Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday, "Dr" Gerald Brosseau Gardner. You would have been 134 years old.

Whatever your faults - as many as those of the rest of us, I guess - you still functioned as the catalyst around which the NeoPagan religion of Wicca crystallised, and for that I am very grateful.

Anything Other Than Holy

I haven't celebrated Samhain with all the trappings for years now.

The carved pumpkin heads, black and gold candles, myrrh-heavy incense, robes and a cast circle haven't been seen around my place for a good long time.

That doesn't mean that I've forgotten to mark the first day of Winter. Rather, the marking has become almost entirely internal rather than demonstrative for me, and I'm happy with that.

I might be fortunate to be someone with enough intelligence and training to be able to work out for myself when the mid-point between Solstice and Equinox falls, four times a year and hence have less need to display my acknowledgement of the Sun's apparent position in the sky.

Or I might be a person who hasn't much need for the validation of others when marking time.

Or I might be a person whose interior life is just growing richer as I go on whirling on a rock around a big ball of hydrogen fissioning into helium.

Whatever the reason, my withdrawal from external displays of Sabbat hasn't stopped my ancestors gathering around me when the time draws near, or me dreaming of them every night, conversing with generations I have never known while alive,  or inviting them to accompany me throughout my day.

For perhaps that's the point - no day is mundane any longer, and no experience anything other than holy.

Tides

There's nothing quite like the Samhain tide to open your emotions.

It is said that twice a year, at Samhain and Beltane, the veil between the worlds becomes tenuous and crossings from one to the other are more common. But in my case, I reckon it's just that at these times I'm more aware of the existence of the veil, and other worlds, than at more mundane times.

And so I am dreaming, and nightmaring, enough to keep me for the rest of the year, it seems.

My loved ones and ancestors are featuring quite heavily in my dreams - sometimes unrecognisable by their appearance yet completely known for who they are and were to me - old fears are playing themselves out and connections are being rebooted.

Head tipped back into the (finally) winter-blue sky this morning, I watch a fairy crossing above me.

No...not a fairy...a locust, with its rainbow wings whirring. I remember that I am quite averse to locusts on the ground and step out of its flight path quickly.

Music is getting stuck in my mind, so I switch my electronic collection on to shuffle and listen to Joe Walsh, Corvus Corax and Tim Hardin. Ah, the poor heroin-addicted boy who never managed to claw his way out of the poppy's grip before it killed him.

Emotions are raw yet surprisingly manageable in this season of other-worldly connection.

I view a house a friend (and teenage sweetheart) used to live in as a boy - 4 doors down on Arthur Road, long since sold up as the matriarch's health failed.

I reconnect with the Covenant of Hekate, thinking to honour Her Fires again this year, when the Moon is right.

I miss the Gautrain Bus, the drivers of which have been on strike for almost a week now, and don't fancy the stress of driving in a car through Sandton traffic this afternoon - never mind what stress it must be giving Warren to do the actual driving.

I remember my Mom, who, when last seen in the dreamworld was wearing a different face, whose last-incarnation-birthday it is today.

Happy Birthday, Mom. I miss you still.

I'm thinking the tide will be gentler this year, as I get older and possibly more able to handle it. The retrograde motions of both Saturn and Pluto in Capricorn seem to be helping this softer view along. We introspected our immediate daily souls last month with the Mercury backtrack, and now a slightly higher portion of our collective Self will be pondering the tracks and ruts of time and space.

Hopefully. As past the veil we slide together, holding hands, some of us shrieking, some of us crying, some of us looking about in wonder and awe.Tides.

Remember Their Names

For the next thirty days the Advocacy Against Witch Hunts will be focusing on a truly distressing facet of humankind : violent domination and suppression of the "other" , whoever and wherever they are perceived to be.

All over Africa, as well as India, Micronesia, the Middle East and parts of the so-called "first world", the poor and marginalised in society are targeted as "witches" and tortured or killed under certain circumstances, which include but are not limited to hard economic times. The Other we blame for all our misfortunes.

Frequently, those targeted are women; probably because women often bear the brunt of poverty in every country on this earth, but also because, well, this is the Patriarchy we've been living in for the last half-dozen millennia after all.

Scapegoating? Sure it is. But giving it a name doesn't excuse it one whit.

Neither does understanding at least some of the mechanisms behind the phenomenon.

This cosmos is, indeed, a work in progress. But that doesn't mean that we can sit back and watch it unfold. We have many things to learn, as we continue to create this living universe, and one of them is the nature of  polarity. 

Our atrocious behaviour towards other living beings whom we are quick to "other" is an object lesson for all of us: one we can learn the most from by becoming engaged with it, recognising the inherent wrongness of it , and trying to address it.

You can do several things:

Sign the petition against witch hunts in South Africa.

"Like" the Facebook advocacy page.

Place a banner on your website or blog.

Join the Pagan Rights Alliance, especially if you are in South Africa.

And, mostly, when the time comes, remember their names.

Beltane Blessings

"Blessed be thy feet, that have brought thee in these ways.

Blessed be thy knees, that shall kneel at the sacred altar.

Blessed be thy womb, without which we would not be.

Blessed be thy breasts, formed in beauty.

Blessed be thy lips, that shall utter the Sacred Names."

..and the mercury hit 35 degrees Celsius today, Beltane in the Southern Hemisphere.

There is still, however, chocolate cake for tea.

Cognitive Dissonance

As we approach the astronomical midpoint between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice (on 7th November this year), we see the signs of Life burgeoning all around us.
Here, South of the Equator, the trees are almost all fully-leafed.
The thunderstorms of the Summer are in full swing on the Highveld.
In my garden, roses are scrabbling at the walls and cascading over the wooden patio frame - white, red, orange and purple - glorious in their profusion and heavenly in their scent.
Honeysuckle has regrown from being viciously cut back last Winter and is now blooming, too, on the North of the ritual space outdoors.
Grass has to be cut once a week, so fast its growth is now.

Everything sings, hollers and shouts of Life: growing, blossoming, increasing. Life yelling unto Life "I'm here!" under a bright, hot, Southern African sun.

Listen to the local energies. They are speaking to you of the upswing of the pendulum, the cresting of the seasonal sine wave. The Summer coming in all its glory.

So tell me - among all this Life, all this growth, all this increase - why in the nether hells would you celebrate the Day of the Dead?

Merry, lusty Beltane everybody South of the Equator.
And Blessed Samahin to you Northern lot!


Pic: Spheres of Light

Fire Under The Earth

Here in the Southern hemisphere of the world,

The long, slow pulse of Winter is quickening.


The seed which was hidden in the earth sends forth testing tentacles, uncurling.


We draw an icy breath together, and taste flowers, leaves and blades of grass Approaching on the chilly wind.

Pagani.

This is a Wheel.

Kindly add your shoulder to it. Blessed Imbolc.

Though You Have Considered All The Facts

I could not, in a million years, have said it better than Sister Hecate does:

My religion doesn’t shy away from death, from the sacrifices that happen every moment, of every day, in Nature. My religion participates, equally, in the death of the robin and in the satisfaction of the fox, feeding her kits. My religion knows that corn cries out when it is picked and that the sow morns for her slaughtered piglets, just as I rejoice in seeing G/Son well-fed. My religion frightens some people because it does not shy away from what we call “the dark.” I want to be as fully present to the robin, who dies, as I will die, as I am to the fox, who eats, as I do eat.

And also, with Wendell Berry, remember to

Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.

Always.

Pic: From the SquirrelBasket

Vale Persephone

As the Sun makes ingress into Aries, we in the Southern Hemisphere cross the line of mid-autumn.
Below the x-axis now, we're coasting to Yule with a stopover at Samhain. The mornings are fresh and chilly, the days high blue cloudless at their best.
I love this time of year.
Blessed Mabon, Blessed Ostara to you all.

Pic: David Schlosser

This Modern World Hath Need of Thee

While giving myself 24 hours off work to recover from 'flu, I read about the Pan chapter in Wind in the Willows on Hecate's blog , then almost immediately listened to Eric Davis going on about goats and Pan in Ritual America on the Expanding Mind podcast.

Ok, I get the synchro - the Goat Foot God wants a word...

Pic found over here

Ave Atque Vale

Ave, Sol Invictus!

And the red-gold sun lifts over the horizon, outlining dark and smoke-spewing towers of a power station on the horizon.

Vale, Quercus Rex.

The Oak King has met the Lady and died in Her arms.

Ave, Ilex Rex.

The God's other face now turns to face us, down here in the southern hemisphere.

Merry Summer Solstice!

Beltane Tide 2011

Welcome to the Beltane-tide. We have it all here - deep red metallic candles, rose-sandalwood-frankincense-woodruff incense, a magnificent declamation from the Stag of Seven Tines and a priestess hobbling around the borders of her land because of a bee sting.

It's only the second time in my life that a Sister has actually had the effrontery to sting me: the first time I was about 10 years old, in England, running barefoot in the garden at Wokingham. The poor Bumble Bee who my enormous foot came down upon had her revenge. On Saturday evening I was dead heading the Thug Rose Number 2 and, although shod in slops, a bee found my foot once more. The pain was, well, excruciating.

Warren applied a thick paste of mustard and a professional crepe bandage after my howling had died down, which drew most of the venom out of the wound. But today it's still red and a bit sore. So I suppose I'll be limping around the Boundaries at twilight, swinging the censer and brandishing the Athame. I only hope all the Sisters have cleared the area beforehand.
In the meantime, the Belfire has been extinguished and relit, the Guardians called to renew their protection of home and family, and yes, the God who Sets the Head Afire with Smoke has proclaimed His presence here.

We continue to tumble into the Summer with all its promise of heat waves, wind-downed trees and blowing up of tolling gantries. And then there's the Beltane Chocolate Cake...

Photo: Bee from the Beltane Ranch. Copyright Joseph Readdy

Beltane's Coming...

RiboNucleic Acid

DeoxyRiboNucleic Acid

Maypole

DNA Maypole

Sculpture by Barry Woods Johnstone

Ostara 2011

"Thee we invoke, O Light of Life;
Be thou a bright flame before us,
Be thou a guiding star above us,
Be thou a smooth path beneath us"

A wonderful Equinox to all - Vernal in the South, Autumnal in the North.
Blessed Be the Balance of the Dark and the Light.

Graph: Found here

Imbolc 2011

A Sagitarius Moon at just over half-full called me outside after sunset.
I stood in the ritual space looking up through the branches at the moonlight silvering the dark green leaves of the Giant Cycad and it was as if the sentinel trees around this intensely holy space had called me just to show off their beauty.

I'm feeling that it's still a bit chilly at night, so  I went inside and loaded my altar with silver candles of many shapes and sizes, a pair of ivory candles looming over all. Their flames flicked across the silver and crystal like the Moon was licking the Cycad outside. I felt the fire in the Mother's belly, and was content.

Yes, it's me late to the feast as usual. Those of us who celebrate the astonomical Cross Quarters are always the last ones to put their shoulders to the Wheel, therefore we have only to nudge it, mostly, to get it to spin really well.

So a very merry Imbolc (or Fire Down Below) to all my Southern friends and readers. And to those in the North, a happy Lughnasadh!

Jacob Zuma and the Ancestors

Most South Africans have had their breath taken away by President Jacob Zuma recently when, campaigning for the ruling African National Congress, he stated that the Ancestors would turn against you if you left the ANC.

This statement was met with hoots of derision, mostly, here in Joburg, from all cultures - except for the mainstream media, who carried it as straight news.
Not concerned with the diminuition of his standing in the eyes of most voters, the man who would be king - and who is planning on taking a fifth (or sixth) wife this year - went on flapping his mouth parts in the Eastern Cape, telling people that the Ancestors would be very upset should the ANC lose Nelson Mandela Bay, a traditional stronghold of the party.

But this is not the first time he's threatened the folk with our forebears. This time last year, he was telling us we would get sick if we should dare to abandon the ruling party.

Now, as most of you know, I also claim to talk with the Ancestors. In fact I'd go so far as to say that while Zuma has claimed such conversation, I really do find myself passing timeless time outside of time in give-and-take with the once incarnated souls who are the Ancestors - of you, and me, and every human now materialised within the dream. For Zuma's ancestors are naturally my own, as they are yours. The web goes back millions of years and turns and folds upon itself in more than three dimensions.

And so I say to you - and to the ANC, and to the rest of the people of South Africa - that President Zuma is lying. Whoever he claims to be talking to, they are not our Ancestors. For the Ancestors are never concerned with political factions, but only with the continuance of life and understanding upon this plane. They will greet you, surely, when you cross that threshold between our space and theirs; they will enfold you and welcome you and take you home to rest awhile. But they will not do so waving ANC, DA or IFP flags. They will not urge you to vote back into power someone who has demonstrated his utter disdain for the welfare of all of us, so that it comes secondary to his own material comfort. And they will not become angry or upset or make you ill should you decide not to back a party so corrupted by earthly power that their president is drunk upon it.

Make up your own minds, people - and, if you wish, consult with our Ancestors yourself. The truth will become evident - that Jacob Zuma is now, and probably has been for some time, lying through his teeth.

Pic: Gallo Images

Kenneth Grant

Kenneth Grant has died.

And, although Wikipedia seems to have noticed, this death has gone remarkably ...umm...unremarked in the main stream media. Maybe I shouldn't be surprised.

"Witch" Does Not Translate As "Murderer"

Shaman, WiseWo/man, Sorcerer....Witch.

In the deadly Wetiko culture which we call civilisation, there are words whose meaning we have forgotten, or conveniently altered to fit the cannibal mindset. Shaman seems to get a pass, mostly - and I wonder if that's because, by now, most Shamans are perceived as male? - but the epithet Witch is still, in many places and in many minds, one of the worst you can apply to a human being.

A Witch is not a person who kills others for the use of their body parts. Neither is s/he a sinker of ships and a blighter of crops. Necessarily, that is. There are other more accurate descriptors for such people - but we apply the W-word almost indiscriminately, especially in Africa, where its use has been drummed into the populace by a colonising, crusading, domineering subset of Wetikos; namely European missionaries.

Well, and many thanks to SAPRA for all the thankless work they do, trying to fight the ignorance, the racism and the inherent evil of the dominant culture's nomenclature. It's a fight with many legs on it, and a long way to go yet.


This morning my attention has been drawn to another Witch hunt which has been ongoing for decades now - and that is the demonisation of the American Pitbull Terrier. A fight , that is, between the ignorant Press on one side, and lovers and friends of the Pitbull on the other.

You see, journalists and reporters of the mass media: the name Pitbull does not translate as killer dog.


Killer domesticated animals are created by their domesticators - us - when we turn our beloved companions into stressed, traumatised, bad tempered paragons of violence. Just like ourselves. And a dog can be of any breed at all, or none, when it snaps and takes a bite out of its oppressors.

I would invite the popular press to stop thinking of the shock value of their puff-pieces on the front page (and I'm looking at you, The Star,  and one Aurelia Chapman in particular) and start considering what it is they are really saying when they unthinkingly refer to any dog which has had a go at a human as a Pitbull.

Witch does not translate as murderer. Pitbull doesn't, either.


Pic: Pitbull Federation of South Africa

Let Them Eat Cake

As if the Frozen Chicken Horror was not enough - what with consumers only now waking up to the fact that unsold frozen chicken is routinely sent back to the producers, washed in chlorine, injected with saline solution and resold under a new sell-by date - as if this was not enough, especially at this traditional chicken-eating time of the year in this traditional chicken-eating country, some industry goofball has just had the gall to announce to the public that "..if they want to eat frozen they can buy frozen, and if they want to eat fresh they can buy fresh..".

I don't fall into the demographic of frozen chicken eaters for one reason only - I can afford not to. By all the gods, just what kind of an attitude is this, to solemnly pronounce let them eat cake like some latter day Marie Antoinette?

In other news, the retrograde mercury has really started to bite down ( do you think we should give the Industry Representative a bit of a pass because of it?....Nah), and is joined tomorrow morning by something I didn't think happened: a void of course full moon. According to the ephemeris, the moon goes void in Gemini (yes, my least favourite sign!) just 4 minutes before it hits full - which is slap in the middle of a lunar eclipse. Not, thank Hecate for very small mercies, visible from here.


Void of course Full Gemini Moon in eclipse while Mercury is retrograde you say: do you think I could have a day off work tomorrow?

Pic: Marie Antoinette en famille. D'you suppose she ate frozen chicken?

Hard Drives and Hecate

So - bugger Microsoft. No, really, bugger'em.
Yesterday the new Lexmark printer failed on the Windows side of the dual-boot I'm running on the desktop - Warren prefers to use Windows XP to print his staff rosters for some un-bloody-known reason, when there's a perfectly good Linux codex running the same hardware on the OpenSUSE side.
I've come to vastly prefer Linux, after a good tussle between me and the open source daemons, as the security is matchless, the maintenance effortless, and the possibilities endless...ah well, there's nothing like a convert, is there?
Well, it seems our 5-year-old Mecer is running out of steam, and refuses to continue to run printers on the Windows partition. IShouldHaveKnown. So, we're down to Rosebank, where we haven't been for a while, ever since the Gautrain started being built there, and the techie informs us, more in sorrow than in greed, that our old (old?) machine can't take another hard drive of the size we'd envisioned (a Terabyte or so), so it looks like a whole new machine, folks...

Not that the trip was entirely joyless - Isis is on the same floor as Incredible Connection, and it was the work of a moment to divert our footsteps there.
Now, I've been thinking long and hard about joining the Covenant of Hekate, so I reckoned a browse around the Goddess images in the store could help me make up my mind. I don't possess a Hecate image, you see, (She's Me and Me's She so it hasn't seemed necessary - a black mirror is the most I use) and I thought that if I joined up, I'd Do It Right for once.

Isis has become, since we last visited it, something of a Hindu Haven - but that's OK, they've got to offer what sells, I guess. So we're mulling over exquisite statuettes of Kali, admiring the most beautiful carved black Isis figure, and wondering if a spiral will do, all in a haze of Nag Champa and boxed ethereal bestseller muzac, and growing more despondent with every circuit of the shop.

Eventually, Warren gives up and goes outside, but I linger a little on my way out of the door - and lo! - just where She should be, if I'd thought about it for a moment, a perfect little pewter icon of my Matron, hanging in a glass case at the line where inside becomes outside. So I brought Her home, where She adorns the black mirror on what is about to become my Hecate altar.


Pic: Galraedia Hecate , that's Her.