Midsummer Musings

Midsummer has passed and already the fields are turning golden and there is a hint of heather on the cliffs. I spent my midsummer day on the Lizard camping. It was beautifullly hot and we spent three days swimmming, surfing and walking the cliffs with their profusion of ice plants cascading down emerald crannies to the turquoise ocean beneath. We saw two basking sharks very close to the shore at Kennack Sands; with its serpentine rocks glistening in the sun like prehistoric beasts awaiting resurrection with the oncoming tide. The days were long and sultry and in the evening of the longest day we watched the sun die in a blaze of fiery light as we sat on a hill in front of the embers of our campfire. Midsummer is a time for celebration,bonfires on the hill tops, dancing, being with friends, lovers and enjoying the long days and starry nights. It is a time to reflect on the turning of the Wheel from outward to inward as from midsummer day when the sun reaches its zenith, the days will gradually wane. It is a time to contemplate what you have accomplished and created and brought into bloom and to dream about what still has to be completed by Lammas before the nights draw in and Mabon is upon us. The abundance of growth and fertility in the pastures and hedgegrows, woods and cliffs reminds us that the year is at its highest point and the goddess is at her most potent and fertile. In the Priestess of Kernow Wheel of the Year we celebrate her aspect as Maeve, Irish Queen and Goddess of the Land whose palace was on the Hill of Tara in Leinster, the sacred centre of Ireland and marked by the Stone of Destiny.Maeve is a powerful goddess whose name means 'intoxicating': she could outrun horses, confer with birds and bring men into the heat of desire with a mere look. Maeve is a goddess of sovereignty, she strides into our lives and asks us to be Queen of ourselves, to stand proudly in our own power and not to be diminished. She wants us to take responsibility for our lives and to stand in our own domain and be Queen of it. Once we take our power and stand strongly within it we are accountable to no one but ourselves and we can then create whatever we desire to flourish and grow. I have found her a very powerful goddess to call upon and she has helped me to walk tall and be brave, to rise above petty injustice and to walk my own path and follow my own destiny. I have had dreams of a queen and a hall of men and it fascinates me to know that her mythical hall was a mead hall. Kings of Ireland would mate symbolically with her to gain the right to rule the land.I also believe she is a good goddess to call upon when women reach their prime and as a woman in my midforties, I can feel her energy commanding me to rule my own life and to take my space and creative power.She knows her own will and mind and is confident and assertive. It is wise to cultivate this energy and to allow it to blossom as you enjoy coming into wholeness. This is a challenge for all women in a patriarchal society to embrace. What is it to be Queen of ourselves, ruler of our own destiny?

Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' personifies this energy in the Faery Queen, Titania. She is haughty, vain, extremely enchanting and sexually alluring. Men instantly fall into midsummer madness when she casts her spell and are made fools of.
Her quarrels with Oberon, King of the Faery have blasted the land with midsummer storms and created chaos in the natural world.She has banished him from her bed since he has taken Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons as his mistress; she in her turn will not give him her 'indian boy' to be his henchman. The descriptions of nature in their opening speeches emphasise the notion of the faery as powerful, magical forces animating nature and controlling it. Titania personifies all that is abundant, fertile and volatile in nature, she is proud and haughty holding her own power with her Lord. She too is a goddess of the land and exemplifies the passion, creativity and sovereignty of the midsummer season.Here is Titania's opening speech to Oberon:

''These are the forgeries of jealousy:
And never, since the middle summer's spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead,
By paved fountain or by rushy brook,
Or in the beached margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturb'd our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have suck'd up from the sea
Contagious fogs; which falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents:
The ox hath therefore stretch'd his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attain'd a beard;
The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrion flock;
The nine men's morris is fill'd up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are undistinguishable:
The human mortals want their winter here;
No night is now with hymn or carol blest:
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound:
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Far in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems' thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set: the spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which:
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension;
We are their parents and original.''Act 2 Sc 1

There are many Queens in Shakespeare: Hermione,Hippolyta,... Cleopatra, Gertrude, Elizabeth, Margaret,and of course Lady Macbeth. All of these embody different aspects of female power. Food for thought and another day.

Blessed Be x x x

Thought for the Day

'Man's heart, away from nature, becomes hard.'Luther Standing Bear 1858-1939

The Lakota knew that lack of respect for growing, living things, soon led to lack of respect for humans too.


'What is the extinction of a condor to a child who has never seen a wren?' Naturalist Robert Michael Pyle

I am currently reading a book by Richard Louv called 'Lost Child in the Woods' about saving our children from what he has coined as ' Nature Deficit Disorder'. Basically,he is arguing that there is no substitute for the joy and freedom a child experiences playing and exploring a wild, natural habitat near to, if not in, their own back yard. He is also arguing that this ablity to access the natural world free from the constraints of adult supervision, the restrictions of urbanisation and increasing dependence on computers, is becoming more and more limited. Add to this adult fears of leaving children to play alone, limited access to free, wild land and the demise of group activities which encourage young people to explore ie: scouts and guides with their camps; as well as restrictions imposed on education by health and safety regulations, and there is a real problem emerging for today's children who may know the names of each new computer game, but not those of the trees and flowers in their own locality...that's if there are any.Subjects like Biology and Geology are also now specialist subjects integrated into general subjects so children are not getting any specialist knowledge of the names of plants and animals. As the quote says if they do not know what a wren is then how can we expect them to be interestedin the plight of the condor and wider envirommental issues. Children, according to Louv, are not making these vital connections.Louv is writing in 2005 and his arguments centre on the plight of American children.

Thankfully there is a growing awareness in the UK that children are in desperate need of outdoor activities and risk taking play. Bushcraft courses and environmental education is apparently on the increase with new projects like 'Plan-it Earth' in west Penwith invitng the community and especially schools to see nature as the source of education. As Wordsworth says:'Let Nature be your teacher..'Hopefully, this sort of community programme will take root but it is still dependent on funding and also can only work with those schools like cape Cornwall who want to allow that sort of educational experience to take place...it is not the norm. Also with increasing and pressing need for housing, roads and even new towns where will children go to play and in any case, will their parents allow them? It is an interesting question....where I live there is a playing field and many open fields right next to a large estate...do I see groups of children happily playing, making camps, running, playingball or hanging out on the grass? The answeris so far, no. I saw a couple of boys playing rugby, some boys round a motorbike and a few children playing on their bikes...but I am aware that the only person who uses that green space on a regular basis is either your average dog walker doing the obligatory round of the field or interestingly the local gypsy in a very speedy horse and cart ( I can't think of the correct term...senile moment!}It is only gypsies who still have this love of freedom in the outdoors....and by gypsies I am not referring to travellers. Everyday when I see him he seems to symbolise that wild, freedom with his deeply tanned skin and black hair...trotting or cantering or racing at speed around that field. Where are the children???Indoors on their playstations racing cars, planning military attacks, collecting new cages for their fantasy pets or losing weight playing baseball on Wi. What's there to do outdoors...it's boring!

Hopefully,living in Cornwall we can still go down to the woods today, let our children play and not be afraid of the Blair Witch or the odd bear on a picnic...hopefully....

Blessed be xxx

Musings on Nature and Imagination

William Blake - Auguries of Innocence


To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

Blake is one of my favourite poets and these lines have revisited my consciousness just recently on my visits to Dartington Hall and its wonderful grounds rolling with banks of primroses and daffodils, magnolia in fleshy pink on china blue skies. The grounds are a natural stage where nature and art unite in harmony. This is a place where a philosophy of holistic education for the perfoming arts,natural sciences, crafts and creativity imbues every space and inspires the soul to take flight with the birds. There is a plaque with these lines from Blake's 'Auguries of Innocence' etched in slate in the grounds near to a statue of what I can only conceive to be the goddess Flora with garlands of flowers in her hair.

The other inspirational gardens I love are those at Heligan, near St Austell Bay: again with Tim Schmidt's love of the arts and nature there is once more this delicious blend of creativity and wild,free nature. There is also this philosophy of bringing the arts, nature, education and environmental awareness together. Here again,in the grounds of Heligan,the goddess dreams on her bed of primroses and the imagination awakens in the form of the Green Man or Giant to stimulate and animate the Goddess Gaia..Mother Earth.Like the Romantic poet's, our imagination is brought to bear upon the natural scene to give it eternal and lasting qualities: to transform it into a very individual, unique world of our own creation with its own harmonies and resonance. Like a painter we paint the scene with our soul...the mage or magician in us waves a wand and the smallest aspects of nature are a world within a world, a vision of the whole of creation: timeless and eternal.

On the course in Creative Arts Therapy,we bring our imagination to the healing process and seek ways into the unspoken parts of the body which have been wounded or locked away. The aim is to be a witness to the unfolding of the flower of the human being before us and to create a space where that individual can find a safe means of self expression through play and creativity; movement, voice, art, drama and poetry. I am only at the beginning of this process myself and yet I am intrigued and astonished by the depths of the spaces within me which are now being set free. This inner growth is reflected in the blossoming around me and in the flowering in every tree, bank and field.

In the grounds at Dartington there are little doors in the roots of trees...one imagines a gnome living here, a Pogle like in the children's TV series of the early 1960's 'Pogles Wood'.I watched an old episode on You Tube and it brought back great nostalgia as well as reminding me that as a child I had imagined these knitted puppets to be green and alive when now I can see they are made of wool, their eyes are even knitted or felt and they are in black and white.....in the episode...six I think..they are visited by a witch....imagination truly is a wonderful thing! My next journey is going to be with the 'Double Deckers' climb aboard!!


Blessed Be xxxx

Beltane Blessings

After a two month break from blogging due to a move of house back to my homelands of Redruth in Cornwall, Capital of Cornish Mining and home of the first gas lighting pioneered by William Murdock, I have managed to walk from my door and greet Beltane as it dawned in blossoms of cherry, apple, wild garlic flowers, forgetmeknots and the rush of bluebells in hedgerow and wood, starting to paint the beech green with sweeps of deep violet blue.

I rose early on Beltane morning and took a gentle stroll towards the village of Carn Brea with its wishing well dedicated to the saint of that parish, St Euny whose church spire nestles in the valley and surrounded by mine ruins and stacks evokes a sense of the roots of this mining kingdom in a deep spirituality which you sense in the clear running stream and the cacophany of birdsong as rooks swoop in the vale for twigs and blackbirds pierce the still blue pools of air with their shrill, piping song.

Beltane is one of my favourite points on the Wheel of the Year with its profound sense of abundance in nature,its fresh canvas of pastel colour and that keen awareness of a spirit of life, joy, passion and fertility. Here we have the goddess in her aspect as maiden queen- life is at its most promising and she is dancing and revelling in the wonder of it all. The evenings are drawing out and the nights getting shorter; we feel awake and alive, 'Full of Spring' as a friend so aptly put it recently.The sun is gathering heat and warmth and the full moon on Lunar Beltane in Scorpio has a mystical poetry. The sense of abundance in nature fills the heart and soul with a desire for self expression..a need to express the beauty of the world as if it had just been created and our eyes were newly opened. May time is a dance, a song, a beat and rhythm deep in the earth captured by the dance of the Obby Oss at Padstow and the Furry Dance and Hal an Tow in Helston.It is a time to revel and celebrate the beginning of summer and the fertility of life. To give thanks and appreciation for the gifts we have been given so far and for what we have manifested in our lives. It is also a time to contemplate what else needs to be done, to be brought to fruition, to be created and expressed. This is a time when the Maiden goddess has come into her own self, her true, wild, free nature bringing the promise of life, love and laughter.

With the prevalent ritual emphasis on the phallic Maypole as symbol of fertility for maidens to dance around, there has been less emphasis on this festival as a time to celebrate womens menarche..the bleeding and floering of the Maiden.Now as women we can celebrate the power of our moon blood..women's blood was once adored and used for its potential life sustaining properties. When a woman started to bleed she was honoured and declared of value and importance to the tribe. The blood of women meant blessings from the goddess and the assurance of life's continuation. Blood was ritually poured into the earth to aid the growth and fertility of crops.Like the fruit and flower of plants, the woman bleeding was the woman's flowering.The blood of a woman is potent and healing it can be used in spells and rituals to add intensity and life force to these.

At Beltane celebrate, contemplate your moon flow and your experience of it over the years...celebrate its power and awaken your own free, wild nature - your maiden aspect free, powerful and strong unto your self. In what ways are you enriching your own life? How are you blossoming and coming into your own power? Dance with your own vital energy, enjoy your self, feel the sap rising and the world celebrating the fire of your spirit in a universal joy of being.

Blessed Be xx

Dartmoor Photos of Walk 1

Dartmoor March 2010 - Walk 1

I have just returned from a visit to Dartmoor with a friend to go walking and revisit some sites. The landscape of the moor is particularly late greeting spring this year after the snow and ice of winter. Snowdrops were in profusion in the pretty moorland churchyards and hedgegrows but daffodils had yet to trumpet the return of Spring. Nevertheless, there was plenty of sunshine and in places out of the breeze it was really mild for this time of year. The sunshine, dappled on green boulders showering the many dancing streams and rivers, was particularly beautiful and the High Moor was bleached blonde almost like a desert.

We walked from Scorhill stone circle on the moor above Gidleigh and Chagford to the Tolmen stone - like our Cornish holed stones it is a large granite block with a hole through it caused by water erosion as it rests above the racing Teign river. This stone is famed like Men -an- Tol for healing rheumatism and whooping cough should you manage to crawl through it.Scorhill is a stunning stone circle with tremendous power and energy. It is nearly 90ft in diameter and comprises of over 30 stones with the tallest menir at 8ft high.It is in a dramatic, wild spot looking out upon the moor with wilderness on all sides. It is special in that it has not been restored but some stones have been removed to line the leat further in the valley. i have visited here on a number of occasions and find it a particularly energising circle, well worth a visit and within easy reach if all you want is a short stroll.

From this area, we walked towards Kestor rock. passing over two clapper bridges:Walla Brook and Teignon Teign-e-ver. Kestor Rock seemed as if it would be a bit of a climb, but on approaching it it was like alot of the Tors, easy to get up once you had clambered a few granite boulders.It was a dramatic rock, scored by wind and rain, the wind blowing away the cobwebs of winter as we stood and nearly took flight with the buzzards on its peak. The views over the High Moor were fantastic and its skirts were strewn with granite boulders and the remains of Bronze and Iron age occupation: field systems, hut circles, and also a round pound, possibly a smithy dating from 500BC. On the top of the rock was an unusually deep rock basin filled with water like a giant's ink well with the sun shining so brightly. In Victorian times it was rumoured to have been used as a place of sacrifice by the Druids....a pretty common yarn amongst God fearing folk attached to most cairns on high ground it seems.

From the desolation of the High Moor, we were content to amble down hill at last through a magical conifer wood lit with dappled light to Glassy Steps and across the rushing River Teign again. These woods would be pretty ominous in mist or damp but in sun they cast a more benevolent, elven magic. This sense of timelessness permeates this landscape and gives it an other worldly, ancient atmosphere. One can feel the primeaval energies in ancient woodland and Tor, as well as sense the faery realms in the sylvan riverside valleys and trees.

From Glassy Steps we walked uphill and out of the wood on to the winding Dartmoor lanes. It always feels very easy to get lost on these when driving and one mile seems to last an eternity. We followed the sign posts for Gidleigh and came to rest at its pretty churchyard with 15th century church; with its banks covered in beds of snowdrops and the stream running through, it felt deliciously warm in the melting afternoon sun. Blackbirds sang and there were Blue tits darting through the branches overhead. The sun felt like honey on the skin and the peace of the place imbued it with a timeless quality. Through the iron gateway after the church we could see the remains of the tower of Gidleigh Castle, a fortified manor house built by Sir William Prous around AD1300. It did have a feudal feel with the church so close and spring lambs in the pasture nearby.

From the peace and tranquility of Gidleigh, we wound our way up hill still tracing the end of the ambiguous Dartmoor 'mile' we seemed to have begun an age ago to eventually, after probably another 'mile' at least up hill, reach the car park at Scorhill where we had begun at midday. There were still icicles hanging on the bowl of a stream where the sun had yet to reach reminding us of a faery crystal glade.There was a rare magic every where in this area which had touched us both that day.

Blessed Be xxx

Quote for the Day - What is Magic?

To work magic is to weave the unseen forces into form; to soar beyond sight; to explore the uncharted dream realm of the hidden reality, to infuse life with colour, motion, and strange scents that intoxicate; to leap beyond imagination into the space between worlds where fantasy becomes real; to be at once animal and god. Magic is the craft of shaping, the craft of the wise, exhilerating, dangerous - the ultimate adventure.' Starhawk 'The Spiral Dance' pg 136

' The language of magic is expressed in symbols and images. Images bridge the gap between the verbal and non verbal modes of awareness. They allow the two sides of the brain to communicate, arousing the emotions as well as the intellect. Poetry, itself a form of magic, is imagic speech.' Starhawk ' Spiral Dance' pg 137

Magic - magical - magician - mage - image - imagination - I Mage - Magnet - Imagnetic - Imagenesis( creation out of image) - Imagnosis ( this through what we imagine we know - take a word and see what it imagines itself to be!!