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Broken Tools

I'm always a little in awe of those who are so sure that they have all the answers.

Are they really so stupid, or just lying to themselves?

Back in the 80s, N joined the Starhawk vanguard and let her politics become her religion.

For years she was a social activist warrior: protests, marches, and power-raisings against the Wrongs of the Right became her Craft. Her causes somehow came into every conversation. Worthy as her goals were, we all got a little sick of hearing about them all the time.

Now Tr*mp is back in office. The waters that she worked so hard to protect are fouled with plastics and forever chemicals. I listen, silent, to her railing. The old social firebrand is gone. She's angry and bitter, glad only that she bore no children to inherit whatever comes next.

Nothing is quite so sad as a failed vision.

At the moment, Evangelicals are reveling in their current cultural ascendancy, but their triumph will not last. The Wheel turns. Their youth are leaving, looking elsewhere because they're sick of having rewarmed Right-wing politics passed off as spirituality.

It's a lesson hard of the learning, for Left and Right both: don't let your politics become your religion. When you do, both tools will assuredly fail you, just when you need them most.

 As Sung Every Sunday in Evangelical Churches Across America

Donald Trump

kiss his rump

bend and turn

then he'll hump

Donald Trump

Donald Trump

my god

I'm a faithful Evangelical

Democrats are diabolical

it's so Evangelo-logical

Donald Trump

One of the advantages of giving a workshop on the first day of Paganicon was the accrued feedback.

Over the course of the next two days, numerous folks approached me and thanked me for the workshop. In such situations, I always ask: “What stood out to you? What will you remember most, say, a year from now?”

Three of them said exactly the same thing in response: “The stories.”

Naturally, I followed up with: “Did you have a favorite?”

Gratifyingly, each of the three cited a different story. One woman repeated hers back to me virtually word-for-word: an impressive feat of memory, after only one hearing.

In the absence of writing, how do oral cultures pass on information?

Perhaps you have been overwhelmed recently by a series of unfortunate events – problems with work, finances, etc.–seemingly beyond your control. Do away with these burdens as quickly as possible. This spell requires paper, a black candle, a flat rock with a hollow in the center to set the candle into, a black ink pen, and a “cancellation” stamp, readily available at any stationary store. Anoint your candle with a drop of peppermint oil. Dress your altar with a peony blossom, the luckiest of the flower family. The consummate time to release bad luck is immediately after the full moon. Write what you wish to be freed from on a piece of parchment or stationary; this is your “release request.” Write this same request onto the candle as well. Ideally, this is scratched into the candle with the thorn of a rose you have grown yourself. Light the candle near an open window so the negative energy will leave your home. While the candle burns, intone:

Waxing moon, moist wise Cybele, from me this burden please dispel. Upon this night so clear and bright I release __ to the moon tonight.

You are designing a ritual to be enacted around a standing stone. The ritual includes three constituent parts:

• A round-dance around the standing stone.
• Crowning the standing stone with a circlet of flowers.
• Pouring a libation over the standing stone.

What does a witch like her want with the body of an executed criminal?

Don't ask me, I'm just the go-for guy. You want it, I'll get it for you: for the right price, anyway. Me, I don't know anything about magic, and—believe me—you don't want to, either.

Call it plausible deniability.

(I hear she cooks 'em down into a topnotch flying ointment, but maybe that's just a story.)

Anyway, her silver's as good as anybody's. Twenty years now I've been sourcing for her, and in all that time, she's never had one single complaint, and never once stiffed me. Good business, that.

Good money too, if you don't mind getting your hands dirty.

Well, son, time to learn the family trade. Beats honest work any day of the moon, ha ha.

Just leave the cart there, then come on over and help me move this stone, would you?

Oh, and bring the sack too, while you're at it.

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