Spring Birthing

Amber and Celtic shields, put on without even conscious thought.

The wings stay, forever.

This time there was no pain with death, just transition.

The Raven Lady with me always.

A blue bird alighted in the wet spring morning.

Things fall into place

Water rushing down from the mountains.

The Fair ones sing.

Everything is moving at its natural pace.

I am at peace.

The thundering has quieted.
The Now is still.

There are no wrong answers?

That burden left behind,

I am human, these bonds chosen

The future is bright.

Menarche – the Threshold of the Maiden

I had a couple of experiences this weekend that gave me an ephiphany about the nature of the Maiden phase/face of the Goddess as well as Maiden as a phase in a woman's life. A girl in my family crossed the threshold of Menarche last week. Menarche is the onset of menses, a girl's first period. I have not been close to a girl of this age before other than myself so it has been an interesting process to watch. I saw her two days after the big event and found that her energy had completely changed. I looked at her as saw a blossoming young woman rather than a child. Her growing awareness, poise, stature, sensibilities all seemed to have congealed at the same moment into the qualities we typify with the Maiden. She turns inward to dream and learn about the world, she is headstrong, and trying to figure out people, question conflicting messages the society and family members give her. She is very smart and uses her mentality and physical strength to push forward through challenges. From the glow about her skin to the hopes and fears that she had on becoming an adult all seem to swirl around her.

The other experience I had this weekend was priestessing in the role of the Maiden for a triple priestess polarity working in the Assembly of the Sacred Wheel's annual ritual for the Stag God Cernunous. I spent a lot of time thinking in the past week as I got ready for this role. I found some of the typical “maiden-style” dresses are no longer cute and comely on my maturing figure.

I have been spending the past year or so transitioning into the “Mother” phase in my life. I am turning 30 this year. I am no longer an innocent slip of a young woman. I have transitioned to roles of teacher, wife, stepmother, Priestess, and am entrusted with overseeing the growth of my students who circle with me. Hopefully I will be birthing a coven in the near future. In those ways, I am an expecting mother. And yet, to many an eye, I am seen as one of the young ones in my tradition. Like all of us in this culture that mortalizes youth, I hope to hold onto the physical attributes of the energy and health of youth as long as possible. I wash the gray out of my hair and am flattered on the rare occassions when I get carded. My 9 year old stepson jested with me a while ago that since I am in my 29th year, that I should enjoy the last days of my youth that I have left. All of these things were swirling through my head as I got ready to embody the aspects of Maiden in this rite.

So, in order not to look like a tart, I found an appropriate dress that was pretty and not to showy for my figure, and then I went barefoot! I invoked the verile Stag god with every molecule of my being. Then I danced and sang, clapped and stomped. I stirred up all of the carefree joy and sense of play and newness rushing of life that is the quick heartbeat of ripening.

The best thing about working with the phases of Maiden, Mother, Crone, Youth, Father, Sage in our lives is that all of the aspects are swirling and dancing around us at all times. We just have to call them forth from the DNA within us. Then we can be Maiden, Mother, or Crone, or subaspects of more than one at any time that we take the time to stir them up into our beings.

Blessed be.

Hum of the Engines

I found boot up a little difficult today, so I gave it more conscious time for all of my pieces to get up and running, and man I am running at fuller capacity today.  Here's just one of my morning muses.

When I was a child, I always wondered why the Greek Gods were seen as playing chess with the human race.  I thought it was a insensitive take on our interactions.  This morning I was meditating on the myths of Ouranos and of Prometheus.  I started looking at the influences of Mars, Mercury, Jupiter and Uranus in my life right now.  They all influence us differently and via for power and control.  Those measley humans at the bottom them seek the balance of all of those influences and exercise theirown will to mitigate a messy game of chess turned rugby. 

I turn to the Sun in the center, seeking balance and harmony of the other spheres.  Those spheres turn in an ever shifting, ever unique dance.  I walk the star road ever a different path.  May my silver sandles not wear out and my my vision be forever in starlight. 

Blessings

Becoming the main character of our personal mythos

When I was a child, my favorite game was one where I was the young princess of a magickal land. In this game, I saved the kingdom, treated the people fairly, and fought off magickal disaster numerous times. As I grew older, I looked to other archetypes to fall into and found many of them to be lacking. Once I discovered Paganism though, I started to purposefully cultivate archetypes within myself such as Artemis –strong, independent, just. The idea of being the main character in one’s personal myth was very appealing. Whether we actively believe this or not, we are creating our story through the years of our life. If the story has plot lines, morals, and gains momentum or gets lost without a plot is up to us.

just before dawn

It is just before dawn in the Northern lands. Morgan waits, yet the waiting does not imply patience. The waiting is a quiet, dull boredom that isn't yet excited. The dawn chorus has not arrived and there is not tense anticipation for the explosion of the day. All she feels is an anxious annoyance at being awake, still, and waiting, for the dawning of just a normal day.

Morgan knows she has made progress, no longer in the still, dead, timelessness of the Temple of Saturn. Yet, the experience gained seems to resemble more jadeness and weariness than it does experience or wisdom. Soon, the dawn will start and the day will take over. The machinations of daily life will stir and the gears of progress will leave such doubts behind. But for now, there is nothing but the stillness and the churnings of her fretting.

Day by day, petals fall from the stem, leaving an ever unfolding bud that opens in fullness. The frustrated impatience is a choice she has made. She strains to hear the first bird start its song and wonders in the solitude, what colors the clouds are turning. Those hues of orange, magenta, and impossible pinks burn out the mists of the dreams still clinging to the edges of her vision. A scraggly owl tries to shake off the evening rains to get some sleep. Charon has already stayed the mooring pole against the bank, not turning back now. It doesn't matter, Morgan thinks to herself as she shakes off the draught of sleep. Cronos will take his due. It is another day, Sol rises and there is work to be done.

Why?! The constant crowing echos in the back of her brain. She offers no answer for the eternal hypothical question. Clothes, coifed hair, the mask is assembled, piece by carefully chosen piece. Silence, methodical rhythm of unquestioning traditional practice. Work, this is life, the push forward in undeniable.

"Sigh, leisure is not my lot." Thus it has always been, and that's okay. The work of today will turn into the fortress of tomorrow. That time is not now. Tears now brushed aside, she takes up her sword, her bow, boots and assundry sachels.

"Why!?" calls the voice, quiet and lingering.

"Because I am aware of the truth. It gives me no other choice but to live up to it. Every step in this life I walk as an ox pulls its burden forward. It is the ox's place and this is my lot. I can only change my fortune by each day, and today is my day in this life. It's not all bad..." she finishes as if she'd truncated herself.

"...just wish I didn't feel so alone."

but beneath it all...

I've been meditating on the Strength card, the Empress, and the Magician during the past few days. I am so weary of winter, waiting for some new life pulse of the fresh new season to overpower it. Yet, within the wet snowfall of the morning, I saw the pure beauty of the bright whitenesss covering everything in transformation. The snowstorm did so immediately and instantly.

Between mundane and spiritual projects, tippety-type, day after day, careful planning and tending to those little sprouts I wish that one day may grown into trees, I am weary. Such projects are both tedious, trying, sometimes boring, and tiring. Just like the snow though, there is a connective cellular tissue beneath everything. Crystaline strutures creating fractal patterns reminding me "everything is connected to the spark of the divine in everything else". The infinity symbols hanging over both the Empress within the Strength card and the Magician remind me, yes this is the point. This is the height of our being that if we allow ourselves to connect to our higher nature, then we are allowing suplication, trust, and faith to connect to the divine, to our personal divine, to the rest of the universe, and on a human level, to each other.

My favorite tree as a child was the willow. I seek now to be the willow, reaching for water, persistant, strong and flexible. The strength of the willow is not the strength of the oak. The willow does not tower, but bends. adapts and flows, connecting with wind, sky, earth, and water. The cow's horns over my head reflect the light shone upon it. My toes are within the earth and my crown seeks connect with all. I pray not casting my gaze downward, but to the vastness of the stars. I hear the pulse of life beneath the sunrise and sunset of every day.

The fluxuation is constant, though I may not be able to keep the meter unassisted. The light within is eternal. I am Saturn's daughter, within his temple, I keep time. Within and beyond that pulse is the glory and victory triumphant.

For the kingdom and the power and the glory are yours should you dare. Look within, the spark is there.

Blessed be.

missing in action

Sorry I haven't been posting a whole lot lately. Each time I sit down to write a new post or article it doesn't quite convey what I want it too. So, I'll have to say that for now, I am cooking a lot of things and they need time to rise, set, and rest.

This may be a bit of a trend as I prepare for my next transition. In early January, I passed my 3rd degree interview with all of the 3rd and 4th degrees of my tradition. In a couple months I will receive my 3rd degree initiation, and gain the mantle of all the responsibility that goes along with that degree. I have expected magickal shifts, but I am also adjusting to some of the other, more mundane shiftings that go along with change. I'm going to leave off there.

Blessed be.