Wind Of The Willow

י"ב בתמוז תשס״ט
Faunus 13

Last night before retiring for bed, I drew an Ogham divination card to read the energy in the atmosphere. That card was Willow, the fid saille. Associated with Goddess, the mistress of the mysteries, the moon, water, protection on deep journeys into the underworld, the power of binding, the harp, music, honey and mead, knowledge of time and proper timing, poetry and psalmistry, harmony, ancestral communication, dreaming, seership, understanding, and all that is feminine, saille has four steps to the right of the stemline (druim).

I dreamt.

I was among a small group of individuals who had been gathered together for the purpose of being moved around in the world as a matter of protection. We were loaded onto an airplane and flown 'above it' and 'out of harm's way'. The scene had the feeling of high level otherworldly espionage - those from whom we kept safely away were not of the normative human world, but of the mystical hidden world. Those of us flown to safety were masters in training. There were only a very few of us in the entire world.

Once we landed, we all went our separate ways, each of us accompanied by a pair of masters who had already crossed the fuzzy liminal line which distinguished novices from masters. The masters of protection worked in pairs. I had a pair watching over me, a master in training.

The liminal line that few novices survived (to become masters in training) was the place of beginning seership. At the place of beginning seership, a seer's eyes were opened to see the hidden but had not yet come to understanding. Seership at this level was literally fascinating - one became mesmerized by her or his visions and gazed into them with innocent curiosity in the effort to gain a clearer view of the vision. There was nothing inherently wrong with the novice doing this. The problem with doing this was that a deathly trap had been deliberately woven into the very act of doing it by ... by this ancient Creator Creature of the Deep Sea.

Each evolving seer had a trap woven since the beginning of creation into her or his budding power of seership. As soon as the person began to see, the act of seeing triggered a shift in the reality around the seer such a lethal lazerbeam was generated that the novice seer could not see. The lazerbeam was drawn from the seer's own sight, to focus specifically and directly on the seer, to kill her or him. A novice seer, though able to see a little bit into deeper reality, couldn't see deep enough to see the lazerbeam focused on to kill the novice seer. Only a master seer could see it.

From a set aside place in reality, I saw the lazerbeam focused on to kill me the first time I began to see. I also saw the pair of masters charged to protect me push me out of its path such that I had not been killed. From there, they had been teaching me to see it and how to avoid its lethal touch, as my seership developed into understanding. As novice seership evolved to include understanding, the lethal lazerbeam would no longer exist because a master seer's mind was so fast and moved at such a high vibration as to make the lazerbeam nothing by default before it became anything. Nevertheless, very few in the world ever survived the liminal line where the lazerbeam operated, where novice seers were either destroyed or lived on to become masters in training.

The Creator Creature in the Deep Sea was a masculine force in a silent Deep Sea. It appeared as a big worm-like fish. I saw it emerge from the hidden depths, and it spoke to me in defense of its killing of seers, saying thus, "I am the Creator Who brought All into being. I Create and I can Take Away."

"What a chutzpahdik little fish," I thought. On the one hand, I understood that in some manner it was the Creator. On the other hand, I understood that despite that it may be the Creator (in terms of Bringing Forth energy), it was still a fish Creature in the Deep Sea. The Deep Sea in which it existed had remained silent in the stillness following its boast. Something perturbed me about this silence.

The Sea is a feminine energy. Now, while the masculine Creator fish had spoken, the Sea he was dwelling in had remained silent. I saw and understood my own power.

I woke up.

"No!" I spoke with the Voice of the Wind of the Willow to the little Creator fish Creature, "you don't have the Authority to Take Away. The power of Destruction is a Female Authority."

Simply walk four steps in the complex Land on the left with a Voice Who Speaks. It is.

Deep.

Path To The Old Ones

י"ג שבט תשס"ט
Imbolgen 13

This past week I've felt particularly under psychic attack. Literal happenings have contributed to this feeling, though their actual role in the psychic pressure surrounding me has been unclear. Nevertheless, right before leaving work yesterday, I was given mildly disturbing news. Consequently then, I went into this shabbat with a feeling of uneasiness and unrest.

To get to the source of and to eliminate the negative energy disrupting my shabbat rest, I enlisted the aid of my Ancestors. Simply, my spell was "help me."

A little later in the evening, I drew one card of divination from my Well Worn Path deck. That card was The Old Ones. The teaching of this card calls us to examine the foundation of our beliefs. The Old Ones of Tradition are prehuman Primal Earth spirits of the Forgotten Age in complete unity with Ancestral Memory. They stand, as a Multiplicity in Unity, as first stirrings of Human Awareness in connection with All, and in singularity as the Seed of Religious Awareness. The Old Ones call you to attention, to wonder how you have arrived where you are, to ponder where you are going, and to lead you to the Memory you now seek.

The Old Ones answered my call.

On the divination card is depicted four pale-cast standing megalithic stones with weathered faces surrounding the personal altar of Human Awareness. Faces of Living Spirits see from within the trees of the forest behind the stones, gathering around The Gathering. I lovingly placed this divination card, along with a vintage skeleton key I have, a specimen of blood root, an amber gemstone, a fava bean, and a glass skull (purchased for Samhain) on my altar in simple ritual acknowledgment of my Ancestors, The Old Ones.

Later in the evening, getting ready for bed, a vision 'startled into' my awareness. As I walked past my altar to leave the room to do something, my consciousness 'jumped' and I was seeing ...

... among The Old Ones. 'I' was both an individual megalithic Standing Stone and, simultaneously, the collective of megalithic Standing Stones. 'I' was a complete link in a timeless chain of transmission. 'I' too was an Ancestor, even in the present, to my descendents. Time was both present and absent. 'I' stood as a timeless Ancestor and as a being in time seeking my Ancestors. It was an incredible split moment in time.

My seeing originated among pale-cast Stones set among 'seeing' trees of the forest, like those depicted on the divination card. Proceeding from my origin of seeing, a path opened up before me, leading to a site of dark-cast Standing Stones (like Stonehenge) set in a clearing and standing like black shadows against the full silvery-white moon-like light of the earth. Though the ground was not raised, it was clearly a 'raised place' (גאות, geut/high tide).

I knew immediately that the Path I had come upon was a faery path [1] (kefitzat haderekh in kabbalah), and that the 'jump' (dilug) in consciousness I was experiencing was one example of the phenomenon known in witchcraft as Second Sight.

And now, my spirit is at rest. There is no separation between myself, my Land, my Ancestors and Divine Awareness.

Footnote:

[1] Short excerpt on faery lines/paths from The Living World of Faery (R.J. Stewart): "Faery lines may be broadly described under two headings. First are the ancient or enduring lines that are confirmed by folklore, including 'secret' lines which are known traditionally to individuals or families. Second are those which are discovered either by accident or through intent ... once you are attuned to the faery tradition you will be able to find such lines for yourself. A feary line is where power flows over and through the Land, but also flows between realms. Think as lines and paths as alive, not circuits or conduits, but living connectives ... an organic whole."