak trees. Some of the trees are a size you might once have thought of as "large" and others are so enormous you find yourself wondering if it might take five or even six tall adults holding hands to encircle them. As your eyes move up the trunk of the one across the clearing from you, you can see that they are taller than most of the trees you've seen, as well, but their great canopies part, leaving a circle of stars in the sky. And such stars! You can see the Milky Way to your left, at the edge, but the rest of these stars are more dense, more numerous, than you are used to seeing.

Quietly, from somewhere nearby, Na Morrigna emerge. "The star stories are no longer remembered, but they must be learned again." one sister says. You look towards her, but she directs your gaze back up. "There, these stars make the great silver tree, with the three golden apples." And there in the sky, you see lines connect the stars, to draw a great tree, and three bright stars become apples nestled in its branches.

"There are others." says another sister, as the lines fade. "The scald crow, look -" and again, lines form. Two Vs, one large for the wings, one smaller for the tail. A crow further to the right of the tree, and flying towards the Milky Way.

"And the cauldron," says the third sister, as the lines fade again. "It rises in the east, upright and full, and then pours out all its blessings upon the land, and sets in the west, inverted and empty, ready to be filled again beneath the earth." You look up, but not lines form; it seems this constellation is not currently in this patch of sky.

"Give what you brought into the water, to remember this place" they say together, and you find that you are holding an apple. Not a golden one, but a normal apple, like you might buy for a snack. You step forward towards the pool of water, and you notice the ice again, and how very clear and very deep it looks, with a small rippling current in the middle, like the water is constantly both bubbling up and draining down. You toss in the apple, and watch as it gets caught in what had been an invisible current, sucking it down and then through a hole somewhere on the left side, vanishing from your sight. It is the pool of an underground river, perhaps, bubbling up here as it makes its way through the stone below.

Na Morrigna leave as silently as they came, and when you next turn to look, what you see behind you instead is the doorway again. This time, a warm breeze blows through it, reminding you how very cold it is where you are. When you are? For you know somehow that this is Ireland, and yet it seems too cold for the time of year; there is frost and ice everywhere around you. And how long has it been since human eyes saw this many trees of such size in the same forest? This journey has given you more questions than answers.

With one back glance up to the stars, you turn to go back to where you came from, down the path filled with crunchy leaves and back to the door. Once again, a crow flies over your head as you approach the doorway, and calls to you as it flies through, and back into the daylight. You follow, stepping back onto the dirt path, and as you continue on, the mist returns, swirling up around you until it obscures everything but the way back to your body.

The above is, basically, a transcript of my own journey. The weather seemed too cold and the trees too big and the stars not quite right, so I don't know where in the sky these constellations might be, beyond what I've already told you. I'm no astronomer, but I am a historian, and my experience made me wonder if this wasn't just a journey to Ireland but also a journey back in time, perhaps to the early iron age, when there was a cold period in Western Europe c. 500 BCE. That would, of course, mean the stars would not be following quite the same paths through the sky as they do now. I think most pagans are at least passingly familiar with the precession of the equinoxes, and we'd have to do similar calculations to find our constellations of the tree, the crow, and the cauldron. I did look up the corona borealis, the northern crown constellation, and it rises in the opposite way as we were told the cauldron did, rising pouring out and setting full, instead.

Tempting as it is to dive into that, though, I think the stories themselves might be more important. They were very clear on the tree having three golden apples, which surprised me, because the only tree like that I can think of is Greek, not Irish or even Celtic. But they did say the stories were missing. So it's on us, I think, to find them again, or to find the constellations and channel their stories. It will all be UPG (unverified personal gnosis) of course, or it may become shared gnosis in time, but sometimes such things can be useful for filling in the gaps. We are missing so many pieces of Irish mythology: from a creation myth. to small tales only hinted at in other tales, to the stories of those Tuatha Dé whose names are all we know about them. If this is to continue being a religion with living traditions and not a fossil to be merely displayed, we'll need more stories.

Ritual for the Way Opening – My Experience

This past week, I did one of the rituals from Morgan Daimler's fairy faith Pleiades Cycle - and I did the whole thing outside for the first time. It wasn't intense (though some other people have had intense experiences with this same ritual), but it felt right in a way that's a little hard to explain.

In preparation, I baked two loaves of spiced honey apple bread (which is basically a gf muffin mix with honey and buttermilk in it, and then previously prepared-and-frozen apple slices dredged in those same spices and honey put on top to bake; simple, but tasty); one for offering and one for my family. I made silvered water for my compass casting, and picked up a candle a friend made that has been sitting unused on a shelf, poured the last of my homemade violet liqueur into a smaller bottle, and got out my last stick of poppy-scented incense.

I set up my ritual space at my fire pit, including such mundane necessities as a chair, a lighter, and a bucket of water (fire safety, y'all!). I used a round log slice as my altar for the first part of the ritual, and then burned it during the second. The first part pretty much followed what is in Daimler's book, though I used the song I wrote last year instead of those prayers as written:

Anti-sunwise compass casting, beginning and ending in the East (where the Pleiades were to rise)
Lighting the candle and inviting the Gentry to join me (singing the first two stanzas of the song)
Singing the next three stanzas, which narrate the mythology of the holiday
Uncovering/pouring offerings and lighting the incense, moving these to the eastern side of the fire pit
Singing the last two stanzas, which invite the Fairy Rade to take refreshment and bless us in return

And then I lit the log and meditated on the flame and smoke as dusk became full dark. I did not stay until I saw the Pleiades, because between the clouds, the close treeline, and the light pollution in that direction it would have needed to be close to midnight before I would have seen them. But I did pull a card from my personal oracle deck to ask if the ritual had accomplished what it needed to, a little after the Pleiades could have been seen over a clear horizon, and got "The Sun", which is a resounding "yes", so at that point I took my omen for the night, then undid my circle and went inside.

Like I said at the beginning, it wasn't an intense experience, though at one point when the smoke blew an anticlockwise spiral in my face and parted around me I could briefly feel the reverberation of thundering hoofbeats going by at a fast pace. (I'm not a horse girl so I don't know canter or gallop or what, just fast.) Mostly it just felt... right. I sat out there, in my suburban backyard, and watched the light fade, heard the birdsong die out, the songs of the crickets and katydids rise and then settle. I watched the flames turn into strange striped flags of red and orange and blue, I watched the smoke continually spiral anticlockwise, and I leaned back and looked up at the few stars I could see. And it was peaceful. And I felt aligned in both myself and my spirituality. And I'm definitely going to do the next one outside, too.

I do have a couple of thoughts for next time, though - I think I'll start a little later than I did, which was only a few minutes after sunset, when there was still a lot of traffic and human noise. I also think I'll write a compass casting and uncasting charm also to the tune of the ballad of Thomas the Rhymer, to match. And I think I may want a set water-silvering prayer, and not do it extemporaneously like I did. But mostly I just want to do it again in November!

Crow Folks: Hold Fast

September 16, 2023
by Alexandra

During the dark moon this week, I went to visit Na Morrigna in my usual manner, and we again gathered outside around their large cauldron. I had pulled an ogham fid as an anchor before starting the journey — Dair, associated with the oak tree (among other things) — and when I arrived at the cauldron, I found myself holding the walking stick I had received from the spirit of Dair during my work with them and the rest of the spirits of the ogham feda. There was also a small stump I hadn't seen before, and I was instructed to stand on the stump — which was hardly big enough for both my feet — and to hold my walking stick parallel to the ground, for balance. "Hold fast", They told me, and I was given images and sensations of things flying at me, trying to make me move, but I resisted and kept my footing.

My personal kenning for Dair (which I developed in communion with the spirit of Dair as I came to understand them better), is "Dignified Steadyness" and that seems to be the lesson Na Morrigna were ingraining in me, this time, and the message they mean me to pass along to all of you. Hold your ground. Be immoveable. You are strong; they cannot harm you, and they cannot sway you.

While I wasn't expecting to basically have a martial arts lesson, I guess it makes sense after last month's message asking us to plan. We planned, and now its time to keep moving on those plans, to implement them and make sure the foundations are solid.

I expect we're at the beginning of another uptick already, though it may not be obvious until we get closer to the equinox. Make sure your agreements are honored and your wards are tight, and it might be time to reread my blog series about a Defensible Home (1, 2, 3) if you haven't, and the one about protection during otherworldly high tides.

Freyja’s Falcon Flight: Beneath the Tree

Late Late Late, but better late than never, Freyja assures me. This should have been posted more than a week ago, apologies, but, hey, the website is up again!

As before, this is based on my experience, and I’m offering it to the community in case it’s helpful or resonates with some of you. If you’re used to doing journeys from a script, great! Otherwise feel free to have some one read it to you, or record yourself reading it. Edit the intro and expand the outro if you need to, but please leave the middle intact, and don’t share the recording without telling them where to find my original post!

I recommend lighting a devotional candle and/or making a small offering to Freyja (perhaps a libation) and to the Norns before you begin. Prepare yourself however you normally would, to do work at an altar. For my part, that usually means wearing one of my devotional hair ribbons and perhaps donning magical jewelry, and acquiring something to go over my head while I journey.

Falcon Flight: Beneath the Tree

Begin in stillness, and quiet, and darkness. Find your center, and align yourself with earth and sky. As you stare at the darkness behind your eyes, feel and see as mist swirls up from the ground, obscuring everything around you. After a moment, it begins to part, leaving you standing in a flowery meadow.

When you arrive in the meadow, take a moment to observe around you, turning until you see a path. At the entrance to the path are two shrubs, and as you move on that direction, you see trees as well. Shrubs give way to trees and undergrowth on either side of the path, getting taller and denser as you move onward, until they join overhead into an arch, forming a tunnel of trees that slopes downward, getting denser and darker.

Eventually, you notice that the path has become flat, and then it begins to rise. Now the trees are thinning again, branches giving way to brightness, and as the trees again give way to shrubs, you see a gate in front of a wide plain and beyond it, the great world tree. If you have any guides or guardians you wish to accompany you, ones who can join you in flight, call to them now, before you step through the gate and make your way towards the tree.

As you approach the World Tree, prepared to circle around it clockwise as before, you instead see Freyja standing in front of you. She beckons you in the other direction, and before the entrance under another great root, she casts a cloak over you, turning you into a falcon, and as you fall to the ground, she changes herself and leaps into the air, giving you no choice but to follow her through the opening under the root, and into the gloom.

Within, she glows brightly enough that you can follow her easily: down and around the path spirals, over rivers and past mountains and forests - other worlds branch out from here. And then, in front of a large well, around which sit three ancient beings, Frejya throws back her cloak to regain her usual form, and reaches out an arm for you to land on. When you do, she changes you back as well, and holds you by the arm lest you stumble into the Well.

These are the Norns - Urd, Verdandi, and Skuld, who know the fate of all beings and can read all of time in the runes in the rime.

"Put your offering into the water," Freyja instructs you, "and then speak the question that weighs heavy on your heart."

Do so, and wait patiently for the answer.

[interlude]

When you are satisfied with the answer, or when they have no more to tell you this time, thank them for the wisdom you have received, and turn back to Frejya. She will turn you back into a falcon and then lead you on the return journey: up and around, up and around, back out the entrance you came through beneath the root.

Out in the open air again, she removes her cloak and yours, and at this time if you have anything you wish to tell her or ask her, you should do so, before departing.

When you are finished, return the way you came, across the plain, and back to the gate, through the tunnel of trees, and back to the meadow. Then the mist will swirl up again, and take you back to your body.

Crow Folks: What Plans Will You Make?

August 18, 2023
by Alexandra

Once again during the dark moon earlier this week I went to visit Na Morrigna in the place I usually find them. This time we gathered around their large cauldron outside again, and when I arrived, I placed some incense into the fire below it. When I asked for an omen or message to share, I was instructed to stick my hand into the fire in the journey while using my physical hand to draw three ogham feda, and had a sort of double vision of my ogham set (birch coins I pyrographed myself) overlaid with a birch limb darkened by fire, with clear markings down one side.

The three ogham feda I ended up with were hÚath, Dair, and Coll. Broadly, I understood these together to mean that yes, we have been wounded, and scared. We have fought packs of wolves, we have been battered and bruised. But nonetheless, we are still standing. We stand tall, we stand strong. We have healed our old wounds as best we can, and we are centered, in alignment, and ready to continue. We have learned much from our trials, and we have tasted sweet wisdom. We need to integrate all that we have learned, and we must be ready for the next challenge. It is time to harvest wisdom and prepare ourselves for the work of the autumn and winter. We should be consulting our allies, both human and Other, and making plans. So, what plans will you make, Crow Folks?

What I’m hearing from my allies is that, in my local area at least (DC/MD/NoVA), the run up to the equinox is likely to be Particularly Intense as far as Otherworldly Activity is concerned. So I’m focusing on my Local allies, first and foremost, as they are likely to have things they’d like me to do, and I’d like to continue being in their good favor and under their protection. The next dark moon is the 14th of September, just about a week before the equinox, so I kind of expect that to be the “deadline” for figuring out what things I’d like to focus on in my personal work with Na Morrigna from now until Imbolc. I’ll still be doing these, of course, and that seems to be mostly oracular poetry or ogham or both, for the most part, but I do have some things that are just for me, and I’m sure I’m not the only one with shadow work that needs doing, as that is a constant process!

Freyja’s Falcon Flight: The Grain Harvest

I was late this month in my journey to see Freyja, and so I am late getting this to all of ya’ll, but hopefully it’s helpful or resonates with some of you. If you’re used to doing journeys from a script, great! Otherwise feel free to have some one read it to you, or record yourself reading it. Edit the intro and expand the outro if you need to, but please leave the middle intact, and don’t share the recording without telling them where to find my original post!

I recommend lighting a devotional candle and/or making a small offering to Freyja (perhaps a libation) before you begin. Prepare yourself however you normally would, to do work at an altar. For my part, that usually means wearing one of my devotional hair ribbons and perhaps donning magical jewelry, and acquiring something to go over my head while I journey.

Falcon Flight: Whose Wisdom Will You Seek?

Begin in stillness, and quiet, and darkness. Find your center, and align yourself with earth and sky. As you stare at the darkness behind your eyes, feel and see as mist swirls up from the ground, obscuring everything around you. After a moment, it begins to part, leaving you standing in a flowery meadow.

When you arrive in the meadow, take a moment to observe around you, turning until you see a path. At the entrance to the path are two shrubs, and as you move on that direction, you see trees as well. Shrubs give way to trees and undergrowth on either side of the path, getting taller and denser as you move onward, until they join overhead into an arch, forming a tunnel of trees that slopes downward, getting denser and darker.

Eventually, you notice that the path has become flat, and then it begins to rise. Now the trees are thinning again, branches giving way to brightness, and as the trees again give way to shrubs, you see a gate in front of a wide plain and beyond it, the great world tree. If you have any guides or guardians you wish to accompany you, ones who can join you in flight, call to them now, before you step through the gate and make your way towards the tree.

As you approach the World Tree, circle around it clockwise, until you see an opening beneath one of the great roots. Duck under this root and enter the tunnel beneath. There is hard dirt packed beneath your feet, and the entire tunnel seems to have been hewn from that same clay-rich dirt and sandstone. Not as many feet come this way — the floor is still rough in places, so watch your step as you continue forward. There are torches set into sconces in the rough hewn walls, and their light looks like fire but you feel no heat as we continue past, and you smell no smoke or pitch.

The tunnel curves gently and then begins to rise in a gradual incline, ending in a doorway, two huge stones on either side and capped with a third. Touch one gently as you step out into the fresh air — these are worn by the elements and smooth to the touch. If you look back to the entrance, you will notice that on this side, the tunnel leads into what looks like a large burial mound, standing alone in a large clearing, though the forest is slowly encroaching from all sides.

Smell the air — the pine sap scent is strong, and your nose can tell there is moving water somewhere nearby, even if your ears cannot yet hear it. Now you should continue, following a clear trail deeper into the forest. Your footfalls are muffled by pine needles, and the air seems still. The scent and after a while the sound of water is to your left as you walk, and after a short time, you arrive at a fork, with three paths to choose from.

You have been here before – normally we take the middle road. But today, coming walking towards you down that middle road is our Lady herself. She nods at you, and indicates for you to follow, leading you down the path to your left. A bit further on, she crosses a bridge over a small creek that is running high, and then the path turns again, and you can see that ahead of you it dead ends into a large field of some kind of golden grain, ripe and ready for the harvest.

As you come to the edge of a field, you see many people dressed in clothes of the early medieval period, singing and doing the hard work of harvest: those with strong shoulders swinging scythes, those with nimble fingers tying bundles, and others reaching down to collect the pieces that fall to the ground.

Two figures are larger than life and seem almost to shine with divine light, much like Freyja does. The man in stripped to the waist and wielding a scythe. With every swing of his scythe he cuts more than ten times any other person here. And when he turns to look at you and Freyja, you notice the family resemblance, how he is like a mirror of his sister: this is Freyr. The other figure is a woman with long golden hair that flows unbound around her. She is using her own hair in place of twine to tie the heaps of grain that Freyr cuts into bundles. As she looks up to smile at you, you realize this must be Sif*.

You may speak to either Sif or Freyr if you choose; or else join in the work and speak to the ancestors gathered here, to see what wisdom they might share about the work of the harvest.

[interlude]

When you are finished speaking with whomever you chose, say your farewells and return to Freyja’s side. You may speak to her as well, if you wish, on the walk back to the fork in the path. When you return to that crossroads, bid Freyja farewell, and then continue back the way you came: through the forest, to the mound, through the mound-tunnel and out from under the root, across the plain, and back to the gate, through the tunnel of trees, and back to the meadow. Then the mist will swirl up again, and take you back to your body.

* Okay, yeah, I know, Sif being a grain goddess is just supposition with no real evidence to back it up, but a lot of people do cast Sif in this role, and also when I tried to ask Freyja if I could equivocate without naming her as Sif, Freyja point blank insisted. Which still doesn’t prove anything, but my role here is to share what I’m told to share and I’m sure Freyja has her reasons.

Also, announcement: I’m currently migrating the website, so things might be a little wonky for a bit; bear with me, and as always, you can reach me via email and I’ll sort you out!

Crow Folks: Three Things for Lughnasadh

July 21, 2023
by Alexandra

I was planning to write up my experiences of Mystic South for this week’s blog, but while I was there I attended a ritual to the Morrigan and the Dagda (run by the same lovely people who put on the Morrigan’s Call Retreat), and I was reminded that my service usually starts on the dark moon closest to Lughnasadh, but that the timing was at Their discretion… and yep, that started this past weekend, and I’m already running a little behind on posting, as I try to catch up on sleep and get unpacked and the bunnies resettled from their vacation, and my house even remotely organized, while my child is doing his best impression of velcro.

So.

I did the journey to my usual place, and was given a set of three tasks to share with you all, for Lughnasadh, or perhaps more appropriately for Brón Trogain, the Earth’s Sorrowing:

Fearn: Renew your protections
Both shields and wards: on yourself, your children, your animals; on your house, your car, your place of work
Idad: Honor the Might Dead and your own personal allies
It’s a good time for renewing oaths but also for just coming together with those who are your kith and kin
Gort: Blessing the first fruits of the harvest
Whatever is coming into ripeness right now, collect some and hallow it and offer it to those same allies

Fairly simple, fairly straightforward, and honestly it seems very doable, even for a very busy practitioner. Reminder, however, that this is of course all UPG – I seek what wisdom they would have me share, and they tell me in a mixture of ogham, imagery, and words, and then I write it up and ask for their approval… and edit and tweak until they give it.

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Category: Paganism