it works

IT WORKS

Would you come if someone called you

by the wrong name?

I wept, because for years He did not enter my arms;

then one night I was told a

secret:

Perhaps the name you call God is

not really His, maybe it

is just an

alias.

I thought about this, and came up with a pet name

for my Beloved I never mention

to others.

All I can say is –

it works.

Rabia of Basra (c.717-801)

female Islamic saint who influenced Rumi

In these months of working on integrating my two traditions into one, of becoming a Reclaiming Feri witch, I became clear I had to find my own names for the elemental guardians and goddesses. I've been working on it, and telling those I know who are interested in Reclaiming Feri to do the same. Fern found this poem in the fabulous collection love poems from god , and
it's makes my heart sing to know that an ecstatic poet from way back when was on the same page.

It works. It really does. Feri tradition is partly based on this, the power of names rarely said, held private, names of the elemental guardians and the god and goddess. The names hold power, but they also hold a dark energy of he who first began to pass them on. They are his names for the beloveds, not mine. I’ll always hold the names I received as sacred, and keep my vow to pass them on as part of Feri initiation, but it’s become clear to me that I need my own names to call the gods and guardians, that most of the names I received are indeed just an alias. My own pet names work. They really do.