September 9, 2014October 2, 2019 Mago Work Admin

(Meet Mago Contributor) Paula Lietz

Paula Dawn Lietz (Pd Lietz ) is an accomplished multi-genre artist, photographer and poet from Canada. She has garnered an impressive range of credits working with various publishers and authors, reveling in the creative energy generated within the artist and literary community. Her poet’s heart shines through her visual interpretations of the world she sees around her.

Lietz’s writing, art and photography have appeared in and as covers of many publications: Naugatuck River Review Summer 2011 & Winter 2013, MaINtENaNT: Journal of Contemporary DADA Writing and Art #4, 5 & 6, Visions, Voices and Verses, Sunrise From Blue Thunder, DoveTales “Occupied” an International Journal of the Arts , Uncoil A Night, Beautiful Women an anthology, Origami Poetry Project, Songs of Sandy, to name a few. She is also artist-in-residence for Writers for Peace.

You can find more of her work at pd lietz photoraphy, art of pd lietz at MadSwirl gallery, and Poetry of pd lietz at MadSwirl. You can also contact her at Paula d Lietz on Twitter.

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(Essay 2) Poet as Initiate: A Rebirth of the Goddess & The Darkmother in Women’s Poetry in the 70’s by Louisa Calio

Poet as Initiate: A Rebirth of the Goddess & The Darkmother in Women’s Poetry in the 70’s[i] (for my mother Rosa) “She is you, she is me, she is our mother’s murmurings, chantings, hummings all her days”[ii] Rites of Isis When I first wrote those lines in the early 1970’s, I hadn’t yet named the process going on within me, nor had I discovered the works of Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum, which would link the dark mother to my own Sicilian and Neapolitan heritage, as well as our collective African roots. I had seen my life undergoing major transitions, a divorce, job loss, a descent, as well as explorations into new and submerged territories of learning, a “remembering” of African culture and religion as well as a reconnection to people from Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia. In the grips of powerful unconscious forces, I was called to renewal or Initiation. Turning inward for guidance, I felt drawn to a copy of E.A. Wallis Budge’s Osiris and the Egyptian Resurrection. There was the image of the great eye I had been drawing since I was a child. There was the name of the Goddess who was initiating me: Isis! Hers was the story of a feminine deity who was making herself; not a cursed and sinful female ancestor like Eve, but a powerful and inspired dark mother who dared to call upon the sun god, Ra, for her equal place in the universe, as well as for a healing of her beloved, Osiris, and their child, Horus. Here was an earlier trinity, with a powerful female deity that saw man as her brother and was putting the pieces of their broken soul back together for all humanity’s benefit.[iii] These ideas were simultaneously emerging in other women poets, artists, writers, historians, dancers, and mothers as well in the late sixties and early seventies. This is well documented now, but was not so then. On reflection, this was a very lonely and perilous passage especially as evidenced in poets like Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton. Initiation, even when guided by instinct and archetypal memory, challenges the stability of the ego and one’s sanity. Yet, it seemed as if a seed, planted by our ancestors and the dark mother a millennia ago was bursting forth and about to give birth. Poetry is also a way of knowing, much like dreaming. The poet/artist lives at the borderlands where inner revelation meets outer experience. She values the inner and imaginary, because it is the source of creativity. Poetry explores the far reaches of the psyche and the depths of feeling in a heightened language carried by breath. At its best, we can call poetry a language of the soul. Many women were wrestling with issues of soul proportion and daring to express the most personal and intimate experiences of being human and female in our time. After two thousand years of patriarchy, a history marked with periods of persecution, witch burning, torture, severe punishment and repression of all dark others, especially women, the silence was about to be broken wide open. While occasionally women writers of the past from Emily Dickinson to Virginia Woolf in her important essay, “A Room of One’s Own,” called out for soul space in our lives, room for the meditative, for process rather than product, as well as respect for the feminine voice, their calls were not widely heard; too many like Woolf were buried under severe depression and covered by a legacy of Victorian artifice and politeness. The accumulated pain of generations, once hidden by conformity, silence, and acquiescence to tribal order and false “codes of honor”(see Daniela Gioseffi’s poem “Bicentennial Anti-Poem for Italian-American Women”)[iv] that buried acts of violence against women in deep depression, mental illness and silent suffering, seemed to reach a critical mass in the late 1960’s, and as the work of Dr. Chiavola Birnbaum fully documents,[v] began to give voice to what eventually became a feminist spiritual movement and its poetry. While initiation in ancient times took place in the temple after many years of preparation, modern women poets of the spirit often began their journeys unconsciously, the result of years of inner turmoil and outer situations with people who did not validate them. Whether their initial quest was for love, friendship, a mate, to understand oneself or simply bear one’s pain, these women journeyed into the caves of their unconscious rousing the sleeping demons of the soul. Often unprepared for a spiritual ordeal, the poet was driven inward by an energy larger than herself; if she survived the encounter, she could pull from the deep, the new image and energy from which to create, heal and continue. In the words of the Jungians, these writers were engaged in a “re-mythologizing of their lives,” a search for meaning that led to a rediscovery of our relationship to the Great Mother and the Greater Mysteries which address the larger purpose for which we are born. Two pioneering poets who contributed to an earlier evolution of the feminine communal soul were Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton.[vi] Their works preceded the new wave by more than ten years and are discussed in an earlier essay, “Rebirth of the Goddess- Part I”. Daniela Gioseffi, Diane Di Prima, Ntozake Shange, Alice Walker, Starhawk and myself were some of the poets who found that protesting and rebelling, though important for exposing the evils of lopsided patriarchy, were not enough to heal them. To heal, one had to confront, time and again, the collective negative beliefs about the feminine and their brutal manifestations, and then transform them one by one within. In the late 1950’s, the dark mother had not yet been renamed or celebrated. SHE was still locked in stone, a “Stasis in darkness/substanceless blue…”[vii] or a distant intellectual ideal of ancient history, or distorted into a literal Virgin or sinful Eve. While the new poets also experienced a deep despair over the old values of patriarchy and the abuses it spawned, they did …
(Seasonal essay) Spring Equinox Southern Hemisphere September 2013 by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

As the new young light continues to grow after the transition of Early Spring/Imbolc, it comes into balance with the dark, at the Seasonal Moment of Spring Equinox or Eostar as it may be known.[1] This is one of two points in the year when the Sun is equidistant between North and South, creating a balance of dark and light, with the trend at Spring Equinox being toward longer hours of light as the Sun in my region moves further South on the horizon: Earth’s tilt creating this effect. I summarize the Poetics of this Moment as “stepping into the Joy and Power of Being”. At my place, Spring and Autumn Equinoxes are both celebrated in the tradition of the Demeter-Persephone Mysteries, and Spring is the joyful celebration of Persephone’s return from the underworld – Her return and re-union with her Mother who has waited and longed for Her: it may be understood generically as the Return of the Beloved One. Persephone, who is the Seed, emerges, unfolding all the beauty and potency that is within Her, manifesting it – Herself – virulently. As is said in the ceremony: “The Beloved One, the Lost One, returns with new Wisdom from the depths.”[2] Persephone, the Beloved Daughter – the Seed – has navigated the darkness successfully, has enriched it with Her presence and also gained its riches. Spring Equinox ceremony may celebrate the magic of the unexpected, yet long awaited, green emergence from under the ground or in the bare branch, and then the flower: that may have lain dormant for months or longer – much like the magic of desert blooms after long periods of drought. The story that our ceremony is based on is the version that we understand as pre-patriarchal, from Old Europe. It is the well researched version told by Charlene Spretnak, and now by others in some varied form, wherein Persephone voluntarily descends to the underworld – she is not forced.[3] In this “story of Old” Persephone is a courageous seeker of wisdom, a compassionate receiver of the dead, a shaman, a redeemer. She is the Seed of Life that never fades away: She carries within Her the sacred red thread of life which continues beneath the visible, and is renewed in the darkness. Spring Equinox may be a celebration of Her return, Life’s continual return, and also our own personal emergences/returns. We may contemplate the collective emergence/return also … perhaps a Return to the Mother – especially as it may be manifesting in our times, perhaps in the very midst of compost. In the ceremony and on the PaGaian Wheel of the Year,[4] the Return of the Beloved One is identified as “Heraic”: since the word hera pre-dates the masculine form hero (who as Heracles was carrying out the bidding of his Goddess, Hera), Charlene Spretnak makes a case for using the term for any individual who acts courageously.[5] The ‘Olympic’ games were originally Hera’s races, with exclusively female runners: the winners were heraic it could be said. Spring Equinox emergence is a grand opportunity to re-store Hera to Her pre-Olympian integrity:[6] that of indigenous Queen Goddess, ‘origin of all things,’[7] Parthenos[8] – before She was married off to Zeus. Invoking and naming the “Courageous One who has Journeyed and who Journeys” as the “Sacred Heraic Self” as is invited in the Spring Equinox ceremony, at once re-stores the participant’s native en-titlement, and appropriately re-contextualizes and re-members the trials of the lost journey of a patriarchal woman or man, who has been Returning.
(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.
(Meet Mago Contributor) Mary Beth Moser

Mary Beth Moser, PhD is passionate about the cultural history of her ancestral homeland of northern Italy. Her publications include “The Everyday Spirituality of Women in the Italian Alps: A Trentino American Woman’s Search for Spiritual Agency, Folk Wisdom, and Ancestral Values.” (ProQuest, 2013), and “Honoring Darkness: Exploring the Power of Black Madonnas in Italy,” along with several published essays. In addition to writing, traveling and giving presentations, she dreams under the night skies of her island home in the Northwest US.
(Prose) The Scarlet Runner Outside My Window by Sara Wright

Photo by Sara Wright I have grown scarlet runner beans ever since I can remember. I have heirloom seeds that I collect every fall to dry and store for the winter. During the last few years as the weather began to shift planting became tricky. The deer were also decimating my plants before they could produce seeds pods so eventually after sharing seeds with others, I gave up growing my own… Last winter I had an opportunity to look at lichens, molds, and stones under a powerful microscope at the Mineral and Gem Museum (MGM) and since I had one old seed from many years past, I took it in along with some slime molds because I wanted to see the colors. To my utter shock when I opened the damp packet the seed had produced a big fat white root. Although it was only the first of March, I brought home my treasure and planted it in a pot. Any seed that wanted to grow that much had to be given a chance to live. Within a month I had this huge vine climbing up my window. Every day, after apologizing profusely and telling the vine how much I loved her, I wound her tendrils back on each other. May came with a hard killing freeze and then the rains began. The flooding lasted all summer along with the worst air quality we have ever had here in Maine (nano particles are not measured, the worst air pollution of all). Our beloved Northern Forests are still on fire. In desperation I planted my vine just outside my window to avoid deer predation, where it immediately died. Imagine my astonishment when a tiny leaf appeared about two weeks later in the rain. It was now almost July. The scarlet runner sent out more shoots and by mid – August tiny scarlet flowers appeared. Hummingbirds flocked to the blossoms. Bees too. I waited, and lo, a few pods finally appeared in September. A terrifying accident prevented me from seeing my beans again… Just two days ago my dear friend James, the Bird Man, collected the few pods for me. Most were unripe but when I shelled the beans this morning I had three good seeds, and some unripe ones that looked like jewels . I will dry all of them for about a week and then store the three viable seeds in a cool place for the winter… Maybe my heirloom seeds will produce another magic vine or two next year. I know that I will never forget this old, abandoned bean seed that simply refused to give up. I am awed by the Powers of Nature. S/he will endure. Perhaps before too long theses beans will be gone forever, but for now, I may see another scarlet runner vine bear flowers and seed pods next year. Our only hope lies with the Powers of Nature. No matter what humans continue to do to destroy this beautiful blue green planet – one day S/he will begin again. https://www.magoism.net/2014/12/meet-mago-contributor-sara-wright/
(Poem) Power of Feminism by Alshaad Kara

Image from Unplash It is to stand for what is right.There is no usage of moralitySince all starts in the wombOf a woman to mother earth.The spirit of this truthIs embodied in each oneOn every single day of our lives. https://www.magoism.net/2023/12/meet-mago-contributor-alshaad-kara/
Becoming Plant by Sara Wright

Photo by Sara Wright “I did not know to recognize you as individuals when I bought you, but I know to recognize you as individuals now…” Xochitl Alvizo This morning, I read an excellent essay by Xochitl Alvizo about ‘extending compassion’ by choosing to become vegan. Her personal story touched me deeply because it was a tale of awakening to the sanctity of animal life. My story was different, but perhaps just as compelling. I include my partial response to her article here: I grew up as a meat eater, and ANIMAL lover… by my mid – twenties I started to feel very uncomfortable about eating meat, so gradually I ate less and less… I took a philosophy course. The professor shocked me. Was becoming vegetarian the answer? Wasn’t I still eating living things? By then I had already developed deep personal relationships with plants both inside and out – I already knew they responded to being loved and cared about. If I really wanted to get away from killing things, then would I be willing to take a pill to get the nutrients I needed instead of eating any more food he asked? I loved to cook. I loved food. I loved plants and animals. No, I thought. For me answering this question honestly was the source of a harsh awakening. No matter what I ate I was killing living beings. I finished that class with a burning question – how do I make peace with being an omnivore? I held that question in my heart. By then I had lost my taste for meat. It was ten years before I received an answer. My study of Indigenous peoples taught me that what I ate was less important than how I ate. The critical thing was to express my GRATITUDE to the beings whose lives were sacrificed for me to live… to be mindful… to stay aware. And so, I have tried to live this way ever since. Staying aware is hard. I have a trickster who often owns my mind. I say ‘try’ because often I forget. I rarely eat meat, but my dogs do because they are carnivores and I buy it. I also eat fish. I see myself as a participant in the Circle of Life where we must kill living beings be they fungi, plants, or animals to live regardless of who we are. I am also aware that most non- Indigenous people don’t have the kind of relationship I do with plants. I did not know how to recognize you as individuals when I first knew you, but I know how to recognize you as individuals now… (Paraphrasing Xochitl) Photo by Sara Wright When I was a toddler, I helped my grandmother in her vegetable garden. This was when I planted my first seed, a summer squash. When it came time to harvest the vegetables, the little person picked the squash and put the vegetable to sleep in her wooden doll’s bed. When the squash finally shrunk into an unrecognizable shape the story ended. For the child eating the squash was never an option, though no doubt I ate the ones my grandmother cooked. Clearly, the toddler sensed something about the sanctity of plants that I later ‘forgot’. As a young adult and mother, I had a houseful of plants that flourished but also seemed to be responding to my touch and care in uncanny ways. Sometimes I sensed something – an invisible current running between us. Plants have feelings, I concluded, not quite believing myself. As soon as my children were older, I planted vegetable and flower gardens that also flourished. I possessed a green thumb, some said. By mid -life I began to have strange experiences with individual plants and trees that spoke to me without words. I dreamed I was a vine with eyes in her leaves that crawled over the ground. I began to make tinctures from plants I gathered after sensing that a particular plant would help me. I went to Amazon to study medicine plants and learned that each healer had his own garden, that all plants spoke and healed various illnesses directly or through dreams. The roots of orchids lit up a luminous green whenever I repotted them. Sometimes the roots pulsed, heating up in my hands. I moved to the mountains from the coast because I was compelled to live in a wilder place. As soon as I did, I had frightening dreams about the death of thousands of trees. Trees were warning me of their collective demise, and I didn’t want to believe them. Strip logging began. Today almost every mountain is at least partially bare and all, but those on protected lands carry ugly scars. We have less than 100 acres of old tree growth left in Maine. I began to grow passionflowers, developing an eerie relationship with this species. Could this be the vine of my repetitive dream? Whenever I gave a rooted cutting to someone who would turn out to be an unworthy person the plant would die. I stopped giving my plants away. I went to New Mexico and stayed with a man I shouldn’t have, even though we had no romantic relationship. Within two months one of my passionflowers died. I was being warned, I knew. (Thank goodness I had left one plant home in the care of a friend).I was living in hell. When I became ill and was forced to leave this man’s house, I mourned the loss of that plant like a grieving mother. I spent a few years in New Mexico elsewhere. Suzanne Simard’s work with trees who communicated with one another through mycelial networks took on a new dimension. This fungal net of underground life that stretched across the earth became increasingly important to me. Fascinated by a world I knew nothing about and couldn’t see, I did a lot of research during this period. Some days when I walked along the river before dawn, …
(Essay 4) How Mother Nature Died: The bio-cosmic rupture of European Renaissance by Luciana Percovich

[This essay was presented at Roma Goddess Conference, May 22-23, 2021, under the theme of “Goddess & Environment – Save Mother Earth.”] Francis Bacon “Nature, you are wrong!”, wrote Francis Bacon (1561-1626) and added: “You must dominate her, rape her in order to tear up her secrets”. He was the first to fix the aim of the New Science as Control and Rule over Nature, to legitimize every possible or imaginable manipulation, because: “The salvation of humankind depends on Science and Science is the ensemble of Mechanic arts”. In his Temporis Partus Masculus, Bacon wrote sentences which made history: “Here I am, to bring Nature with all her creatures to your service as a slave … Just follow her, like a hound pursue her, guiding and pushing her wher you want … You must enter her holes and nooks in the search of truth, without any concern”. Thomas Hobbes Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) with his Leviathan applied to political philosophy the same vision of disgregation and dismemberment, reasoning and rationalizing about the way of freeing exploitation also of human individuals: “A Nation is an Artificial order of individual parts united by Fear” Grounding again Starting during the 1960s, a worldwide movement of “consciousness raising groups” of women began to re-unite. Reclaiming the difference of the experience of living in a woman’s body, a widespread and pervasive work of demystifying the neutrality of historical, psychological, scientific, religious etc. narrations, set in motion a radical critique of the entire patriarchal apparatus at all its levels of organization and symbolic representation. Starhawk, The Earth Path, 2004 “For centuries, since the start of the ‘scientific revolution’, Western culture has pursued knowledge by breaking a subject or an object into its component parts and studying those parts … We developed a mechanistic, cause-and-effect model of the universe. Compartmentalization … doesn’t allow us to look at the whole, or at the complex web of relationships and patterns that make up a whole. (But) science itself has moved beyond … and today is likely to describe the world in terms of networks of probabilities and complexities, as interlocking processes and relationships …” “A witch must not only be familiar with the mystic planes of existence beyond the physical realm; she should also be familiar with the trees and plants and birds and animals of her own backyard, be able to name them, know their uses and habits and what part each plays in the whole … In fact, everybody should. Our culture is afflicted with a vast disconnection, an abyss of ignorance that becomes apparent whenever an issue involving the natural world arises. As a society we are daily making decisions and setting policies that have enormous repercussions on the natural world. And those policies are being set by officials and approved by a public who are functionally eco-illiterate”. Every small or great action, Here and Now, gives Form to one of the possible Futures. (End of the Essay) https://www.magoism.net/2013/10/meet-mago-contributor-luciana-percovich/ An Essential Bibliography AA.VV., Diotima. Il pensiero della differenza sessuale, La Tartaruga, Milano 1987. AA.VV., Donne Tecnologia Scienza: un percorso attraverso mito, storia, antropologia, a cura di Joan Rothschild, Rosenberg&Sellier, Torino, 1986 (Machina ex Dea, Pergamon Press, Oxford, 1983). AA.VV., Storia dell’Arte, Le Prime Civiltà, Mondadori Electa, Milano 2006. Armonie (a cura di), Il mito e il culto della Grande Dea. Transiti, metamorfosi, permanenze, Atti del Convegno 24-25 novembre 2000, Bologna, 2003. Armonie (a cura di), Dopo la Dea. Religioni come segni e strumenti del patriarcato, ribellioni delle donne come permanenze e rinascite dell’antico culto, Atti del Convegno 21 febbraio 2004, Bologna, 2004. Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, Noi e il nostro corpo, Feltrinelli, Milano 1974 (Our bodies, Ourselves, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1971). Brighton Women and Science Group, Alice attraverso il Microscopio: il potere della scienza sulla vita delle donne, La Salamandra, Milano 1985 (Alice through the Microscope. The power of science over women’s lives, Virago Press, London, 1980). Centro Documentazione Donna, Vivere e pensare la differenza. Incontro sulle pratiche e saperi delle donne, Firenze, 23/24 gennaio 1988. Chodorow Nancy, La funzione materna, psicoanalisi e sociologia del ruolo materno, La Tartaruga, Milano 199 (The reproduction of Mothering. Psychoanalysis and Sociology of Gender, University of California Press, 1978). Mary Daly, Al di là di Dio padre. Verso una filosofia della liberazione delle donne, Editori Riuniti, Roma 1990 (Beyond God the Father: Towards a Philosophy of Women’s Liberation, Beacon Press 1073). Mary Daly, Quintessenza. Realizzare il Futuro Arcaico, Venexia- Le Civette Saggi, Roma, 2005 (Quintessence. Realizing the Archaic Future, Beacon Press 1998). Dinnerstein Dorothy, The Mermaid and the Minotaur: Sexual Arrangements and Human Malaise, Harper and Row, New York 1976. Dashu Max, Streghe e Pagane. Le donne nella religione popolare europea, 700-1100, Venexia, Roma 2018 (Witches and Pagans. Women in European Folk Religion, 700-1100, Veleda Press, 2016). Donini Elisabetta, La nube e il limite. Donne, scienza, percorsi nel tempo, Rosenberg&Sellier, Torino 1990. Donini Elisabetta, Conversazioni con Evelyn Fox Keller, una scienziata anomala, Eleuthera, Milano 1991. Eherenreich Barbara – English Deirdre, Le streghe siamo noi, Celuc Libri/La Salamandra, Milano 1975 (Witches, Midwives and Nurses and Complaints and Disorders, Feminist Press, New York, 1973). Eisler Riane, Il calice e la spada. La nascita del predominio maschile, Pratiche, Parma, 1987 (The Chalice and the Blade: our History, our Future, Harper and Row, New York 1987). Eisler Riane, Il Piacere è Sacro, Frassinelli, Milano 1995 (Sacred Pleasure, Sex, Myth, and the Politics of the Body, Harper San Francisco, 1995). Federici Silvia, Il grande Calibano. Storia del corpo sociale ribelle nella prima fase del capitale, Derive Approdi, Milano, 2009 (Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body, and Primitive Accumulation, Autonomedia, Brooklyn, NY, 2004). Federici Silvia, Il punto zero della rivoluzione. Lavoro domestico, riproduzione e lotta femminista, Ombre Corte, 2014 (Revolution at Point Zero: Housework, Reproduction, and Feminist Struggle, Common Notions Press, 20012). Federici Silvia, Reincarnare il mondo. Femminismo e politica dei “commons”, Ombre Corte, 2018. Gilligan Carol, Con voce di donna, Feltrinelli, Milano 1987 (In a different voice: Psychological Theory …
(Poem) Old Mother Azure by Susan Hawthorne

Old Mother Azure went to the pasture to get her poor cow some straw but when she got there the ground was bare and the poor cow wanted more she went to the granary to buy her some chaff but when she came back she was dealing with staff she went to the farmer to buy her some silage but when she came back she was flying on mileage she went to the seamstress to buy her a cloak but when she came back she was sniffing coke she went to the milliners to buy her a hat but when she came back she was chasing a gnat she went to the snippers to get her some colour but when she came back she was learning to holler she went to the shoemaker to buy her some crocs but when she came back she was wearing white socks she went to the moon to buy her some cheese but when she came back she was dancing with bees she went to the sun to buy her the world but when she came back it had all unfurled Old Mother Azure is now in the sky while the cow jumped the moon I don’t know why Notes I wrote this poem during my ‘cow’ period. Not all poems made it into the collection Cow, among them this one. It’s a riff on the children’s nursery rhyme ‘Old Mother Hubbard’. Nursery rhymes include lots of oral histories, especially the histories of women. The struggles of women, especially single women, living in poverty. It is also about women’s connection with animals.. The photo is a cow I bought in Las Vegas, where there had been an exhibition that included Franz Marc’s leaping cow painting which you can find here. This is an image of joy, cow joy. It makes me smile each time I look at it.. https://www.magoism.net/2013/12/meet-mago-contributor-susan-hawthone/

(Special Post 3) 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.] Helen Hwang I study and advocate Goddess feminism or Magoism because it is a way of living for me. I find myself in Mago (the Great Goddess) who in turn leads me to the Way wherein I learn how to become the person who I can be. It has to be Mago, the Female Divine, because She is real! She is the Primordial Mother who is the Beginning and the End of everything to us on the planet Earth. She teaches me the real. I can’t negotiate Her to anything less. Helen Hye Sook Hwang, Ph.D. California http://magoism.net Bridget Robertson A Goddessian I was introduced to a form of meditative journeying by a resident in my grandmother’s retirement community. She approached to me. I know she was at least part Native American, and that alone made her the topic of much gossip in the building. Her Rose colored lipstick, deep brown eyes, wrinkles that only helped illuminate her face and a chiffon scarf that matched none of her clothes. I thought she needed help with her groceries. She didn’t. She had me stop the elevator. and directly asked about my looking tired. My response was about being, busy balancing all the areas of my life. In fact I was exhausted doling out time like pieces of pie.
(Special Post 2) 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.] Harriet Ann Ellenberger I got involved with women’s liberation in the early 1970s, so involved that it became my life for many years. During those beginnings of what is now called “the second wave of feminism,” everything was new to us and everything was mushed together — the political, the economic, the intellectual, the emotional, the spiritual. I liked that a lot; it felt as if all the parts of myself were coming together. During that time, I learned something crucial the imagery and concepts of patriarchal religion justify and are embedded in the material structures of oppression. I don’t know which came first, institutionalized oppression (of everyone; I’m not speaking here only of women) or the religious expression of that oppression. All I’m certain of is that patriarchal religion permeates, for example, the Oxford English Dictionary, which I use all the time, in conjunction with Websters’ First New Intergalactic Wickedary of the English Language, conjured by Mary Daly in cahoots with Jane Caputi.
(Special post) The Goddess Inanna: Her Allies and Opponents by Hearth Moon Rising

Inanna’s Descent to the Underworld is one of the most fascinating myths ever told. Not just because it is profound and enlightening, although it is certainly that. It’s an exciting journey that ignites the imagination, and female characters are at the hub of the action. This is a tale of power: power that is demanded, power that is won, power that is appropriated, and power that cannot be escaped. The story follows the fertility goddess Inanna, who brought civilization to Mesopotamia, as she seeks to expand her realm by venturing into the world below. Inanna’s experiences in the great below, her escape, and the wild events that unfold as a result of her caper are the focus of the tale.

(Prose) Halcyon for the Season by Deanne Quarrie

A bird for this season is the Kingfisher, also known as the Halcyon. The Kingfisher is associated in Greek myth with the Winter Solstice. There were fourteen “halcyon days” in every year, seven of which fell before the winter solstice, seven after; peaceful days when the sea was smooth as a pond and the hen-halcyon built a floating nest and hatched out her young. She also had another habit, that of carrying her dead mate on her back over the sea and mourning him with a plaintive cry. Pliny reported that the halcyon was rarely seen and then only at the winter and summer solstices and at the setting of the Pleiades. She was therefore, a manifestation of the Moon-Goddess who was worshiped at the two solstices as the Goddess of Life in Death and Death in Life and, when the Pleiades set, she sent the sacred king his summons for death. Kingfishers are typically stocky, short-legged birds with large heads and large, heron-like beaks. They feed primarily on fish, hovering over the water or watching intently from perches and they plunge headlong into the water to catch their prey. Their name, Alcedinidae, stems from classical Greek mythology. Alcyone, Daughter of the Wind, was so distraught when her husband perished in a shipwreck that she threw herself into the sea. Both were then transformed into kingfishers and roamed the waves together. When they nested on the open sea, the winds remained calm and the weather balmy. Still another Alcyone, Queen of Sailing, was the mystical leader of the seven Pleiades. The heliacal rising of the Pleiades in May marked the beginning of the navigational year and their setting marked the end. Alcyone, as Sea Goddess protected sailors from rocks and rough weather. The bird, halcyon continued for centuries to be credited with the magical power of allaying storms. Shakespeare refers to this legend in this passage from Hamlet: Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long; And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad; The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow’d and so gracious is the time. Hamlet, I, i 157 When I was a young mother, and my children were little, we lived in a house that had a creek in the back yard. There were small trees along the far bank of this creek and every day, a kingfisher would sit in the branches overlooking the creek. Sometimes he sat there very quietly for a very long time. Suddenly he would dive from his perch straight into the creek. Every time he did he came out and up into the air with a fish. It gave me great pleasure to watch him from my kitchen window. I love birds. I love learning about their habits because it teaches me ways of being that are closer to nature. I love drawing birds as well. When I was a young and more able, I was an avid bird watcher, out with my friends hoping for a sight never seen before. I love the story of the kingfisher and her connection to the Halcyon Days of the Winter Solstice. It is for most of us the busiest time of year. Whether it is for the Solstice or Christmas (often both) we are in a frenzy to get things done, making sure everything is just right and perfect. I celebrate the Winter Solstice. As a priestess, my days right now are very busy creating ritual. It is at the Solstice that many passage rites are happening with the women I work with. And of course, I celebrate with my family with our magical Yule Log each year. But I try to honor those seven days before and the seven days after by trying to have the frantic moments before the Halcyon Days begin and then even when busy, hold the peace and calm of that beautiful smooth sea in my mind. Peace and love and joy surrounding the Winter Solstice make it perfect. May the Peace of a Halcyon Sea be yours in this Solstice Season. Do hold the image of that little kingfisher in mind! Meet Mago Contributor, Deanne Quarrie
(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!
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/
Beltaine/High Spring within the Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from Chapter 8 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Traditionally the dates for Beltaine/High Spring are: Southern Hemisphere – October 31st or 1st November Northern Hemisphere – April 30th (May Eve) or 1st May though the actual astronomical date varies. It is the meridian point or cross-quarter day between Spring Equinox and Summer Solstice, thus actually a little later in early November for S.H., and early May for N.H., respectively. The twin fires lit in older times on hilltops in Ireland for Beltaine likely represented the two eyes of night and day.[i] With this vision, Goddess as Sun and Moon sees Her Land, and with the power of Her eyes (Sun and Moon) brings forth life and beauty. With the fire eyes, Goddess“reoccupied and saw her whole land…”[ii] The twin fires later came to be used to run cattle between as they headed out to Summer pasture, for the purpose of burning off the bugs and ticks of Winter; the fires may thus be understood to serve a cleansing effect and likely the origins of the tradition of the ceremonial leaping of flames by participants in Beltaine festivities. In PaGaian Cosmology this is poetically expressed as the Flame of Love that burns away the psyche’s “bugs and ticks,” and sees the Beauty present, and calls it forth. The Beltaine flames may be a celebration of Sun entering into the eye, into the whole bodymind: a powerful creative evocation upon which the Dance of Life depends, and as the cleansing power of love and pleasure. PaGaian focus for Beltaine is on the Holy Desire/Passion for life, and it may be accounted for on as many levels as possible … the complete holarchy/dimensions of the erotic power. On an elemental level, there is our desire for Air, Water, the warmth of Fire, and to be of use/service to Earth. There is an essential longing, sometimes nameless, sometimes constellated, experienced physically, that may be recognized as the Desire of the Universe Herself – desiring in us.[iii] We may remember that we are united in this desire with each other, with all who have gone before us, and with all who come after us – all who dance the Dance of Life. Beltaine is a time for dancing and weaving into our lives, our heart’s desires; traditionally the dance is done with participants holding ribbons attached to a pole or tree (a Maypole in the Northern Hemisphere, which may be renamed as a “Novapole” in the Southern Hemisphere), wrapping the pole with the ribbons. This is not simply the heterosexual metaphor as is thought in modern times (thanks largely to Freudian thinking) – it is deeper than that. As Caitlin and John Matthews point out: it is symbolic of a far greater exchange than that between men and women – in fact between the elements themselves. … the maypole, a comparatively recent manifestation in the history of mystery celebrations, can be seen as the linking of heaven and earth, binding those who dance around it … into a pattern of birth, life and death which lay at the heart of the maze of earth mysteries.[iv] Beltaine is a celebration of Desire on all levels – microcosm and on the macrocosm, the exoteric and the esoteric.[v] It brought you forth physically, and it brings forth all that you produce in your life, and it keeps the Cosmos spinning. It is felt in you as Desire, it urges you on. It is the deep awesome dynamic that pervades the Cosmos and brings forth all things – babies, meals, gardens, careers, books and solar systems. We have often been taught, certainly by religious traditions, to pay it as little attention as possible; whereas it should be the cause of much more meditation/attention, tracing it to its deepest place in us. What are our deepest desires beneath our surface desires. What if we enter more deeply into this feeling, this power? It may be a place where the Universe is a deep reciprocity – a receiving and giving that is One. Brian Swimme says, in a whole chapter on “Allurement”: You can examine your own self and your own life with this question: Do I desire to have this pleasure? Or rather, do I desire to become pleasure? The demand to ‘have,’ to possess, always reveals an element of immaturity. To keep, to hold, to control, to own; all of this is fundamentally a delusion, for our own truest desire is to be and to live. We have ripened and matured when we realize that our own deepest desire in erotic attractions is to become pleasure … to enter ecstatically into pleasure so that giving and receiving pleasure become one simple activity. Our most mature hope is to become pleasure’s source and pleasure’s home simultaneously. So it is with the allurements of life: we become beauty to ignite the beauty of others.[vi] Beltaine is a good time to contemplate this animal bodymind that you are: how it seeks real pleasure. What is your real pleasure? Be gracious with this bodymind and in awe of this form, this wonder. Beltaine is also a good time to contemplate light, and its affects on our bodyminds as it enters into us; how our animal bodyminds respond directly to the Sun’s light, which apparently may awaken physical desires. Light vibrates into us – different wavelengths as different colours – and shifts to pulse. It is felt most fully in Springtime (“spring fever”), as light courses down a direct neural line from retina to pineal gland. When the pineal gland receives the light pulse it releases “a cascade of hormones, drenching the body in hunger, thirst, or great desire.”[vii] We respond directly to Sun as an organism: it is primal. NOTES: [i] Michael Dames, Ireland, 195-199. [ii] Ibid., 196. [iii] I have been inspired and informed by Swimme’s articulations about desire, particularly in Canticle to the Cosmos, video 2 “The Primeval Fireball,” video 5 “Destruction and Loss,” and video 10 “The Timing of Creativity.” [iv] Matthews, The Western Way, 54. And for more, see “Creativity …
(Mago Almanac Excerpt 7) Introducing the Magoist Calendar by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Book A) at Mago Bookstore. YEARLY LEAP DAY AND EVERY FOURTH YEAR LEAP DAY Each Sa includes a Dan of the big Sa. A Dan is equal to one day. That adds to 365 days. At the half point of the third Sa, there is a Pan of the big Sak (the year of the great dark moon). A Pan comes at a half point of Sa. This is of Beopsu (Lawful Number) 2, 5, 8. A Pan is equal to a day. Therefore, the fourth Sa has 366 days. Each year has a leap day (Dan), which makes a total of 365 days. Every fourth year is a leap year that has a leap day (Pan), which makes a total of 366 days. The Dan day comes before the New Year in the winter solstice month. And the Pan day comes before the first day of the summer solstice month in the fourth year. The above, however, does not indicate when the New Year comes. Logographic characters of Dan and Pan each suggest their meanings. While each year includes the Dan day (the morning), every fourth year has the Pan day. A unit of four years makes the Big Calendar. Dan (旦 Morning) Leap day for every first three years Pan (昄 Big) Leap day for every fourth year I have postulated that the year begins on the Dan day (one leap day), a day before New Year that comes in the month of Winter Solstice in the Norther Hemisphere. And the Pan day comes on the day before the first day of the 7th month that has Summer Solstice in the fourth year in the Norther Hemisphere. Years Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Months Dan Dan Dan Dan 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 5 6 6 6 6 Pan 7 7 7 7 8 8 8 8 9 9 9 9 10 10 10 10 11 11 11 11 12 12 12 12 13 13 13 13 Days 365 365 365 366 The Magoist Calendar’s intercalation involves one leap day every year and one leap day every four years. That is, each year has one extra day to make it 365 days. Every fourth year has an extra day to make it 366 days. Four years has a total of 1461 days (365×3+366), which makes the mean of 365.25 days. Considering that the month is following the sidereal period rather than the synodic period, it is inferred that the year also follows the sidereal year rather than the solar year. In fact, Magoist Calendar’s one year is very close to today’s 365.25636 days of the sidereal year compared to 365.24217 days of the solar year or the tropical year. Given that, as seen below, the Budoji mentions the tiniest discrepancy of one leap day for 31,788,900 years, the discrepancy between 365.25 and 365.25636 (0.00636 day) can be explained that the year was actually 365.25 days at the time of Budo circa 2333 BCE, 4440 years ago. In other words, there is a discrepancy of 0.12375936 seconds between 2017 CE and 2333 BCE. Regarding Lawful Numbers 2, 5, 8, it is involved as follows: 365 days (3+6+5=14, 1+4=5) Lawful Numbers 2, 5, 8 refers the unit of 365 days (364 days with one intercalary day). Further dynamics are unknown. The sidereal year refers to the time taken by the Earth to orbit the sun once with respect to the distant stars. In contrast, the solar or tropical year means the time taken by the Earth to orbit the sun once with respect to the sun. The sidereal year, 365.25636 days, is about 20 minutes and 24 seconds longer than the mean tropical year (365.24217 days) and about 19 minutes and 57 seconds longer than the average Gregorian year of 365.2425 days. The difference occurs primarily because the solar system spins on its own axis and around the Milky Way galactic center making the solar year’s observed position relative. Time is no independent concept apart from space and the agent. The very concept of time is preceded by the agent bound in a space. It is always contextualized. In Magoism, both calendar and time are born out of the cosmogonic universe, the universe that is in self-creation. Like calendar, time is to be discovered or measured. It is a numinous concept. The very concept of time testifies to the reality of the Creatrix. Time proves the orderly movement of the universe into which we are born. Calendar patterns time, whereas time undergirds calendar. How can we measure time? We are given the time of the Earth that comes from its rotation, revolution, and precession in sync with the moon and the sun (and its planets). One type of time is the solar time. The solar time is a calculation of time based on the position of the sun. Traditionally, the solar time is measured by the sundial. The solar time is, however, specific to the Earth only. It is valid only for the-same-observed-location. It is not made to be used for the time of another celestial body. For example, Mars’ solar time has to be measured independently based on its own rotation and revolution rates. The solar time is an isolated time. It is static and exclusive, not made for the time of other celestial bodies. By nature, it is unfit for connection and communication across celestial bodies. The second type is the sidereal time. The sidereal time is a time scale based on the rate of Earth’s rotations measured relative to the distant stars.[29] Because the observed position is in the far distant stars beyond the solar system, the sidereal time may as well be called an extrasolar stellar time. We can think of the observer’s position of an imaginary cosmic bird far out there, infinitely far beyond not only the solar system and …
(Essay) Contemplating How Her Creativity Proceeds by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from the conclusion of chapter 5 of the author’s book, PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. It is a chapter on the process of the Wheel of the Year. for the Northern Hemisphere version: https://pagaian.org/pagaian-wheel-of-the-year/ It seems to me that the main agenda of the Cosmos is ongoing Creativity, “never-ending renewal” it may be termed, and that this is expressed in Earth’s Seasonal Wheel through the transitions of Autumn,Winter, Spring, Summer; and in the ubiquitous process of a Cosmic Triplicity of Space to Be, Urge to Be and this Place of Being, a dynamic that has often been imagined as the Triple Goddess. In the flow of the PaGaian Wheel of the Year, the Seasonal transitions of the Wheel and the Triplicity of the Cosmos come together. There are two celebrations of the Old One/Crone or the Cosmogenetic quality of autopoiesis creating the Space to Be; and they are Lammas/Late Summer and Samhain/Deep Autumn, which are the meridian points of the two quarters of the waxing dark phase. At Lammas, the first in the dark phase, we may identify with the dark and ancient Wise One – dissolve into Her; at Samhain, we may consciously participate in Her process of the transformation of death/the passing of all. The whole dark part of the cycle is about dissolving/dying/letting go of being – becoming – nurturing it (the midwifing of Lammas/Late Summer), stepping into the power of it (the certain departure of Autumn Equinox/Mabon), the fertility (of Samhain/Deep Autumn), the peaking of it (at Winter Solstice). The meridian points of the two quarters of the waxing light phase then are celebrations of the Young One/Virgin or the Cosmogenetic quality of differentiation, the new continually emerging, the Urge to Be; and they are Imbolc/Early Spring and Beltaine/High Spring. At Imbolc, the first in the light phase, we may identify with She who is shining and new – as we take her form; at Beltaine, we may consciously participate in Her process of the dance of life. The whole light part of the cycle is about coming into being: nurturing it (the midwifing of Imbolc/Early Spring), stepping into the power of it (the certain return of Spring Equinox/Eostar), the fertility (of Beltaine/High Spring), the peaking of it (at Summer Solstice). In the PaGaian wheel of ceremony there are two particular celebrations of the Mother, the Cosmogenetic quality of communion; and they are the Solstices. If one imagines the light part of the cycle as a celebration of the ‘Productions of Time’, and the dark part of the cycle as a celebration of ‘Eternity’, the Solstices then are meeting points, points of interchange, and are celebrations of the communion/relational field of Eternity with the Productions of Time. This is a relationship which does happen in this Place, in this Web. This Place of Being, this Web, is a Communion – it is the Mother; the Solstices mark Her birthings, Her gateways. The Equinoxes then – both Spring and Autumn – are two celebrations wherein the balance of all three Faces/Creative qualities is particularly present: in the PaGaian wheel, the Equinoxes have been special celebrations of Demeter and Persephone – echoing the ancient tradition of Mother-Daughter Mysteries that celebrate the awesomeness of the continuity of life, its creative tension/balance. Both Equinoxes then are celebrations and contemplations of empowerment through deep Wisdom – one contemplation during the dark phase and one during the light phase. The Autumn Equinox is a descent to Wisdom, the Spring Equinox is an emergence with Wisdom gained. I like to think of the Equinoxes, and of the ancient icons of Demeter and Persephone, as celebrations of the delicate ‘curvature of space-time’, the fertile balance of tensions which enables it all. Her Creative Place The Mother aspect then may be understood to be particularly present at four of the Seasonal Moments, which are also regarded traditionally as the Solar festivals; and in this cosmology Sun is felt as Mother. I recognize these four as points of interchange: at Autumn Equinox, Mother is present primarily as Giver – She is letting Persephone go, at Spring Equinox, She is present primarily as Receiver – welcoming the Daughter back, at Winter Solstice the Mother gives birth, creates form, at Summer Solstice, She opens again full of radiance, and disperses form. The Mother is Agent/Actor at the Solstices. She is Participant/Witness at the Equinoxes, where it is then really Persephone who is Agent/Actor, embodying an inseparable Young One and Old One. The Old One is often named as Hecate, who completes the Trio – all seamlessly within each other. Another possible way to visual it, or to tell the story, is this: The Mother – Demeter – is always there, at the Centre if you like. Persephone cycles around. She is the Daughter who returns in the Spring as flower, who will become fruit/grain of the Summer, who at Lammas assents to the dissolution – the consumption. At Autumn Equinox She returns to the underworld as seed – Her harvest is rejoiced in, Her loss is grieved, as She becomes Sovereign of the Underworld – Her face changes to the Dark One, Crone (Hecate). As the wheel turns into the light part of the cycle She becomes Young One/Virgin again. Persephone (as Seed) is that part of Demeter that can be all three aspects – can move through the complete cycle. The Mother and Daughter are really One, and embody the immortal process of creation and destruction. Demeter hands Persephone the wheat, the Mystery, and the thread of life is unbroken – it goes on forever. It is immortal, it is eternal. Even though it is true that all will be lost, and all is lost – Being always arises again: within this field of time there is never-ending renewal, eternity. This is what is revealed in the ubiquitous three faces of the Creative Dynamic/ She of Old, the Triplicity that runs through the Cosmos. The Seed of Life never …

(Book Excerpt 5) The Mago Way by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note] The following is from Chapter One, “What Is Mago and Magoism and How Did I Study HER?” from The Mago Way: Re-discovering Mago, the Great Goddess from East Asia, Volume 1. Footnotes below would be different from the monograph version. PDF book of The Mago Way Volume 1 download is available for free here.] How My Education and Experience Helped Me Study Mago The topic of Mago came to me in time for writing my doctoral dissertation for the Women’s Studies in Religion program that I was enrolled in at Claremont Graduate University. My graduate education, which I crafted to be a feminist cross-cultural alchemical process of de-educating myself from the patriarchal mode of knowledge-making, led me to encounter the hitherto unheard-of Goddess of East Asia, Mago. I came to read the Budoji, the principal text of Magoism, in 2000 and did some basic research to find out that Mago was known among people in Korea and that S/HE was also found in Chinese and Japanese sources.
(Mago Almanac Basics 1) What is the Magoist Calendar? by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: I have created 13 basics of Mago Almanac, which are included in Mago Almanac Planner for Personal Journey: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Volume 6), Year 6 or 5920 MAGOMA ERA (Equivalent to 2023 CE). These 13 basics constitute the backbone of Magoist Cetaceanism as well.] It is a 13 month 28 day luni-menstrual-solar calendar of Old Magoist Korea. Insofar as one year marks about 365.25 days, a time taken for the earth to revolve around the sun, it is a solar calendar. The fact that both the moon and the female menstruation cycle mark 28 days, which makes 13 months or 364 days for one year. This makes approximately 1.25 a surplus. Thus, we have days outside the calendar grid. Each year has one extra day on the day before the New Year’s day. The New Year of Year 1 or 5915 Magoma Era was set on the new moon date before Winter Solstice in 2018 by the Gregorian Calendar. With one extra day, the year makes 365 days. Given that the actual period of the Earth’s revolution is approximately 365.25 days, we have the second extra day every fourth year. Setting aside the extra days, we have 364 days for one year. 364 days divided by 28 days is 13. That is how we have 13 months in a year. The Magoist Calendar championing the matricentric worldview is the very indication that our Mother Earth is stabilized in her own voyages. https://www.magobooks.com/update-on-mago-books/mago-almanac-13-month-28-day-calendar-book-a/ https://www.magoism.net/2013/07/meet-mago-contributor-helen-hwang/
(Book Excerpt 2) Mago Almanac Planner by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Details for Mago Almanac Planner are available here. [Author’s Note: This is Part 2 of the Preface. Read Part 1 of the Preface here.] PREFACE What Mago Almanac Planner Offers There is nothing more plainly indicative of the fallacy of patriarchal thinking, that is, the perspective of male-supremacy than the 12 month calendar. Considering that the calendar is the basic foundation for human activities, the standard 12 month calendar that the modern world is adapting functions to maintain patriarchy. According to the Budoji (Epic of the Emblem Capital City), the principal text of Magoism, the 12 month calendar was first invented and introduced by Yao (ca. 2356-2255 BCE), the pre-dynastic ruler of ancient China to replace the 13 month Magoist Calendar. The newly risen patriarchal rule needed to amend the female-centered 13 month calendar, which would make the Mother-Nature bond invisible. First of all, the 12 month calendar has an irregular number of days (28, 29, 30, or 31). The inconsistent number of days is an indication that the 12 month calendar is out of tune with Nature’s rhythm, ultimately Sonic Numerology. Reality is distorted. Fundamentally based on the imposed or presumed balance within the scheme of dyads (the male and the female), the 12 month calendar propagates a hierarchical dualism. In the dyad, the two are viewed as independent single entities disconnected from each other so that it allows one to be superior to the other (A>B). The worldview it represents is reductionist; the evolutionary process of life is predetermined. On the other hand, the 13 month calendar has 28 days in a month. It is regular and rhythmic, a sign of a healthy living entity. In tune with Nature’s rhythm, the 13 month calendar guides us into an infinitely creative and open-ended worldview based on Sonic Numerology (musical interplay of nine numbers), the cosmogonic force of WE/HERE/NOW. Numerologically aligned, the 13 month 28 day calendar leads us to an ever-unfolding reality. The triadic principle, an epitome of Nine Numerology, stands for the web of spiral interconnection. One divided by three leads to the realm that never ends as it goes 0.3333… for example. That said, what is the better way to restore the lunar-female song and dance than women themselves by charting out the menstrual cycle in the 13 moon calendar? Mago Almanac Planner provides tools for menstruators to mark menstrual dates side by side with lunation dates. We want our modern-day maidens and mothers to see how their own menstrual cycles run in harmony with all other beings in the Natural World! Menstruation is a calendric indicator designed to guide human societies. Biology is not only social but also cosmic. Menstruation is never a separate biological phenomenon. For non-menstruators, Mago Almanac Planner opens the door to each day, week, and month of the cosmic song and dance. We are about to move the axis of our consciousness in tune with all else in the universe!Book information on Magoist Calendar Year 4 and Magoist Calendar Planner Year 4 here. (To be continued) https://www.magoism.net/2013/07/meet-mago-contributor-helen-hwang/ [1] This is a topic that will be treated in detail in my forthcoming book, The Magoist Calendar: Mago Time Inscribed in Sonic Numerology.