branches up, roots down

I love the Oscars. I’ ve watched them as far back as I can remember, my parents letting me stay up late – a tradition I carried on when I had my own child. If magic is defined as “changing consciousness at will”, then movies are magic. Throughout time, stories have held power. Movies are the stories and myths of popular culture, binding us together and creating frames of reference. On Oscar night we gather around the flicker of the television screen to celebrate the stories and honor and award those who’ ve written, directed, produced, edited, and acted out the stories. Awards are given too to those who created sets, dressed the actors, and made the music that fueled the story. People gather around the screen, debating who they think deserves the award, placing bets, arguing over the significance of the stories. And, of course, dish the fashion. I wouldn ’t miss this for the world. Last year there was a plethora of movies with gay characters, signaling that the closet door of ...

Maybe it was Pantheacon, or maybe it was the moving into Pisces, but my nights have been filled with a multitude of vivid dreams. Among other things, I’ve been busy attending in my dreams all the workshops I missed at P-Con. I don’t regret for a second staying home to honor and bask in the perfection of Friday night and Saturday day, but it just so happened that this meant I missed two of the talks that I wanted to attend. One was the talk by Margot Adler , who just may have the best overview today of the history and diversity of this new “old religion”. She’s done me the courtesy of making several appearances in my dreams, imparting all sorts of wisdom that of course I can’t exactly recall. I’m thinking Margot is actually pretty wise, as from what I heard she said we’ve got to stop trotting out our “lineages” and we need to take better care of ourselves physically. Yes, and more yes. It is time to be adults, realize we can’t party without consequences forever and time to stand on ...

I did indeed go to Pantheacon, and am still ruminating on the experience, which was overwhelmingly positive. Witches and pagans are indeed moving on from the state of reaction and reclaiming and as a whole I felt the maturing of the Craft. Hopefully, in the coming days, I will write more, but at the moment I am exhausted and will soon go to bed. I drove from Pantheacon down to Morgan Hill to help my cousin sort and box up the contents of my aunt’s home. I came back yesterday with a carload of stuff, that now needs to find a place in my home. Almost all the items are fraught with memories, and lots of them include my grandmother and great grandmother. My aunt was the holder of history among her siblings, the one who researched the family tree, who kept old photos, and who considered anything an heirloom that involved those who came before her. I’ve unpacked the boxes, so now there are piles of dishes and glassware on my dining and kitchen tables, waiting to find their place amon...

My plans were to be at Pantheacon , but I am home. Here I am, blogging on my rooftop deck with the early spring bursting all around me. Yesterday and today are the kind of sublime days that demand to be admired. It’s balmy out, and the plum trees in the front and back of my house are in peak bloom. The air is perfumed with the subtle scent of the blossoms, and it truly is the most glorious of days. I’ve been preparing for Pantheacon for days now, and thinking a lot about Hecate’s response to Thorn’s and my musing on a lack of depth in Craft writings. Her point is that the Craft has up to now been an experiential thealogy, not primarily passed on thru the written word. This is certainly true, as when I began practicing there was a dearth of written material on feminist spirituality and neopaganism. We were too busy reclaiming and creating it. That time has now passed, and what with the internet and so many more books being written, we really are in a different stage. Unfortuna...

I saw too many couples in conflict today. Next year, I'm going to refuse to see couples on Valentine's Day, suggesting instead they invest what they spend on therapy on a nice dinner out or perhaps filling their home with flowers. Sometimes therapy is not the right therapeutic endeavor. Seeing couples today just felt wrong. I love weddings, as they are one of the few rituals left in the overculture that celebrate love and connection. Heck, they are the only ritual that does this, except Valentine's Day. So, of course, I love Valentine's Day as well. What can be wrong with a holiday that centers on hearts and cards expressing love? Believing in the power of ritual and symbol, I believe in the magic of Valentine's Day. I wore red today, including a fabulous pair of socks dancing with a print of scarlet flames. And also a big silver heart on a chain. I made every couple at some point in their session stop and remember what they love about each other, and breathe int...

I had an almost perfect birthday weekend. My girlfriend took me to a beautiful hotel situated smack dab between Chinatown and North Beach . All weekend, when taxi drivers and the like asked us “where are you from?” we would laughingly answer “The Mission”. It’s great to be a tourist in your own hometown, seeing it with new eyes and fresh vision. Saturday afternoon we met up with some of my dear friends at Nordstrom ’s on Saturday for a lesbian lingerie fashion show, and then it was off to a ritzy spa on Nob Hill. Do other cities have department stores that host lingerie shows for lesbians, complete with champagne and chocolate dipped strawberries? The flower festival in Chinatown , along with each meal being better than the last, made the weekend more than delectable. It was a feast of a weekend, and now I find myself preparing for what comes next. This upcoming weekend, for some inexplicable reason, I will be going to Pantheacon , the big pagan conference disconcertingly held...

The rain fell softly on and off all day. Tomorrow is my birthday, always a time of reckoning in some way or another. I’m tender from my visit with my mother and maybe from other things as well. If reading poetry is like a massage to the soul, then I’ve been getting spa soul treatment since Brigid. My love affair is turning into a comfortable relationship, something which is making me rather uncomfortable. Isn’t it dangerous to be so happy? And then there are my friends. Yesterday and today there was a variety of calls and e-mails from and to my friends. Some were checking up on me, some I was checking up with. Nothing really out of the ordinary, but in my tender state, with my pores wide open from the soul spa treatment, I realized how rich I am, how wealthy in friends. Even writing this, I’m tearing up. I love my friends and I know they love me. Tonight, my son is up in our attic, with a group of his friends. I can hear their laughter as I write this, and the house is...

I’m back in San Francisco , my beloved city. The trees are beginning to bud. The plum tree out my back window has begun to bloom, and tonight I’m loving the beginning of what hopefully will be several days of soft rain. The poetry has not stopped. Every day I follow a link to a new one. The web was aptly named, and what makes this spinning out of poetry so perfect is that so many actual knitters and actual spinners are part of it. I came back to a city abuzz with the news of our mayor having an affair with the wife of one of his friends. Both my housemate and ex-husband know the friend. It is a small town. Now Gavin is saying that alcohol is a problem and there’s a cry for him to resign. Gosh. I’m having a kind of strange reaction, not unlike how I felt during the whole Clinton blow-by-blow blow job hoo haaa. I’m missing my childhood. I’m missing a time when the president was having martinis (and popping pain pills) and fucking everything that moves, and it was not any of...

For three days now I've been traversing the web, going from one blog to another, reading poetry and "meeting" the most amazing folks thru their blogs. I wouldn't miss this experience for the world. However, making my way back to the limerick about knitting or the poem about kissing cannot be done quickly or easily. Yvonne , who submitted a great original poem, has begun the endeavor of collecting the poetry in one place, making it possible to view in one swoop the diversity of the poems. We can even all help in adding on to it! The site itself is amazing - the pagan theologies wiki. I know I'll be contributing to this beyond the poetry. It also means that from now on, each year we can put a poem on our blog, and then record it also on the wiki, for a record of what was "read" at Brigid's poetry slam. Thank you, Yvonne!

Today my mother’s hair started falling out for the first time. It really does fall out in handfuls! Big hunks come out with one swipe of a brush. Tonight she is close to bald. We are in new territory in more ways than one. This is the first time I’ve visited her here and I’m feeling a bit like someone in movie about time travel. I’m in Surprise, Arizona , and it’s not anything like San Francisco , California . In San Francisco , I can feel Brigid in the buds emerging on the trees, the green that is beginning to insist. Here, I can’t quite acclimate myself. It is a land of malls, chain stores and suburbs built on desert. Going out to get groceries and some fresh nightgowns, I felt myself a stranger in a strange land. Sad, but true, that I feel more at home in France , Wales , Italy , or Central America than I do in the majority of the United States . It’s helping to know that so many people from all over the states are posting poetry. The memory of this trip will forever...

I’m in Phoenix , visiting my mother who had chemotherapy yesterday. I flew here last night, and thankfully, there’s wireless service here. Spotty, but working enough for me to occasionally immerse myself in the poetry flowing thru the blogosphere. Last night I read until sleep overtook me. Today, every hour or so I read another two to three poems, marveling at the new sites I’m finding in the process. The poetry is a balm to the ache of this visit. I am so thankful for it. This poetry reading is potent. This poetry reading is healing. Thank you, my fellow bloggers!!!!

Fifteen years ago, I gave birth to my son on January 30 th . This week, as I reflected on which poem I would dedicate to Brigid, I kept coming back to the poem he wrote for me two years ago. My son was conceived on Beltane and was born a few days before Brigid. From the beginning I have felt my son was a gift from the Goddess. Being a teenager, his task now is to rebel. He’s doing a good job of it. He was the quarterback on his football team at the Catholic High School he fought to go to. He is more straight arrow than this queer witch can fathom. Being fifteen, he’s embarrassed by just about everything I do and say. Two years ago he wrote this for me, and in the last few months I've returned to it again and again. I am so thankful for him. And for poetry, life, and love. It has all come back. And just keeps coming. The One The water for the seed The one who grows The young. The teacher. You are the oak for The acorn. The one Who stands tall like A tree...