May 12, 2025April 24, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

‘Willowing’ at the Turning by Sara Wright

My relationship with Indigenous peoples reinforced my intuitive sense that seasonal turnings like the Spring Equinox need to be experienced when the ‘time’ is right. Time, in the Indigenous sense Read More …

May 9, 2025May 1, 2025 Susun WeedLeave a comment

Betsy’s Garden #3 by Susun Weed

Moonrise over the mountain behind Betsy’s house. Purple cactus. Palo verde. Bougainvillea. And, of course mitochondria. Let yourself be drawn into the quiet. Soon it will be cool, dark, quiet. Read More …

May 8, 2025May 9, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(She Summons Excerpt) Why We Need the Goddess at the Time of Great Global Crisis: Evolving a New Feminist Sacred Activist Vision by Kavita Byrd

[Editor’s Note: This essay was included in She Summons: Why Goddess Feminist Activist Spirituality? Volume 1, coedited by Kaalii Cargill and Helen Hye-Sook Hwang (Mago Books, 2021).] Given that the Read More …

May 7, 2025May 7, 2025 Mago Work2 Comments

Mountain Reflection on May Day by Sara Wright

I On long walks in fragmented forests, alone now, my dogs are old and ill, I seek the gift of silence so I can listen to trees, bees, and the Read More …

May 6, 2025May 1, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Poem) I Am An Elder, Now by Mary Saracino

I am an elder, now 70 years young, my body changing, more wrinkles, more gray hair, muscles less firm, but still strong. My heart is a brave warrior still in Read More …

May 5, 2025February 7, 2025 RTMeditorsKGLeave a comment

(Video) A Beltaine Ceremony by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Beltaine/High Spring: the traditional dates are Southern Hemisphere – October 31st or 1st November Northern Hemisphere – April 30th (May Eve) or 1st May The actual astronomical date varies, and it is the Read More …

May 1, 2025March 12, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Art Essay) Not So Invisible Was A Woman by Claire Dorey

Sooner or later those of us digging into buried female histories will seek meaning and identity within our own story. Tracing ancestry through the occluded lens of paternal record keeping, Read More …

April 30, 2025April 19, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Book Excerpt 6) Wounded Feminine: Grieving with Goddess Edited by Claire Dorey, Pat Daly, and Trista Hendren

[Editor’s Note: This and subsequent excerpt parts are from the anthology entitled Wounded Feminine: Grieving with Goddess, published by Girl God Books (2024).] Grief as a Pathway to the ‘Sacred Read More …

April 29, 2025April 22, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Poem) The Great Physician by Stephanie Mines, Ph.D.

The Great Physician Is she who knows The metallurgy of grief. She transmutes vilification, Betrayal, Scapegoating, Gaslighting, Torture, Finger-pointing, Blaming, Castigation, And all manner of ignorance Into enthusiasm for the Read More …

April 28, 2025April 28, 2025 ANewvineLeave a comment

Beltane Fit For Purpose ~ Spirit Salve for Stormy Times by Alison Newvine

Our dear sister Glenys Livingstone says of Beltane “Her photons are flooding the biosphere, She sees Her Land, which we are also.We are Her Land, at one with our Place. Read More …

April 25, 2025April 25, 2025 Mago Work1 Comment

Guided Walk through Physical Experience of Ancient Ritual by Jillian Burnett

In contemplating Goddess centered spirituality in my poem,I wanted to examine the moments where we allowour awareness to expand into the space where symbolsspiral outward from a single meaning into Read More …

April 24, 2025April 19, 2025 Mago Work AdminLeave a comment

(She Summons Excerpt) Mental and Emotional Abuse: Surviving Patriarchy and Finding Healing Through the Goddess by Sharon Smith

April 22, 2025April 22, 2025 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Essay 5) Mago Halmi (Great Mother) Shapes Topographies with Her Skirt: An Introductory Discussion by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: This essay was included in the journal, S/HE: An International Journal of Goddess Studies (Vol 3 No 1, 2024). Footnotes numbers here differ from those of the original Read More …

(Meet Mago Contributor) Nicole Rain Sellers

Nicole Rain Sellers lives in Newcastle, Australia. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Plumwood Mountain, Spiral Nature, Watermark, Crossroads, Silver Cord, Emerald Egg, The Enchanting Verses, Three Drops from a Cauldron, Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, and the anthologies Grieve 6, Zodiac Tales, and The Story Hunters. For more about her work visit https://www.nicolerainsellers.com/
(Book Excerpt 1) Pagan, Goddess, Mother by Nane Jordan, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: This is the Introduction chapter from: Pagan, Goddess, Mother, edited by Nané Jordan and Chandra Alexandre, Demeter Press, 2021, pp. 11-28, https://demeterpress.org/books/pagan-goddess-mother/.] Introduction Nané Jordan and Chandra Alexandre I am the Mother of all things and my love ispoured out upon the earth…I who am the beauty of the green earth and the white moon among the stars and the mysteries of the waters,I call upon your soul to arise and come unto me.For I am the soul of nature that gives life to the universe. From Me all things proceed and unto Me they must return. Let My worship be in the heart that rejoices, for behold, all acts of love and pleasure are My rituals. (From Traditional Charge of the Goddess by Doreen Valiente, adapted by Starhawk) This book gathers creative voices, stories, and scholarship from the forefront of Pagan and Goddess-centred homes—where Goddesses, divine Mothers, female embodiment, and generative life cycles are honoured as sacred. Pagan and Goddess spirituality are distinct yet overlapping traditions, lived through diverse communities in North America and beyond. Those who inhabit these spaces have much to say about deity as mother and about human mothers in relationship to deity. This anthology puts Pagan and Goddess mothering into focus by highlighting the philosophies and experiences of mothers in these movements and spiritual traditions. By doing so, we hope to generate new ways of imagining and enacting motherhood. Questions informing this collection are as follows. How do mothers in contemporary Pagan and Goddess movements negotiate their mothering roles and identities? How does devotion towards Mother Goddesses empower and/or affect the lived experiences of mothers and feminist practices of mothering? As editors, we wondered how Pagan- and Goddess-centred mothers engage in, and are affected by, their particular spiritual leadership through practices of ceremony, ritual, magic, priestessing, as well as through living connections with nature, the more-than-human world, the Earth as Mother, and our own bodies. We were curious to know how Pagan- and Goddess-centred mothers interface with dominant religions, the public sphere, social institutions for children, community leadership, and social justice movements. We were curious especially because Pagan and Goddess spirituality are not mainstream religions, nor are they accepted as such. Adherents often co-create new pathways, subcultures, or countercultures in life and spirit. Practitioners may or may not belong to particular communities or faith-based groups and may even practice traditional religions alongside their Pagan and Goddess spirituality. For many, the term “spirituality” rather than “religion” best describes Pagan and Goddess philosophies and ways of life. Spirituality may be equated with the search for meaning in life; it is related to sensing the more-than-material world of the sacred, numinous, or divine—feeling interconnections within the web of life, and all that is. Spirituality often describes subtle human experiences that are immanent (from within) and/or transcendent (from outside) of the self. Spiritual experiences often have transformative, healing, or uplifting qualities. For some practitioners, Pagan and Goddess spirituality are understood as growing from the roots of ancient religions or as reclaimed from pre-Christian spiritual worldviews. Pagan- and Goddess-loving individuals may be hidden in their communities and face misunderstanding from mainstream religion and society. Conversely, others live openly and identify with particular pathways, groups, or circles, gathering in designated places of worship to practice their spiritual expression. What especially intrigued us, as editors, is the knowledge gained from our own experiences, struggles, and insights with Goddess spirituality. In this, our practices and experiences of mothering have been uniquely affected by living spiritual paths that value women, the sacred female and feminine, daily embodied life, and mothers themselves as divine and part of the sacred cycle of life. We particularly live our mother- centred spirituality as women seeking to engage in nonpatriarchal spiritual practices and leadership. We see this form of spiritual feminist leadership reflected in this volume—through stories of those who support and uplift women as mothers in their communities and through the voices of mothers who strive to live in balance with male partners and/or the men in their lives. Many Pagan- and Goddess- identified mothers and mother-centred people find their spiritual pathways to be life-enhancing alternatives to patriarchal, male-centred religions. In particular, Goddess spirituality, as a women- and female-empowering movement, has grown out of social gender justice and feminist movements in North America and beyond (e.g. Hwang et al., Robbins Dexter and Noble; Sjoo and Mor, Spretnak). Some common principles to both Pagan and Goddess spirituality are a love of nature and the Earth as sacred; knowing the Earth as our Mother; a respect for the elements and the more-than-human worlds of trees, plants, earth, water, and animal life; belief in the importance of the unseen realms; valuing embodied life and our bodies as sacred in female and all gendered forms; honouring the seasons and the cosmic turning of the wheel of the year; and appreciating the depth of interconnections between birth, life, and death. Through the authors represented herein, this anthology examines the pleasures, struggles, and challenges of living Pagan- and Goddess-centred truths as mothers raising children towards postpatriarchal, Earth-based, and love-centred lives, which recognize the pain of suffering alongside the importance of healing, compassion, and the pursuit of an interconnected, joyful life. Such mothers are striving to unleash their own and their children’s fullest potential from worldviews that honour the female/feminine and mothers as divine and sacred to all life. Engaged in and uplifting Pagan- and Goddess-centred spirituality, this anthology reveals the tensions and insights of these communities, philosophies, and practices for empowering and healing the lives of mothers as well as the next generation. (To be continued) (Meet Mago Contributor) Nane Jordan https://www.magoism.net/2014/03/meet-mago-contributor-nane-jordan/
(Tribute 2) In Loving Memory of Eve Helene Wilkowitz by Jack Dempsey, Ph.D.

Eve is on the verge of her 21st birthday that Spring: a smart strong happy outgoing person grown up in Oakdale, Long Island, and moving now from Bay Shore into dynamic relation with the world, through her college-course pursuit of a career in social work. She loves her Jewish family, old friends from Connetquot High School, home-cooked meals, horses, stupid movies, music (most lately, The Beatles): the first thing they love together is walking the great city streets holding hands, and talking and talking. “Eve and I were not what anyone would consider popular at Connetquot,” writes a close girlfriend (posted among other fond comments with “Eve, Spring, Flowers” at Wordpress). “Other girls were sometimes mean to her,” and although Eve is “rather shy and fragile,” people close to her know “one of the sweetest people I ever met.” “I always felt she would contribute a great deal to society” because “she had such a lovely personality…from deep within.” “She seemed to have blossomed after high school.” Eve’s love for her family and her own life’s hopes are a painful mix these days. Just a year ago, her mother has died young of cancer, and Eve hides the grief still in her heart. As she lives now to honor and care for her father and younger sister, she also “just has to get out” of their devastated home awhile, to find her way. And out comes her current situation—for she had jumped too fast into living with a boyfriend who, she avers, is boyfriend no more. She’s stuck in a very uneasy living-space and longs to break out in new directions. Weekly February dates for lunch become home-cooked dinners at the writer’s midtown mouse-hole, and always a fresh red rose sprayed with baby’s breath in his hand or on the table. He’s holding back most of a million kisses as Eve urges him, “Go slow, go slow”: she says the last thing she wants is new commitment, even as a girlfriend recalls that at the time, “she seemed the happiest I had ever known her to be.” To him she seems endearingly grateful for any little kindness, such as taking her by crosstown taxi to the evening’s last Long Island Railroad train, and constant offers (staunchly declined) to see her all the long way home. “There’s nothing to worry about, I know everybody,” she protests. Eager to show what a patient, understanding fellow he could often pretend to be, he croons a few after-dinner songs with acoustic guitar. “Like James Taylor?” “Some,” Eve shrugs. So, he plays, and as sure as it happens that two people instantly know they belong together, he can see her slowly melting toward the world he longs to give. Well the sun is surely sinking down but the moon is slowly rising so this old world must still be spinning round and I still love you It won’t be long before another day we gonna have a good time and no one’s gonna take that time away you can stay as long as you like Soon, one mid-week morning, Eve rides into Manhattan early and just shows up with breakfast at the writer’s door. Spring sunshine pours down through tall windows onto his ratty little table where they sit (talking, talking), and life between them is in full bloom. Her planned spontaneous visit happens in the same days when Eve starts a diary (later shared with the writer by authorities): I bought this book to write in because I am very confused with the things I’ve been doing and feeling lately….I think I have a problem with guys and love. I don’t want to fall in love and don’t want a commitment. But it seems as if they do….I definitely don’t. I do want a guy to care….I really don’t know what exactly I want out of a relationship. I know that right now I like Jack….I know that he likes me too, but I told him not to push….But so far he seems like a nice guy. He is honest, and he thinks that I am funny. Although Eve hates and dreads office-gossip, she stops by his Macmillan writer’s desk as work allows, and there one morning he invites her on a writing-trip to talk with his WWII-veteran uncle in Asheville, North Carolina. “What? When are you going? All that for a stupid book?” “Stupid book? I think you should go away now,” he says with obviously fake umbrage. Within hours an enormous red rose lands on his desk, with a card: Jack, Sorry. Hope this helps, Eve. He brings the bloom home and it unfolds like no rose he’s ever seen. March 12 1980. I think I am in trouble now. I think I am really starting to like Jack more than I wanted to. I have a feeling that this time I am the one who is going to be hurt. I asked him if he dates other girls and he said yes. And that bothers me, but I can’t show it. I don’t want him to think I care too much, or too little. I really don’t want to lose this guy. He is really good to me and makes me feel good, I’m glad we’re taking it slow like I said. But now I think about him more than I want to. I am afraid. I really don’t want to fall in love with him, and I am so scared of being hurt. Nine days later—Friday March 21st—they glide down Third Avenue from Macmillan to his place on 36th Street. Under red evening sky young street-poplars bloom out yellow and purple. Sharing wine, laughing, kissing, talking challenges and hopes: he’s rolling a smoke, Eve comes from behind to wrap his neck and nuzzle, and the man dissolves. “Eve, don’t be afraid. But I love you. I love you and I …
(Book Excerpt 3) “Placental Thinking: The Gift of Maternal Roots” by Nane Jordan

[This and the ensuing sequels are from a Chapter from Placenta Wit: Mother Stories Rituals, and Research, edited by Nané Jordan, Demeter Press, 2017, pp. 142-155.] PLACENTAL PRACTICES Attending to placentas and cords during and after birth was an outgrowth of the kinds of holistic midwifery care and grassroots homebirth practices that I learned from. Midwives and mothers were following body wisdom in allowing birth to unfold—reclaiming what I would now call “mother- or matricentric” healing traditions. During my experiences learning with midwives, we used to think and read about issues relating to how women’s knowledge had been lost or suppressed in Western societies over the ages—this included feminist readings about the historical impact of the European witch hunts on women’s social practices and wisdom (Spretnak) and about the violent colonial impact on Indigenous cultures (Shiva). Through the collective midwifery movement, a large amount of study, intuition, trust, love, and decolonizing attunement continues to be at work. So much of what we learned in those early midwifery years is flowing and flowering into mother- and baby-centred practices and uses of placentas—including not clamping or cutting the umbilical cord too soon and allowing it to stop pulsing, so all of the baby’s blood can transfuse from the placenta back into baby itself. When the cord is left on its own, the natural physiology of birth, developed over millennia, completes itself. Not cutting the umbilical also means keeping mother and baby together, where they can touch, smell, see, hear, and meet each other—the hormonal physiology of bonding is at work. Homebirth mothers often chose to bury their placentas. This might be done under a tree, in a yard, or in park, somewhere close to where the baby was born. Families and midwives have created rituals and ceremonies with the placenta, giving thanks for the gift of life in the new baby, and thanks to the Earth. The other use, which still shocks many people, is to prepare, cook and, feed the mother some placenta postbirth, just as many mammals do. Placentas are hormone and nutrient rich; they balance and mediate mothers’ physical and emotional wellbeing postbirth (Enning). During my midwife training, we taught ourselves the technique of drying the placenta to make capsules of its powder, which was before it was known as “placental encapsulation,” a practice that is now taking off across North America (Selander). Placenta capsules are understood to restore vitality and strength, and to support postpartum depression and/or have general therapeutic value during the long challenges of early mothering and beyond. Researchers have been investigating the regenerative properties of stem cells from placental blood for curing various diseases, making placentas a material of healing interest for medicine beyond the birth room (Parolini). Attending homebirths, I also began a practice of keeping a piece of the baby’s cord for mothers postbirth, as I would dry these in spiral shapes. The cord takes days or even weeks to dry out, and shrinks down in size. The umbilical cord is the original thread that ties us to the beginnings of life, an energetic metaphor that goes on long afterward. I have my own daughters’ cords and umbilical stumps, dried in this fashion, and have kept them in special pouches. I also learned of homebirth mothers who practised “lotus birth,” which means not cutting the cord at all. Lotus birth mothers keep the placenta with the baby intact for several days until the cord naturally dries up and falls away on its own. One must carefully wash, wrap, and care for the placenta in this case. It is thought to be physically and energetically gentle for the baby to keep the placenta until the cord releases itself (Lim). Another artful, creative practice has been the “placenta print,” which involves taking the afterbirth and some white paper, and directly printing the blood outlines of its mass onto the page. One makes a placenta print of each side, mother and baby. I love birth art for its many growing and evolving forms as creative expressions for mothers’ experiences and honouring of birth and life (Lin). (To be continued) (Meet Mago Contributor) Nane Jordan.
(Poem) If We Were Rooted by Mary Saracino

If we were rooted to the ground like trees or roses would we understand how intimately our lives are entwined with the Mystery? She carries us in her arms, cradles us in her heart washes away our sorrows with her rain echoes our fears with her thunder warms our weary bones with her sun dries our tears with her billowing wind
(Art and Prose) Mothers of Vibration by Claire Dorey

[Author’s Note: This post follows Understanding Tanit through Felt Experience, Visualising the Energy in Hathor’s Temple , Girls On Top , A Bun in the Oven and I Made an Aroma Cone.] Art by Claire Dorey I’m searching beneath the elaborate creation myths adorning the walls of Hathor’s temple for something more primal – energies aligned to the Divine Feminine that can empower today, after all the story of the Goddess is one of evolution. “I need a father, I need a mother, I need some old, wiser being to talk to. I talk to God but the sky is empty.” – Sylvia Plath. This is a lost world of hand gestures, Asanas, dance, body art, medicine, magic, mantra and lineage. Once dormant beneath the sand Hathor vibration rises like mist in the desert. Awakening feminine consciousness has the potential to heal past, present and future. Empires fall and rise. The Goddess fell. Hathor’s temple lay buried, holding it’s breath, resting and healing, yet the intention was always to rise again. We are a humanity adrift, battling apocalyptic tides of a patriarchy so toxic we struggle to tune in to the steady pulse of loving, healing and joyful Hathor energy our ancestors described as the Celestial Cow, who’s maternal legs were pillars of protection beneath which humanity could thrive in peace and stability. “The mission of the Seven Hathors is to bring a consciousness level to the people [ ] the sistrum is used to activate in ceremony through sound the vibration of the Pleiadies.” – Sonja Grace, author of Spirit Traveller – This Egyptian Temple Is Connected to the Pleiadians, Gaia. Hathor’s temple, homage to the Mothers of Vibration, including Naunet, Nut and Isis, is a soul sister temple. Construction, overseen in part by Cleopatra VII, was completed as Egypt became a province of the Roman Empire, a very turbulent time to be a woman. Soon a male dominated society would embark on the systematic eradication of the Sacred Feminine. Meanwhile patriarchal propaganda painted Cleopatra as a depraved temptress; sacred sex as debauched and the Hathor priestess as whores. Hathor asks us to ‘align our core vibration with source’ through sound, light, love and other energies we can’t see or hear – energies the existential sciences are starting to explore. Consciousness; the sacred trinity of sex, pregnancy and birth; herbalism and body autonomy; mirroring the divine within ourselves and in parallel worlds (Eugene Wigner proposed the existence of mirror worlds,1927) are prominent concepts in Hathor’s temple, as are EMOTION; vibration – the on/off binary code which weaves through the universe….and fractals. “…Fractal is [ ] the nesting of the Mother within the Grandmother, [ ] the Girl within the Mother, and the Baby within the Girl, an infinite process bridging the Macro to the Micro.” – Jain 108. Cult priestesses were tattooed with the mark of the Hathor Cow, Uraeus, Lotus and Protective Eye. Henna’d thighs and tattooed bellies could be the marks of the shaman, after all the Egyptian soul journeyed between realms and deities shape-shifted from human to power animal. Priestess Amunet bore elliptical tattoos on her root and sacral energy centres – a vesica piscis opening over her womb, possibly a form of apotropaic magic, or symbol of the ‘womb matrix’, an energy grid – matrix means ‘uterus’ – connecting Mothers of the Universe, past, present and future. Energetic dots and spirals decorate ancient temples and female icons, found all over the globe. “A woman who heals herself, heals her mother, heals her daughter, and every woman around her.” – source unknown. Gentle movement releases trauma and strengthens life-force. Hathor’s dancers raised vibration – said to protect women in labour, as did the Taweret amulet. We get so used to viewing dance as entertainment that we’ve removed from consciousness the ancestral memory of the female shaman rhythmically moving into intuition, ecstasy and healing. Trance wasn’t the only pathway to other dimensions. Festivals of drunkenness removed inhibitions and psychological blocks so the portals of mass consciousness open. “You are [ ] the Mistress of Dance The Lady of Unending Drunkenness.” – Hymn of the Seven Hathors, Dendera. Drunken gatherings of uninhibited, high status women ‘making love to source’ horrified the Roman patriarch, who themselves loved consuming to excess. For them this was male territory, their god of wine, ritual ecstasy and drunkenness was male and they preferred women temperate. In contrast, blood thirsty lion Goddess Sekhmet, ‘She who is powerful’, an aspect of Hathor when angry, was plied with alcohol during festivals to keep Her happy. “I am woman hear me roar.” – Helen Reddy. On the temple walls, etched in stone, representations of sound and vibration made visible, cascade into storage jars, as the Sistrum and Menit necklace are rattled. Remote healing can be directed to the past, present and future. The energy, intention and timing for healing can be stored in a container, so perhaps this is what these images describe. Did they raise and store vibration to activate ceremonial libations, spells, the latent power of hieroglyph (temple language) and statues? The temple was a birth house so they may have infused mother’s milk, used in spells, with the vibration of bovine ‘Mother of Mothers’ and Goddess of percussion, Hathor. Dr. Masaru Emoto’s experiments with water consciousness show how sound, thoughts and intention impact the molecular structure of water. Sound and intention can raise our vibration since our bodies are 50-60% water. Harmonics can levitate and alter the shape of water droplets. Art by Claire Dorey When harnessing universal energy a triadic flow is created between energy, agent and recipient making healing reciprocal, so perhaps hands held up to venerate deities, as seen in temple imagery, could be for energy channelling rather than solely for reverence – their palms do resemble the Reiki hand posture. Perhaps the story of the Dendera Zodiac is one of Karma, identifying past and future dates in need of healing, possibly problematic lunar or solar eclipses. “During the period 51 BCE – 30 BCE, the …
(Art) Primal Feminine Essence by Jassy Watson

Women have a natural born intuition, a sensing, a deep knowing that we have largely been disconnected from and we are seeking ways to get back in touch with our primal feminine core. Our primal nature is embedded in the code of our DNA, it is our life force, the root of our being and by re-connecting and awakening our primal womb energy, we can begin to discover the common link that binds all women, past, present future. We can also gain insight as to our true nature and to our truth and purpose upon this earth, which can lead us to remember the source of ourselves, and all that surrounds us. For me, painting is a direct tool that can be used to access this part of ourself – our innermost soul; the core of our being. The painting shown here was done as part of my ‘Primal Feminine Essence’ workshops that incorporate trance dance and painting. The Primal Process is about stripping back to basics, letting go of fear, embracing trust and just simply mark making just like the ancients did so long ago with tools and oxides made from the earth. From the mark making a story is developed using symbols and patterns and our Primal Self then emerges. The story here is my own creation story and it reads from left to right. The lake feeds the womb below it, which then feeds the people dancing whose tracks lead back to the lake where they gather to fish. The lake is fed by the waterfall behind that stretches far left over the mountains to the ocean. In the centre of her dress are two lovers in the dance of life and the spiral wheel to the right represents the drumbeat/heartbeat. There are a number of things that appeared here including a wolf pup face. Can you see him? Read Meet Mago Contributor Jassy Watson.
(Essay 3) Circe the Island Witch by Hearth Moon Rising

Third in a series. Earlier segments are here and here. I call Circe’s mythical island, Aeaea, The Island of Vowels, but Robert Graves says the name means “wailing.” If so, perhaps the wailing refers to the falcon colonies which nest on islands in the Adriatic Sea. Graves claims Circe’s name means “falcon.” There is some confusion as to whether Circe is really a goddess, a demi-goddess, a mythical heroine, or a historical woman. Circe’s parents are supposedly a god (Helios) and queen (Pasiphae), suggesting a demi-goddess (half-human, half-god). Alternatively, Circe’s mother is an ocean-deity, which would make her a goddess. Roman oil lamp depicting Odysseus and Circe. Photo: Matthias Kabel/Wikimedia Commons. Circe marries the prince of Colchis, a city-state along the Black Sea, and rules there for a time, again suggesting she is human. As queen, she kills her royal husband, which is a mythic trope. In Celtic romance, this sequence is read as goddess-of-the-year vanquishing the winter god, who will be reborn as the summer god. But Circe appears in Classical mythology, where allegoric subterfuge to escape Christian censors is not necessary. She could be read straightforwardly as a heroine performing a well-worked theme. Yet Circe presides over a willow cemetery in Colchis, which might suggest she is a priestess of Hecate. At least one Classical scholar argues that Hecate is the mother of Circe, making Circe, once again, a goddess. Legend has it that Circe is whisked away in the chariot of her father Helios to the island of Aeaea, as punishment for killing her husband. Leaving aside the fantastical method of transportation, Circe behaves much like a stereotypic sorceress on Aeaea, living apart from male rule while blending potions that heal or wound. Turning men into animals suggests an above-average level of magical proficiency, but she is nearly human when she meets Odysseus. Her assistance in his travels is classic shamanic work: she prescribes a journey to the land of the dead; she makes an animal sacrifice for a propitious journey; she provides counsel and framework for his journey to the underworld; and she interprets his experiences for him upon his return. In her most famous appearance in Greek myth, it’s hard to see Circe as anything but a priestess, albeit an extraordinarily powerful one. Scylla. Boeotian red-figure bell-crater, 450–425 BCE. Photo: Jastrow/Wikimedia Commons The appearance of Scylla dashes upon the rocks the theory of Circe nothing more than a mortal sorcerer. Scylla is a sea nymph transformed by Circe into a dangerous beast: beautiful from above, a many-headed death hound from below. Scylla characteristically captures sailors and vessels and savagely wrecks them, and circumventing her is one of the obstacles Odysseus most manage on his route home. Circe offers Odysseus advice in escaping Scylla’s clutches. It doesn’t take much imagination to see Scylla as the spirit embodying a rocky outcrop in the Adriatic Sea, an outcrop with a strong multi-faceted whirlpool. It does seem a stretch to give credit for Scylla’s monstrosity to any mortal woman. Perhaps Circe is given credit for creating Scylla’s fate because she “owns” Scylla by revealing to Odysseus how to escape her. Perhaps the sorceress Circe, as animal shapeshifter, is presumed to have shapeshifted Scylla, since this Scylla supposedly yelps like a dog. The geological formation that is Scylla’s body was reported to emit a hound-like sound, and hounds are associated with the Greek underworld. Another explanation is that Circe is a death goddess, like Hecate, who creates other manifestations of death. Men on Aeaea being turned into animals. 560-550 BCE. Photo: Lucas aka Ancient Art Podcast//Wikimedia Commons The island of Aeaea itself seems to embody divinity. It is surrounded by Alder trees, which, because they bleed red, are considered trees of death. Odysseus senses a bewitching atmosphere about the island as he moors his vessel. He soon kills a deer to feed his crew, a propitious sign the mistress of animals is disposed to help him. On his way to meet Circe, Odysseus is given the mysterious life-giving “moly” herb, offered by Hermes, who is known as Messenger of the Gods. Is Hermes thwarting Circe or conveying her protection? We now have a very complex Circe archetype, one that stretches from the Black Sea to the Adriatic. She is a legendary queen, a semi-divine priestess, and a bona fide goddess – mistress of animals and ruler of death. Beneath all of this we have the word “falcon.” There are reasons for considering Circe a falcon goddess independent of Graves’s etymology. The next essay will examine a denizen of the Mediterranean called Eleonora’s Falcon. https://www.magoism.net/2013/04/meet-mago-contributor-hearth-moon-rising/
(Poem) One People, One Plea by Mary Saracino

Full Moon Albuquerque by Mary Saracino Everywhere the world’s gone crazy righteous rulers grease their greedy palms wrap their filthy fingers ‘round the spoils of power broker death deals at every corner genocide, war, poverty rape, murder, torture the stench of violence overwhelms our nostrils we turn away, unable to bear the odor that catches our throats causes our tongues to curl our stomachs to seize our hopes to curdle our rage to flare unable to gaze one more time upon the bloodied faces of wailing children the broken bodies of dead soldiers the despairing mouths of refugees we turn away, unable to abide the pain yet look we must; averted eyes ease nothing but our own discomfort as horrors reign unchecked the human heart cracks open on TV, disenfranchised faces infiltrate our cozy living rooms their sorrows morph into ours allusions of difference shatter illuminated by our common cries; we are one people, we have one plea: let babies live and prosper, let people of every nation thrive, grow old & die encircled by loving arms, their wounds and worries liberated at last, by tender mercies their ears caressed by the laughter of their children’s children who know nothing of human horrors for they live, at last, in lasting peace free, at last, to dance, to dream, to fly https://www.magoism.net/2013/05/meet-mago-contributor-mary-saracino

(Special Post 1) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality? A Collective Writing

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, 2014. We have our voices together below and publish them in sequels. It is an ongoing project and we encourage our reader to join us! Submit yours today to Helen Hwang (magoism@gmail.com). Or visit and contact someone in Return to Mago’s Partner Organizations.] Introduction by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang and Wennifer Lin-Haver Helen Hye-Sook Hwang I am asking each of us to consider writing a sentence or paragraph on “Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality?” This idea is prompted by Wennifer Lin-Haver, Founder of Mother Tree Sanctuary, and I agree that we need to and can create a sort of collective writing on the topic. What we write below will be included and published in The Girl God, Mother Tree Sanctuary, and Return to Mago. As a subaltern minority as we seem at the current point of time, Goddessians/Magoists [the term Mago means the Great Goddess] need to make extra efforts to make our voices and presences exposed to the public and inner circles. Length and style are open. Please also include your name, region/state/country, title, and/or website URL. We strongly encourage you if you are located in a place where Goddessians are rarely around. We intend to make a collective testimonial tapestry of WE as Goddessians/Magoists! Please keep this in your mind and join us in this collective effort. Thank you in advance. March 6, 2014 AF (Archaic Future)! Wennifer Lin-Haver Our “call” started as a conversation between Helen and me where I was expressing to her the real need for Mother Tree Sanctuary to be more articulate with exploring the significance and importance of Goddess in our lives. I was prompted to give such a response, when asked “why” we had to differentiate God and Goddess. “Isn’t everything God?” She asked. And “Isn’t Goddess also God?” “Isn’t it all the same as long was we’re all coming from our ‘higher’ self?” she asked. So I saw this warranted a longer and much deeper discussion. I initially thought I should formulate a response and post it as a Page or Tab in our website, but after some reflection with Helen, I saw how much better it would be if we replied to this question as a diverse and creative collective. I surely do not have all the answers as an individual but perhaps together, we can come up with something more whole, colorful and satisfying. I do hope you will contribute a little something! We are always grateful for all that you have to share.
(Special Post Isis 3) Why the Color of Isis Matters by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s note: The discussion took place in Mago Circle during the month of July, 2013. Our heartfelt thanks go to the members who participated in this discussion with openness and courage.] Part 3 Isis, Arab Women Revolution, and Black Goddesses Naa Ayele Kumari Going back to the original topic of the post…. Some quotes ” Women are in half the society… How come there are only 7 in the Assembly… and they are all Islamist! ” I can’t beat up my wife and almost kill her and call it discipline… this is not discipline… this is abuse and insanity” http://youtu.be/y4umifTLSII 12-Year Old Explains Egyptian Revolution in Under 3 Minutes www.youtube.com Max Dashu It is tremendously heartening to see these insights being expressed, and spread. The Salafis have made such inroads, and now the pushback is happening. Harita Meenee Dear Naa Ayele Kumari, thank you actually reading my post and commenting something relevant to it. It’s refreshing when someone does hear what we have to say instead of projecting their own notions. Building a solidarity movement with those who are oppressed but fighting is very important during these critical times! Harita Meenee See also: https://www.facebook.co/intifadat.almar2a?fref=ts The uprising of women in the Arab world انتفاضة المرأة في العالم العربي حرية الفكر ، حرية التعبير ، حرية الاعتقاد ، حرية التنقل ، حرية الجسد ، حرية اللب…See More Glenys Livingstone … as you say Max …” way too much of it going on” – amongst people who should know better (I would have thought): “Dark goddess as terrifying, challenging, white goddess as benign; “black magic” as harmful; I see way, way too much of this going on out there.” And related to that in my mind is all the “love and light” business that is so common: the Ground of Being is Dark … it seems to me that mystics have always understood the quintessential darkness of Love/Deity. Max Dashu Sure. I would just like to add that the critique raised here addressed issues much broader than the substance of the article, which made some good points. But once the choice of graphics flagged the issue of representation, people had much more to say about that old yet still very fresh wound which is constantly reopened by the cultural habit of whitening Egypt, or interpreting Africa through a eurocentric lens. It is not on any one person to carry the weight of that; we all have a responsibility to address the issues, but especially those of us of European heritage need to familiarize ourselves with how this plays out over and over. Just as men have a responsibility to speak up in support of women when patriarchal assumptions are on board. We all can learn something from each other, along all the various axes of domination, and overthrow them in coalition. Naa Ayele Kumari I have often considered where the roots of this psychology comes from. It is dualistic thinking that causes us to compare and contrast, then sum up judgement of good or bad and place a value on each. It extends into competition and justification for war. It also doesn’t escape me that often this came with certain civilizations who systematically destroyed others. It didn’t just happen with blacks in Africa… but blacks in Asia and the Indus Valley as well. With the Aryan invasions of India, came the eventual introduction to lighter divinities and more emphasis on male divinities. Southern Indians, Sri Lankans are very dark… even more so than many African Blacks. The caste systems implemented by the Aryan invaders did the same thing to them casting them as “untouchables”. With that came the marginalization of their black female divinities such as Kali. Kali actually has 10-16 forms… from compassionate mother, the fountain of wisdom, to she of great beauty but she is minimized as just destructive and terrifying… especially as Brhaman, Vishnuu, and Shiva grow in popularity. One of Kali’s statues has her black self standing on top of Shiva because she conquered him. Later there is a discussion in on of the Hindu text explaining Kali (as Parvati) after being subdued by Shiva she becomes lighter. Further they have stories about him rejecting her and calling her blackie which made her do austerities to rid herself of her black skin. Naa Ayele Kumari It should not be overlooked that in the Story of Alice in Wonderland… a story intended to keep Goddess elements for future generations, has the Elder sister ( the Queen of Hearts) portrayed as man, ego, and power driven who cuts off heads and has a fierce dragon…a clear reference to Kali. The White goddess as the younger sister is her opponent… and her mission is to usurp the throne of the Queen of Hearts even though she was the rightful heir as the oldest … or primordial. Stories like these also reinforce the stereotypes and negative iconography. Max Dashu Yes, it is pervasive in many cultures of domination. Demons are portrayed as black not only in Europe, which we know well, but also in China and in a lot of Buddhist iconography. In modern India, the sweet goddesses are shown as pink, the wrathful as black; and Krishna (name means “dark”) is turned powder blue. (Another of his titles, s’yam, also meaning dark, is the word translated as “green” in Green Tara.) The countercurrents (Black Mazu, loving Kali – esp in Bengal and south India, Black Madonna) bubbled up from the common people, who knew and longed for something other than the dominant racialized hierarchy. Naa Ayele Kumari I am just discovering Mazu ( Matzu/LuShui) in China today! Never knew about her. This discussion has led me to look deeper for black goddesses in Asia. Max Dashu Taoist spiritual tradition often refers to Xüan Nü, which can be translated in several ways. You’ll usually see it rendered as “the Mysterious Female,” a phrase that occurs in the Dao De Jing (Tao Te Ching), and this is a valid translation; but what is less emphasized is that it also means “the Dark Woman.” In […]
(Special Post 2) Nine-Headed Dragon Slain by Patriarchal Heroes: A Cross-cultural Discussion by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s Note: This and the ensuing sequels are a revised version of the discussion that has taken place in The Mago Circle, Facebook group, since September 24, 2017 to the present. Themes are introduced and interwoven in a somewhat random manner, as different discussants lead the discussion. The topic of the number nine is key to Magoism, primarily manifested as Nine Magos or the Nine Mago Creatrix. Mago Academy hosts a virtual and actual event, Nine Day Mago Celebration, annually.] Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: Here is another image of the nine-headed Lernaean Hydra slain by Herakles. https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydra_(mythology)… Glenys Livingstone: Yes, the Hercules story is more documentation of the Old Battle, of the rise of the “hero” to slay the Mother, when in the earliest of times he served with his beauty and labours. It is so interesting to see the analogies in other cultures/places as you are doing Helen, especially in Asia – it seems important work. Your perseverance is paying off, and will. Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: Glenys, I am re-reading a book on Chinese mythology and found a lot more on the nine Magoist symbolism. Someday, I hope to write about the topic in its own right. Glenys Livingstone: This chapter’s work is good re the Old Battle in Greek mythology: Valaoritis, Nanos. “The Cosmic Conflict of Male and Female in Greek Mythology”, in From the Realm of the Ancestors: An Anthology in Honor of Marija Gimbutas. Joan Marler (ed). Manchester CT: Knowledge, Ideas and Trends Inc., 1997, p.247 – 261. Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: Now back to the female divine who is depicted with the nine heads. See the nine-headed Guanyin/Kannon/Gwaneum. Also note that her icon comes in eleven-headed (the 8 Daughters and the Triad Creatrix, which makes eleven). http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/kannon.shtml Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: The symbol of nine dragons was adopted by imperial China. See the Nine Dragon Wall China. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nine-Dragon_Wall Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: We connect the dots. When Guanyin is depicted with nine dragons, it conveys that the nine symbolism was/is once deemed sacred. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/4a/17/b3/4a17b33d9a4ae53bad6466a0eaf11722.jpg How popular the Guanyin icon, three headed and eight armed, to this day! Simply Google “eight armed Guanyin.” Below is from the Late Ming Dynasty, China. https://www.google.com/search?q=eight%20armed%20guanyin… She comes in a different name, Ushnishavijaya, in Tibetan Buddhism. https://www.himalayanart.org/items/65445 Helen Hye-Sook Hwang: We can draw that the female deity such as Guanyin and Ushnishavijaya, just to name two, is venerated in association with the nine symbolism. Within the mytho-history of Magoism, I infer that Guanyin or Ma Guanyin is a persona embodying Goma, the Magoist Shaman ruler of Danguk (3898 BCE-2333 BCE), the head of Nine Hans (Magoist Koreans). Note that Magoist shamans or priestesses are called “Mago.” See my essay, “Goma, the Shaman Ruler of Old Magoist East Asia/Korea and Her Mythology,” in Goddesses in Myth, History and Culture (Lytle Creek, CA: Mago Books), 2018. The insight that the major Goddesses in East Asia and beyond point to the same and old divine persona is NOT farfetched, considering that the nine-headed snake or dragon representing the female sovereignty of pre-patriarchal times is slain by male heroes across cultures. Judy E Foster: I’d have to agree with you here. As usual, interesting information! Patty Kay: My meditation this morning was on a history of mysticism. While I’m in the midst of appropriating all of the wonderful beliefs I find here, I also have found a strand in my own tradition that helps me understand why all the Divine Feminine stuff makes so much sense to me. I’ve been trying to determine when the patriarchal world view took over. According to this history, mysticism began to emerge in about 800 to 500 BCE. Could it be that mysticism kept alive the ancient understanding of the cosmos? This is just speculation, but in it I’m answering my own questions. (To be continued) Join us in The Mago Circle https://www.facebook.com/groups/magoism/.

A Southern Hemisphere Perspective on Place by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from the Introduction to the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion, which was an outcome of her doctoral research/thesis entitled The Female Metaphor – Virgin, Mother, Crone – of the Dynamic Cosmological Unfolding: Her Embodiment in Seasonal Ritual as Catalyst for Personal and Cultural Change. This doctoral work was in turn a documentation and deeper research of the Seasonal ceremonial celebrations that the author was already engaged in for over a decade. The whole of the process is here named as her “Search”. photo credit: David Widdowson, Astrovisuals. The site of seasonal ceremonial celebrations will always be significant. In my case, the place in which I have created them has been notably in the Southern Hemisphere of out Planet Earth. The fact of my context being thus – the Southern Hemisphere – had contributed in the past to my deep internalized sense of being “other”, and dissociated from my senses, since almost all stories told were based in Northern Hemisphere perspective. Yet at the same time this context of inhabiting the Southern Hemisphere contributed to my deep awareness of Gaia’s Northern Hemisphere and Her reciprocal Seasonal Moment: thus, awareness of the whole Planet. My initial confusion about the sensed Cosmos – as a Place, became a clarity about the actual Cosmos – which remained inclusive of my sensed Cosmos. PaGaian reality – the reality of our Gaian “country” – is that the whole Creative Dynamic happens all the time, all at once. The “other”, the opposite, is always present – underneath and within the Moment. This has affected my comprehension of each Sabbat/Seasonal Moment, its particular beauty but also a fullness of its transitory nature. Many in the Northern Hemisphere – even today – have no idea that the Southern Hemisphere has a ‘different’ lunar, diurnal, seasonal perspective; and because of this there often is a rigidity of frame of reference for place, language, metaphor and hence cosmology[i]. Indeed over the years of industrialized culture it has appeared to matter less to many of both hemispheres, including the ‘author-ities’, the writers of culture and cosmos. And such ‘author-ity’ and northern-hemispheric rigidity is also assumed by many more Earth-oriented writers as well[ii]. There has been consistent failure to take into account a whole Earth perspective: for example, the North Star does not need to be the point of sacred reference – there is great Poetry to be made of the void of the South Celestial Pole. Nor need the North be rigidly associated with the Earth element and darkness, nor is there really an “up” and a “down” cosmologically speaking. A sense and accountof the Southern Hemisphere perspective with all that that implies metaphorically as well as sens-ibly, seems vitally important to comprehending and sensing a whole perspective and globe – a flexibility of mind, and coming to inhabit the real Cosmos, hence enabling what I have named as a ‘PaGaian’ cosmological perspective, a whole Earth perspective. It has also been of particular significance that my Search has been birthed in the ancient continent of Australia. It is the age of the exposed rock in this Land, present to her inhabitants in an untarnished, primal mode that is significant. This Land Herself has for millennia been largely untouched by human war, conquest and concentrated human agriculture and disturbance. The inhabitants of this Land dwelt here in a manner that was largely peaceful and harmonious, for tens of thousands of years. Therefore the Land Herself may speak more clearly I feel; one may be the recipient of direct transmission of Earth in one of her most primordial modes. Her knowledge may be felt more clearly – one may be taught by Her. I think that the purity of this transmission is a significant factor in the development of the formal research I undertook – in my chosen methodology and in what I perceived in the process, and documented; from my beginnings as a country girl, albeit below my conscious mind in the subtle realms of which I knew little, to the more conscious times of entering into the process of the Search. In this Land that birthed me, ‘spirit’ is not remote and abstract, it is felt in Her red earth[iii]. Aboriginal elder David Mowaljarlai described, “This is a spirit country”[iv], and all of Her inhabitants, including non-Indigenous, may be affected by the strength of Her organic communication. It took me until the later stages of my research to realize the need to state the importance of this particular place for the advent of the research: the significance of both the land of Australia, and the specific region of the Blue Mountains in which I was now dwelling, as well as the community of this particular region, which all lent itself to the whole process. The lateness of this perception on my part, has to do with the extent of my previous alienation; but the fact that it did occur, is perhaps at least in part attributable to the unfolding awakening to my habitat that was part of the project/process. The specific region of the “Blue Mountains” – as Europeans have named them – is significant in that I don’t think that this project/process could have happened as it did in just any region. David Abram says, “The singular magic of a place is evident from what happens there, from what befalls oneself or others when in its vicinity. To tell of such events is implicitly to tell of the particular power of that site, and indeed to participate in its expressive potency[v]”. Blue Mountains, Australia: Dharug and Gundungurra Country The Blue Mountains are impressive ancient rock formations, an uplifted ancient seabed, whose “range of rock types and topographical situations has given rise to distinct plant communities”[vi]; and the presence of this great variation of plant communities, “especially the swamps, offer an abundance and variety of food sources, as well as habitats for varied fauna”[vii]. I feel that this is the case for …
Artful Ceremonial Expression by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This article is an edited excerpt from Chapter 7 of the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. I always wore a special headpiece for the Seasonal ceremonies when I facilitated them over the years, and I feel that any participant may do so, not just the main celebrant. My ceremonial headpiece with its changing and continuous Seasonal decoration took on increasing significance over the years; it became a personal central representation of the year-long ceremonial art process of creating, destroying and re-creating. For the research period of my doctoral studies particularly, when I was documenting the process, I realised that this headpiece came to represent for me the essence of “She” – as Changing One, yet ever as Presence – as I was coming to know Her. In my journal for the Mabon/Autumn Equinox process notes one year I wrote: As I pace the circle with the Mabon headpiece in the centre, I see “Her” as She has been through the Seasons … the black and gold of Samhain, the deep red, white and evergreen of Winter, the white and blue of Imbolc, the flowers of Eostar, the rainbow ribbons of Beltane, the roses of Summer, the seed pods and wheat of Lammas, and now the Autumn leaves. I see in my mind’s eye, and feel, Her changes. I am learning … The Mother knowledge grows within me. The headpiece, the wreath, the altar, the house decorations, all participate in the ceremony: they are part of the learning, the method, the relationship – similar to how one might bring flowers and gifts of significance to a loved one at special moments. Then further, the removal and re-creation of the decorations are part of the learning – an active witness to transformation through time.
(Photography & Poetry) Thoughts of Spring by Deanne Quarrie

Spring At the highest point on the tree, you stretch, reaching for the sun. Your pink petals elegant in their grace, you stand alone. Bravest of all, for leaves have yet to come to offer shade Branches bare except for furry buds that will soon follow in imitation of your daring first move. Intrepid flower of Spring, I feel like you in my yearning for the Sun!
(Essay and Video) Cosmogenesis Dance: Celebrating Her Unfolding by Glenys Livingstone

The dance begins with two concentric circles, which will flow in and out of each other throughout the dance, resulting thus in a third concentric circle that comes and goes. The three circles/layers are understood to represent the three aspects of Goddess, the Creative Triple Dynamic that many ancients were apparently aware of, and imagined in so many different ways across the globe. In Her representation in Ireland as the Triple Spiral motif, which is inscribed on the inner chamber wall at Bru-na-Boinne (known as Newgrange)[1], She seems to be understood as a dynamic essential to on-going Cosmic Creativity, as this ancient motif is dramatically lit up by the Winter Solstice dawn. It seems that this was important to the Indigenous people of this place at the time of Winter Solstice, which celebrates Origins, the continuing birth of all. Thus I like to do this Cosmogenesis Dance, as I have named it[2], at the Winter Solstice in particular. The three aspects that the dance may embody, and are poetically understood as Goddess, celebrate (i) Virgin/Young One – Urge to Be as I have named this quality – the ever new differentiated being (also known as Fodla in the region of the Triple Spiral)[3]. This is the outer circle of individuals. (ii) Mother – the deeply related interwoven web – Dynamic Place of Being as I have named this quality – the communion that our habitat is (also known as Eriu in the region of the Triple Spiral)[4]. This is the woven middle circle where all are linked and swaying in rhythm. (iii) Crone/Old One – the eternal creative return to All-That-Is – She who Creates the Space to Be as I have named this quality (also known as Banba in the region of the Triple Spiral)[5]. This is the inner circle where linked hands are raised and stillness is held. The three concentric layers of the dance may be understood to embody these. The Cosmogenesis Dance represents the flow and balance of these three – a flow and balance of Self, Other and All-That-Is. It may be experienced like a breath, that we breathe together – as we do co-create the Cosmos. Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme have named the three qualities of Cosmogenesis in the following way: – differentiation … to be is to be unique – communion … to be is to be related – autopoiesis/subjectivity … to be is to be a centre of creativity.[6] The three layers of the dance may be felt to celebrate each unique being, in deep relationship with other, directly participating in the sentient Cosmos, the Well of Creativity. The Cosmogenesis Dance as it is done within PaGaian Winter Solstice ceremony expresses the whole Creative Process we are immersed in. It is a process of complete reciprocity, a flow of Creator and Created, like a breath. There is dynamic exchange in every moment: that is the nature of the Place we inhabit. The dance may help awaken us to it, and to invoke it. The Cosmogenesis Dance on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR73MDMM9Fk For more story: Cosmogenesis Dance for Winter Ritual For Dance Instructions: PaGaian Cosmology Appendix I Meet Mago Contributor Glenys Livingstone NOTES: [1] The Triple Spiral engraving is dated at 2,400 B.C.E. [2] This dance is originally named as “The Stillpoint Dance”, or sometimes “Adoramus Te Domine” which is the name of the music used for it. I learned it from Dr. Jean Houston in 1990 at a workshop of hers in Sydney, Australia. I began to use the dance for Winter Solstice ceremony in 1997, and it was only in the second year of doing so that I realised its three layers were resonant with the three traditional qualities of the Female Metaphor/Goddess, and also the three faces of Cosmogenesis. I thereafter re-named and storied the dance that way in the ceremonial preparation and teaching for Winter Solstice. See Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology: pp. 280-281 and 311. [3] Michael Dames, Ireland: a Sacred Journey, p.192. [4] Michael Dames, Ireland: a Sacred Journey, p. 192. [5] Michael Dames, Ireland: a Sacred Journey, p. 192. [6] Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry, The Universe Story, p. 71-79. I have identified these qualities with the Triple Goddess, and the Triple Spiral in the synthesis of PaGaian Cosmology: see Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology, particularly Chapter 4: https://pagaian.org/book/chapter-4/ References: Dames, Michael. Ireland: a Sacred Journey, Element Books, 2000. Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Lincoln NE: iUniverse, 2005. Swimme, Brian and Berry, Thomas. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era. NY: HarperCollins, 1992.
Imbolc: Through Goddess Eyes by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Photo by Carolyn Lee Boyd In times past, Creation’s Winter cupped me in her icy hand of sanctuary Gathered in, I sucked dormant life, and slumbered Till Earth’s rebirthing groans awakened my new body Now, older and full of life’s weeping and wondering awe At all that has happened in my decades on Earth I must shake myself into consciousness My seed’s opaque, blinding hull disintegrates and Bodyless, at last I can see through Goddess eyes I ache as my blood paints each flower petal I spin the whirlwind that cannot stop creating abundance I push the seasons through the year that mortals believe revolve of their own accord. Through Goddess eyes I can see me, I inhabit Winter’s hand as my own. I make the cold to slow creation of outside of me To gather the seed into fertile stillness within. That burgeons in my own time. https://www.magoism.net/2016/08/meet-mago-contributor-carolyn-lee-boyd/
(Mago Almanac Excerpt 5) Introducing the Magoist Calendar by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Book A) Free PDF available at Mago Bookstore. THE 28-13-7 INTERPLAY How does the number, 28 (days), for the lunar cycle come about? Why is it 28 days and not 29 or 30, the latter implicated in the traditional lunar calendar of East Asia? It appears that 28 days is a value closer to the moon’s sidereal period (about 27.3 days) than the synodic period (about 29.5 days). Or is it that 28 days points to the median between the synodic lunar cycle and the sidereal lunar cycle? To answer these questions, it is important to note that a value in the Mago Time captures an inter-cosmic biological cusp/juncture derived from the matrix of sonic numerology. Distinguished from the patriarchal measure of time fixated into a solipsistic space, it makes visible the interconnectedness of all bodies. It never stands as an isolated single occasion. The 28 day, 13 month calendar has to do with how we perceive the moon. There are two ways of understanding the lunar cycle; the sidereal period and the synodic period (see Figure 2). The synodic period refers to the time, about 29.5 days, that we on earth see the moon complete one round of revolution, e.g. from the full moon to the full moon. In contrast, the sidereal period refers to the actual time, about 27.3 days, that the moon takes to complete one round of revolution. While the synodic time is measured relative to the Earth (the observer’s position is on earth), the sidereal time is measured relative to the distant “fixed” stars (the observer’s position is far out at the distant stars). Since the distant stars are considered at rest, the sidereal period is taken as a universal value, not affected by the location of the viewer, we on earth. There is, apparently, a discrepancy between the lunar cycle that we on earth see the moon return to the same phase and the lunar cycle that the moon actually completes a revolution. The former is based on our observation of the moon’s phases, whereas the latter is based on the moon’s actual orbital motions. The two differs basically because all celestial bodies, the moon, earth, and sun, in the solar system are in motion. It is not just the moon that we watch revolving but Earth also revolves around the sun. We are watching the movement of the moon on a moving vehicle, earth, so to speak. Therefore, the moon has to travel about 2 more days in order for us on earth to see it in the same phase (see the green portion in Figure 2 part). At the position A of the moon in Figure 2, the moon is in line with the sun and the distant stars, which is a new moon. In the position of B (the new moon), the moon is in line with the sun but not with the distant stars. The right hand line of the green portion in line with the distant stars is where the moon started as a new moon. The moon has traveled about 2 more days to be in line with the sun. That is why the synodic period is about 2 days longer than the sidereal period. When it comes to “the lunar calendar”, moderns tend to think of it as the waxing and waning phases of the moon (29.5 days, the synodic period). The problem lies in that, following the synodic period, people see nothing beyond the moon’s phases. They overlook the fact that the moon rotates and revolves on its own axis and around the earth approximately 13 degrees every day. The synodic lunisolar calendar is a navel-gazing vision. Attending to the moon’s phases may seem benign. However, that is a planned pitfall; the synodic lunisolar calendar with 12 months in a year is here to supersede the 28 day, 13 month gynocentric calendar. Its irregularity with the number of days in a month (29 or 30 days with about 11 extra days for intercalation) is an inherently critical flaw. Its inaccuracy when incorporated within the solar annual calendar (approximately 365.25 days) stands out. Seen below in the table, the synodic lunar track results in as many leap days as a total of 44 days for 4 years, whereas the sidereal lunar track has 2 days for 4 years. The synodic lunisolar calendar undercuts the moon’s given capacity – guiding earthly beings into the intergalactic voyage of WE/HERE/NOW. In it, both the moon and women are, glorified and objectified by the viewer, cast under the male voyeuristic eye. On the contrary, the sidereal lunisolar calendar, based on the cyclic synchrony between the moon and women, offers the lens to the interconnectedness of all bodies in the universe. Synodic Lunar Track (Patriarchal) Sidereal Lunar Track (Magoist) Focus Moon’s phases Moon’s motions Days of month 29 or 30 (irregular) 28 (regular) No. of months in a year 12 13 Women’s menstrual cycle Assumed sync Synced Luni-centric Astolonomy Unknown 28 Constellations Intercalations 11 days annually, a total of 44 days for 4 years 1 day annually & 1 day every 4 years, a total of 2 days for 4 years Sources prove that the sidereal lunation is, albeit esoterically, known across cultures to this day. Through the comparative study of ancient cultures of Babylon, Arabia, India and China, W. B. Yeats (1865-1939) observes the substantive difference in dynamic between the two lunation tracks, the synodic and the sidereal. He notes that the moon’s orbital motion, apart from the sun’s, charts out the celestial sphere as the 28 Mansions. I have learned that the 28 Mansions or 28 Constellations of the Moon is a popular form of the 28 day and 13 month Magoist calendar, widely circulated among East Asians especially Koreans from the ancient time. Yeats’ following insights corroborate the Budoji’s explication of the Magoist Calendar in general and the faulty nature of the patriarchal (ancient Chinese) calendar in …

(2014 Mago Pilgrimage Report 1) Sweat Lodge in Gyodong, Ganghwa Islands by Helen Hwang

[Author’s Note: Revised verison of this report is published in Celebrating the Seasons of the Goddess (Lytle Creek, CA: Mago Books, 2017). 2014 Mago Pilgrimage to Korea (Oct. 7-Oct. 20) was participated by a culturally mixed group of pilgrims from the U.S. Australia, and Korea. Among non-Koreans were Dr. Glenys Livingstone (co-facilitator), Mr. Robert (Taffy) Seaborne, and Ms. Rosemary Mattingly. For details, read 2014 Mago Pilgrimage. View the video on our visit to Ganghwa Islands by Robert (Taffy) Seaborne.] 2014 Mago Pilgrimage granted me ever unfolding revelations. The first of them that I would like to mention concerned the sweat lodge called Hanjeung-mak (汗蒸幕, Chamber of chill and steam).[1] Until we visited the traditional sweat lodge in Gyodong, Ganghwa Island, it did not occur to me that the origin of its modern variations[2] has to do with the rebirthing experience in the Womb of Mago. (Here Mago means the Great Goddess or the Primordial Mother.)
(K-Drama Review 1) Liminal Space/Time into WE: What Hotel del Luna Displays by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: Hotel del Luna is a 16-episode Korean television drama aired in 2919. Caution is required for the spoiler. This essay is prompted by this drama, which was discussed in a new class, Experience Korean Culture through Film (EKCF) offered by Mago Academy. I am ever grateful for this opportunity to assess matriversal (read Magoist) soteriology, eschatology, and cosmology implicated in this drama. This drama takes viewers to a liminal time/space. At the liminal timespace, we see how one meets the other. Almost all objects of the drama remind viewers of their liminal property. The female main character, neither living nor dead, stands between the living and the dead. The ghost-serving moon lodge she operates is visible to both ghosts and people. So is the tree of the moon spirit, a symbol for the tree of life or the world tree, which summons the moon lodge to take place. And so are all beings with physical forms. The liminal timespace is where we find ourselves in the Reality of WE/HERE/NOW.] Copyright origin unknown. Part I: Introduction with Synopsis Jang Manwol, the female protagonist, is fixated to the tree of the moon spirit (wolryeongsu 월령수) and entrusted as the representative of the moon lodge, which serves ghosts charged with unrelenting resentments, by the Mago Divine. Mago Halmi (Great Mother, Creatrix), by providing new opportunities, awaits Manwol until she takes actions to relieve her unyielding grudge, caused by the complex socio-political misfortunes in the 7th century. Manwol is, currently neither living nor dead, expected to die and take a ride to the realm of after-life (returning to the origin) just like other ghosts in her lodge. Together with her ghost employees, she operates a large luxurious hotel, Hotel del Luna, the latest name of the moon lodge. Standing in the liminal time/space, the hotel is equipped with an elegantly decorated spacious lobby, a sky-viewing terrace, a horizon-surrounded beach, and an amusement park as well as a multiple number of rooms, each of which is catered to serve the special needs of a ghost guest. At the heart of the lodge is the tree of the moon spirit. The hoteliers welcome ghosts, diagnose the story of han (unresolved resentments) that they carry in themselves and its remedy, and execute plots to resolve resentments in a peaceful manner, to be beneficial to ALL. Upon being healed and rejuvenated with a new perspective on their past lives and the Reality of Intercosmic Life, the ghosts leave the lodge to take the ride to the realm of after-life (jeoseung 저승). The dead are supposed to take this ride to the Origin. Ghosts with unrelenting resentments escapes this route and lingers in the in-between reality of the living and the dead. Until accepting the help of the male protagonist, Gu Chanseong, sent by the Mago Divine, Manwol stubbornly continues to roam around her inbetween space/time. Insofar as she holds onto her own oath to avenge, the tree of the moon spirit remains dormant, seemingly dead. The tree, a visual locus reflecting the inner landscape of Manwol (her predecessors and successors alike), connects ghosts and people and reveals the reality of Life to them. The young man, Chanseong, misses no opportunity to choose the good and to right the wrong in ghosts and people, which is the key to straightening up the entangled karmic consequences. He prompts Manwol to heal herself: She realizes the truth about her betrayer (she was consumed by her anger against him so much so that she could not know the truth; he did not betray her but saved her) and let go of her over-1,300 year-long desire to destroy him. Affected by the grudge-releasing actions of Chanseong, she gradually chooses the path to reconcile with her past, as the Mago Divine wishes for her. The tree of the moon spirit, showing a sign of life again by putting out leaves and flowers, harbingers the end of the moon lodge. Manwol and her ghost employees as well as Chanseong reach the timespace of saying good-bye to move on to the next stage of Life’s cycle. Mawol becomes the last ghost who get helped in her lodge. The Mago Divine is seeking a new owner for the lodge so that ghosts with resentments can continue to be served. The drama is potentially transforming the human psyche from within. Tantalizing, heart-breaking, and frightening stories of the dead and the living stretch the horizon to the whole — the realm of physical life (iseung 이승), the realm of afterlife (jeoseung 저승), and the in-between realm of ghosts. In the sense that its narrative structure is built on the Korean folk belief of Mago Halmi (Great Mother, Crone, and Creatrix), and Magoism, the Way of the Creatrix, I find this drama a composite text of Magoist thealogy (a systematic understanding of Mago, the Creatrix) at the core. What the hoteliers are doing is in fact the role of Mudangs (Korean Shamans). Although Mudangs and Muism (Korean Shamanism) are strikingly absent, the drama resonates with the Muist worldview. The core message is to release unrelenting resentments of the dead on the part of the living. Intriguingly, this drama does not speak directly to humans, “Humans, do not create cheok (hatred or suffering in other beings).” Perhaps, such is too clear a message to articulate. At any rate, we are supposed to gain the lesson by listening to the stories of ghosts. What we see is that troubled ghosts with resentment are helped and guided to the journey of afterlife. The dead are expected to take the ride to the realm of after-life immediately. Ghosts are those who would not follow the path of the dead. Viewers are told why some people become haunting ghosts upon death, why ghosts seek to interfere with humans, and why ghosts are tempted to take revenge upon humans. We may say that ghosts are the confused or disrupted souls. Ghosts face extermination by the Mago Divine if they harm humans or assist an evil ghost. Consequently, evil ghosts are precluded from the cycle of rebirth. That is …
How do you say what The Mago Work is? by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang & Mago Circle Members

It took many years for me to pronounce the communal nature of the Mago Work. Defining the Mago Work necessarily endows us with the bird’s eye view of the Great Goddess, the primordial consciousness of WE in S/HE. Early this year, I asked people to define the Mago Work and their definitions are illuminating about what this book ultimately seeks to achieve.[1]

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