Spells For Democracy

A sad note from Phaedra Bonewits to the Spells for Democracy group:

As you all know (or I hope you know), this group was founded by Isaac Bonewits as a way of coordinating major spellcastings in the service of the democratic process.

As you also all know (or I hope you know), Isaac is now gravely ill. He is no longer online, nor is he likely to be again.

As of July 13, 2010, Phaedra is converting the Spells for Democracy list to "read only"; current members may set up a new group with a similar name.

Isaac has been such an important force in modern Paganism. May his final days be a blessing.

At The Dawning Of This New Day

Dear Weather Gods,

Love,

Hecate

Sunday Dance Blogging

Talks With G/Son

The anniversary of my mother's death occurred a few weeks ago, and I think G/Son had heard his 'rents mention it. He and Son were over eating crabs on my porch while DiL was at a conference, and G/Son asked me about it, saying, "Nonna, were you there in the hospital when my great grandma died, before I was born?" And I said, "No, I wasn't there." G/Son said, "My Mommy was there, instead, holding her hand." I said, "She was. Your Mommy is very kind, isn't she?" and G/Son nodded seriously.

A few days later, I was driving him home and he said, "Nonna, is your Nonna dead?" and I said, "Yes, my Nonna lived to be almost a hundred, but then her heart got tired out and quit beating, so she went to the Summerlands." G/Son said, "The same Summerlands as your cat?" and I had to laugh because my grandma really hated cats. But Miss Thing always reminded me a lot of my grandma.

Somehow, I started telling G/Son what I remember about my grandma: that she cut out tons of paper dolls for me when I was little, played the organ for her Methodist church, grew African violets like nobody's business, made delicious lemon meringue pie and a kind of candy called divinity, taught me how to sew, and sewed me a flannel nightgown every year for xmas, to keep me warm.

G/Son said, "Just like you make me sweaters to keep me warm."

I said, "That's right. I think it just makes Nonnas feel good to think about our grandchildren being warm." Then, I said, "What I believe is that whatever is remembered, does not die, so I like to get a chance to remember my Nonna with you. Maybe even after I've gone to the Summerlands, you can remember my Nonna wanting to keep me warm."

G/Son said, "Why you think what is remembered does not die?" and I said, "Well, it feels to me as if, as long as people remember some good things about you, in some way, you are still here. When I remember my Nonna making pies and growing violets and making me nightgowns, it feels to me a little bit as if part of her is still alive in my memory."

I have a lot of good times with this kid. He's got an old, old soul.

Picture found here.

Sunday Garden Blogging

This is the "blackest" of the black day lilies in my garden.



Info on black plants here, here, and here.

Photo by the author. If you copy, please link back.

Independence Day Poetry Blogging

America

BY ALLEN GINSBERG

America I’ve given you all and now I’m nothing.
America two dollars and twentyseven cents January 17, 1956.
I can’t stand my own mind.
America when will we end the human war?
Go fuck yourself with your atom bomb.
I don’t feel good don’t bother me.
I won’t write my poem till I’m in my right mind.
America when will you be angelic?
When will you take off your clothes?
When will you look at yourself through the grave?
When will you be worthy of your million Trotskyites?
America why are your libraries full of tears?
America when will you send your eggs to India?
I’m sick of your insane demands.
When can I go into the supermarket and buy what I need with my good looks?
America after all it is you and I who are perfect not the next world.
Your machinery is too much for me.
You made me want to be a saint.
There must be some other way to settle this argument.
Burroughs is in Tangiers I don’t think he’ll come back it’s sinister.
Are you being sinister or is this some form of practical joke?
I’m trying to come to the point.
I refuse to give up my obsession.
America stop pushing I know what I’m doing.
America the plum blossoms are falling.
I haven’t read the newspapers for months, everyday somebody goes on trial for murder.
America I feel sentimental about the Wobblies.
America I used to be a communist when I was a kid I’m not sorry.
I smoke marijuana every chance I get.
I sit in my house for days on end and stare at the roses in the closet.
When I go to Chinatown I get drunk and never get laid.
My mind is made up there’s going to be trouble.
You should have seen me reading Marx.
My psychoanalyst thinks I’m perfectly right.
I won’t say the Lord’s Prayer.
I have mystical visions and cosmic vibrations.
America I still haven’t told you what you did to Uncle Max after he came over from Russia.
I’m addressing you.
Are you going to let your emotional life be run by Time Magazine?
I’m obsessed by Time Magazine.
I read it every week.
Its cover stares at me every time I slink past the corner candystore.
I read it in the basement of the Berkeley Public Library.
It’s always telling me about responsibility. Businessmen are serious. Movie producers are serious. Everybody’s serious but me.
It occurs to me that I am America.
I am talking to myself again.

Asia is rising against me.
I haven’t got a chinaman’s chance.
I’d better consider my national resources.
My national resources consist of two joints of marijuana millions of genitals an unpublishable private literature that jetplanes 1400 miles an hour and twentyfive-thousand mental institutions.
I say nothing about my prisons nor the millions of underprivileged who live in my flowerpots under the light of five hundred suns.
I have abolished the whorehouses of France, Tangiers is the next to go.
My ambition is to be President despite the fact that I’m a Catholic.

America how can I write a holy litany in your silly mood?
I will continue like Henry Ford my strophes are as individual as his automobiles more so they’re all different sexes.
America I will sell you strophes $2500 apiece $500 down on your old strophe
America free Tom Mooney
America save the Spanish Loyalists
America Sacco & Vanzetti must not die
America I am the Scottsboro boys.
America when I was seven momma took me to Communist Cell meetings they sold us garbanzos a handful per ticket a ticket costs a nickel and the speeches were free everybody was angelic and sentimental about the workers it was all so sincere you have no idea what a good thing the party was in 1835 Scott Nearing was a grand old man a real mensch Mother Bloor the Silk-strikers’ Ewig-Weibliche made me cry I once saw the Yiddish orator Israel Amter plain. Everybody must have been a spy.
America you don’t really want to go to war.
America its them bad Russians.
Them Russians them Russians and them Chinamen. And them Russians.
The Russia wants to eat us alive. The Russia’s power mad. She wants to take our cars from out our garages.
Her wants to grab Chicago. Her needs a Red Reader’s Digest. Her wants our auto plants in Siberia. Him big bureaucracy running our fillingstations.
That no good. Ugh. Him make Indians learn read. Him need big black niggers. Hah. Her make us all work sixteen hours a day. Help.
America this is quite serious.
America this is the impression I get from looking in the television set.
America is this correct?
I’d better get right down to the job.
It’s true I don’t want to join the Army or turn lathes in precision parts factories, I’m nearsighted and psychopathic anyway.
America I’m putting my queer shoulder to the wheel.

Berkeley, January 17, 1956


Picture found here.

My New Name For A Blog

What Thorn Coyle Said:

We have a lot of work to do, people. We still tear each other down too much, rather than lifting each other up. [Which may say more about our own shadows than anything else.] We still fight for petty positions rather than coming into our deep power and recognizing the power we see in each other. This is changing, blessed be, and I hope to continue working with those of you who are active in this change. I saw a lot of this sort of change at Pagan Spirit Gathering last week. I encounter it in other places where I travel and teach. I encounter the desire for this from people in my spiritual direction practice. It is my deep work to foster integration within myself and amongst those who are drawn into my circles. It is our deep work to shine like the stars that we are.
Would I ever want to host a television show? Perhaps. Teaching a million people how to align their souls intrigues me. Fostering spiritual dialog from a larger platform might be a good thing. Am I willing to compromise my core mission in order to get a television show? No. That sort of compromise is a compromise of my Being, of the Work of this God, and of my True Will. So, I did not make a video for Oprah. But I plan to make a video for you.

Look on YouTube in the coming months. All of this has inspired me to finally start videocasts to alternate with my audio podcasts. Just some short meditations, and answering questions you or I are grappling with. Something simple. Something to help us connect and reintegrate.

Meanwhile, let us continue to find ways to step up to beauty together. Let us continue to find ways to walk in strength. Let us open to amazement at this world, this cosmos. Let us amaze one another.

As I noted in comments to Thorn's post, I've long believed that YouTube is an under-utilized resource for Pagans. Many of us can't or won't (/raises INTJ hand) get to Pagan festivals, but we can be inspired in our own daily practices by Pagan teachers. I don't spend all of my day thinking about Pagan topics, spirituality, magick. I spend a big chunk of it thinking about law, legal prose, statutory interpretation. So I'm thirsty to hear from people, like Thorn, who have spent most of their time absorbing, thinking about, digesting Pagan topics, spirituality, magick. YouTube is easy, fast, cheap, and can be watched over and over in order to really grock the main points. I'd love it if, when I searched "Wicca" on YouTube I found more people of Thorn's calibre.

Picture found here.

Turn, Turn, Turn.

All The Senses, And The Extra Sacred Thing

Mudpies

I don't kid myself that, as his Nonna, I'm going to be the biggest influence on G/Son's life. Heck, I'd be ecstatic if I wind up being half as big an influence as Batman and Spiderman. But one thing I'm determined to do is to help him to be out in nature, even when that means out in the wading pool in my back yard, floating mint leaves in the water. (His 'rents are even better at this than I am. Hiking is one of their main family activities, and they kayak whenever they're down at DiL's folks' place on the river. I wasn't good about getting Son outside. Their love of nature is, I guess, like playing the balalikya -- a gift.)

I do think that JMG is right; the "good times" as we've defined them, based upon cheap energy, are likely not coming back. I worry about what G/Son's future will be. But if, along with the difficulties that change will bring, people can re-engage with nature, maybe it won't be all bad. My goal for my time w/ G/Son is to gently invite him into that communication, to introduce him to all that I know of the Divine.

Elements: Earth

As my v creative friend, K, recently pointed out in comments, visiting the farmers' market is a good way, especially for urban Pagans, to stay in touch with the seasons. There are several quite good farmers' markets near where I live and work; the Falls Church Farmers' Market is one of my favorites. I was there early this morning, sampling peaches and cherries, catching up on civic gossip, and buying tomatoes and mozzarella (Blue Ridge Dairy Company; if you live around here, you'll thank me!).

Sometimes, simple is best.

I slice the tomatoes, drizzle some balsamic vinegar and olive oil, add Genovese basil from the herb bed, crack some pepper, and sprinkle some marigold petals.

Photos by the author. If you copy, please link back.

Saturday Poetry Blogging

Little Summer Poem Touching the Subject of Faith

~Mary Oliver

Every summer
I listen and look
under the sun's brass and even
into the moonlight, but I can't hear

anything, I can't see anything --
not the pale roots digging down, nor the green stalks muscling up,
nor the leaves
deepening their damp pleats,

nor the tassels making,
nor the shucks, nor the cobs.
And still,
every day,

the leafy fields
grow taller and thicker --
green gowns lofting up in the night,
showered with silk.

And so, every summer,
I fail as a witness, seeing nothing --
I am deaf too
to the tick of the leaves,

the tapping of downwardness from the banyan feet --
all of it
happening
beyond any seeable proof, or hearable hum.

And, therefore, let the immeasurable come.
Let the unknowable touch the buckle of my spine.
Let the wind turn in the trees,
and the mystery hidden in the dirt

swing through the air.
How could I look at anything in this world
and tremble, and grip my hands over my heart?
What should I fear?

One morning
in the leafy green ocean
the honeycomb of the corn's beautiful body
is sure to be there.

Picture found here.


I've posted this poem before; it's one of my absolute favorites. It helps me to remember what's really important. Is there a poem or a saying that does that for you?

Magic To Do

I like this definition of magic:

Magic is the art of sensing patterns, following the energy, and doing it all while staying centered and tapped into your creativity. What emerges is total transformation. What can also emerge is a very practical application of all that esoteric stuff, a vehicle through which we can use our whole skill set to bring positive change to the greatest number of people, while living by our core values. In other words, a very cool business.

If you've read my posts for a while, you know that one of my recurring themes is that Witchcraft should make one more effective in the real world. It's frustrating to me to see so many Witches and Pagans whose lives just don't work. Can't hold a job even in a good economy. Don't have a clean, safe, nurturing living space. Have serious health problems that they don't address. Can't manage their finances. Don't really have a working daily practice. And, IMHO, there's a circular effect. When my life doesn't work, it's more difficult for me to sense patterns, follow energy, stay centered, and do magic.

It's high Summer, and one should always make hay while the sun shines. And, the Moon is waning, a good time to get rid of clutter and chaos in all its forms.

Christine Kane (at 6/30/10) has some great suggestions for gaining control of your living space.

Thorn Coyle (at 6/28/10) has a very inspiring podcast up about caring for your physical body -- your main instrument for doing magic.

Many of us have a three-day weekend coming up. What one thing could you accomplish this weekend that would put you in a better place to do magic?

Picture found here.

Most Pagans Live In Urban Areas

How much nature can you relate to in your urban landbase?

Friday Garden Blogging

A few of the daylilies. We planted Sir Mordred, Bela Lugosi, Satan's Kiss.

Most Witches Live In Urban Areas

Enjoy.

It's Elemental

My great luxury this Summer is water.

A year ago, Landscape Guy put in trees, dozens of gardenia bushes, hundreds of day lilies, lots and lots of toad lilies, butterbur, and ferns. Then, the blizzards of early 2010 hit and damaged quite of bit of what we'd done. Now, we're in the middle of a quite dry Summer. And, so, I water.

I do have a rain barrel and it helps quite a bit. Every morning and twice every evening, I move the hose to a different spot to drain the water onto another dry area in the garden. And, then, I turn on the sprinkler. I've been packing lunches, doing w/o much air conditioning, foregoing new clothes to pay for the water. It's what I really want.

In the Winter, my great luxury is often Fire, in the form of gas heat, although I also luxuriate in knitted covers (Earth) and hot baths (Water, Fire), warm soups (Earth), and the scent of dried herbs (Earth, Air).

What elemental luxuries do you enjoy this time of year?

It Rhymes!

Kagan the Pagan.

Isn't that funny? No, it's not.

Course, his name is "Savage." Just saying.

Goddess, I wish she were a radical leftist, but this is just more Overton Window work. The radical right never takes a day off.

Merlin's Time

You should go read The Arch Druid Report.

First Of The Month Bazooms Blogging

Ladies! Listen up! Detecting breast cancer early is the key to surviving it! Breast Self Exams (BSEs) can help you to detect breast cancer in its earlier stages. So, on the first of every month, give yourself a breast self-exam. It's easy to do. Here's how. If you prefer to do your BSE at a particular time in your cycle, calendar it now. But, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

And, once a year, get yourself a mammogram. Mammograms cost between $150 and $300. If you have to take a temp job one weekend a year, if you have to sell something on e-Bay, if you have to go cash in all the change in various jars all over the house, if you have to work the holiday season wrapping gifts at Macy's, for the love of the Goddess, please go get a mammogram once a year.

Or: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pays all or some of the cost of breast cancer screening services through its National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program. This program provides mammograms and breast exams by a health professional to low-income, underinsured, and underserved women in all 50 states, six U.S. territories, the District of Columbia, and 14 American Indian/Alaska Native organizations. For more information, contact your state health department or call the Cancer Information Service at 1-800-4-CANCER.

I know that a recent study indicated that early detection via breast self exams might not be "cost effective." I'm not a scientist, but when I read those studies, they appear to be saying that sometimes women find a lump during the BSE that turns out not to be cancer. Those women have caused some expense and have gone through some discomfort in order to find out that the lump wasn't cancer. I don't know about you, but when that happens to me, as it has a few times since my first mammogram found a small, curable, cancerous lump, I go out and buy a new scarf, take myself out for a decadent lunch, call everyone I know, and declare it a good day.

Send me an email after you get your mammogram and I will do an annual free tarot reading for you. Just, please, examine your own breasts once a month and get your sweet, round ass to a mammogram once a year. If you have a deck, pick three cards and e-mail me at hecatedemetersdatter@hotmail.com. I'll email you back your reading. If you don't have a deck, go to Lunea's tarot listed on the right-hand side in my blog links. Pick three cards from her free, on-line tarot and email me at hecatedemetersdatter@hotmail.com. I'll email you back your reading.




Picture found here. Not safe for work.