Another Gallimaufry

– I’ve been learning more about foraging lately – this is something that should perhaps have interested me more than it had previously, but I guess I never could get really into the side of it that’s about processing large amounts of whatever one finds, learning recipes to make with them, etc. But I have this book called Wild Plants of Maine and he uses the term “trail nibbles” a lot, and I realized I already do this – I will often put a piece of wintergreen or sweetfern in my mouth as I’m ambling around the woods, just to further connect with the land, to taste it as well as see, touch, smell, etc. Yesterday after a guided excursion on which I tasted several new-to-me plants, just picking leaves and nibbling on them, I had a sort of revelation that I was eating the landscape, taking it inside me, and what an intimate form of animism that was, what a special way to interact with the plant spirits. I think this is going to be my approach now, and my mindset around it. I think it’s particularly impactful to do so while out in nature, not just bringing things home to cook later. Being in the landscape and of the landscape.

– Throughout the winter I was practicing something I called Silent Sundays, spending the whole day without any noise, no music or podcasts or shows, no talking to any other humans even via text or email, just reading and writing and doing ritual and walking in the woods and being with the spirits. It was a game-changer, really. I had expected to find it difficult to stick to but in fact I quickly found myself wanting more, and in the last few months I’ve noticed that I’m more likely to opt for doing activities silently rather than always wanting some kind of aural accompaniment. I can think more clearly, and it absolutely has given me more mental space to connect with the gods. I’m going to continue it off and on when possible.

– As a correlation perhaps, I’ve started feeling even more sensitive to the intrusive nature of other people’s noise, both literally and what you might call psychic noise. Even though I spend the far majority of my time alone, that’s made me want more solitude rather than less. At some point I started covering my head when I went out into the human world (not the woods, that doesn’t bother me), and it’s been remarkably effective, considering that I’m often only using a crocheted kerchief, which doesn’t physically cover much…but it’s almost like a web, catching things before they get to me. I feel protected. I mean, I shouldn’t be surprised, as head covering is obviously a widespread devotional practice in many traditions for many different reasons, but it had never seem relevant to me until now.

– I also got a set of Loop earplugs and let me tell you, it’s been amazing. I got them initially so that I could more easily slip into a headspace where I could communicate with my spirits when doing things like hunting for meaningful items in flea markets (something I do a lot of), to block out the terrible overhead music and the conversations of other customers. But now I use them in the grocery store and other noisy places. It creates this little bubble and again, I feel more clear-headed, and more easily able to reach out to the spiritual world, and not so clobbered by the aggressive mundanity of modern life, especially in commercial spaces. So there’s a rare product endorsement from me!

– So, sometimes I can be extremely dense. I’d been having this problem where I was not able to remember my dreams very much, they kept slipping away immediately upon waking, and it had been going on for quite some time and really disturbing me, as dreamwork had been a huge part of my practice forever. In desperation, it occurred to me to do a very simple thing that most dream books will tell you as an obvious first step – keep a dream journal. But the thing is, I had always dismissed that because I thought I *was* keeping one, in the sense of always recording any obviously significant dreams I had in my spiritual journal (along with divinations, rituals, and other elements of my spiritual life). But that’s not actually the same thing as writing down *every* dream one has, constantly. I think the idea is that it signals your subconscious that you are taking it seriously, to pay attention, and it also means you force yourself to write them down even in the middle of the night when you just want to slip back into sleep. Within just a week or so, I was recording dreams almost every single night, and that’s continued ever since. Sure, most of those dreams are the kind of junk that just comes from the brain processing stuff, rather than anything more meaningful or spiritual, but the more I do this, the more interesting things come up, especially when looking back at it in retrospect. And I feel like I’ve been granted access back into that otherworld that I so loved and felt connected to, something that follows me into waking life, and helps me be aware of all the layers of reality. All for the price of a cheap notebook. Humbling, to be so changed by something so basic after all these years of practice, but I’m not too proud to be grateful for that.

– Synchronicities play a huge part in my life, in how I navigate my relationship with the gods and especially my spirits, how I understand magic as it functions in our world. Recently I spent a month absolutely inundated by extremely specific and unlikely synchs throughout every day – almost none of which were meaningful in their actual content, but rather by the fact of them happening. It was beyond any kind of probability. The world felt electric, alive, responsive. I think that when this happens, it’s a sign that one is really living one’s Story. Because if you think about it, in a story, nothing is random or happens alone – like Chekhov’s gun, everything eventually comes around again. Themes are repeated. Everything is part of the journey. When the synchs increase, I know Something Is Afoot.

– Kind of going back to the stuff about silence, I am finding that solitude itself can be a kind of altered state of consciousness, in a way. I haven’t needed entheogens as much in the last year in order to nudge me into that kind of awareness, the way I used to. I dwell inside it now, more of the time. The gods and spirits feel closer, more easily reached at any given moment. This is obviously due in part to simply living in a way where I can almost always have silence if needed, set aside any potential distractions, etc., without having to negotiate with any other people, but I actually think it goes deeper than that. I mean, I lived alone in the city, too. But nowadays, I can easily go a week or more without speaking aloud to another person other than extremely brief interactions with clerks, and I only spend time with someone in person maybe twice a month. I can easily go into the woods without encountering anyone else there or on the way there. I can step outside my back door and look at the land and not see anyone. So, the major Others in my life are the gods and spirits – They are the ones I talk to most, the ones that occupy my mind most, more intensely than ever before this. I know this isn’t the way for everyone, and that there are also other ways to attain such closeness, but for me, this is feeling more and more right.

– Maybe this is why I’ve felt it so hard to sit down and write anything here in awhile, other than the Species Lunation posts. I decided this collection of brief thoughts was better than nothing, because I’m having trouble putting most of it into words in any lengthier or more cohesive way. “Words are useless, especially sentences / They don’t stand for anything / How could they explain how I feel…” (from “Bedtime Story,” the most interesting and esoteric Madonna song probably because it was written by Björk)

Species Lunation 4 – Wood Frog

Once again I had pretty perfect timing, as the wood frogs started their strange and hilarious quacking chorus just a couple days after the lunar month began, almost exactly the same time as last year. For a few days they were on their own out there, but were soon joined by the little chirps of the spring peepers. We had a lot of rain at that time, and as per usual my whole front yard flooded (joys of living swamp-adjacent!), which meant that at night I was pretty much surrounded by frogs on all sides. (It was so loud. I could hear it even with the windows closed and music playing.)

I am fortunate in that the runoff ditch that runs alongside my property (pictured in the video clip above) functions as a vernal pool, so that’s where most of them are. Frustratingly, it was very hard to sneak up on them to catch a glimpse – the minute I would get close, they’d all dive down into the water. But, one night I snuck out there with a flashlight and managed to catch them in flagrante delicto. They froze like deer in headlights and stared up at me, the smaller males atop the larger females – it was quite funny.

During the week or so of frog quacking, I thought a lot about the Aristophanes play, and the frog chorus who declare their singing a hymn to Dionysos, whose sanctuary lay in the marshes. Brekekekex koax koax.

I also resonated strongly with the frogs as the ultimate sign of spring – these amazing little creatures can FREEZE SOLID for days during the winter, and spend the whole time hidden away in their hibernacula (my new favorite word) under the dirt or leaf litter, in a state of suspended animation, and then the minute that spring hits BAM they are out looking for pools in which to furiously mate before absconding to the woods and swamps to live out the summer peacefully. Before flowers push up from the soil, before there are leaves on the trees, there are the frogs. It’s a welcome sound after a long, challenging winter. No wonder the Abenaki called April the Frog Moon. They truly are one of the most prominent presences at this time of year.

About a week ago I decided to check and see if any of the clusters of frog eggs in the ditch had started to hatch, and indeed there were plenty of tiny black tadpoles. So I scooped up a few, made a little habitat in a plastic tub which I set out on the porch, and am watching them grow and change day to day while feeding them bits of salad. It’s been pretty fascinating. Hopefully at least one will survive to become an adult frog, we’ll see.

(As a side note, when I was looking up information on how to do this properly, all the websites were geared towards it being an activity for children. Why do we assume that only kids want to observe nature and learn about animals like this? It’s sad. This seems far more interesting and worthwhile a pursuit than…whatever most adults occupy their minds with.)

Anyway, of course I made my customary page for the species, which will now be displayed while I move on to my next subject. Though this time I have the actual living frogs as a reminder too.

Oracles Resume

The Oracle of Wolf-Bright Apollon will open for the season on Sunday, May 19. I am now accepting questions. More information is here – please read thoroughly if you haven’t participated before. Some important reminders:

I only have three slots per session, due to the intensive nature of this work. ALL SLOTS ARE NOW FILLED FOR THIS DATE.

Questions are accepted regarding religious matters only.

Payment is in-kind rather than monetary. The easiest way is to choose an item from my Bookshop wishlist. However, since I already have more books than I’ll be able to read in quite some time (not that I’ll ever say no to a book!), and to broaden the range of options to keep this as accessible as possible, I figured I’d offer a couple other suggestions, all of which will be used directly for spiritual practice and offerings:

• This set of incense sticks (or any of the smaller packets individually) – I use these almost daily in my morning devotions
• Agarwood (oud) incense or raw wood material
• Palo santo sticks
• Makko powder – I use this to make my own incense cones
• Raw beeswax in blocks or pellets – which I can use to make my own ritual candles
• Pre-made beeswax tealights
• Honeycomb
• Black lava salt
• A gift certificate in any amount to this liquor store (they have an incredible selection and I frequently buy my offering libations there)

(Let me know when you send in your question if you need my mailing address for one of these options. The book wishlist has my address built in.)

Also, as an FYI I have decided to pause my cartomancy practice during oracular season this year. I may be making a few changes on the back end of things before resuming in the fall.

I am once again honored to be able to do this Work in service to the gods so They may more easily communicate with Their devotees, and especially on behalf of Apollon, the oracular god par excellence. This has been one of the most beautiful (and humbling!) practices I have undertaken, as well as demanding – I put a lot of time and effort into being the clearest conduit possible, including hours of preparation, purifications, offerings and ritual starting the day before and also involving various spirits of place. This is quite a different practice from cartomancy (which of course I also take seriously, but is more flexible, usually less intensive, open to a wider range of issues, etc.). If you are interested but are unsure if your situation is appropriate for the oracle, or have any questions about how it works or how to proceed, please email me at dver at birdspiritland dot com (or comment here if it’s a general question).

Spring renewal

Now that the ground is clear (at least on one half of my property, the other half still being somewhat of a pond due to living in a swamp-adjacent low area), I have been hard at work preparing for the growing season, and continuing my ongoing project of responding to the inherent spirit of the land in various artistic, spiritual and practical ways.

Yesterday I put out a little locally-made spirit-house (or some might say birdhouse) on the back porch:

And created a new base for a portable fire bowl, out of pavers I was gifted:

I deconstructed my original fire pit, which I had made with some old concrete blocks I’d found lying around the yard when I moved in. I used a few of the blocks to create a little pedestal where I will place a dish to use as a birdbath soon, but many of them had broken into various pieces. As I was moving those off to the side, I noticed that one kind of looked like a bull’s head. Then I got an idea…

These are modeled on the bucrania called “horns of consecration” at the temple of Knossos (see below photo). Though bucrania are a recurring decorative theme going all the way back to Çatalhöyük.

It immediately felt like the right thing to place there. That platform will likely be a deer feeding station in winter (when I’ll remove the “horns” so that they won’t break further during the freeze/thaw cycle) but in the summer it can be a sort of forecourt to the temenos of Dionysos that lies within the swamp behind it.

As I collapsed in the evening, exhausted from all the work I’d done, I said to the land something along the lines of I hope these things I am doing and making please you and properly honor you. I am very careful, after all, to work with the existing character of this place and not try to impose ill-fitting ideas on it. I’m mostly keeping it wild and simple.

Anyway, that night I feel I got a nice confirmation, as I was delighted to witness something I had long thought might happen someday – when two different animal species arrived to scavenge for treats at the same time. I was watching an enormous raccoon munching away when he suddenly looked apprehensively down the driveway and I saw a petite gray fox come into view. They stared each other down for awhile, the raccoon making some intimidating movements towards the fox, the fox looking a bit nervous but ducking around him to steal food anyway before eventually running off, after which the raccoon finished eating everything in sight. It was fascinating to observe, and it felt like a gift.

I am very much looking forward to spending more time outside enjoying the land now that I don’t have to don several layers of gear just to get around through the snow! Watching the swamp come back to life – tall blue-green grasses emerging, crickets and frogs singing all night, small points of red dotting the trees where maple leaves are budding – is quickly making this my second favorite season here (after autumn, of course, which is always the best wherever I’ve lived). Having survived another winter just makes the joy of spring even more intense and personal.

Review of Dwelling on the Threshold

Thanks to Sister Patience for reviewing my book Dwelling on the Threshold – it is very gratifying to know that my words landed well and were helpful, and are continuing to be pondered a dozen years after its publication! This book is now out of print but much of the content is available in my ebook At the Edges.

Species Lunation 3 – Mink (+ the eclipse!)

I chose Mink for this month’s species because last March I had an encounter with one in the woods behind my house – I was standing very still, looking out over the swamp, and just turned my head slightly and noticed something dark and lithe approaching. Eventually I realized it was a mink, and because I remained perfectly still and quiet, it passed within a few feet of me without ever seeming to notice. It doesn’t appear that minks are commonly seen around here so I thought that might be a one-time blessing. But, two days before the start of this lunar month devoted to it, I looked out through my kitchen window to see one bounding through the tall grasses that grow alongside the runoff ditch. Apparently Mink couldn’t wait to get started!

Minks are semi-aquatic mustelids, related to weasels and polecats (and therefore, I would posit, potentially sacred to Hekate). They live in little underground labyrinths (dens with twisting passages and multiple entrances). They have pungent scent glands, and when threatened they can shriek, hiss, stomp, and puff up. They are bold, inquisitive, clever, and can swim and climb trees and even slide down snow on their bellies. And they kill their prey (sometimes larger than themselves) with a swift bite to the back of the neck. I have long adored mustelids – the perfect combination of cute and vicious. (I actually have a spirit helper in the form of a taxidermied least weasel who I propitiate every dark moon after the deipnon to Hekate.)

In Wabanaki lore the “moos-bas” is an adopted son of their culture hero, a fletcher who sometimes fulfills wishes. They were eaten in times of scarcity, but mostly provided fur/skin for pouches and garments – and the baculum was used as a toothpick!

While doing my initial research, I learned that in this region minks had a cousin, the sea mink, which was hunted to extinction. Of course minks themselves were trapped extensively for their fur, until that gave way to mink farming in the 19th century. There’s even a “Mink Farm Rd.” nearby so I guess there’s a history of it locally. I had considered buying a vintage piece of mink fur in order to connect with the animal more viscerally, but it didn’t feel right – too much trauma attached, and anyway I had read that domesticated/farmed minks were notably different physiologically than wild minks.

Instead, I found someone offering a wild mink skull for sale, and since I know no one is going out hunting them solely for the skull, I figured this was an acceptable source – certainly it’s better to honor every part than to toss it away. When I received the skull, however, I could immediately tell that the spirit (unlike, say, my taxidermied friend) wished to be outdoors, back in the woods where it belonged. I wrapped it in a sacred cord and took it for a walk at the beginning of the month, introducing it to the area where I saw my own mink, and asked to be allowed to hold onto it just for the duration of this month.

Yesterday, as things were winding down, I decorated it with ink and feathers (because of the fletching), and today I brought it back to the wetlands where it belongs, and left it in the hollow of a tree along with some offerings. I also made a wish, just in case. (I kept remembering the line “Do one thing for me” from Saki’s wonderful story “Sredni Vashtar.”)

Actually, this last small ritual was folded into a much larger series of offerings, as I decided that this day of the solar eclipse was the perfect time to make my end-of-winter thanks offerings to various gods and local spirits for helping me and my home come through unscathed. We had several big storms, as usual, and yet this year I didn’t lose power once – even during the last big Nor’easter, where literally half the state was out, and in fact at one point the electric company’s website showed all but *two households* out of about 3,000 in my town were out, including everyone on my road, and yet my power stayed on. Maybe that was a computer error, but I am immensely grateful nonetheless.

Anyway, I trekked far back into the woods, making offerings along the way to Hermes, Odin, the goddesses I call the Winter Witches, my personal spirits, and ending at a very numinous and powerful area which is home to some daunting entities I refer to as trolls (I do not visit Them often, and only when I have a very special offering). I sat there on enormous boulders, occasionally looking through my eclipse glasses at the progress of the moon across the sun, and watching the sky turn a strange color and everything go very still. It was an eerie way to experience the eclipse – and even though we didn’t get totality here, I’m still happy I decided to stay on my sacred land and be present with what was around me rather than driving for hours to battle other tourists for a spot in what has become an annoyingly trendy event.

It’s a very liminal time of year right now, between the seasons – the way through the woods was bare ground in some places, knee-deep snow in others, and completely flooded in yet others, and there were downed trees everywhere, so it was a bit of a challenge, physically, to make my way through, and that felt appropriate, that I was paying in sweat as much as in liquor and cake and tobacco and effigies. And I’m glad it worked out this way, to honor Mink along with all the others today, and especially appropriate to do this on the dark moon, with the deipnon and cartomancy coming later tonight. I am exhausted but satisfied.

Species Lunation 2 – Birch Polypore

Before I talk about this month’s species, let me just say that already I am finding this whole experiment to be deeply rewarding. Ever since my month with Pileated Woodpecker, I have been more aware of their presence – both directly when hearing their calls and hammering, or indirectly when noticing their holes in trees throughout the swamp. They have also been visiting me more than before, which is interesting! The other day I watched a particularly acrobatic male successfully manage to use the suet feeder despite being quite a bit larger than it. I keep thinking that if I continue to immerse myself in a local species each month indefinitely, eventually I will get completely tuned in to the entire ecosystem. Especially because, as I research, I pay attention to the ways in which each species interacts with others. (Not directly related to this, but I recently learned that scientists believe reishi mushrooms are spread from tree to tree by woodpeckers, who deposit the spores as they dig for insects, in the same kinds of decaying trees that the mushrooms favor!)

This past month was spent in the company of Birch Polypore. Going through this process with a fungus was quite a bit different than with an animal, as the fungus could be observed readily and closely. In fact, the first thing I did was venture out into the woods to find them, thinking that I might not be able to get out there again during the month as I assumed there would be more snow and ice on the way (instead we had an extremely mild late winter). I had seen plenty of birch trees rife with these mushrooms and was planning to take a single sample of a fruiting body, but was fortunate enough to come across a fallen branch covered in them, which I could take home and store out on the porch without actually harming the mushrooms at all (who can continue to feed on the decaying wood until I return the whole thing to the woods later and let them spread their spores).

I also want to share this photo below, which was taken back in November, looking up at one of my favorite polypore trees out there:

These mushrooms are found year-round and can live through the winter, but at this time of year they are not at their best in terms of harvesting, so I also ordered some dried ones from a small company that forages them very near to where I live.

Meanwhile, I got to work on the research part. I knew they had some purported medicinal properties but the list is vast – antiparasitic, antiseptic, antitumor, antifungal, antiviral, immune-boosting, and even styptic (they can be used as makeshift bandages). They are not edible but can be consumed as a decoction or tincture. They are also used for tinder, polishing metals, sharpening blades (giving them the folk name “razor strop fungus”), as inkblotters and for mounting insects. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any information on possible use by the local indigenous peoples. But the famous Ötzi the Iceman was carrying a piece of birch polypore strung on a thread, either for medicinal or tinder purposes. I decided to make my own pendant from one of the dried slices:

Considering this fungus selectively parasitizes only birch trees, I saw a strong connection with Nerthus (who I pay cultus to) and other birch goddesses, as well as with other polypores that specialize in this tree, such as chaga and the tinder or hoof fungus (both of which I have harvested and used here). Themes of healing, fire, and decomposition kept emerging.

Towards the end of the month, I decided to try an experiment with some of the dried mushroom slices – I wanted to make a mask. I broke them into pieces and soaked them in water overnight, then wrung them out and started kneading them into a pulp. When it wasn’t adhering as well as I’d hoped, I thought of adding flour (like with papier mache) and it worked wonders. I shaped it over a mask form, dried it for a few days with a fan (watching the color oxidize to a dark brown, although strangely the inside surface stayed white), and then sat with it until I felt some inkling of what it was meant to be. As a name/title came to me, I added strips of curling birch bark, and mounted it on a birch branch I collected last year from a particularly special spot, so that it could be held up to my face (feeling it was too fragile to try to pierce with holes for string and tie on, though ultimately I feel this way suits its use better anyway).

This is To See the Silence in the Land (I have a couple more photos over at imWalde)

Yesterday, the last day of the lunar month, I did another brief ritual on the porch – burning birch bark in a fire lit by a strip of the fungus, drinking polypore tea (quite bitter), wearing the pendant, and holding the mask to my face to gaze out at the swamp, silently thanking the mushroom.

I also completed another page of illustration and information. Like the last one, I will keep this displayed in my home for this coming month while I focus on the next species, to make sure I keep it in my thoughts even as I move on.

A poem for Khoes

Maidens I Have Hanged

I.
Three ragged poppets of muslin and wool
in the pines, in the pines
at the edge of the edgelands
swamp-watching, eyeless
temenos-markers.

II.
Pretty paper dolls, parthenoi from vases
dangling by their slender necks
twisting and fluttering in the breeze
at twilight
in the holy marshes.

III.
Small, rough forms of knotted gray yarn –
one disappeared in the mire when spring came
as the wine-stained snow melted into black pools,
one I burned, much later
when I needed to expel some miasma.

IV.
The effigy that found me
the one year I went to the sacred precinct
empty-handed
and saw it lying where the creek flows underground
waiting to be strung up in the branches above.

V.
And all the girls I’ve left behind
after swinging in their memory
(my head thrown back as my feet left the ground)
their strange, pale figures
haunting children’s playgrounds.

On this day of Pitchers, I drain my cup
in their silent company.

…

Species Lunation 1 – Pileated Woodpecker

As described here, I am devoting each lunar month this year to a different species of animal, insect, plant or fungi. I am not sure if I’ll document each one on this blog but I’m going to at least talk about the first one, which was Pileated Woodpecker – specifically in order to discuss some of the ways in which I approached this exercise.

I am nothing if not a nerd at heart so the first thing I did was research. I started with the basics of biology and ecology – what they eat, where they nest, their seasonal behaviors, lifespan, predators, etc. Favorite fact – the long tongue they use to lap up ants, when not extended, is stored way back in their skull, wrapped around their brain for added protection against their constant battering.

I looked up the meaning of the Latin name (Dryocopus is from the Greek for woodpecker, literally “tree-beating” which is appropriate, and pileatus is capped of course, like the pilos hat). I listened to audio recordings of their calls and taps (as a refresher, since I’ve already encountered them around).

Then I moved on to indigenous knowledge and folklore. I learned that this bird is rather significant to the Wabanaki peoples, as a friend of one of the most prominent figures in their mythology, and they even have a story about how it got its red cap (sea serpent blood!). It is a spirit messenger and teacher of language, among other things, leading me to make an initial connection to Hermes (who is also famously capped, albeit with petasos rather than pilos)…we’ll have to see if that idea develops into something meaningful over time.

I recalled the various places I had observed these woodpeckers so far – on the trail near the sacred grove of Wolf-Bright Apollon, in several places along the trail that abuts the swamp, and in the trees near my suet feeder (which attracts all the smaller woodpeckers here – the pileated shows interest but is a little too big to use it)…maybe a total of five or six times during over a year of living here. So I was absolutely delighted and blessed when one showed up right outside my window not only during this month I’d set aside for it, but on the day I was celebrating the Lenaia festival!

Towards the end of the lunar month, I decided to make an expedition out to the place on the trail where I had seen one previously chipping away at one of those distinctive oblong holes. I wore my pointed red hood and black and white clothing, brought dried berries as an offering and cranberry tea as a libation. Again, I was blessed – not only because I found the tree based on only a vague memory, but because the entire time I was out there, at least one pileated woodpecker was very audibly active out in the swamp, making its loud, distinctive calls and hammering away at trees. Even though I never saw it/them, I felt acknowledged.

The tree was even more impressively full of pileated holes than I could have imagined. I actually saw a few other single holes here and there on the journey to this tree, but this one surpassed all of them, it was entirely riddled with holes, the above photo being only maybe a third of them. I was amazed the tree, a white pine, was still alive.

As you can see, there was a lot of old sap dried along the bark, but I found a good sized glob of fresh stuff, still pliant, and extremely fragrant. I collected it on a shard of wood from inside the hole, and carried it home with me.

On the last day of the month, I finished my time with Pileated Woodpecker by doing two things – one was a brief ritual out on the porch, where I burned the pine resin on charcoal and spun my gragger to imitate their calls. The other was setting down all the salient points of what I had learned and done, along with a few pen-and-ink drawings of the bird and the tree, as a record of my experience. I plan to do something similar for each species this year.

I am so excited to continue this project, and feel I have already learned a lot and made a new connection to my environment. With all the time I spend outside and in the woods, understanding more about even a single species really enhances my ability to be present in the landscape.

Home as Art

I haven’t updated my art blog (imWalde) in a long time, and I realized that part of the reason was because most of my art these days has been centered around my home – making pieces to hang or display, painting murals, arranging various finds from antique stores, etc. (Hunting through the vast flea markets in this area for numinous treasures has been a magical exercise in itself, one that I often undertake with Hermes’ assistance.)

I put a lot of time and effort into this, actually, because (1) I spend the vast bulk of my time at home and (2) I am attempting to create a space here where aesthetics and spiritual meaning are deeply intertwined. Aside from necessary practical considerations, every choice is made with the religious and magical implications in mind. Nothing is “just” decorative, and I have many times nixed an otherwise interesting artistic idea or passed up a beautiful object because I couldn’t justify it on that level. As I continue to develop my practice here, I have figured out how to use each part of the place for meditation, ritual, altered states, offerings, magic, etc. – even the bathroom – and crafted the rooms accordingly. There are many formal shrines, but all the other areas are carefully designed to reflect my spiritual allegiances and interests, to the point where it is beginning to feel like one big interconnected shrine.

One of the benefits of living in a somewhat run-down older mobile home is that I feel totally free to do whatever I like – not just because I own it, but because one can’t really “ruin” outdated wood paneled walls and patched plaster ceilings. Might as well go crazy!

I feel like this work is really paying off, not just as an artistic offering to my gods and spirits, but also in the sense of helping to keep me constantly in an otherworldly state of mind, as being here never feels mundane (it also helps that I have no visible screens unless I am explicitly using one, no clocks displayed, and most of my windows look out at the swamp rather than cars passing on the road).

I have for years eschewed posting photos of my shrines publicly, for a variety of reasons, but I did want to share some little glimpses of the art in my home (especially since, as a full-fledged hermit now, I have only had two non-family visitors see it in person in over a year of living here!). I decided an interesting way to do so would be to take some Polaroid photos of not-technically-shrine scenes and objects…the somewhat uncanny and dreamlike quality of the film (especially the yellow tinted ones at the end) captures something of the way I feel about this. So I invite you all to visit “Inside The Edgelands” over at imWalde (The Edgelands being the name I bestowed on my property as a whole, house included).