New Moon

The Red Earth: A New Moon Solar Eclipse in Capricorn and a Welcome into 2019

This morning, meditating on the new moon eclipse in Capricorn, I had a vision of a woman rising, round faced, like a tree, growing up out of the ground and spreading into the sky so that there was little else to see.

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I’m in Kenya, where the earth is red and well-packed roads lead to where you were always going. My first impression, before arriving here, upon arriving here, was that I was going to a magical land, where strange and wonderful animals still lived and people still smiled a welcome you didn’t need to deserve. This morning, I thought of the whole earth being like this, a magical land, where people smile a welcome, where strange animals and birds roam, whether the soil is black or red. Here we are reminded of it because you can’t escape it. She sticks to your shoes and skin, leaving her red mark. Don’t forget me she says! Smile your welcome.

Reducing Whatever Was Left Of My Hard Outer Shell

For me I think 2019 will be about reducing whatever was left of my hard outer shell down to nothing so that I can better serve the world. Capricorn is the goat climbing steadily up the mountain, and I want to slowly grow my business, to keep talking to the flowers, offering their wisdom, speaking more broadly for the non-human worlds. I’ll keep forgetting who I am in the process. Saturn conjunct the sun teaches the value of hard work and humility. All this cardinal Earth energy demands contribution, retribution, reminds us that, in the darkness, something new is beginning, and it isn’t about us as individuals. Don’t take it personally. Whatever changes have swept over you are for the greater good. Pluto is there too, reminding us that perhaps there will be further sacrifice demanded of us. Perhaps total transformation is now the only option.

Sometimes The Earth Seems Fragile

Sometimes the Earth seems fragile. Everywhere I read news of breaking cycles, vanishing animals, emptying seas. Sometimes it seems solid, like it does here, holding us up, even in mud, with the trees. I’m near the equator and the shapes of the stars are different. In the garden many flowers grow, and along the roads, hibiscus, a yellow bush I don’t know, small tubular orange blooms clustered together, a bush whose clusters, like a sunset, fade from orange to pink to yellow. I don’t know their names. I think today I will make a hibiscus essence. She whispers to me of faith, faith in this trembling world, which, like a mirage, might disappear at any moment, doesn’t always seem real, so that I remember my own fragility as I walk upon it. Here I go.

All That Is Real

Yet the Earth isn’t going anywhere, she’s solid and strong, present, all that is real, and she’s letting us know. Like her, I’m solid and strong, not a wisp anymore. Perhaps as I walk upon her, I could be more imposing. Perhaps, as I walk upon her, I need to be more imposing, to encourage whatever transformation for the good is naturally happening. With my voice I’ll spread wide into the sky like a tree, and tell everyone how the birds speak to me.

Sacrifice and Synchronicity

Speaking of sacrifice, if you want to join a group learning experience to follow along with the currents of our changing world, it is the last chance to join Charles Eisenstein's Living in the Gift course in its first round. This month's theme is sacrifice and synchronicity: I just had an experience of the latter when, after mentioning sacrifice here, I read an email from the course and found that it was the theme there this month as well.

Keep your eyes out for my new website which will have a place to purchase my flower essences, some offerings to grow your creativity with the flowers, a cosmic blog and other as yet undreamed of offerings.

May your hard work and persistent visions be blessed. May your dreams, however dark, be transformative, and may your actions support the health of the communities and ecosystems you are a part of.

Karibu!

(Originally posted on January 6th, 2019)

Magical Mullein

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Happy New Moon in Aries! This is a powerful new moon for new beginnings. Here in Vermont the leaves are still only thoughts in the minds of the trees. I'm still sitting by the fire and wondering how white tomorrow's morning will be. I haven't called down the moon yet, though my intentions have been made, and I've thought of what I want to release.

Meet Mullein

I want to share with you something that happened on a full moon last fall when I gathered Mullein. Have you met Mullein? I have been traveling with her for a while, with her root. I did so intuitively, but recently I learned that doing so protects healers, so that’s appropriate. Her root is smoothly curved, and she sits by my bed or under my pillow. She has been calming my lymph, and I chewed her for toothache. I made a wonderful oil with her leaves, which despite growing mold and repeatedly calling to be peeled back while infusing, has calmed my friend’s large thyroid and, put in my bath, made me feel like I was turning green, green with life and pleasure, energy and health. I highly recommend you meet Mullein!

Messages From Mullein

In the moonlight she called to me, tall stalk and soft leaf. She's a weed, but my father lets her grow tall. She likes to grow by the old stone wall across the road and near our garage, rearing two, three friends. She reminds me of a he, actually, with her tall yellow stalk, standing erect and proud. She grows above our heads. Her dried stalks used to be used as candles by witches who dipped them in wax, I've read.

I pulled her out of the ground, turned her stalk around and she was a staff as I talked to the moon. She said:

The roots are the trees are the roots.
I'm underground
and the moon is the sun
and the dark is the light
and inside is outside
and fire is night
the day is the dark
and the night is the day
and I'm sitting her mooning
my sun tan away.
The winter is spring when you're the other way round
and bedtime is morning
when the stars shine on the ground.

Gather at the roots, she told me, gather at the roots.

Unearthing The Lesson

There are lots of lessons there, about embracing paradox, and going deep with each other, of spending more time in the dirt and with friends.

I enjoyed the feeling of the night on my skin and the small sound of the wind and the bigger sound of the water. It was November, almost exactly six months ago, and it was the Beaver full moon. I thought of the beavers, and I felt so alone here without all the animals that used to roam.

On this new moon in April, a cold early spring, I remember the promise of Mullein, how she will grow, and fill myself up with soil and seed.

(Originally posted April 16th, 2018)