How Do You Get to Carnegie Hall?

Here's a fascinating article about Media Matters for America doing some intense training in how to handle the media. Their particular focus is how to handle being on tv talk shows, but much of the advice is relevant for dealing with all forms of media. One of the weaknesses that MMFA identifies for lots of liberals is shared by many Witches and other Pagans:

The problem for the soldiers of the left, according to Media Matters instructors, is that they are just too smart for their own good. The traditional dependence on facts and figures, on being right, is no longer germane. Too often these wonks disappear into the policy weeds or fall through the cracks of nuance.

This is where, as I've discussed before, knowing your objectives for the interview and having your simple, short, well-thought-out statement makes a lot of difference. You can always add details and more information if asked. And a pithy, planned close is good, as well:

Shuster asked how Brenner could advocate foreign aid during a budget crisis.

“Well, David,” he replied evenly, “I understand everyone is hurting” and went on to calmly explain that foreign aid pays for medicines for children and early warning systems for tsunamis. In a second round, Shuster hammed it up as an aggressive Fox host and asked Brenner, “Why do you love the children of Africa more than the children of Alabama?”

“I want it to say ‘Made in America’ on medicines rather than bombs,” Brenner replied coolly.

“Ooooh,” the participants in the control room hummed approvingly. “Did he have that in the can?” one asked.

“He did,” nodded Kohut.

I get that, with a few exceptions, most Witches and other Pagans aren't going to spend time on national news shows, nor will they have access to the level of training described in the WaPo article. But everyone who talks to the media can spend some time practicing, and even a few sessions with a friend, videoed on an iPhone, can make a big difference.

Here's a great example of a Pagan doing it right. Note that Reverend McCollum had three clear, positive goals (none of which were "and I want people to know that we don't worship Satan or eat babies").

I had set out with three main goals to accomplish for our community which was the real focus of my trip. My first goal was to have us seen by others as a community with valuable things to contribute to the world. My second goal was to make alliances with other world spiritualities to join together to become a more formidable force for positive change in the world. And my third goal, was to include Pagan ideals into the mix as world leaders strive to construct a plan to achieve world peace and a sustainable planet.

Clear. Simple. Positive.

And, as an exercise, see if you can re-write this closing sentence in an otherwise outstanding media presentation concerning recent (and wildly successful) Pagan efforts to raise money for relief efforts in Japan: "And we are getting rid of the myth that Pagans cannot act together." (Remember Lakoff's point: When you attempt to negate a frame, you invoke it.)


Picture found here.

Things That Make This Urban Witch Smile

Mark Bittman:

We’re not just buying, we’re growing | Urban agriculture is on the rise. If you’re smirking, let me remind you that in 1943, 20 million households (three-fifths of the population at that point) grew more than 40 percent of all the vegetables we ate. City governments are catching on, changing zoning codes and policies to make them more ag-friendly, and even planting edible landscaping on city hall properties. Detroit, where the world’s largest urban farm is under development, has warmly and enthusiastically embraced urban agriculture. Other cities, including Pittsburgh, Philadelphia (more on Philly in a week or two), New York, Toronto, Seattle, Syracuse, Milwaukee and many more, have begun efforts to cultivate urban farming movements. And if local food, grown ethically, can become more popular and widespread, and can help in the greening of cities — well, what’s wrong with that?

More, including a great Wendell Berry quote, here.

It occurs to me that Beltane would be a great time for Witches and other Pagans to do blessings for local, community, and urban gardens and farmers' markets. (Although performing the Great Rite at the farmers' market could be dicey. ;) )

Picture found here.

Here, Have a Hellebore

Photo by the author; if you copy, please link back.

What Cenk Said

Monday Poetry Blogging

What to Eat, What to Drink, and What to Leave for Poison

~CAMILLE T. DUNGY

I.
Only now, in spring, can the place be named:
tulip poplar, daffodil, crab apple,
dogwood, budding pink-green, white-green, yellow
on my knowing. All winter I was lost.
Fall, I found myself here, with no texture
my fingers know. Then, worse, the white longing
that downed us deep three months. No flower heat.
That was winter. But now, in spring, the buds
flock our trees. Ten million exquisite buds,
tiny and loud, flaring their petalled wings,
bellowing from ashen branches vibrant
keys, the chords of spring’s triumph: fisted heart,
dogwood; grail, poplar; wine spray, crab apple.
The song is drink, is color. Come. Now. Taste.

II.
The song is drink, is color. Come now, taste
what the world has to offer. When you eat
you will know that music comes in guises—
bold of crepe myrtle, sweet of daffodil—
beyond sound, guises they never told you
could be true. And they aren’t. Except they are
so real now, this spring, you know them, taste them.
Green as kale, the songs of spring, bright as wine,
the music. Faces of this season grin
with clobbering wantonness—see the smiles
open on each branch?—until you, too, smile.
Wide carnival of color, carnival
of scent. We’re all lurching down streets, drunk now
from the poplar’s grail. Wine spray: crab apple.

III.
From the poplar’s grail, wine spray. Crab apple
brightens jealously to compete. But by
the crab apple’s deep stain, the tulip tree
learns modesty. Only blush, poplar learns,
lightly. Never burn such a dark-hued fire
to the core. Tulip poplar wants herself
light under leaf, never, like crab apple,
heavy under tart fruit. Never laden.
So the poplar pours just a hint of wine
in her cup, while the crab apple, wild one,
acts as if her body were a fountain.
She would pour wine onto you, just let her.
Shameless, she plants herself, and delivers,
down anyone’s street, bright invitations.

IV.
Down anyone’s street-bright invitations.
Suck ‘em. Swallow ‘em. Eat them whole. That’s right,
be greedy about it. The brightness calls
and you follow because you want to taste,
because you want to be welcomed inside
the code of that color: red for thirst; green
for hunger; pink, a kiss; and white, stain me
now. Soil me with touching. Is that right?
No? That’s not, you say, what you meant. Not what
you meant at all? Pardon. Excuse me, please.
Your hand was reaching, tugging at this shirt
of flowers and I thought, I guess I thought
you were hungry for something beautiful.
Come now. The brightness here might fill you up.

V.
Come. Now the brightness here might fill you up,
but tomorrow? Who can know what the next
day will bring. It is like that, here, in spring.
Four days ago, the dogwood was a fist
in protest. Now look. Even she unfurls
to the pleasure of the season. Don’t be
ashamed of yourself. Don’t be. This happens
to us all. We have thrown back the blanket.
We’re naked and we’ve grown to love ourselves.
I tell you, do not be ashamed. Who is
more wanton than the dancing crepe myrtle?
Is she ashamed? Why, even the dogwood,
that righteous tree of God’s, is full of lust
exploding into brightness every spring.

VI.
Exploding into brightness every spring,
I draw you close. I wonder, do you know
how long I’ve wanted to be here? Each year
you grasp me, lift me, carry me inside.
Glee is the body of the daffodil
reaching tubed fingers through the day, feeling
her own trumpeted passion choiring air
with hot, colored song. This is a texture
I love. This is life. And, too, you love me,
inhale my whole being every spring. Gone
winter, heavy clod whose icy body
fell into my bed. I must leave you, but
I’ll wait through heat, fall, freeze to hear you cry:
Daffodils are up. My God, what beauty!

VII.
Daffodils are up, my God! What beauty
concerted down on us last night. And if
I sleep again, I’ll wake to a louder
blossoming, the symphony smashing down
hothouse walls, and into the world: music.
Something like the birds’ return, each morning’s
crescendo rising toward its brightest pitch,
colors unfurling, petals alluring.
The song, the color, the rising ecstasy
of spring. My God. This beauty. This, this
is what I’ve hoped for. All my life is here
in the unnamed core—dogwood, daffodil,
tulip poplar, crab apple, crepe myrtle—
only now, in spring, can the place be named.

Picture found here.

Thou Shalt Not

I'm often baffled at Christians who insist that every single word in the Bible is a literal truth and that everyone has to follow rules developed thousands of years ago for people who lived in a nomadic society, want their 10 commandments inscribed on every square inch of government property not taken up with nativity scenes, but feel that it's ok to, for example, kill abortion providers or, in this story, steal signs from stores selling Pagan supplies. It's not as if those bits are ambiguous; "Thou Shalt Not Kill," and "Thou Shalt Not Steal" are pretty clear-cut. No exemptions for situational ethics or in service to some higher good. After all, "'Vengence is mine,' sayeth the Lord."

Speeding to get away from the police, ok, you can argue about whether that falls under "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's," but the not stealing bit seems fairly unambiguous.

And, as always, if you're going, as this story does, to capitalize "Christian," then you should, as this story fails to do, capitalize "Pagan." Both are umbrella terms for a variety of religions.

Picture found here.

Ivo! Evoe! Hail, Kore! Ivo! Evoe!

One of the morning prayers that I say is, "Mother, Wash away from my eyes the enchantment of forgetfulness. Allow me, as much as I can know, as much as I can see, to realize that we are all connected. Remind me Mother, that it's all just You pouring You into You." A bit of this prayer is based upon a quote from J. D. Salinger and I forget the source from which I borrowed the rest of it, but I'm grateful to that person for helping me to articulate how I feel about those times when we allow ourselves to be ensorcelled by the Overculture into thinking that the world can be divided into the Sacred and the Mundane, that there are "muggles," that magic and mystery and connection to the Ineffable is what happens only inside a sacred circle, censed with sage and inscribed with occult symbols. And I work hard most days, I do, to keep my eyes open, to see with True Sight, to remember that it's all one immense and breathtakingly beautiful and dangerous and perfect and safe and glittering Web and that I'm a node on that Web, but also that I am the Web and the Web is me. I work at it and some days I do better than others.

And then some days, Grace comes flooding through some phloem in the Universe and I'm synchronistically, randomly, at the right corner, on the right street, at the right moment and there's no work involved at all. The Web is so real and visible and crystal clear that I can't imagine, literally can't imagine, how it can ever seem otherwise. And then I'm the Web wondering how that node ever imagined itself anything but a part of the whole. And then even that is part, a perfect part, of the Web.

I had to go to my office this morning, Sabbat or no, but I left at 2:00 to head home, do some errands, and make ready for Ostara. Sitting at the light, I caught a glimpse of her: a girl at that exact age after her childhood and before her teens. She was reedy and thin, not self-conscious, but unconsciously conscious of herself in the way that no child can ever be. She carried some kind of a book or folder, up flat against her chest, and was skip-running a bit to catch up to her father. I looked away, waiting for the light to turn green, thinking of what needed to be done when I got home. I glanced back; she and her father were now at the corner, waiting for the same light to change. She said something to her father, I could see her braces.

And, then, it happened. All in a moment, all of the enchantment washed away from my eyes, and my body and all my senses were simply, perfectly, by Grace, a mechanism for perceiving the Web from inside the Web, the Web's own unconscious self-consciousness of itself. The sun got inside the girl's hair, which was that heart-wrenchingly beautiful color of carroty-red that is not replicated anywhere else in nature. Her hair was simply, perfectly, by Grace, a mechanism for the Sun to make itself manifest and to show its beauty; without that hair, that color, at that moment, on that girl, at that corner, the Sun could never have been all that it was born to be, and the Sun knew it and I knew it and we were both awed by it.

And there, sitting at the red light, surrounded by the city, headed for the Teddy Roosevelt bridge, there, I was -- and best of all, knew myself to be -- in the presence of The Kore, in the sunlight, on the day of Osara. Not, symbolically, not metaphorically, not in any of the ways that it would make sense to say that I was, just a few feet North of that girl, in the presence of The Kore, but, simply, in the presence of The Kore. Not that The Kore "rode" her or that she somehow pulled The Kore down into her. Not that she stopped being a flesh-and-blood girl with a history and a future and braces. Not that she had ever not been The Kore and not that . . . . Well, that is why the Goddess says, "And you who seek to know Me, know that the seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery: for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without. For behold, I have been with you from the beginning, and I am That which is attained at the end of desire." Words stop working.

And the light changed and I turned my eyes, full of tears and light, back to the road and, shaking, drove on, deeper into the Web.

May your Ostara be blessed, may all that is good and healthy and fresh bloom into your life, and may you have reason to exclaim, "Hail, Kore! Ivo Evoe!"

Picture found here.

Sunday Ballet Blogging

A Poem for Ostara

The Enkindled Spring
~D.H. Lawrence

This spring as it comes bursts up in bonfires green,
Wild puffing of emerald trees, and flame-filled bushes,
Thorn-blossom lifting in wreaths of smoke between
Where the wood fumes up, and the flickering, watery rushes.

I am amazed at this spring, this conflagration
Of green fires lit on the soil of the earth, this blaze
Of growing, these sparks that puff in wild gyration,
Faces of people streaming across my gaze.

And I, what fountain of fire am I among
This leaping combustion of spring? My spirit is tossed
About like a shadow buffeted in the throng
Of flames, a shadow that's gone astray, and is lost.

Picture found here.

Spring Reads

hat tip/SJ Tucker.

Thank You!

Many, many thanks to the very kind "Anonymous Reader" who sent me A Pagan Ritual Prayer Book by Ceisiwr Serith. Here's one of my favorites:

*Here in this city, surrounded by a canyon of
buildings that seem to block out Nature,
I pray to the gods of nature, who are present everywhere,
here no less than in the wild forest,
or the empty plains over which the storm winds blow,
or the ocean that hides its immense number of life
in its depths.
For we human beings are not separate from Nature,
and have our own nature,
and this nature is above all to gather into
communities,
and to form societies,
and to build cities.
So I stand here in this city and praise Nature,
present here all around us.
How could we keep Her out?

*Open my eyes, Dyeus Pter, to those around me.
Open my heart, Gouwinda, with your loving care.
Unite me with them, Xaryomen,
into a society of individuals,
based on reciprocal exchange.

Picture (of my city) found here.

Garden Dreaming

Hail Kore!

My New Name for a Blog

What Cenk Said

Synchronicity -- Wherever You Go, There It Is

There's this:

You don’t have to wait until things reach a critical point before you take stock of your life. Make it a habit to regularly sit down, be with yourself and ask yourself what you want, if you are happy with how you spend your time, if your relationships are strong or just a place to gossip. Go on a retreat, take a weekend to write in your journal and read inspiring books. Step away from your life in order to look at it more deeply. To paraphrase Michael Gerber: “Work ON your life, not just IN it.”

TAKE it off.

What are you still settling for in your life, in your surroundings, in your schedule? What’s draining you? What’s not a “hell yes?”

Be ruthless in answering these questions. And then, be ruthless in letting go. Take it off and feel the space that’s created from not settling for excess maybe’s in your life. Make your life one big YES – and live from that place.

How to Heal a Planet: A Give-and-Take Guide by Christine Kane

and, there's this:

And my time is particularly precious right now, because I’m not only writing but also teaching full-time and attempting to finish a doctoral dissertation. And I have a seven-year-old.

To be honest, I think what I did to make time for all those things is cut out the things that wasted time, that didn’t seem worthwhile. But that took looking at life a little differently.

So for example, once upon a time I used to make dinner. I would get home from the university and make dinner, which took about an hour. When we lived in the city, that was easy to do and still left time in the evenings. But here, after my commute, I am far too tired in the evenings. So instead of making dinner, I rely on organic frozen dinners. I know, they’re not homemade, but they’re as healthy as anything I would make myself, and Ophelia gets to try all sorts of things I don’t know how to make. . . . And while they’re cooking in the oven, I can write a blog post.

There are all sorts of other ways in which I decided to simplify my life and make time for what I thought truly mattered. For example, I decided a long time ago never to buy any clothes that required dry-cleaning. . . . All of the dishes and utensils go into the dishwasher, including the silver plate. If silver plate is used every day, it doesn’t need polishing. I have furniture that doesn’t need a lot of care, solid wood pieces. The floor requires sweeping and the rugs must be vacuumed, but this is a small house, relatively easy to keep clean. (It could be both cleaner and neater, but here I’ve decided that I’m not going to feel guilty about spending time writing instead of cleaning. Because after all, everyone who visits tells me how neat my house is. So that’s good enough, right?)

. . .

I should say, too, that there are a lot of things people consider leisure activities that I don’t bother with, partly because to me they’re not all that interesting. Going to movies in theaters, for example. Any sport that involves a ball. (I’ve discussed, haven’t I, my experience with balls? We repel each other, like magnets. Imagine how difficult that made kickball, in elementary school!) Going sailing, just to go sailing rather than getting anywhere. Going to any sort of gym for exercise. (Why? I’d rather go to a dance class.) Going to a spa. (Why? I’d rather learn to spin wool, or fight with a sword, or just about anything.) And I don’t shop, except when I’m going to an old book store, a thrift store, an antiques market. If I’m going to shop, it’s going to be an adventure. (Malls. Why?) That’s a good rule, actually: don’t do anything unless it’s an adventure. The other stuff: what’s the point? (Unless you like doing it, of course, and then you should. But don’t do things just because you feel as though you ought to.)

Not that it’s effortless. There are days when I’m tired, days when I don’t want to write. But I do think that writing is not about having time, but about making time. It’s about priorities. It’s about doing the things that truly matter, and trying to minimize the rest.

Making Time by Theodora Goss

In the end, it all comes down to Mary Oliver's Very Important Question: "Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" (I'm not a tattoo girl, but if I ever did get tattoos, one of them would be that question, somewhere like on my forearm where I could see it all the time. (The other would be one of my favorite quotes from Rumi: "The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you./Don't go back to sleep./You must ask for what you really want./Don't go back to sleep."))

Picture found here.

Read for Me?

I know that one is supposed to pretend otherwise, but I love birthdays. I love to make a fuss when family and friends have birthdays, and I love my own. Everyone deserves at least one day a year to celebrate the fact that they were lucky enough to incarnate on this breathtaking Goddess of a planet and that they've made it for another trip around the sun.

I'm 55 today, and proud of every single wrinkle, grey hair, and scar.

Like a lot of people, I do a reading for myself on my birthday, asking for some guidance for the coming year. (I want to make each one count!)

This year, I pulled:

A quality I need to foster this year: Playfulness

A Goddess with whom I need to develop a deeper relationship: Pele

My body/health/physical existence: Page of Pentacles

My job: 3 of Cups

My family/home/garden: The Star

My spiritual life & circle: The World

If you feel inclined, I'd welcome your readings in comments. May you, too, enjoy many wonderful birthdays!

Wick

Loosen up the roots and let the Earth get warm.

Monday Poetry Blogging

I am continuing to sit at my altar for Japan.

A Song on the End of the World

~ Czeslaw Milosz

On the day the world ends
A bee circles a clover,
A fisherman mends a glimmering net.
Happy porpoises jump in the sea,
By the rainspout young sparrows are playing
And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.

On the day the world ends
Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,
A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,
Vegetable peddlers shout in the street
And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,
The voice of a violin lasts in the air
And leads into a starry night.

And those who expected lightning and thunder
Are disappointed.
And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumps
Do not believe it is happening now.
As long as the sun and the moon are above,
As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,
As long as rosy infants are born
No one believes it is happening now.

Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet
Yet is not a prophet, for he’s much too busy,
Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:
There will be no other end of the world,
There will be no other end of the world.

Warsaw, 1944

Picture found here.

Things Will Die

On Being a Gardener: From "And I Shall Have Some Peace There" from Margaret Roach on Vimeo.

Margaret Roach, reading from her new book And I Shall Have Some Peace There.

You've got to love a gardening book titled after a poem, especially a poem that includes the words "bee-loud glade," which I think make the world's second-best poetic description, just after the ineffable "wine-dark sea".

Sunday Ballet Blogging