Having a table at Greater Pittsburgh Pagan Pride Day was great fun. Big thanks to the organizers of the event, and to those that helped man our table, and to those that stopped by to learn more about Reclaiming and Feri and Bone and Briar!
Parley
Parley
by Amoret BriarRose
“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” ~African proverb
“I have never seen a greater monster or miracle in the world than myself.” ~Michel de Montaigne
Have you noticed I always drag toward dark?
I don’t dance a delicate compromise, won’t meet you halfway,
won’t partake in pleasantries and won’t shake hand to tentacle.
But if you’re smart, you’ll go without fuss, for
when I’m clawing at your anchor, when I’m roiling ‘round the undercarriage?
You’ll need my eye to scan the inky black, my tongue to sing forgotten languages.
Let’s go together; you’re not set on survival.
Crossing is only part of the story.
The captain always goes down with the ship.
The real writer is one who really writes.
I’m stretching myself again, writing poetry about the sea. A dear friend and I are committed to writing a poem related to that week’s prompt (issued on a Monday) and posting it (the following Sunday.) The point is to write whatever gets written.
I love these sorts of projects – I work well with prompts and finite amounts of time and no pressure to write something great. Writing like this helps me actually write.
Having said that, I offer the following to you, dear writers, who are looking for motivation to actually write:
For the young who want to
By Marge Piercy
Talent is what they say
you have after the novel
is published and favorably
reviewed. Beforehand what
you have is a tedious
delusion, a hobby like knitting.
Work is what you have done
after the play is produced
and the audience claps.
Before that friends keep asking
when…
View original post 180 more words
A Selkie declines the dance
“You’ll be the rhythm and I’ll be the beat
You’ll be the rhythm and I’ll be the beat
Then I’ll be the rhythm and you’ll be the beat
And love, the shoreline, where you and I meet”
~Lykke Li, Melodies & Desires
A Selkie declines the dance
by Amoret BriarRose
I learned well from my sisters still blazing
these waters with eyes burning from salt
for those stone-colored bone princes,
forever blinking and awake
in their grey-green beds;
and those too, whose flames
having dimmed to small candles
standing still silent on ledges, eyes locked with the waves.
Desire will dare you to skulk and steal and bury my soul
skin bare, preferring my feet shaking the rocks, lungs
out of their depths in the shallows.
Temptation will tell me to drag, and to drown.
Waves are not content with kissing the breakwater
when the shoreline is calling, a surrender…
View original post 2 more words
There are a thousand ways to practice magic
Breathing Hate: When a mother turns on her child
(alternate title: birthing a bisexual)
(alternate alternate title: FOAD)
I breath in hate,
and expel it with my breath, transformed;
Injustice pulled in, boiling my blood;
Hope flows out,
clearing cruelty from my vicinity.
breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out;
I have been taught to change energy this way.
Blind rage beats my temples,
pools of anguish spread to cheeks,
My slack-jawed countenance
declares my failure to comprehend;
With malicious forethought
you’ve disowned who you birthed.
I am stunned to silence.
My disgust causes bile to rise,
coating the back of my tongue,
splashing my teeth,
blistering my lips.
All the words I bite back,
All the curses I refuse to throw,
rumble and strain against my skull,
pushing for the weak spot of release.
My will becomes my spell
becomes my prayer becomes my mantra:
“May you receive all that you deserve.”
I have been taught to work magic this way.
©Pamela V Jones Sept. 2014
Originally posted at Lean in to Joy.
The Cauldron of Cerridwen, a Bone & Briar Mystery School offering
The Cauldron of Cerridwen: Power and Transformation
A Myth for the Dark Half of the Year
Cerridwen works for a year and a day to create a potion for her son, who she deems too ugly to be admitted among men of noble birth.
This story is about control. Have you ever sought to mitigate circumstances for someone else? Have you ever tried to step in and shift someone else’s fate?
Gwion Bach is hired to stir the Cauldron of Inspiration for a year and a day, never stopping. On the last day three drops of the potion land on Gwion’s hand, and without thinking, he tastes them, gaining all the benefits of the potion.
This story is about work and reward. Have you ever done work that someone else would benefit from? Have you ever become more powerful from doing work without thinking of reward?
Cerridwen, upon learning that her potion was lost, chased after Gwion. Gwion changed into a variety of animals to outrun Cerridwen, but she also shapeshifted to keep up with him.
This story is about running from power. Have you ever thought you could outrun change? Growth? Yourself? A Goddess?
Bone and Briar Mystery School will be exploring the story of the Cauldron of Cerridwen in a 6 month online class from November 1, 2014 through April 30, 2015 in creating an online community experience that will include:
– monthly packets of story, information, and prompts for magical work
– online discussion with class participants and facilitators
– audio files for trancework
– video discussions with facilitators
You will need:
– access to a computer and internet access
– a journal
– basic art supplies
Facilitators:
Amoret BriarRose: Spiritual Midwife, Itinerant Priestess, a Phoenix Flame and a Siren Song. An initiate of both Reclaiming and Anderson Feri traditions, she has been studying, working and facilitating in the Reclaiming tradition since 2000, and currently works in partnership with Boneweaver in the Bone and Briar line of Reclaiming/Feri in Pittsburgh, PA.
Amoret’s passions include community building, co-creation and manifestation, ecstatic ritual, divination and the poetry of life. She is experienced in leadership training, small group facilitation, tarot, trance techniques, and ritual arts. Amoret believes that transformation can be blissful if we surrender to the process. It is her privilege and calling to tempt seekers to their transformations.
Boneweaver: Spiritual Midwife, Transition Priestess, Feri Witch working the energy through a Reclaiming framework. Initiated Priestess of the Reclaiming and the Anderson Feri traditions who lives seeking Joy in all its forms with her working partner Amoret BriarRose at Bone and Briar a Reclaiming/Feri line near Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
Boneweaver’s passions include bone throwing, mixing essential oils and herbs for intentional purposes, ritual arts, trance, and art. Her gifts in the religious realm center around deep transformative work (often referred to as shadow work) and transitions. Priestess to all beings both Seen and Unseen she approaches transformation with arms wide open and trusts the process to sanely guide the Work and the Work to support her throughout.
Registration: To register, please send an email with the following information tothewitches@boneandbriar.com: Preferred name: Email address: Current location (as this is an online class, just a general idea of where you reside): Brief outline of pagan/magical experience:
Sliding scale registration fee: $150 – $210
Payments accepted through Paypal
Email for payments: song.of.embers@gmail.com
A non-refundable deposit of 50% will hold your place for this workshop; full payment is due by October 18th.
My Reclaiming Teacher/Priestess Listing is Up!
Just in case you were wondering…
My Reclaiming teacher/priestess listing is up on the Reclaiming Resource Listing page! Yay for official officiallyness of it all!
Melusine, on the occasion of being intruded upon while bathing
Just a tidbit of poetry…
it was never my intention to play a bathing Bluebeard, and there is no sealskin for stealing. yet the revelation – always amusing. what could reasonably be expected, in the arms of fairy tale? is the forest not dark and twining? is the water not weighted with treachery? does the female exist that isn’t warning, isn’t mystery, isn’t monster? our bargain was to love – not to look.
The Cauldron of Cerridwen, a Bone & Briar Mystery School offering
Bone and Briar Mystery School Presents
The Cauldron of Cerridwen: Power and Transformation
A Myth for the Dark Half of the Year
Cerridwen works for a year and a day to create a potion for her son, who she deems too ugly to be admitted among men of noble birth.
This story is about control. Have you ever sought to mitigate circumstances for someone else? Have you ever tried to step in and shift someone else’s fate?
Gwion Bach is hired to stir the Cauldron of Inspiration for a year and a day, never stopping. On the last day three drops of the potion land on Gwion’s hand, and without thinking, he tastes them, gaining all the benefits of the potion.
This story is about work and reward. Have you ever done work that someone else would benefit from? Have you ever become more powerful from doing work without thinking of reward?
Cerridwen, upon learning that her potion was lost, chased after Gwion. Gwion changed into a variety of animals to outrun Cerridwen, but she also shapeshifted to keep up with him.
This story is about running from power. Have you ever thought you could outrun change? Growth? Yourself? A Goddess?
Bone and Briar Mystery School will be exploring the story of the Cauldron of Cerridwen in a 6 month online class from November 1, 2014 through April 30, 2015 in creating an online community experience that will include:
– monthly packets of story, information, and prompts for magical work
– online discussion with class participants and facilitators
– audio files for trancework
– video discussions with facilitators
You will need:
– access to a computer and internet access
– a journal
– basic art supplies
Facilitators:
Amoret BriarRose: Spiritual Midwife, Itinerant Priestess, a Phoenix Flame and a Siren Song. An initiate of both Reclaiming and Anderson Feri traditions, she has been studying, working and facilitating in the Reclaiming tradition since 2000, and currently works in partnership with Boneweaver in the Bone and Briar line of Reclaiming/Feri in Pittsburgh, PA.
Amoret’s passions include community building, co-creation and manifestation, ecstatic ritual, divination and the poetry of life. She is experienced in leadership training, small group facilitation, tarot, trance techniques, and ritual arts. Amoret believes that transformation can be blissful if we surrender to the process. It is her privilege and calling to tempt seekers to their transformations.
Boneweaver: Spiritual Midwife, Transition Priestess, Feri Witch working the energy through a Reclaiming framework. Initiated Priestess of the Reclaiming and the Anderson Feri traditions who lives seeking Joy in all its forms with her working partner Amoret BriarRose at Bone and Briar a Reclaiming/Feri line near Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
Boneweaver’s passions include bone throwing, mixing essential oils and herbs for intentional purposes, ritual arts, trance, and art. Her gifts in the religious realm center around deep transformative work (often referred to as shadow work) and transitions. Priestess to all beings both Seen and Unseen she approaches transformation with arms wide open and trusts the process to sanely guide the Work and the Work to support her throughout.
Registration: To register, please send an email with the following information to thewitches@boneandbriar.com: Preferred name: Email address: Current location (as this is an online class, just a general idea of where you reside): Brief outline of pagan/magical experience:
Sliding scale registration fee: $150 – $210
Payments accepted through Paypal
Email for payments: song.of.embers@gmail.com
A non-refundable deposit of 50% will hold your place for this workshop; full payment is due by October 18th.
I will not drag you kicking and screaming to the Work
You want to learn, you want to do Deep Work. Kudos! I will assist you when you ask and when I am able, but I will not drag you kicking and screaming to it. If you want it the impetus must come from within you not from me on the outside.
I gladly parse out energy to willing people. I become miserly when you wish to lie on your back with the expectation that I’ll grab your foot and drag you with me. Push you? Oh, hayel yes! Catch you when you tip backwards from the force? Sure, as long as the lesson isn’t the fall itself. But if you want it you have to reach for it. That’s what this path is: being the force behind the Will and then engaging Will to be Who You Said You Would Be.
(On a related note: No skipping steps. No, IRAB (I Read A Book) or ITAC (I Took A Class) and now I’m ready to instruct others without all the praxis that must occur in between those steps. If you skip the steps the missing pieces will be spotlighted with time and the community you wish to engage will avoid you.
If you desire to be taken seriously, if your wish is to be Seen and Known and Trusted then you must Do The Work all the way through. You must want it, reach for it, and practice it. And check your ego and ethics every step of the way while surrounding yourself with folks who will call you on your behaviour if it looks like you’ve forgotten to do so.)
You can find those who do it differently than I do. You can find people who will prop you up when a faceplant is the work, who will take your hand and pull you forward while you protest and lean back. They just are not me. I will not work with those folks, either. Just so we’re clear.
/PSA
Originally posted to LeanintoJoy.
Bone and Briar 