Thoughts at the Twilight of the Year

Here we are, the last day of 2021. Perhaps it’s because I just listened to too many astrology podcasts in a row, but I’m having a hard time feeling any hope for 2022. I pulled the shadow-face of Elder for my plant divination card this morning—and it’s not wrong. It’s a time when the weight […]

Ode to Poison Ivy

Hail, shining jewel of the forest’s edge, who, guarding the damp and shade-worn oaks, graces the green boughs of the sun-warmed hedge and hides in the root-skirts of the Wort Folks. Strong oils weep, coating your arrows-leaves: a warning, a curse to any so arrogant, ignorant, or foolish, your fierce spears fine punishment for woeful […]

Review: Sacred Actions by Dana O’Driscoll

For those of you who haven’t come across the 19th century Japanese word tsundoku, it’s a wonderful term that in my case has resulted in liberation from the guilt of often buying more books than I’m able to read at one time (the English equivalent bibliomania sounds too much like a disease for my taste!). […]

Emergence

It’s been a while. Two years, in fact. That definitely qualifies as “a while”. It would be nice to blame my absence on the pandemic, or the previous administration, or unemployment, or a new relationship, or any of a dozen terrible, wonderful, mundane things that have happened in the past two years. But the fact […]

Spirits, Spirits, Everywhere

And not a drop to drink? No, sorry, wrong poem. Sometimes it can be a bit hard for folks to wrap their heads around how a person can have a devotional practice without having a patron, per se, or at least being henotheistic or monist for that matter. I’m one of those rare, blessed writers […]