In heathen mythology, the first self aware being was Audhumla, the sacred cow. She licked the gods and giants out of the ice and nurtured them with her milk.

Funny, the things you hear coming out of your own mouth.

Just before sunrise, looking west for traffic as I cross 31^st Street, I see her, hovering there over the horizon: what seemed at the time to be just about the hugest Full Moon I'd ever seen.

My reaction surprises me.

“Blessed be!” I say out loud.

It was both a reaction of surprise, and a blessing. It was, likewise, a greeting to Herself. What most delighted me about my spontaneous little ejaculation was its utterly un-self-consciousness nature.

Pagan language, when used in everyday settings, can sometimes seem a little forced, as if we're trying too hard.

But then, suddenly, there you are. You see a beautiful, big Moon where you're not expecting her, and the words gush forth like water from a spring.

Banishing mirror spell

Use this mirror spell to banish financial problems (or anything else for that matter, use the basic framework and adjust the chant to your requirement).

Dear Moon Muser, Time now to call upon the Divine Warrior Within for your anger can be healthy if released in a life-changing and powerful way. Here's an Aries painting & snippet to inspire you from my upcoming Goddess Zodiac Oracle Deck due out in Spring, 2020.

Sparkly Blessings!
Kathy Crabbe
Soul Reader & Artist

Aries – The Ram
Time of Year – Spring, March 21 - April 19
Quality – Cardinal
Element – Fire
Ruler – Mars
Anatomy – Head
Natural sign of – 1st House
Opposite sign – Libra
Color – Red
Gemstones – Amethyst, diamond, fire opal, garnet
Tarot cards – The Emperor, The Empress
Goddesses – Amazons, Fuji, Kali, Sekhmet, Valkyries

Aries Meditation
Fire God, Fiery Goddess,
Red the path to your heart’s desire,
Lead the way to your soul’s fire.

Aries Affirmations
- I embody spring fire
- I am true to my path and my inner convictions
- I am erotic and independent
- I am a primal, revolutionary rebel
- I am adventurous, assertive and courageous
- I am the Divine Warrior
- I remember who I truly am even if it bothers others

Tap Into Your Aries Fire
- Take on any challenge
- Start a project
- Assert your rights
- Get creative
- Feel power, strength and vitality come alive within you

Irish Revival writer James Stephen's dazzling little 1924 novel  In the Land of Youth, though largely forgotten today, is nothing short of a modern pagan classic. In it, Stephens takes up an ancient Irish literary genre, back-stories to the Táin Bo Cuailinge, and recounts, in shining, lapidary prose, his tales (and tales-within-tales, and tales-within-tales-within-tales) of human and sidhe, of This World and the Other, and of the intercourse between the two.

The Song of Death is drawn from the novel's second section, “The Feast of Lugnasa,” but in this Season of the Ancestors it is the novel's first half, “The Feast of Samhain,” which I commend to the reader and which, in my opinion, richly deserves to become to the modern Samhain what Dickens' Christmas Carol has become to its eponymous holiday.

In the royal hall at Cruachan, on the Eve of Samhain—when gates between worlds swing wide—Ailill the King proposes to his assembled heroes a pastime while waiting for the feast to be made ready: that on this night of terrors, one of them should go out alone to tie a withy around the ankle of one of the dead men hanging from a nearby tree.

Two men go out, two men fearfully return, deed undone. Then Nera the Hero goes out into the night's darkness, withy in hand.

But things are not as they seem, for Ethal Anbual, King of the Sidhe of Connacht, is that very night proposing to raid and burn the royal hall at Cruachan....

The Song of Death

(James Stephens)

The festival organizers had chosen the one mostly flat place on the slope between the woods and Turtle Creek on which to lay out their ritual circle. So far, so good.

Unfortunately, it went downhill from there.

Mistake Number One. They'd designed their Circle using the "Quarter altar" model, with four card tables, one per quarter, each covered with a schmatte in a garishly bright “elemental” color.

On the living body of the valley's natural beauty, the cheap and artificial tables and cloths stood out like an open wound.

Moral Number One. When it comes to the gods, only the real and the beautiful are worthy.

Mistake Number Two. The landscape had a distinct and palpable flow to it, from the forest above to Turtle Creek below, and back again, running roughly ENE by WSW.

Unfortunately, the organizers had decided to lay out their Circle with a compass, thereby placing the Card Tables of the Gods in due East, South, West, and North.

Completely out of rhythm with the land around it, this skewed circle in fact impeded the valley's natural flow rather than augmenting it.

Moral Number Two. Regardless of what the books may say, real sacredness inheres in working with the landscape.

OK, Posch: so how would you have done it any better?