art

Let’s Hear it for the Men!

Posted on December 20, 2013 by Molly

A lot of my work focuses on women and has for many years. I don’t actually feel any particular need to rationalize, explain, or justify this—working with women is something that has held deep meaning, relevance, enjoyment, passion, and purpose for me ever since I started working in a battered women’s shelter as a volunteer when I was seventeen years old. My age has since doubled and the type of work I do with women has morphed, expanded, shifted, and changed texture over time, but it is a strong, defining, consistent thread that is tightly woven through my professional life, my academic work, my volunteer work, my teaching, and my spiritual path. I’ve noticed, however, that people occasionally misinterpret my focus on women and my enjoyment in creating rituals for women, for honoring “women’s mysteries,” and for exploring thealogy and the Goddess, as well as helping women with birth and breastfeeding, somehow indicates that I don’t value men. My enjoyment of priestessing women’s circles is not a statement about men, it is a statement about something I like to do with my time and life energy. I also value and appreciate my husband, my sons, my dad, and the other men in my life. I have family full moon rituals each month with my husband and our kids (two sons, one daughter). My dad, husband, and sons enjoy our annual family winter solstice ritual. My husband and I work together making our goddess jewelry and I love that this collaborative project represents a harmonizing of our energies, efforts, and time.

I agree with Melissa Raphael’s remark that, “Thealogy has no wish to simply reproduce the masculinist account of divine sovereignty and redemptive power in feminized form” (p. 201). To me this is one of the most beneficial and beautiful elements of Goddess feminism.” And, from Judith Laura’s book, Goddess Matters, she describes Goddess as “she who flows through all” and contrasts this with “God as manipulator.” Goddess is “She what connects us, not only like a link in a chain but also like an electrical current.”

These things said, I’ve been meaning for several months now to give a shout-out to the male bloggers that I very much enjoy. I subscribe to a lot of blogs. I like a lot of writers, but there are only a handful from whom I read every post they write as soon as they post it. These three guys definitely make that list:

John Beckett writes Under the Ancient Oaks on Patheos. He initially appealed to me because he is associated with a UU church and we have that in common. I continued to read him though because he is very logical, solid, practical, and even-handed in his writing and interaction with others, with a nice dash of interesting polytheistic stuff thrown in. One of his recent posts about pagan unity is a good example of the practical style I find so appealing about his blog:

I prefer a Big Tent approach to Paganism – a big tent with four main posts. Some of us are right in the middle, some cling tightly to only one post, while others are in one of the corners. Some people are close enough for me to see them but not close enough for me to tell if they’re actually under the tent or if they’re standing outside. What about Green Christians? I think they’re outside, but their fundamentalist brethren over in the next camp think they’re standing right in the middle of us. What about the Kabbalists? I think they’re in, but many of them say they’re only in the Jewish tent. The Hindus are over in that corner – some of them are insistent they’re in our tent and others are just as insistent they’re not.

Complicated? Yep. Messy? Sure is. Living, growing, reproducing organisms are like that.

The problem with big tents is, well, they’re big. Try to embrace the whole tent and you can find yourself bouncing back and forth between pouring libations to Zeus, protesting fracking, organizing the Beltane picnic and meditating on The Fool. Those are all worthwhile things to do, but they can lead to a personal religion that is the proverbial mile wide and an inch deep. That’s a problem – if you’ve been reading Under the Ancient Oaks for any time at all you know one of my favorite soapboxes is the need for spiritual depth.

via Pagan Unity.

John Halstead writes The Allergic Pagan (as well as another blog at Witches and Pagans and for Humanistic Paganism). He’s willing to tackle somewhat controversial issues and engage in intelligent conversation and debate. He never fails to make me think and is just a really smart guy with a lot of interesting stuff to say. I recently shared this quote in a different post, but trust me that he has lots of posts that rank as thought-provoking favorites:

This is your Goddess,” my wife said to me smiling.

“It’s the slimy side of her,” I responded.

“This is life,” she replied.

It’s strange when a seemingly mundane moment is transformed into a sacred one. I looked at my Mormon wife standing in the ocean, holding a shell, and I heard her speak the words of a true priestess: “This is your Goddess. This is life.”

via My Goddess is gross.

Jason Mankey is the often light-hearted and funny, but not afraid to be serious and occasionally blunt, author of Raise the Horns at Patheos. I love the way he writes about ritual, modern paganism, personal practices, and the way he digs into holiday origins. One of his recent posts that really spoke to me was this one:

In our own practice becoming a High Priestess and Priest was not something we aspired to. It came about because people viewed the two of us that way. I’ll admit to even being uncomfortable with the title on occasion. I have a thirst for knowledge and history and write pretty good rituals, but there are many Witches and Pagans who know so much more than I ever will. That a few people think of me in such august company is flattering, but I often feel like I don’t belong. (I got weirded out when one of our coven members referred to me as “a spiritual leader,” I’m much more comfortable just being the guy who drinks cider and listens to 80′s hair metal.)

Even with my occasional reservations about the title I feel like I’ve earned it, and I know my wife has earned her title of High Priestess. How do you know you’ve earned the right to call yourself a High Priestess or High Priest? You’ve earned the title when someone asks you to officiate their handfasting or wedding. You’ve earned the title when every eye in the circle glances your way looking for instruction or guidance. You’ve earned the title when your High Priestess deems you ready for elevation. It’s an honor that finds you, and it finds you when you are ready.

via Becoming a High Priestess.

When I first began writing this post back in October, Teo Bishop would definitely have been on my list as well. I really enjoyed his contemplative, gentle, personal, enriching style of writing. If you follow pagan bloggers at all, you’ve probably surmised that something happened and it involved Teo Bishop. If you follow me and read my other blog, you also know that I, personally, spend virtually zero time talking about “current events” and/or controversies within either of my primary fields. I call this dissecting of current events a “putting out fires” mode of blogging and I just don’t like to do it myself. It seems reactive in a way that bothers me, and reminds me a bit too much of the dominating, semi-oppressive energy that can spread so fast in other areas/topics (dare I mention Miley Cyrus, for example?). So, I’ll just say that I read Teo’s blog Bishop in the Grove for at least two years. This month he decided to discontinue Bishop in the Grove as he moves in a different direction with his spiritual path. His new path doesn’t hold a lot of interest for me, though his same contemplative writing style is still engaging, he’s no longer speaking in a spiritual language that I find compelling. He should still get a shout-out though, because I’m pretty sure it was his blog that introduced me to interesting pagan men’s blogs I love to read and learn from.

In keeping with the collaborative energy with my husband that I mentioned at the beginning of this post, we’ve been painstakingly finishing up our first ever free-standing pewter casting that is male! While I made a polymer clay “daddy goddess” sculpture before when requested by my toddler daughter, most of my artwork is Goddess/female-centric. After one night of full-moon drumming with my husband and boys, I knew the time had come to introduce some masculine energy into my art and the result was this little drumming team:

The casts are still on the rough side and we’re having a terrible time getting their hands to work correctly. Many, many, many of these little guys have been plopped back into the melting pot for another rebirth (my husband often turns them face down, so he doesn’t have to watch their little “faces” looking up at him as they dissolve). We’re keeping these two sets, but probably need to start over with another sculpt altogether as well as a fresh mold because we do anything more with this design idea. I felt like they were a symbol of our own work together, as well as the harmony possible between men and women in the rest of the world.

They work together and I like them!

This morning when I went to the woods to take these pictures, the cinnamon sticks I offered up last night were sitting there on the rock in this arrangement evocative of an “equal” sign. I thought that was pretty cosmic.

Categories: art, community, feminism, feminist thealogy, resources, spirituality, women | 6 Comments

Whew!

Posted on December 12, 2013 by Molly

Light from the back porch (saying, “come back inside!”) and light from the moon.

“We are nature. We are nature seeing nature. The red-winged blackbird flies in us.” –Susan Griffin (Open Mind, 5/29)

I got to the woods at 11:00 tonight after a long day of grading papers, interspersed with household tasks and kid needs. I keep trying to remember that this is only a very temporary phase and my usual “balance (such as it is) will be restored soon. I enjoyed looking at the moon (which is half right now, even though it my pictures it looks almost full) and the sensation of the quietness in the woods tonight. Still snowy, dark. Almost silent. I tipped my head back and watched the lights from a far off something flying noiselessly across the sky, noticing how the sound of it followed, rather than preceded it. I listened to my own breath and became aware of a humming sound, a ringing almost, in my ears. Just the biological effect of having my head tilted back, or tinnitus, or the divine hum and heartbeat of the universe, I’m not sure. The sound I think we hear when everything else is quiet and our minds are still. I heard a guest on Voices of the Sacred Feminine talk about this once—that if you settle down and listen to the sound behind everything else, it is a “divine buzz” or hum or the “ommm” to which the world vibrates.

“Mother earth, sister sea,

giving birth, energy

reaching out,

touching me

lovingly.”

–Miriam Therese Winter (Open Mind, 7/5)

In other news, we’re having a holiday 10% sale in our etsy shop (use code: HOLIDAYS10OFF). I love that these goddess pendants represent a collaborative creative effort with my husband. Feels like a union of energies.

Categories: art, nature, night, quotes, self-care, spirituality, woodspriestess | Leave a comment

Self-Improvement

Posted on December 5, 2013 by Molly

So, two days ago I wrote about giving up the idea of personal perfection and yesterday I mentioned enjoying how the internet “smallens” the world. One of those smallening experiences is the opportunity to be Facebook friends with authors I admire and one of those authors is Jennifer Louden. She is one of my all-time favorite writers and I have her books—The Pregnant Woman’s Comfort Book, The Women’s Comfort Book, The Couples’ Comfort Book, The Women’s Retreat Book, and The Life Organizer (new paperbook edition and digital support kit is available now). I’ve read her books for years and return to them often—she has a unique ability to not be a self-help author, while still being helpful and about working with the self. I’m planning to work through The Life Organizer again beginning in January (I did it in 2008 and actually kept it up the entire year). Jen has always seemed real to me. Approachable. Authentic. Not fake or gimmicky at all. I don’t get the “sales” feeling from her, nor do I get a glitzed-up perfection image. And, though she writes about spiritual topics, I detect no touch of what I would semi-meanly call “shaman chic,” which is a surefire way to rub me the wrong way. Anyway, we’re Facebook friends and I comment at various times on her status updates, a recent one being:

“Be willing to look at your own life and want more for yourself without beating yourself up or making it about another self-improvement plan.”

Ooh! Such a good tip and yet one I wasn’t sure I could actually figure out. So, I commented to that effect: “I joke that I’m tired of my life being one long self-improvement project. However, I also want to reach my own potential!” She said she’d write a blog post for me and today, she did. See. World, smallened. So cool. While I perhaps didn’t explain myself in full—what I think I really meant when I used the word “potential” in my comment was that, “I worry about whether ‘self-acceptance’ can be a sort of a screen for hiding behind or an excuse for ‘giving up’ and not fully developing yourself”—I still loved and learned from the insights she offered in this post, especially this:

Your potential isn’t something to be reached, it’s something to be trusted.

After I read her post with a couple of tears prickling in my eyes, I shared my done-with-perfection spontaneous woodsvision with her. I didn’t write about it here on the day it happened because I didn’t feel like I had enough time and besides it was kind of…weird.

I saw that this perfection thing was a white worm that was wrapped around my heart and also curved into the grooves of my brain. Sitting there on the rock in the woods, I unwound it. Pulled it out. It was long and ropy and invasive. I held it out in open hands and it floated off down the hill, dissolving into a million sparkles in the sunshine until I couldn’t see it any longer.

I felt lighter after this and like I really was, truly done. I don’t need that wormy thing any more. I had the same sense of certainty about being done with apologizing for things as well. Hope it really lasts!

Today, my woodstask was actually taking new pictures for our updated listings on etsy. See, sometimes there are visions, sometimes there are poems, and sometimes there is business. I love how the same space has born witness to it all over the course of the year. I feel like I both bear witness and am witnessed there in that same space. Earlier in the day I’d been thinking, again, about my dissertation. In shifting my thesis topic to my woodspriestess experiment, I feel more confident that I have something original to offer. It is an offering of myself and my own experiences—and a personal process of spiritual inquiry that I hope can be of some benefit to others. With birth as the focus of my dissertation, while I might have 200+ pages of notes and over ten years worth of reading, writing, and thinking, I’m not sure I have anything new to offer. However, looking at my sculptures, I felt a renewed sense of confidence that this is actually what I have to say that is new. These figures are my language and my lessons, the symbols of what I’ve learned, how I’ve grown, and what matters to me. I’d already decided to “frame” my thesis in the context of my sculptures and I feel somewhat confident that I can draw that over to my dissertation and use a sculptural framework for my narrative as well…

P.S. I also decided that I’m not going to waste my energy fretting over literally getting my daily post published by midnight. When I say “today,” I’m not talking about the day we’ve technically just slipped over into. I’m talking about what happened before I stayed up past midnight and finished this post!

Categories: art, birth, books, self-care, woodspriestess | Leave a comment

Practice

Posted on December 2, 2013 by Molly

“My writing is a practice. It requires that sort of daily repetition and solitude—being with oneself—awareness—awareness of one’s body, awareness of one’s thoughts, awareness of one’s own process. And meditation makes me more aware of everything I do, so it makes the movements within my writing process clearer to me.”

–Susan Griffin (in Open Mind, 10/16)

It is interesting to see that I’ve decided to begin this new daily writing practice at a time in which I don’t feel much like writing any blog posts! Hmm. Today, my time in the woods was abbreviated slightly by the return of my small children, but before their voices came floating over to me, I was sitting with the sound of woodpeckers. There were at least three different ones near me of at least two types and it sounded like there were more that I didn’t see. As winter steadily approaches, I’ve noticed that there is much less bird song in the forest lately, but today (warmer) the woods were alive with the sounds of birds and squirrels. Woodschorus.

Sunset

Got obsessed with collecting acorn caps to make hats for Christmas ornament elves

A mysterious hole in the ground that wasn’t there yesterday.

Can you see the little woodpecker?

I’ve also noticed that while I enjoy being alone, I’m feeling a little cooped up and isolated lately–the Thanksgiving holiday meant that our usual weekly activities were different from what they usually are and I’ve gone nearly a week without seeing anyone other than my immediate family and my parents. My nerves feel a little shot by the voices of my darling children, I’m really feeling extremely done co-sleeping with my toddler daughter, and all three of them seem out of sorts and extra messy, wild, loud, disagreeable and irritable too. I think they also miss seeing their friends and going places.

With winter’s approach and the turn of the wind to cold, it has also come to my attention that I want to create some more sacred spaces inside my home. Before I began my woodspractice, I used to sit at my living room altar every morning and spend some time in prayer/reflection. Now, I’ve let it get a bit dusty and so over the weekend I spent some time cleaning it up and rearranging the items a little bit. Today when I sat down at my desk to work on my classes, I lit a candle and then designed to squeeze a little altar space in front of my textbooks 🙂

I’m having trouble allowing myself the moontime downtime my body calls for as well. Though I very nearly talked myself out of it AND very nearly apologizing for wanting to do it, I did carve out a small niche of time in which to participate in Paola’s New Moon Intention call this evening. I laid down with a heat pack with a candle and a pocket goddess sculpture as a tiny altar space and listening with my eyes closed to her voice and to the intentions of the other women in the virtual sacred circle. I’m glad I gave this to myself, even though it meant people were waiting for dinner.

Yesterday, I decided that I’m no longer willing to expect myself to be perfect. I’m done with that. I’m cleaning it out. Unraveling it from around my heart and brain. Done.

“Imitate the trees. Learn to lose in order to recover, and remember that nothing stays the same for long, not even pain, psychic pain. Sit it out. Let it all pass. Let it go.” –May Sarton (in Open Mind, 10/25)

“It is a long baptism into the seas of humankind, my daughter. Better immersion than to live untouched.” –Tillie Olsen (in Open Mind, 11/8)

In keeping with the swirling change of the seasons, I fell in love with this amazing picture of Shekinah Shaking Out the Seasons by Caron McCloud (Shiloh Sophia McCloud‘s mother). For some reason it came to me today and I felt absolutely transfixed by it:

I hope there is a print of this available someday because it must go on my wishlist! And, I signed up for her free “7 day aliveness challenge” too.

Categories: art, family, introversion, moontime, nature, quotes, woodspriestess | 1 Comment

Sunday Sabbath: An Irish conachlann

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Molly

New projects I’ve been working on with my husband this week!

I follow the footsteps of my foremothers Foremothers who
gave birth to me Me, a priestess of the Goddess Goddess we
draw down to us Us, the People of the Earth Earth that
supports us all All life, even you and I I follow the footsteps
of my foremothers.

–Elizabeth Barrette
Charleston, Illinois

in Talking to Goddess, edited by D’Vorah Grenn

(Formatting as the original)

Categories: art, blessings, Goddess, poems, quotes, readings, sabbath, theapoetics | Leave a comment

Womanrunes: The Tool

Posted on October 13, 2013 by Molly

Womanrunes: The Tool. Rune of Labor. Production. Enterprise.

This is a rune of hard work. Satisfying labor. What are you unearthing? What are you digging up? What are you uncovering? What is causing sweat to drip from your brow, your cheeks to flush, and your heart to beat faster? This work can be dirty. It can be long, it can be hard. But, you can do it. You ARE doing it. Keep digging.

Remember too that others are doing their own hard work, unearthing their own riches, discovering their own treasures. What might you be missing in other people and how can you work side by side, turning over your deepness together?

This rune helps us recognize the ebb and flow and heave and swell of energy. Life energy. Time. Perspective. There is a time and place for production, for being focused on the doing rather than the being. There is a time for rest and a time for stillness and the key is recognizing the differences between these times and not forcing what is not ready to emerge. Then, when the energy peaks, the shovel comes out and the digging starts. Go with it. Put your back into it, lift with your knees, bend with the wind. And, dig, sister. Dig deeply.

It has been a long time since I’ve felt inspired to do a Womanrunes post. But, as always, when I drew the stone, it was just what I needed. I’ve been feeling unproductive and somewhat uninspired lately, but I feel my energy cycling upwards again and I got up on the morning of this reading feeling ready to work. I drew this stone and thought, ah ha! So, yesterday, my husband and I (plus toddler) spent a long time down on the rocks taking photos for our new etsy store. Then, that afternoon I made nine new sculptures! After going to a candlelight vigil in the evening, I wrote a new blog post for my birth blog and crossposted a similar version to Pagan Families. And, I finally finished watching a film I was supposed to review ages ago and wrote up my thoughts about it and scheduled it to post on Monday. I call that good work. 🙂

High Priestess ring

New sculptures

Priestess of the Flame ring

—

Update: this project evolved into a real book!

The first post in my Womanrunes series is available here and all others here. The runes and the names of them come from Shekhinah Mountainwater’s Womanrunes system for which there are no written interpretations available other than the names and one word meanings. I’m engaging in a practice of drawing one and then going down to the woods with it to see what it “tells” me–basically, creating what I wish I had, which is a more developed interpretation of the meaning of each womanrunestone.

Categories: art, sculpture, Womanrunes | 1 Comment

Woodspriestess: Summer’s Surrender

Posted on August 27, 2013 by Molly

Tiny flowers of summer
Waving colorful flags
of the season’s surrender
against a backdrop of dry leaves

Lifting tender, hopeful
tenacious faces
parched but promising
a last hurrah
a final fling
a tiny majesty

Spots of glorious color
on dry ground

Proof of life’s own love affair with itself.

Speaking of love affairs, I had one with the tiny flowers of spring and I’m having another with the tiny flowers of summer. It is like a religious experience to me to discover the ever-changing tableau of what Nature has planted for us all season long. I love that these tiny flowers bloom whether I notice them or not. I love that they grow without me watering them or tending them. I love how they emerge in unlikely, unsuspecting places, such as the floor of the greenhouse or between cracks in stone or from piles of gravel. I love that they’re here, doing their own tiny thing, even as the leaves begin to fall from the trees and the winds shift towards autumn. They’re going to keep being beautiful, dang it, as long as they can. I’ve had a mini obsession with spotting them and taking pictures of them over the last two days. I don’t know the proper names for many of them and I also know that several of them turn into nuisance things like burs, but I see them. I’ve noticed and paid attention and this visual experience is my sweet reward. In this photo gallery, the only flowers pictured not planted by Nature are the roses, which are currently experiencing a delightful last hurrah as well, even after a major assault by Japanese beetles this year. Also pictured is a cute mushroom 🙂

Perhaps not coincidentally, I was also inspired to make some fresh new goddesses this week with a floral motif! (available in my updated etsy shop) 🙂

And, in past odes to tiny flowers I have known:

Woodspriestess: Tiny Flowers

Tiny flowers know
that hope blooms eternal
pushing the way
through cracked stone
reclaiming
repopulating
rebirthing the Earth

What is a seed
but a miracle
right in front of me

What am I
but a miracle
to be seeing this right now…

Woodspriestess: The Language of Spring

A blush of green begins

Delicate lace of wild plums
Graces gray forestscapes

Heartbeat in the forest sings
The passion of life untapped.
The soul of the world
is speaking the language of spring.

Woodspriestess: Stoneflower | Theapoetics

Like flower growing from rock
the world is full of tiny, perfect mysteries.
Secrets of heart and soul and landscape
guarded tenderly
taking root in hard crevices
stretching forth
in impossible silence.

And, while traveling: Sunday Sabbath: Tiny Desert Flowers

Tender green shoot in unlikely place
Tenacious tapestry of life
This weaving unfolding before my eyes
This is my religion.

Categories: art, nature, poems, spirituality, theapoetics, woodspriestess | 1 Comment

Woodspriestess: Medicine Woman

Posted on August 20, 2013 by Molly

Medicine Woman

She who heals

Reaching out
strong hands
supple wrists
cleansing touch
place your hand in hers
and you will feel it…

Energy
passing from one to another
conduit of grace
and repair.

Restoration

Medicine Woman reminds you
to sleep when you’re tired
to eat when you’re hungry
to drink when you’re thirsty
and to dance
just because.

Medicine Woman
let her bind up your wounds
apply balm to your soul
and hold you
against her shoulder
when you need to cry.

Medicine Woman
Earth healer
she’s ready to embrace you.

(7/5/2013)

Memorial prayer flag

I wrote this poem last month as another character/archetype poem that came to mind after my original outraged ancestral mother poem and prayer. (Both of which were recently published in the current edition of The Tor Stone). Prophet Woman and Shakti Woman also showed up, as did Medicine Woman. I’ve still got Yoga Woman out there too and I thought there weren’t any more, until I had a Buzzard Woman encounter earlier in the month.

Last night I went to a local ceremony for the Day of Hope and Healing, which is a national memorial day for families who have experienced miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss. The photos in this post are from the event. And, today then felt like the perfect time to share my Medicine Woman poem. I’m also having a giveaway on my other blog for this pendant that I made over the weekend:

I also made some new sculptures and necklaces and updated my etsy shop!

Categories: art, friends, poems, spirituality, theapoetics, womanspirit, women, woodspriestess | 3 Comments

Saturday Sabbath: Summer Solstice Redux

Posted on June 22, 2013 by Molly

Summer solstice

Look at what’s blooming
see what you’ve said yes to
and look carefully for that
which can now be pruned away.

The bounty is before us
we see it clearly
knowing that what we have sown
has borne fruit.

Noting that which is
beautiful and good
and that which has
withered in the heat.

Life is open before us
spreading its petals
dripping with juice

Sweet, simple
infinitely complex
and magnificent.

(6/21/13)

Last night, after picking five more pounds of wild black raspberries, I went down to the woods at dusk and found I did have a couple of more summer solstice words in me. I also worked on my content for my first post as a blogger for SageWoman magazine. I’ve been feeling really stalled out on it—like I’m afraid I can’t write something “good enough” and so I asked the woods for help. Luckily, they answered!

I’m excited to be featured in this month’s Full Moon Share from Paola at Goddess Spiral Health Coaching and I just barely finished some new goddess sculptures to add to my etsy shop in time for the Full Moon Share tomorrow!

In keeping with this time of seasonal change, I made my first ever set of goddesses depicting the four seasons!

I like them all, but my favorite is the Summer Goddess.

I made just a few more as well, including a butterfly goddess as a special request for someone who is grieving.

And, today my husband briefly took our toddler out in a kayak for the first time while we were at our friend’s house for a work party!

Speaking of our work party, while there, we worked what felt like way too hard on scheduling several ceremonies and celebrations for the coming months—two blessingways, a summer retreat, a fall retreat + coming of age ritual, and of course, our ongoing series of Rise Up and Call Her Name classes. I struggled to fit it all in, but realized that this is what I want to do. I came back to the words I wrote last night and thought, this is what I’ve said yes to and it is bearing fruit. And, I like it. 🙂

Categories: art, friends, Goddess, nature, poems, spirituality, theapoetics, woodspriestess | 7 Comments

Woodspriestess: Chorus

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Molly

Birdsong
Heartsong
Bees buzz
Mindbuzz
Flowers bloom
Hopebloom

Interconnected
in a deep
magical
dance of life.

Tulip tree is still blooming!

Spinning souls into being,
unfurling leaves,
beating my heart
and that of
mouse
chicken
dolphin
elephant
monkey
panther…

This animating force
that dances through the cosmos
speaking through our lips
hearing through our ears
touching our skin
creating through our hands
and bodies.

The lifepulse
of reality.
The skeins
of time and mystery.

Sage is sneaking up out of the weedy grasses.

This beat
this dance
this beautiful rhythm
I waltz with it
and I sing
in its chorus…

(4/29/2013)

I’m feeling pretty beat. Wrung out. Exhausted. Tired. Strained. I still went down to the woods though and I still practiced yoga this afternoon. And, I’m still planning our women’s retreat for May 10th. These things should NOT be the first to go. I must uphold my commitment to these practices for my own well-being. Likewise with writing even this simple post—I “should” be doing something else, or should I? Doing this actually matters too.

At our craft workshop this last weekend, I lamented briefly to my husband that I hadn’t gotten everything done I’d hoped to do while there. Then, I noted that I had, in fact, finished reading two books, prepared for both of my college classes, graded 11 genograms and 4 papers, kept up with my online class (even though I had to drive up the road for the internet access), and made five new sculptures. And, oh yeah, I also ran a craft camp and took care of my three kids too. Perhaps I actually rock.

In addition, I published a brief post here and I woke from a nap humming with inspiration and wrote a blog post about Womenergy for my other blog:

…Womenergy moved humanity across continents, birthed civilization, invented agriculture, conceived of art and writing, pottery, sculpture, and drumming, painted cave walls, raised sacred stones and built Goddess temples. It rises anew during ritual, sacred song, and drumming together. It says She Is Here. I Am Here. You Are Here and We Can Do This. It speaks through women’s hands, bodies, and heartsongs. Felt in hope, in tears, in blood, and in triumph.

via Womenergy (Womanergy) | Talk Birth.

Here are some pictures of the sculptures I made while away:

VBAC “Hope” mama.

Cesarean “je donne” sculpture.

Mamapriestess made with every scrap of remaining clay.

Experimented unsuccessfully with some A’kuba style sculptures. While I was originally excited about the potential, I am not a fan!

The opening poem was from yesterday, this was mine from today (I was lying on my back on the rocks):

Hot sun
cool stone

restore me

body
mind
and soul

stilling
nurturing
holding
nourishing

granting peace
grace
and harmony.

Dog breath
on my face.
Surprise!

Categories: art, blessings, embodiment, nature, poems, spirituality, theapoetics, woodspriestess | Leave a comment

Goodbye

Posted on April 24, 2013 by Molly

The photo on the left was taken a few months ago. She was 83. One of the ways I will always remember her is wearing zoo-themed necklaces 🙂

She has told stories
she has made memories
she has preserved history
she has created
she has birthed
she has mothered
she has grandmothered
she has been of service
she has traveled far
she has grieved
she has rejoiced
she has loved
and been loved in return

This woman from which I came
this mother of my own mother
she who has been daughter
who has been wife
friend
mother
grandmother
great-grandmother
she has come to the end of her road
to the last stop on her earthly journey

Part of eternity
gave her birth
and she in turn shared that gift
and now she is reclaimed
re-embraced
hugged with the winds of time
and change.

Just a couple of hours after I posted my “last words” post, my grandma did in fact, let go and died during the early part of the morning. I always hope to have dreams about people who have died, to somehow get “messages” from them and the only person that that has ever happened vividly with was my father-in-law, which is strange given our distant relationship when he was alive. I’m surprised I didn’t dream of my grandma at all this month during this terribly short and terribly long process. Last night I did dream a short tiny dream though. In it, she sent a birthday card to my mom—we knew in the dream she’d wanted to make sure my mom still got a card on her birthday (my mom turns 60 next month)—the card came with $20 in it and it was in a homemade envelope. She hadn’t wanted to ask anyone to get her an envelope, so she’d made her own. That was it. Not the enlightening “message” sort of dream I imagine, but at least I had one! More photos and additional thoughts are on my other blog.

Go in peace
go in love
and go knowing that you have left behind
something beautiful
something marvelous
something that matters
The fabric of a life well-lived
the hearth of a family well-tended
the heart of a community strengthened
and a never-ending chain of women
unbroken.

You’re our Mamoo
You’re our grandmother
and we say goodbye
and thank you.

Sink deeply
and gently
into the arms and lap
of time
the great mother of us all

She holds you now.
We let go.

Tonight I went down to the woods at sunset, which seemed fitting. I finished my memorial sculptures earlier in the day and so I took pictures of them there on the rocks. Later, we went back outside to go for a walk and I saw the nearly-full moon rising, so I ran back down to experience the fairly-rare occurrence of a sunset-moonrise, something that is hard to photograph because they take place in opposite directions.

Generations sculpture

Sculpture using a rock I found in the woods.

Sunset

Moonrise

Categories: art, blessings, death, family, poems, sculpture, womanspirit | 5 Comments

Last Words

Posted on April 24, 2013 by Molly

On Sunday, we thought we’d reached my grandma’s final day on earth. I spent the day thinking about her, crying, talking to my husband, and fanatically checking my phone for texts from my mom (side note to those people who write critical blog posts about “distracted” people “glued” to their phones, you may do well to remember that some of those distracted-looking people might be looking for texts about dying grandmothers from their own distraught mothers and that this phone-based link in fact represents connection and not disconnection or distraction). I went to the woods and I sat on the rocks and sang Woman Am I. My mom told me she’d been singing it to my grandma as she listened to the erratic sounds of her breaths, thinking each was the last. My letter did make it in time to be read to my grandma while she was still conscious enough to indicate she heard it. And, on Friday I did a FaceTime call with my mom and she took it to my grandma’s bed so that I could talk to her. She didn’t open her eyes, but she murmured a greeting and she smiled when she heard my little two-year-old say, “hi, Mamoo!” So, we were able to say some final words and goodbye “in person,” which was really, really difficult, but also a gift.

After singing on the rocks, I then spoke aloud to her, those final words that didn’t really come in a letter or on Facetime:

Unfinished new grief sculpture…

We have learned from you
we have loved with you
we have heard you
we have seen you
we have hugged you
and held you
we have mourned with you
we have mourned for you
we have been dazzled by your radiance
inspired by your adventures
and touched by your generosity.

Three generations of women
have sat in your lap as little girls
have been covered by your quilts
and zipped into your sweaters
you carried each of us on your hip
and held us each in your heart

We respect you
we cherish you
we appreciate you
we’ve learned so much from you
we’ve laughed with you
and lived with you
and traveled with you

and now
we open up our hands
we open up our hearts
and we let you go.
Be free.
Continue your travels
on the currents of time and space…

My grandma was a beautifully active, vibrant woman and her quick devolution due to advanced and very aggressive pancreatic cancer is a harsh blow to our family. I’ve always admired and respected her and been proud of her for all of her accomplishments and activities. She was not a particularly emotionally demonstrative woman, but it amazing to think about all the ways her presence is woven through my days even though she lives 2000 miles away–the sweater I put on every morning is one she knit for me, her quilts are on my kids’ bedroom walls and on all our beds, magazine subscriptions she gifts us with are in the car and bathroom…we’re connected in many ways and I don’t know what life will look like without her in it.

My “three generations of little girls” thoughts made me create this not-finished sculpture. Little boys are part of the generations as well, but not in as direct a line as the girls—I’m the oldest daughter of an oldest daughter of an oldest daughter (and my own daughter is an “only daughter,” so while she’s my youngest child she continues a line as the first daughter of a first daughter of a first daughter of a first daughter).

My dad also brought over the last four beads for my woodspriestess necklace and so I took a new picture with them too:
When I came back in, I drew a Crone Stone and got, no joke, She Who Knows: The Grandmother of Time:

I have had some really amazing experiences with these stones and I was in awe at the cosmicness when I read, Wisdom is the inner knowing we already possess. How is it our bodies know how to menstruate, to ovulate, to cease menstruating, to breathe? I thought at first reading it said to cease breathing and I thought it was so perceptive because of my mom waiting and listening to my grandmother’s slow, labored breaths. Then, I re-read and saw it was only “to breathe” and then it felt less cosmic. Ah, well.

Categories: art, blessings, death, family, poems, prayers, womanspirit, women | 6 Comments

Happy Mother Earth Day!

Posted on April 22, 2013 by Molly

“International Mother Earth Day is a chance to reaffirm our collective responsibility to promote harmony with nature at a time when our planet is under threat from climate change, unsustainable exploitation of natural resources and other man-made problems. When we threaten the planet, we undermine our only home – and our future survival. On this International Day, let us renew our pledges to honour and respect Mother Earth.”

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
Message for the International Mother Earth Day 2013

International Mother Earth Day promotes a view of the Earth as the entity that sustains all living things found in nature. It honors the Earth as a whole and our place within it. It does not seek to replace other events, such as Earth Day, which has been celebrated by many people around the world…but rather to reinforce and reinterpret them based on the evolving challenges we face.

United Nations

Categories: art, blessings, nature, priestess, womanspirit | Leave a comment

Woodspriestess: Bad Mood

Posted on April 20, 2013 by Molly

Angry
crabby
spiky
irritable
pain-drenched

and yet still
I touch the ground of being
patient
loving
peaceful
life-soaked

touches me back

sun on my eyelids
wind in my hair
stone at my back

Earth holds me
Earth settles me
Earth hears me

bearing witness
to one another
in change
and possibility
in raggedness and decay
and in transformation
and purpose…

I have been in a horrible mood all day. I woke up with a headache for the third day in a row and it makes me foggy and unfocused and like I can’t choose the right words. Part of my brain is always 2000 miles away from home with my mom and grandma—I literally feel as if part of my spirit is gone there and it makes it hard to feel centered enough to write and to complete other tasks. Today, I tried to get ready for our annual craft workshop that begins next week and was frustrated and distressed by trying to round-up the supplies for classes I don’t really feel like teaching and for which I only have a tiny collection of students signed up. I felt like I should make another doll for my spirit doll workshop, but I just didn’t want to. I made it anyway and felt resentful, irritable, and in pain the entire time. And, like a genius, I also decided that I was sick of my too-long bangs (my mom usually cuts them) and so I hacked them off in the bathroom mirror using curved nailscissors—always a great strategy for an angry person with migraine-blurred vision.

The doll is a simple one that I envisioned as a sort of 3D scrapbook. I used an unfinished quilt square as her body and an assortment of pins from various “lives” and identities that have just been languishing in a box.

The quilt has some really lovely embroidery!

I also found an abandoned past project that holds some promise!

Categories: art, family, nature, woodspriestess | 2 Comments

Woodspriestess: Bonewind

Posted on March 25, 2013 by Molly

Winter chill
bone wind
settling in
sinking deep

Biting
frosty air
cold stone
bone wind.

(2/6/13)

This surprising second winter continues. The ground is snow-covered. The air is frosty. When I went to the woods this afternoon, I thought of some bonewind observations from some cold days last month. Yesterday, when I went to the woods it was snowing sharply enough that I couldn’t face forward on the rocks, but had to turn to the side, to keep cold snow from hitting me straight in the face. I finished a variety of new sculptures this weekend, but I knew it would be too cold to photograph all of them, so I just brought down a couple. I made two new figures with rocks. As I’ve said before, I don’t do this often, just when the rock seems “given” to me. The smaller white stone was laying out on the moss like a gift when I went out to take a picture of my first Crone sculpture. It caught my eye because the rock has a “foot” that looks like it is stepping out/stepping forward and I thought again of my reader commenting on needing a sculpture of a Crone going back to school—so, when I made this one, that is what I was thinking of. She’s casting off things she no longer needs, she’s gathering her energy at her core, she’s finding her balance, and she’s stepping out into a new direction 🙂

I didn’t plan it this way, but it ends up that the two new rock goddesses look like they could hold hands.

And, I’ll write more specifically about these later, but my little girl was asking and asking me to make a “Daddy Goddess” for her the last time I was making sculptures. So, I did. When I showed my husband, I said, “this is a different spin on a Trinity,” and he said, “and it is one that actually makes sense.” I was pleased with them.