Speculative Pagan

This is not a ‘how to’ book. It is my strongest advice to anyone wishing to know more or to follow the path of the Druid to find themselves a well respected teacher or training course. This can take time and patience. But it will also save time and potential confusion.

Before we know anything at all, we are free. When we have begun to discover, we each carry away with us for some time the burden of thinking we know everything. True magic is about empowerment. Empowerment is about personal creativity, not
control. Competition is the game of the ego. A good teacher will never appear superior. It isn’t a race for enlightenment; it is a journey towards balance and perfect peace. There is no Holy Grail which holds all the answers. There is only our own freedom of spirit.

A quote from the beginning of Spirits of the Sacred Grove. It absolutely is not a how-to book, and anyone picking this up to learn Druidry will have their work cut out to say the very least. Even so, it is a book that has inspired a great many people to find their own way and their own path as Druids. Emma Restall Orr offers a poetic sense of what it means to be a Druid, a tantalizing glimpse of something hard to name, and even harder to pin down or possess. There are a great many contemporary Druid authors whose journey and inspiration began with Emma Restall Orr's work, and a great many Druids who are still questing after something that they first sensed while reading this particular book. It holds an important place in the evolution of modern Druidry.

I believe this is the first incarnation of Emma Restal Orr's book - it was republished as Druid Priestess, and then re-published a second time as a Pagan Classic, by Moon Books, where it's reverted to the original title, and found a new cover. I've tagged all three versions of the cover for clarity. Emma Restall Orr is person featured on the Druid Priestess cover, not a model. 

The original paperback version of Spirits of the Sacred Grove can occasionally be found second hand, as can Druid Priestess, but the most recent version is also available as an ebook, which hasn't previously been an option.

Hag is not a nice word.
Yet there comes a time in every woman’s life when nice is tedious, when nice is insipid, seeping into the soul like souring milk, warping the mind. Indeed, nice can, at times, be all that is offensive.

Hag: it’s a fascinating word. As I speak it aloud, the sound is as smooth as an out breath. Aspirated, its vowel is extended and then clipped as if with a warning kick of death. It is a primal word, formed with barely any effort required. It whispers of cold
wind, of thick fog and the stench of stagnant water. It is a word robed in spiders’ webs, dusty and worn, unsure where to place itself on the shiny veneers of today. Lingering at the edges of life,

it waits to run a broken nail down some blackboard of the soul.

No, hag is not a nice word. Like princess or pole-dancer, the word quietly slips us a picture, and though for each of us the image may differ slightly, it invariably embodies all that is declared to be simply and irrefutably not nice in woman.

This book is about her.

It is about us all.

I've taken this quote from the beginning of 'Kissing the Hag' - it gives a flavour of the book, in terms of both the writing style and the content. It's a very readable book, in which some quite difficult subject matter is handle in prtty accessible ways.

The story of Gawain and the Loathly Lady runs through this book - a mythic counterpoint to talking about issues of modern femininity and gender relations. I've talked about that aspect of the book in more detail in another blog post - http://nimueb.booklikes.com/post/1274838/of-knights-and-hags 

Before opening the gate and bidding the reader stride on into the wordscape of this book, it is worth offering a few notes of explanation, of introduction and of thanks.

Firstly, some readers may know my previous books. It is a policy I maintain not to reread my older writings to ensure a continuity of ideas. If what I present here in some way contradicts what I have written earlier, I can only hope that the newer work can be seen as a development, and not a sliding back into error. In the same way that it can be a delight to watch an actor grow older over decades, their seriousness of youth transforming into the gravitas of experience, I enjoy the opportunity of witnessing a writer’s journey of discovery, whether in fiction or nonfiction: I trust my readers will not only allow me the same process of change and growth, but feel that my work as a whole is richer because of it.

As a metaphysics, this text is offered as a sort of prequel to my Living With Honour: A Pagan Ethics, published in 2007. In that book, I used the term *Pagan to describe a belief system based wholly upon nature. There are large parts of modern Paganism the focus of which is very much human nature, and the power of the mind to manipulate and influence; with these being so very far from my own spiritual and philosophical practice, it would not have been accurate to use the simple word Pagan. The animism described in this text could be said to be a main strand of *Paganism.

Taken from the Forward to The Wakeful World. I think the quote illustrates something of the shift here from previous books - the tone is very different (I thought) from much of Emma Restall Orr's previous writing - there are more academic tones in the mix, and there's less of the experiential material that dominated previously. Instead, she adopts a more theoretical and philosophical approach to considering Paganism.

In shamanic terms, everyone is believed to have power animals – guardians that empathise with us, guide us on the spiritual path, and protect us from harm. Each power animal increases our inner power by giving access to the wisdom of its kind, so that negative energy cannot influence our thoughts and actions. A horse guardian will impart ‘horse sense’, and endow us with some of the attributes of a horse; a dog guardian will give ‘dog sense’, and bestow some of the instincts of a dog. The animal
kingdom has a wealth of knowledge to offer and our animal guardian communicates this wisdom by drawing our attention to happenings around us … and repetition of such ‘happenings’ is their means of communication that will, eventually lead to
understanding.

The quote comes from the opening of 'Black Horse White Horse' - a book about working shamanically with horses, horse spirit, horse energy. Being a portal, it's quite a short book, ideal for people who are new to the subject. 

Being a Melusine Draco title, we of course aren't talking about 'horse' as some vague and abstract concept - the specific horses of specific myths are explored, the history of the horse, how human cultures have related to horses, different kinds of horse - there's a lot of knowledge packed into these pages, and takes us from working with the idea of 'horse', to something much more real and intense.

First and foremost, forests and woodland have played a mystical role in all cultures where trees have dominated the landscape. Trees bring Nature right up close and personal and, as a result, the whole of the natural world becomes a ‘tangled web of enchantment’ to a true witch’s eyes. Most of us are familiar with what we call ‘broad leaved’ woodland … that is to say, forest made up predominantly of trees whose leaves are basically flat, as opposed to being needle-shaped like those of the conifers of the evergreen world. These trees are mostly deciduous (with the exception of the holly, box and strawberry tree), and shed their leaves when winter approaches, lying dormant until the warmth of spring stimulates new growth.

The trees in Hunter’s Wood are natives and form part of the great broad-leaved forest that once stretched over the whole of northern Europe. Nevertheless, not all remaining woodland is ancient; nor are all woods that are not ancient, man-made. Left alone, Nature has a tendency to re-colonise almost any land that is allowed to remain idle. Trees such as sycamore, birch and oak, which readily colonise new territory, quickly invade open land and very often relatively new, dense woodland can be found only an hour’s drive from the city centre.

In the beginning … Britain’s original trees disappeared during the last Ice Age, 10,000 years ago, but by the time the land had separated from continental Europe some 2000 year later, 35 species had returned by natural means — brought in by the wind
and birds — as the climate gradually grew warmer. Until man began clearing the forests 5000 years ago, the natural vegetation of much of the British Isles was a blanket of broad-leaved deciduous trees — alder, birch, oak and lime. The myths and
legends that grew out of this forest haunted his imagination.

Before we begin to practice the Craft of the wood-witch, however, we must learn to look at trees with different eyes, because there is still a sense of mystery and enchantment in the woodland world.

This is an excerpt from the opening to Melusine Draco's Traditional witchcraft for the woods and forests. 

One of the things I particularly admire about Melusine is her earthed and practical approach to all subjects. For her, unsurprisingly 'the wood' is not a simple concept - she writes extensively about different tree types, about the myths and magic of woodland, and the ways in which we can work magically with trees. If Paganism is earth-centred spirituality, then we need to know the earth, and we need to know, as species, and as living individuals, the trees that we deal with.

There's a wealth of tree lore in this book such that it would also be highly suitable for students of Druidry as well as for those interested in witchcraft.

For a witch the magical energies of Traditional Witchcraft for Fields and Hedgerows differs quite considerably from Traditional Witchcraft for Woods and Forests because whereas the woods have been part of our landscape since the beginning of time, fields and hedgerows are a relatively recent innovation. It therefore stands to reason that the witchcraft of fields and hedgerows is going to be much more of a domestic and homely variety, not moving far from hearth or cattle byre. It will lack the primitive, sometimes hostile, sensations that we encounter when walking alone in the woods. Unfortunately, very few modern witches have the opportunity to understand the land, but once we learn to appreciate it again and begin to feel part of it, it begins to share its secrets.

This quote is taken from the introduction to Melusine Draco's book on traditional witchcraft for fields and hedgerows. It makes plain the case for why this manifestation of the countryside needs considering as a separate issue from working magically with the land in wilder places.

Much of the UK has been in agricultural use for a very long time - there are field systems that go back to the Iron Age, and many iconic landscapes - our moors, commons and fells - have been co-created by humans and their grazing flocks. The energy of land that has a long history of human use is not the same as that of a wild place. This book explores the differences, but without prioritising one kind of experience of the natural world over another. Fields and hedgerows are nature, too. Just nature that we've interacted with a lot.

How we understand the countryside has a lot of impact on how we treat it - which in turn has far wider implications than magical use alone. Being able to see the ancestors in the land, the human uses and influences, and being able to recognise that and work with it, rather than romanticising it - as people often do with the tapestry of British fields, and not rejecting is as really just another industry and therefore not nature, opens the way for a better relationship between people and the soil.

If much of today’s pagan propaganda is to be believed, anyone who doesn’t live a stone’s throw from, or have regular access to the rural heartlands of England, is hardly qualified to call themselves ‘pagan’. And if the unfortunate town-dweller can’t be found at weekends rooting about in country hedgerows, then ‘witch’ is also a label to which they apparently have no right!

Tosh, tosh! And thrice tosh!

Yes, of course, we can haul out the old chestnut of ‘pagan’ deriving from the Latin pagus, which properly means ‘belonging to a village’ but it was used in a derogative sense, just as contemporary town dwellers might refer to country folk as ‘swede bashers’ or ‘carrot crunchers’. Long after the Christian Church was first established in the cities and towns (centres of learning), what they saw as idolatrous practices continued to be observed in rural districts and villages, so ‘pagan’ and ‘villager’ came to mean the same thing. Similarly, the word ‘heathen’ (from the Anglo-Saxon hæthen, hæth) referred to a ‘dweller on a heath or common’. Christian doctrine would not have reached these remote people until long after it had integrated town and city, and in both cases, ‘pagan’ and ‘heathen’ implied a lack of worldliness, sophistication and learning. It was intended as an insult.

In contemporary society, ‘pagan’ is now the accepted umbrella term for those who follow any eclectic, reconstructionalist doctrines of pre-Christian beliefs, while ‘heathen’ tends to refer more specifically to those of the revivalist Norse traditions. Ironically, the vast majority of followers of both traditions live in towns and cities. And let’s face it, people live in urban communities for a variety of reasons: the most common being the close proximity to work and/or family.For the witch whose career confines them to an urbanised environment, regular Craft practice may often seem like a futile gesture, especially if home is a small, gardenless-flat. Even the suburbs can be magically incapacitating, if there is constant noise from traffic and neighbours. People work long hours; often setting off for work and getting home again in the dark during the winter months, without having the opportunity to notice the subtle changing of the seasons. Weekends are a constant battle with family commitments, domestic chores and socialising. It’s no wonder that the urban witch has little time or strength left for magical and spiritual development.

There are, of course, others who find themselves having to remain town and house-bound because of age or disability; because they are caring for an aged/infirm parent, or partner; or because they have small children. Urbanisation often provides on-the-spot facilities to make things easier on the domestic front but it cannot give the one thing that a witch needs most – privacy and spiritual elbow-room.

So how do we manage?

First published as Mean Streets Witchcraft, this book has become part of Melusine's Traditional witchcraft series, published by Moon Books. Increasingly Pagans are urban dwellers, and there's growing demand for pragmatic books that deal with the realities of urban living rather than a romanticised, rural Paganism that simply isn't available to the majority of people in their daily lives.

The quote I've shared comes from the introduction to the book, and highlights all the issues urban Pagans routinely face. That question of 'So how do we manage?' is the jumping off point for this book, which goes on to explore how nature exists in urban spaces, how to relate to the elements, content about the history or urban magic users and more. There's a lot on offer here about how to have a really workable magical practice in an urban environment, and I think it has a lot to offer all Pagans, not just witches. 

Around the world there are thousands of miles of coastline: rugged cliffs, tidal-battered rocky shores, sweeping estuaries, gentle brackish creeks, golden sand and shingle beaches. Although each has an enchantment all of its own, few of us are fortunate to live near enough to the sea to use this dramatic shoreline as a regular magical working area. And yet, for a natural witch, born and bred by the sea, the beach and rocky shore are equally as magical as the inland woods and hills of
more traditional approaches to witchcraft.

Our shorelines also provide every kind of haunting landscape – from mysterious sea-caves and treacherous, misty saltmarshes; to endless beaches and rock pools; and salt-water estuaries where trees grow right down to the water’s edge, and petrified forests emerge at low tide. The diverseness of our northern Atlantic coastlines in particular … from Shetland to Scilly, to Norway and Brittany, from Newfoundland to Cape Cod …owe these distinctive characteristics to constant erosion, salt spray and the battering of spring and winter gales. The sea carves rocks into jagged cliffs and smoothes the sand of a beach – but even if there is no shortage of breathtaking scenery in which to create a sacred space, it is the sea itself that provides the
real focus for our magical energies.

This is a quote from the opening of Melusine Draco's book on Witchcraft for the seashore. there's lots of practical information here about the physical nature of coastal environments, and how to work magically with them. Each section of the book includes some clear instructions about things to be doing - if you're looking for a work book and reliable guidance for things to explore, then this is ideal content. Melusine is an experienced witch who is able to offer meaningful projects to those who wish to learn by doing.

The Moon is such a beautiful sight in our skies; she is full of mystery and intrigue yet also full of immense power. She has been seen through history as being part of the occult and linked to enchanters, magicians and witches alike. Images abound of a wolf howling to the Moon and of witches flying on broomsticks silhouetted against her as a backdrop.

She is a huge part of all sorts of pagan pathways and plays a very important role in all areas of working magic. Observing and working with the Moon and her phases is one
of the ways we can tune into the here and now and the universe that surrounds us, learning to go with the flow of energy and follow her course. Working with the phases of the Moon also helps us to understand our own body and our inner thoughts, feelings and emotions. She controls the tides of the oceans; so the Moon is very much about our emotions which are linked to the element of water.

Within this book I hope to open up some of the mystery and guide you through working with her phases and to tap into her powerful energy.

The quote comes from the introduction to Rachel Patterson's Moon Magic book. this is a book full of ideas for spells and rituals associated with different phases of the moon. People often think of witchcraft as a full moon activity, but as Rachel demonstrates, any phase of the moon can be worked with, although some lend themselves more to certain kinds of magic and ritual than others.

Now, I am not a born and bred hereditary Hoodoo root worker living in Georgia or New Orleans (I hope to come back in another lifetime as one though…), but I have studied Hoodoo in great detail. I work with Hoodoo magic all the time and have incorporated it into my witchcraft. I have great respect for the practice of Hoodoo and all the practitioners who use it.

What I hope to do in this book is provide an introduction to this amazing and fascinating magical practice. This is MY interpretation of Hoodoo and how I work with it within the Craft. I have tried to make it as accurate as possible and have drawn on many sources as well as my own experiences.

I have included many original recipes for oils, powders, incenses etc and have tried to be as traditional as possible with the ingredients for the well known ones, but other recipes included here are my own blends and therefore may not be so traditional.

My intention is for this book to honour the art of Hoodoo and all those who practise it.

I've taken this quote from the opening to Rachel Patterson's book on Hoodoo. it's never straightforward when working with the traditions of another culture, and it's really important that an author acknowledges their relationships - whatever that is - with the practice they are talking about. 

We all know that blissful moment of putting our feet up at the end of a hard day and sipping a hot cup of soothing tea. Relaxing, calming and apparently the answer to every situation: ‘Have a cup of tea, it will make you feel better.’ But tea can also be extremely magical, especially if you create the blends yourself and tie them in with your magical intent.

I have a beautiful teapot that has a built in infuser, but you can get small metal infusers for individual cups of tea and these are brilliant for popping your tea blends into or just use a normal teapot and a strainer. You will want to use one of these methods otherwise you will be spitting bits of herb and spice out…

I think there is something very magical about the whole process of making tea, especially if you make a bit of an effort rather than just throwing a teabag into a cup and filling it up. It can become a small ritual in itself.

The Japanese have a tea ceremony called Chanoyu, Sado or Ocha. The whole event from preparation to serving and drinking the tea (a green tea called Matcha) is part of the ritual. It isn’t all about drinking the tea, it is about the care and attention that goes
into it, the serving of it and the appreciation.

The Japanese tea ceremony is for creating relaxation, communication (if you are serving guests), connections with your surroundings and the elements, to create harmony, but ultimately the aim is to make that deep spiritual connection that you get from drinking the tea in silent contemplation. Almost as if the process from preparation, serving and drinking is all part of a ritual to send you into a meditative spiritual state. The Japanese tea ceremony philosophy is one of harmony, respect,
purity and tranquillity.

From the Magic of Tea (quoted above) to a Happy Cake Filled Ending, this is a celebratory sort of book for bringing magic into your everyday life. Lots of recipes, lots of correspondences between foodstuffs and all manner of things - ideal for your sympathetic magic. Magic for hearth and home. 

The kitchen is traditionally the woman's domain, as wife, and mother, as domestic servant. I should perhaps give a nod to the sinister witches kitchens where children may be cooked, but there's none of that here! This is a book of benevolent, family friendly magic where nothing is going to object to going in the oven.

it's very readable, and accessible, the recipes are pretty straightforwards, and can be used as acts of seasonal celebration, or as food magic. Food preparation is a great focus for intent, it gives you enough to be doing, it gives you a delivery method, and if you want to bring any kind of joy, encouragement, romance or good fortune into the world, something charming and edible will help that process on its way.

This book is essentially about my life and how I live and work as a kitchen witch. It is my Book of Shadows, my Kitchen Witch’s Grimoire. It covers what it means to be a witch, how we work, what we do and how we celebrate the turning of the seasons. It is packed full of information about all sorts of subjects from a breakdown of rituals to reading auras, along with meditations, recipes for oils, incenses and spells and a huge amount of crafts to make for each Sabbat. The information herein does not follow any strict tradition; it is my own interpretation of witchcraft melding together my Wiccan training with kitchen witchery, ways of the Old Craft and a bit of hoodoo thrown in for good measure. You can also find a lot of information about magical
cooking, herbs and gardening in my first book, Pagan Portals: Kitchen Witchcraft, it’s not included here because I didn’t want to duplicate!

I believe magic and the Craft to be fluid and flexible, it is ever changing and we are ever learning.

This is from the opening to Rachel Patterson's Grimoire of a Kitchen Witch. I think the bit of a book where the author lays out their intentions is always a helpful thing to look over. I tend to know from an intro whether the book is going to suit me or not, and I very much enjoyed this one, precisely because it's a personal interpretation drawing on experience coupled with a willingness to improvise.

'Grimoire' sounds a bit sinister and dangerous (I think) but this book is anything but. It's a warm, often playful, insightful and inspiring take on a very down to earth kind of witchcraft.

Bluebell / Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia,
Hyacinthoides non-scripta)
Two different species of plant, both with pretty blue bell-shaped flowers, that both seem to be called bluebell or harebell depending on what part of the world you are in. They also seem to have similar magical properties. Note: the Hyacinthoidesspecies is protected in the UK so please don’t pick any in the wild.

The bluebell is definitely a flower of the faerie folk and also good for helping with shapeshifting magic. It is said to provide protection especially against witchcraft if you rub the flower on your body.

Use dried bluebells in magical workings to bring about the truth in a situation.
Add it to incense blends to aid with healing and to dispel illnesses.

This is a charming book, with an array of simple, practical and magical uses for herbs. Much of the book is concerned with correspondences, so if sympathetic magic especially appeals to you, this is an ideal text to pick up. 

It's pleasingly responsible as a text.I picked the above quote because it illustrates this. I find it curious that anyone could confuse bluebells and harebells - bluebells are a Beltain flower of the woods, harebells a late summer flower belonging to grassland. they do however look very similar, and colloquial names for plants can vary a lot one place to another.

Rachel includes a helpful set of folk names for herbs and the plants they connect with - all that eye of newt stuff may not be as gruesome as first imagined! This is a really interesting list. I was also fascinated to see a list of Victorian flower associations - the language of flowers being more associated with sending secret messages than with magic. But that's the thing about this kind of pragmatic approach to witchcraft - is something is interesting, appealing, if it works in some way, it really doesn't matter how old it is. What matters is the inspiration and where that takes you.

A woman stands hunched over an old wooden table, pestle and mortar in her hands, grinding away at a mixture of ingredients. A large white candle stands on the table beside her, the flame flickering and spluttering. Open in front of her lies a huge leather bound book, the pages well worn and filled with beautifully written spells.

Sounds like a scene from medieval times?

Actually it could be now; it could be me (or you) in a town house kitchen, or an apartment in the city. This is a witch at work, same scene, same utensils, and same
ingredients now as centuries ago.

A witch works with nature, in tune with the earth, working and living along with the ebb and flow of the seasons. Spring is for cleaning, clearing out clutter, sweeping out the cobwebs and setting new goals. Summer is a time for celebrating the Sun God, for basking in his glow, working on projects, gardening and creating. Autumn is a time to be thankful for the harvest, to give thanks for all that we have and to start storing away for the winter. Winter itself is for reflection, a time to pull up a chair by the fire and think back over what you have achieved. All of these things can be done physically, mentally and spiritually with each turn of the Wheel of the Year.

As a witch you can have all the right equipment – wands, athames, pentagrams etc, but you will find a Kitchen Witch tends to prefer to use what is to hand. A finger serves purpose as a wand, a feather for the element of Air, a pebble for the element
of earth… you get the drift.

A Kitchen Witch will create… recipes, crafts, lotions and potions. When a friend is poorly a Kitchen Witch will work a spell to aid, but will also make some homemade soup, putting healing energy into making it, adding healing energy with each
vegetable and herb that is added.

This is an excerpt from the Pagan Portal Kitchen Witchcraft, and I think it's a great expression of what Kitchen witchcraft is all about - this is the kind of magic you weave into your daily life, working with whatever is to hand.

Rachel Patterson has a really warm, engaging, easy to read kind of style which I think comes through really well in this quote. Reading her work is like sitting down with a friendly mentor and a nice cup of tea.

"It can be tempting to see dreams as purely something happening in the mind, or equally to hive them off as spiritual experiences totally separate from our waking lives. My understanding is that dreams can also be deeply rooted in our biology. The more pressing our physical issues are, the more likely they are to inform our dreams. In dreaming, body and soul remain intertwined.

For those who see dreams as innately irrational, the strange, reality defying illogic of them can seem to be little more than foolish and whimsical distractions from the important business of life. This is not my experience at all. Having worked with dreams for many years, I find them to be very much involved with our waking lives. Often dreams are (admittedly distorted) mirrors we hold up to reflect on our waking experiences, fears and desires. We use our dreams to make sense of life. Thus how
we sleep and how we dream has a direct relationship with how we experience waking life, both reflecting and informing it, even if we aren’t conscious of that process. It is part of our life experience, and as valid as any other. At the same time I do not believe in getting over-enthusiastic about pulling out mystical messages from dreaming, although I think these too are present.

This is a quote from the introduction of my Pagan Dreaming book, I think it gives something of a flavour of where I've been going with this work, and why. It's not a dream interpretation book - the interpretation of dreams is a very small part of what I think dreams are about, and there's far more to explore in terms of how we might engage with our own dreaming.