November 6, 2023June 3, 2023 RTMeditorsKG

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 1^st November

Northern Hemisphere – April 30^th (May Eve) or 1^st 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 of Beltaine Moment”: http://pagaian.org/2014/10/30/1279/.

^[v] Desire is a big topic: see Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology, 251-253 for more.

^[vi] Brian Swimme, The Universe is a Green Dragon, 79.

^[vii] Laura Sewall, “Earth Eros, Sky,” EarthLight (Winter 2000), 22.

REFERENCES:

Dames, Michael. Ireland: a Sacred Journey. Element Books, 2000.

Matthews, Caitlin. The Celtic Spirit. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 2000.

Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Nebraska: iUniverse, 2005.

Sewall, Laura. “Earth, Eros, Sky.” Earthlight, Winter 2000: 22-23 and 25.

Swimme, Brian. Canticle to the Cosmos. DVD series. CA: Tides Foundation, 1990.

____________. The Universe is a Green Dragon. Santa Fe: Bear & Co., 1984.

1 thought on “Beltaine/High Spring within the Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.”

Carolyn Boyd says:

November 10, 2023 at 7:24 AM

I so appreciate these seasonal writings that remind us that we are all part of one globe. I am reminded that though I may reside in the northern hemisphere, these Beltaine energies are now swirling in the southern hemisphere and need to be brought into my Samhain and winter celebrations for a more complete connection to the Earth.

Loading...

Reply

Leave a Reply to the main postCancel reply

The Awakened Woman by Arlene Bailey

Art, The Sorceress, She Who Is Art The awakened woman is an alchemical cauldron of potentiality Wild and authentic , She is empowered and embodied magic and mystery Created from the wisdom of the ages, She is a force blazing like the phoenix rising out of the ashes, a Sorceress on a quest of revisioning ancient codes and narratives for this time Find Her! Know Her! Welcome Her! Be Her! For… She is the wild card holding the key to the ineffable https://www.magoism.net/2020/04/meet-mago-contributor-arlene-bailey/
(Poem) The Dead by Susan Hawthorne

Opera di circa 220mq realizzata a San Gavino Monreale col contributo dell’Associazione Culturale Skizzo, Wikimedia Commons i The dead press their faces up against mine. They speak to me endlessly of the past. Souls clamour as I near the caterwauling realm of the dead. I seek my mother, but cannot find her in this murky-aired vault. They speak to me. They tell me stories of their lives. But all I want is to speak with her. They say, First you must listen to us, you must hear our grief. Then you are free to speak with her. The bench is hard. I will not eat of the food of the dead. This much I have already learned. The table is filled with fruit: apples, pomegranate, plums, grapes, wild roses. Red onions, carrots, plaited bread and a glass of red wine are left to tempt me. The storytellers take their places around the table and begin. ii My name is Charlotte. She brushes back her corn blond hair. My mother, her sister, my great-grandmother, my great-great uncle, my great uncle and much later my mother’s mother, my grandmother all perished by their own hand. Despair was inherited with the blood of my family. I was the last. They came and took me away, took me to the camps, where their final kindness was to end the family curse. There they gassed me, along with thousands of others. But they could not kill my spirit, my life which lives on in the thousands of paintings I made. The theatre of my life. iii My name is Anonymous. I speak for all the other women whose names are unknown, but whose stories reverberate around these rooms like thunderous storms. I am not long dead, my memories still torment me. I stand in a crowd of tearful women, waiting and wailing. Willing that the lives of our fathers, brothers, husbands be spared, or if they are dead, that they did not die cruelly. The veil of a woman screams with her expired breath, seeing the names of those she loves on the list. Those of us who wait, who return to wait again and again shiver, wanting and not wanting to know. I return to my daughters in the camp and resolve to flee into the Afghani mountains when the list bearing my beloved’s name is nailed to the gate. My daughters and I will run between the flying bullets. iv I found freedom in the underworld, where circus jesters, acrobats and long-limbed stilt walkers play Russian roulette with their souls. I hardly recognise her. Is that you? Is that really you? I ask, repeating the question. Fire breathing women walk by, each question punctuated by a flaring of the mouth. Her soul retreats again and I reach out to grab her hand. Death is wheeled by on a cart such as Athena once invented. The underworld is not technologically literate, but a primitive world full of primitive passions. Death casts her eye over me and passes on. Not yet. Not for me, at least. There she is again. Mum, I call. She turns, her eyes owl-grey, where once they shone blue. A beach ball flies between us, light as a ghost. I hold her hand, cold, and press it to my hairline. Her gaze passes over my left shoulder and I wonder who she sees. I want to talk, but no speech can creep between my lips. When her mouth opens, I see neon words fly like birds but no sound … I strain to hear but there are only the faint strains of an accordion, like a circus passing by on a distant road. She makes the leap as Death cruises past again and takes her place on the horse-drawn cart. No backward glance, no regret, simply passing on. As I turn to leave the world of the dead, my eyes catch another face I know. No warning and the dead throttle past me in their rush for eternity. v And another and another. Is there no end to the greed of Death? Crossing the road in her prime, Death steers straight for her. Didn’t she notice? Did neither notice? Death did. Death stood by the bed for days. Pushed and pulled by life’s will. But Death is a bad loser, knowing that her endurance outlasts all. I spin the wheel waiting for the next game. A pomegranate rudely torn open tempts me, a glass of red wine is proffered. Souls bristle into the seats nearby, the storytellers take their place around the table and begin … May 1994-October 1996 Notes When my mother died in May 1994, I grieved for a long time. This poem references Persephone and Demeter. Persephone in her role as Queen of the Dead, who is tricked by Hades to staying in the underworld for six months of each year. The poem also tells the story of Charlotte Salomon who was captured by the Nazi’s and sent to Auschwitz. I stumbled upon a book of paintings by her called Leben? Oder Theater? (Life? Or Theater?) while staying with two German friends living in Berkeley. I was very moved, not only by her tragic story, but also by her extraordinary paintings. This life and all the other lives of women who are unnamed are important to remember, especially around the time of Halloween and All Souls Day. This poem is from my book The Butterfly Effect (2005). https://www.magoism.net/2013/12/meet-mago-contributor-susan-hawthone/
(Book Exerpt 1) She Rises Volume 3 by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 3 (Mago Books, 2019)INTRODUCTION DEANNE QUARRIE, D. MIN. I look back and can’t imagine why I said yes, to Helen Hye-Sook Hwang when she asked me to be the lead editor for, She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 3. Having edited and published an eight-time yearly, online magazine, The Global Goddess Oracle, I knew it was a big job and I was up for it. It was a lot. I never dreamed there would be so many amazing people, so many submissions, all bringing such talent, such heart and such love to this work. It was like being allowed into the hearts and yes, private lives of those women and men who love Goddess. It became primarily a job of organization, to keep track of so much. I asked Christine Hirsch to join me in co-editing this wonderful material, splitting the submissions, and we went to work. It took a long time, longer because of my health, interrupted with hospital stays followed by cataract surgery and so we had delays. Thank you, Helen, for being so kind and patient, waiting for me. Reading each piece, seeing the beautiful art and incredible poetry, often brought tears from the emotions I felt while reading into the lives of the contributors, the stories, so amazing and yet, so familiar as well. I feel such gratitude, knowing we all share such love in our similar journeys. We all have so many ways of expressing the deep commitments of living lives of joy, dedication and commitment, walking with Her. As you hold this book in your hands, may you be touched deeply as you read into all the lives of those who shared here for you. CHRISTINE COURTADE HIRSCH, PH. D. I have lived a brightly blessed life, but one of my greatest blessings was being asked to serve as a guest editor for She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 3. Words cannot express the sheer pleasure and soul-deep joy of reading the submissions: the variety, the depth, the inspiration, the learning, the art, the majesty, the magic. I think perhaps equally important was being invited into the company of sisters – sisters in strength, in beliefs and values, in hope, in power, and in the so deeply undervalued recognition and sharing of what we have in common as women in the goddess sisterhood! Bright blessings to all as you read, learn, share, reach inward and outward, and grow in the magic, love and joy found within this volume! And thank you forever and beyond for allowing me to participate! HELEN HYE-SOOK HWANG, PH.D. She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? is the third volume in the She Rises trilogy after She Rises: Why Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 1 (2015) and She Rises: Why Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 2 (2016). The present volume continues on the path prepared by the two earlier volumes and takes the Goddess feminist activist movement to a new horizon. Creativity and connectivity are the hallmarks of this volume. Our 59 contributors have tailored the question, What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? to convey their insights and to address the importance and urgency of Goddess feminist activism amidst the current crises on the global context that affects all beings within the very eco-system. We in this volume collectively embrace a capacity of connectivity with other sisters and brothers across borders. Our message is that Goddess feminist activists are healing, nurturing and transforming ourselves and the world. We are born stronger. We are ever more grounded, committed, daring, creative, and fiercely focused. We are the trees that are crisscrossed at the root! This book presents a loom that interweaves colorful tapestries of insights, experiences, visions, research articles, poems, artworks, rituals, plays and creative activities across disciplinary boundaries. Our readers may sense a phenomenon through this book. Like other She Rises books, She Rises Volume 3 follows the convention of using Mothers as Parts and Sisters as Chapters. We have three Mothers (Mother One, Mother Two, and Mother Three) and nine Sisters (1 Sister East, 2 Sister North, 3 Sister West, 4 Sister South, 5 Sister Center, 6 Sister Wind, 7 Sister Fire, 8 Sister Water, and 9 Sister Earth) organized under each triad Mother. This is to visualize the cosmogonic principle of Sonic Nine Numerology embodied in the pantheon of our divine mothers and human ancestors (Goddesses) across cultures. As co-editor and publisher of the She Rises trilogy, I am ever honored and humbled for the history of the collective writing project itself. Indeed, it is a tremendous amount of time, effort, reading, thinking and editing as well as laying out the manuscript for publication that I have put into these projects. It is nothing other than a sharing of myself. Am I depleted? Do I feel exhausted inside? The opposite is the case. I am ever freshly renewed and charged to dream the dreams and work hard to make our dreams happen. At the core, the vision and necessity that I see among ourselves lead me to keep moving forward. In particular, I rejoice to see the very fruition of the She Rises trilogy in this volume. Our readers will discover bedazzling jewels in the forest, as I have found. As we complete the She Rises trilogy with this volume 3, I have a little flashback. About five years ago in the fall of 2014, I hurriedly announced in social media that we wanted to begin a book project of our collective writing on the topic of Goddess feminism, activism and spirituality. Out of the blue, I did that. Neither had I planned or thought about it. In fact, I never heard of the phrase, “Goddess feminism, activism and spirituality” before. Wennfier Lin-Havor had addressed a need to bring the Goddess to our attention during our phone conversation. Bringing the Goddess into our discourse wasn’t enough for me. Even the thought …
(Poem) Lost texts: Linear A by Susan Hawthorne

“The project is about how history is told, how many stories are left out and how many texts are simply lost: sometimes by time and neglect, at other times because they were intentionally destroyed. One section of the poetic series is about ‘lost texts’. It includes translations and inventions.” Introduction I visited Crete in the winter of 1976 at the end of my undergraduate university studies. I had very little knowledge of ancient Greek history (perhaps an advantage in retrospect), but I had heard from other women living in the same squat in London as I was that Crete had at some time in the distant past been a matriarchy. I was overwhelmed by what I found, not only at Knossos and Phaestos and Haghia Triadha, but also in the tiny seal stones in the Museum in Heraklion. My mind spun as I moved from the oldest work, full of vitality, energy and some kind of woman-spirit, to the newer layers which struck me as tight, restricted, geometric and masculine. This was what I thought. It was an eye-opener, like coming to feminism the first time and the scales falling from one’s eyes. I returned to Australia and began to read about the ancient world. By 1979, I was enrolling in a PhD on ‘The structure of belief systems in the ancient world’. I studied Greek as a way of getting access to the original sources. My favourite subject was Historical Syntax. In this class we looked at the development of the Greek language, its Indo-European roots and how Greek words were transformed into other related words in Lithuanian, German, French, Italian and so forth. We also looked at Linear B and its connection to Ancient Greek. Linear B was deciphered in 1952. All the credit has gone to Michael Ventris, but in June 2013 the news emerged that American classicist Alice Kober did the painstaking work behind the decipherment, without which Ventris would not have had the information for the decoding. Unfortunately Alice Kober died in 1950. I didn’t ever finish that PhD, but my novel, The Falling Woman (1992), incorporates some of the ideas I was thinking about.
(E-Interview) Kaarina Kailo by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

I am honored and grateful to initiate our conversations through this E-Interview. What impressed me, among others, is her unflagging critique of academia. While keeping an academic position, even attempting to write as a feminist activist and philosopher is no small feat. It is a call, I must say. We feminist/matricentric/matriversal women need more philosophers. She is one whom I have discovered recently. I came into direct contact with Dr. Kaarina Kailo through the S/HE journal. Having contributed her essay, “Rebirthing Finnish Ancestral Mothers and Goddesses through Art and Research,” and her quilt work in the cover to S/HE Vol 1 No 2 in 2022, Dr. Kailo continues to interweave with The Mago Work. Recently she has given a back cover blurb in a new anthology, Celebrating Intercosmic Kinship of the Goddess (Mago Books, 2023). Also her research interest in the bear Goddess and sweat lodge overlaps with my research on Goma (Shaman Queen of Old Magoist Korea). With my respect and appreciation, I ask her the following questions. Courtesy of Kaarina Kailo Hwang Tell us about your career as a scholar and an educator concerning feminist/matricentric philosophy? What was your teaching experience for universities like? Kailo After my first degree at the University of Helsinki, Finland, I continued my master’s studies at the University of Geneva, Switzerland (French, English, political science, Russian). I became a landed immigrant in Canada and taught at the universities of Toronto, Quebec University and Concordia, Simone de Beauvoir Institute. After completing a Ph.D. in comparative literature in Toronto, I worked in Northern Canada and finally in Montreal in women’s studies. My teaching covered a wide range of feminist topics from health, literature, Native studies, history, folklore, spirituality, ecofeminism to healing from gendered violence. Gradually I began to focus on matristic civilizations after first delving into the mysteries of the bear religion, mythology and sauna/sweatlodge research. Finding Gimbutas’ theories of Old Europe made me even more intent on combining the teaching and study of bear and goddess mythology. Even though I had tenure, I accepted a position as the first women’s studies/multiculturalism professor at Oulu University, Finland in 1999 and moved back to Finland for personal reasons. The neoliberal politics affected women’s studies so my position was frozen and I ended up unemployed after a few more years as senior scholar of the Finnish Academy. This was a disappointment as I enjoyed teaching about goddess cultures and ecofeminism as well as woman-positive healing methods. Using the so-called midwife method and adopting the best Indigenous teaching philosophies, I sought to empower students to explore their own voice, wisdom traditions, foremothers and soul. I also encouraged students to get in touch with their dreams and the journals in the 101- level courses included visionwork and self-reflection, not just abstract theorizing and data collection. I learnt a lot from the Native North American students who taught about their very different methods and learning philosophies. I also mentored a Sami student from Finland and she ended up as a Native studies professor at the University of Toronto. Family and cultural roots seem to matter more to us women than to many men. Now I focus on publishing the research I carried out for 30 years. As a retired widow, I have time as never before… Hwang Your research is multidisciplinary. How is your multidisciplinary approach reflected in your books and articles? Kailo Gender studies in general tend to be inter- and multidisciplinary as wo/men’s experiences and philosophies do not automatically fit patriarchal ways of doing scientific work including its methodological biases, blind spots and assumptions/projections. I have applied Indigenous, ecofeminist, modern matriarchal and archeomythological approaches and methods to be able to foreground new perspectives and data beyond the limitations of patriarchal research that is often misogynous and quantitative rather than qualitative in spirit. Do we study women’s spiritual wisdom traditions, like menstrual or sauna rituals as part of archeology or religious studies, or something else? Religious studies still keep us out and voiceless, the bear ceremonial studies likewise exclude women. The traditional categories do violence to the topics, which have been shunned by patriarchal disciplines and their strict boundaries. Multidisciplinary approaches alone allow us to show how many topics overflow strict boundaries. I have had to jaywalk across disciplines to find “women’s ways of knowing” and living. I am very keen to delve more deeply into the myths of the Golden Woman, a great mother figure of Northern Europe of which little is written. I have published hundreds of articles on the gift economy/imaginary, ecomythology, Bear and Great Mother Worship/mythology, the woman who married the bear, sauna and sweatlodge healing, Finno-Ugric ecomythology, modern matriarchal studies, healing from gendered violence, Jungian philosophy, on the gender impact of neoliberal austerity politics, ecofeminism, goddess mythology, Finno-Ugric mythology, gender and Kalevala, Indigenous worldview/theory, Northern women’s culture and literature, societies of peace (matricultures), Jungian and Freudian theories of creativity, anti-racist theory and practices, gender and future studies.Hwang What is the main focus of your research? How did you make yourself an authority on your research topic? Kailo It is a bit hard to focus on only one topic for so many themes are interconnected. For example, I studied the gender impact of neoliberal politics and the promise of the gift economy, showing how wo/men are the primary victims of patriarchal politics of multidimensional violence. My red thread has perhaps been healing wo/men from emotional, psychological, political, religious, spiritual and physical violence which explains why studying the sauna-sweatlodge connection was a logical consequence from my research on economic and cultural issues. Finally, having suffered enough violence myself, I found it empowering and scientifically important to study the bear religion/mythology where women were in an authoritative and uplifting role together with great mothers. The philosophy is also part of the maternal culture that is being ignored. Healing comes from being able to recover one’s “own” nonpatriarchal wisdom traditions and ecophilosophies in the name of collective and individual healing from patriarchy’s multiple dysfunctions and inequalities. Having …
(Essay 2) The Old Sow by Hearth Moon Rising

Meet Mago Contributor Hearth Moon Rising. The pig was domesticated shortly after the sheep and cow, about 12,000 years ago. This ushered in the era of pig goddesses, who were probably originally boar goddesses like Freya. Boar lore became transferred to the domestic cousin, but grew in complexity due to the relationship between pigs and cereals. Unlike ruminant animals raised for consumption, the domestic pig requires grain in order to thrive since she does not digest grass. Thus the sow goddess had a vested interest in grain production and she was propitiated for an abundant harvest. The appearance of animal husbandry at roughly the same time as agriculture was not an accident. Pigs were used to clear fields after harvest, aerating the fields as they rummaged. They helped reduce garbage and provided manure for fertilizing cropland. In some forested areas pigs were allowed to forage as a way of reducing groundcover and managing woodlands. The goddess Demeter is the best known of the sow-grain goddesses. She is often depicted carrying a torch, used for traversing the dark underworld, symbolizing her association with death as well as motherhood and sustenance. The main ceremonies once associated with Demeter were Thesmophoria, a women-only retreat where piglets were sacrificed, and the Eleusinian mysteries, the reenactment of Demeter’s loss and reunion with her daughter Persephone. In myth the Semitic vegetal gods Adonis and Tammuz are gored by a boar, again emphasizing the death aspect of the boar. The sky goddess Nut is sometimes represented as a sow, which was probably her earlier form. The ithyphallic vegetal god Min, whose cult was overtaken by Osiris, is the son of a white sow. In some legends the Egyptian god Osiris is gored by Seth in the form of a boar. The Sow Goddess was important in pre-dynastic Egypt, but her worship steadily declined as the pig established a reputation as an “unclean” animal. This also occurred in Babylonia, and it was rooted in the pig’s need to regulate body temperature, which must have been especially great in these hot dry climates. A pig greatly prefers to cool off in clean mud, but will wallow in sewage if there are no other options. In the highly populated areas in Mesopotamia and along the Nile cleanliness was a persistent concern, while opportunities for ideal pig wallows were probably becoming scarcer. Neither culture forbid pork consumption, but the meat did grow out of favor for those who could afford cattle. Egyptians continued to carry pig charms and use pig ingredients in spells and healing remedies. Sow pictures or figures are occasionally found in tombs from all eras. To be continued. Read part 1. Hearth Moon Rising is a Dianic Priestess living in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York and the author of Invoking Animal Magic: A guide for the Pagan priestess. www.invokinganimalmagic.com. She blogs at www.hearthmoonblog.com. Sources: Barrett, Clive. The Egyptian Gods and Goddesses: The Mythology and Beliefs of Ancient Egypt. London: Diamond Books, 1991. Bottero, Jean. The Oldest Cuisine in the World: Cooking in Mesopotamia. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Cooper, D. Jason. Using the Runes. Wellingborough, UK: The Aquarian Press, 1986. Germond, Phillippe. An Egyptian Bestiary: Animals in Life and Religion in the Life of the Pharoahs. London: Thames and Hudson, 2001. Gimbutas, Marija. The Living Goddesses. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1999. Gimbutas, Marija. The Language of the Goddess. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1989. Graves, Robert. The Greek Myths. London: Penguin, 1960. Graves, Robert. The White Goddess. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1948. Green, Miranda. Animals in Celtic Life and Myth. London: Routledge, 1992. Johnson, Buffie. Lady of the Beasts: The Goddess and Her Sacred Animals. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions, 1994. O’Sullivan, Patrick V. Irish Superstitions and Legends of Animals and Birds. Dublin: Mercier Press, 1991. “Pigs,” Ancient Egyptian Bestiary, http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/bestiary/pig.htm “Pigs in Egypt,” Tour Egypt, http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/pigs.htm “Welcome to Eleusinian Mysteries,” Eleusinian Mysteries, http://eleusinianmysteries.org/SubjectIndexP_Z.html
(Poem) The House of the Sidhe by Angelika Heike Rüdiger

The House of the Sidhe for G.N. Others bring peerless stones of shining white And precious shells To the green-covered homestead of the Sidhe, but I bring nothing more than my own tresses, a sweet song and a kiss while gold is showered onto greenness and hidden chambers fill with sound a resonance beyond all reason embracing the unknown while the white moon walks on in silver slippers over the purple mountains of the sky, while the deep blue is whispering of love.
(Tribute 3) My Loving Father (7/31/1935-10/10/2020) by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Bomun Sanseong (Mountain stronghold), photo by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang Death does not take away the dead from the living. The death of a beloved causes a pain of separation for the living, triggering the ontological wound from being born into this (patriarchally inflicted) world. Our mourning for the death of our beloveds is real because we are part of the dead. Love transforms everything. Mourning is a gift of grace from the deceased. The dead embraces the living in the way that the living can’t do. My deceased father works miracles for his beloveds. He is finally free to show his love in a tangible manner. He is solid in his love for all. And he has made himself a guardian for his beloveds. I see and revere the legacy of a Korean Magoist male identity in him. I can tell my story. I flew to S. Korea to visit my mother second time this year because I wanted to support her when she was deeply grieving for my father. My belated visit earlier this year, due to the Covid pandemic, to my father’s grave made me realize that I needed to show my love for my mother before it was too late to do so. My grieving for my deceased father yielded to the sensitivity that I felt that my mother needed love and care. She was affected the most by his death. And the sensitivity that I had was his care for her to be implemented by me, I see now. Love flows in reciprocity. My mother and I had a lovely time together, while we both are grieving for him. It was a cosmic womb time for both of us (my mother and me), made possible by the love of my deceased father whom we love dearly. It was very special that I spent time with my mother alone for 3 weeks in her apartment, in fact for the first time in our adult lives. We both were deeply touched from our time together. As the purpose of my trip was to spend time with her, I did not make any other appointments but decided on focusing on our time together. Under the jet lag, I struggled a bit to be attentive for the first two weeks. Then, the third last week was amazing. Magic happened. It was a time, which felt like I was in her womb. Or we both were in the Womb of the Creatrix, Mago! It was a womb time for both of us. She wanted to take care of me (she used to say that she could not feed me well or dress well as much as she wished to when I was small) so I accepted that. If something made her happy and if she wanted to do something, I did not interrupt her. I was well fed (to the degree that I kept apologizing for her services in the beginning). We cooked together and talked and talked. We watched TV together and I listened to her stories of making new friends with neighboring women. She allowed me to go and carry on my writing task daily. She minimized her social activities to be with me (she usually does that). My brothers were genuinely good to my mother and me. They took us to their homes and entertained us. When the three of us, her children, were with her in my younger brother’s vacation house, my mother was so thrilled like a little girl. It was her time with her three children alone after my father transited two years ago. She did not stop laughing and smiling. In fact, throughout my three-week’s stay with her, her excitement was felt in her voice. It was clear that she felt loved and appreciated by her three children! And we went to my father’s grave. He received a 2 years anniversary ceremony from my family two months ago in October. Whenever my mother went to his grave, her grief became overwhelming. She wailed so much so that I could not release my own grief (see my tribute 2 to my father). Thus, I had not broached my wish to visit his grave to anyone until I had a chance to tell my youngest brother who happened to treat us in his home toward the end of my visit. I desperately needed one of my brothers to take us to the graveyard because no public transportation was available to this huge mountain cemetery park. It was a cold day when my youngest brother took us to his grave. My heart was getting clogged with tears. This time, to my surprise, my mother came to the grave but did not wish to stay longer because it was too cold, she said. Deep sorrow did not take up her heart this time! My conflict melted away. That allowed me to cry loudly as I wished. No one else was there. I told my brother to allow me to cry out alone. And he agreed. I had a good cry out alone. I wanted to stay longer but left the site to join my mother. It was important that I did not trigger her deep sorrow. My youngest brother gently hugged me and we walked to the car. I could not believe that my father was not there when I visited Korea. It is conventional that one mourns for the loss of a parent for three years for Koreans in old days. I comforted myself that I still have one more year to grieve for him, while appreciating his life to us and the world. One thing my mother and I refrained from talking about this time was my father/her spouse. I had been concerned in April when I visited her that she was grieving too much. So this time, I was cautious not to trigger her deep grief. Her health would be at stake, if she continued to be in such an intensive state of emotion. So my father was a pink elephant in the house that we pretended that we did not see, so to speak. That was …
(Meet Mago Contributor) Sudie Rakusin

Sudie Rakusin is an American visual artist, sculptor, author, illustrator and publisher. She was born and raised in Washington, DC, and currently resides in Hillsborough, NC. Sudie received her BFA in Painting from Boston University and her MFA in Painting from University of Arizona. Being an animal activist and feminist, Sudie’s artwork flows from what moves her: women, animals and the earth. Through her artwork she creates the world as she would like it to be – where harmony exists between animal and human. Sudie’s artwork is featured in the books of Mary Daly, Carolyn Gage and Patricia Monaghan. P.O. Box 92, Carrboro NC 27510, info@sudierakusin.com www.sudierakusin.com

(Special Post) Discussion on Mother-Daughter Wound by Mago Circle Members

[Mago Circle members discussed and answered the question, “What do you think of this (the topic article below)? If you are a feminist, it is something that you would promote? If so, why? If not, why not?” The discussion took place on May 15, 2017 and shortly thereafter in The Mago Circle.] Topic Article: “For The Daughters Who Don’t Love Their Mothers – Screw Mother’s Day” by Sade Andria Zabala Everyone talks about a mother’s unconditional love. But what if it doesn’t exist? Daughters are socially expected to be close with their mothers. But are you one of the women who aren’t? Mother’s Day isn’t just for celebrating moms. It’s a day some of us dread because we are reminded we grew up (or are still) unloved, not good enough. (Read the whole article here.)
(Special Post Isis 2) 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 2 The Color Talk in Goddesses Kahena Dorothea Athena was also whitened which is sad. However the statues were worshiped by many women to whom they brought comfort. And their origins were later remembered by the abundance of Black Virgins that became important in Italy and other parts of Europe. I don’t see Dark Goddesses as shadows but as having depths of Creativity and Knowledge. My main Goddess is Kirke and the bast relief I have of her is a chocolate brown. Diane Horton The worship of Isis broadened from Egypt to all the countries bordering the Mediterranean, as well as the Middle East and the isles called now the British Isles. She and Her worship were virtually everywhere in the westernly known world of the time! She IS the Goddess of 10,000 Names! And as such she was adapted to each culture’s vision of Her. She was the basis of all the” Black Madonnas”. I do not think of this as Isis/Auset representing the “dark” Goddess as something somehow bad or to be dealt with, but rather that ancient darkness represents infinite potential, eternal creativity/fertility, the beginning and ending of all things, and the always deepening knowledge of magick. Max Dashu However, there is a politics of representation that we all need to be aware of, that pushes original African iconography down and away, and fronts Europeanized images. There is no possibility of “colorblindness” in such a system; a restoration of the original must be actively striven toward. This is incumbent on all of us not of (recent) African descent. Otherwise we perpetuate the injurious status quo, instead of overturning it. Harita Meenee I agree with those who say that race is largely a social construct. Its roots seem to lie in colonialism and the slave trade. I would also like to add that racism is used to oppress people of different nationalities and colors. Ηere in Greece the IMF neo-liberal policies are destroying our economy (and lives); they go hand in hand with a vicious racist campaign against immigrants, along with the rise of a neo-Nazi party. This is part of an effort to redirect people’s anger away from the government and bankers, towards those who are poor and foreign and often have a different color or religion. Fortunately, many grassroots activists are responding to this by building a strong anti-racist, antifascist movement. You can see our Facebook page below. It’s in Greek but the photos are quite revealing. If anyone is interested in learning more about the situation here, please message me and I’ll try to find some articles in English for you. https://www.facebook.co/19JanuaryATHENSvsFASCISM?fref=ts 19 Γεναρη – ΑΘΗΝΑ ΠΟΛΗ Αντιφασιστικη Μπροστά στη κλιμάκωση της φασιστικής απειλής και της ρατσιστικής βίας, στη εμφάν…See More Naa Ayele Kumari Let me put this in the context of something you might understand. This is a goddess group that honors the feminine and the power it represents. People in this group understand the oppression and misrepresentation of women. We understand the implications of misogynistic patriarchal thinking. We understand the implications of stealing the information, rites, and traditions from goddess centered cultures and rephrasing them into male dominated themes… especially those that then went on to oppress women today. This is the same thing that has happened as it related to race and our cultures. It infuriates us when a man may say… why do we have to focus on the goddess? Let us just accept that we are all human and no special consideration should be given to anyone because of their gender. Or, this is just a distraction or social construct and it really doesn’t matter. We understand the blatant disregard and ignorance of those statements. Yet, the same is true for race and people of other races. Your attitude and casual disregard perpetuates a lie that you are comfortable with and don’t wish to move from that comfort zone. It means you don’t have to be accountable for the injustices or oppression it continues to perpetuate in the larger culture toward people who do not look like you. As far as I am concerned, I truly believe that the dark goddess for many with white skin IS their shadow… It is the part of themselves that they deny and fear. That you may have come from black people may scare you… even when the science proves it. That deep down… you fear what you don’t understand. To even confront it is frightening… something that you would rather ignore and deny… Yet… here we are. Black, Yellow, Red… people.. women… who have been oppressed for thousands of year because of this… and are asking… to be seen in their true likeness… not as you wish them to be… or fear them to be. Naa Ayele Kumari Thank you Max Dashu, I so appreciate your scholarship and dedication to the truth where ever you find it… and Helen Hwang for staying open to it as well. [Someone withdrew the threads.] Rick Williams No, you can’t passively aggressively slither your way out of this, reread your own statements and that last post contradicts most of your ascertains. I can’t believe that you honestly say fire away at you like you’re some sort of martyr and VICTIM of being misunderstood, not at all, I understand you very well. I don’t think you understand yourSELF. That’s the real tragedy. Rick Williams “The Lips of Wisdom are Closed except to the Ears of Understanding.” It is in quotes, and it’s part of Ancient Wisdom, of Tehuti, DJehuti, or Hermes Trimegitus… The Great Scribe of KMT.. they have alot of pretty pictures of him all over KMT(Egypt).. still have no idea what you are saying have the time. Max Dashu Thank you Naa Ayele for taking the time to make the extremely apt analogy of women’s oppression to clarify the politics of race oppression […]
(Special Post Isis 1) 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 1 Is Isis White (European) or Black (African)? Harita Meenee What could Isis have to do with the political situation in Egypt? Read on to find out! Isis, Egypt and the Revolution For the past few years Egypt has felt like a second home to me. Some cherished friends and co-workers live there, to whom my thoughts often travel. Also, Isis, the Egyptian great goddess once worshiped all over the Mediterranean, has been an ever-present source of inspiration… By: Harita Meenee, Author https://www.facebook.com/notes/harita-meenee-author/isis-egypt-and-the-revolution/457348724361326 Rick Williams Isis and that picture for me is kind of offensive in 2013. KMT [Kemet, Egypt] and AUSET [Isis] “worship” is an oxymoron. Kahena Dorothea Can you explain, Rick Williams, how it is an oxymoron? I am curious. Rick Williams First, Auset as a deity was not a singularly honored symbolic personage. KMT taught principles of BALANCE and UNIVERSAL COSMOLOGICAL TRUTH. There are NO images from the dawn of that age depicting her as EUROPEAN. [Threads curtailed] Helen Hwang I would strongly suggest that Rick and others who see Rick’s point educate us in Mago Circle. I know this is very difficult but we are here to learn and express differences from each other. We are all centers and please share your perspective and knowledge so that others can learn. I am doing that with patience and tolerance as well. Thank you all! Rick Williams I try to be as honest and respectful when I can, Helen. I only personalize things when ONE person says something. Yet there are those who know that the people of that land now weren’t the same people who honored the deities of mythology and that image isn’t of Auset. When will folks stop promoting fictitious images and uneducated observations? I could have beat around the bush and politely asked about the statue, why that one isn’t truly the same of Auset’s time? Helen Hwang Okay, conflicts and contradictions are everywhere. Nonetheless, we can’t be beat by those. We are exploring ways to be empowered by addressing our differences in Mago Circle. We trust that we have good intentions and yet we are not perfect. I do Mago Circle and Return to Mago because I believe there is a way for us to meet and talk with our differences, I can’t let that hope go! Thank us for talking to each other. Naa Ayele Kumari I can see both points. Egypt has a long and ancient history… One filled with invaders.. wars.. people who stole the magic and manipulated it for their own purposes… Those invaders changed images to make them in their own reflections all the while slowly destroying the indigenous images of power and strength as well as the sacred tradition they were built on.. As a woman of African descent, it is sometimes difficult to see the Hellenistic images of our mother.. because her original images were a woman of color. Racism… whether we chose to admit it or not has played an immense part in our oppression as a people and that includes the struggle for Egypt today. It is especially a sensitive issue because those images play a role in how people see and view black women… even today. The dark goddess is stereotyped as being a part of our shadow while the white goddess is caste as being all that is good in the world. What black women struggle to tell the world is that those projections are simply racist projections… and so we reject them. Still, I recognize that people like to experience the divine in their own image and that our Mother has been taken around the world… and by extension absorbed many names and faces because after all, she is mother not to just Africans… but to the World. Right now, we have dominant tradition of Islam… that at its roots has a feminine basis… (Islam came from the word Isis) all the while oppressing women by its dogma. The indigenous people of Egypt, the Badarians and Nubians… are oppressed by Arab invaders who have taken control, projected their own religions all the while wanting to destroy the remainder of the images of the ancients. Injustice recognizes injustice… and all the ways that it shows up. At the root of Egypt…is Isis… called also Esi and Auset by the indigenous people. She has been oppressed by many layers of invaders… Her daughter’s voices have been muted… Timeless icon that she is, as the tides are turning, so are the heavy oppressions being lifted. Women are finding and re-remembering their power… and as they do… Mama Esi.. is taking back her throne. Naa Ayele Kumari This is the Isis on the walls and temples of Egypt. Harita Meenee Seeing the people of Egypt as all white or all Black means stereotyping them. In fact the inhabitants of Egypt are of different colors: some are white, others are Black and many others are something in-between. The same was true in antiquity and it’s reflected in Egyptian art. Rick Williams Harita, really? What does that have to do with your choice of misrepresentation of that image? Please enlighten me, thank you. Harita Meenee Τhere is no misrepresentation, dear Rick Williams. If you read my note carefully, you’ll see that it talks about Isis as a goddess who was worshiped all over the Mediterranean–I’m not referring to just her Egyptian manifestation. The statue depicted is in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, Greece. I took this picture and processed it slightly so that it looks more like a painting than a sculpture. No change was made to the actual form or color of the statue. I’m attaching a photo of the museum label of this work of art. It may not be clearly visible, but it reads: Marble statue of the goddess Isis-Tyche-Pelagia. 1st-2nd century AD. The composite name means that, as was often the case in […]

(Book Excerpt) Held in the Womb of the Wheel of the Year by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an excerpt from the Introduction of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Meditation cushion in circle of decorated stones My ancestors built great circles of stones that represented their perception of real time and space, and enabled them to tell time: the stone circles were cosmic calendars.[i] They went to great lengths and detail to get it right. It was obviously very important to them to have the stones of a particular kind, in the right positions according to position of the Sun at different times of the year, and then to celebrate ceremony within it. I have for decades had a much smaller circle of stones assembled. I have regarded this small circle of stones as a medicine wheel. It is a portable collection, that I can spread out in my living space, or let sit in a small circle on an altar, with a candle/candles in the middle. Each stone (or objects, as some are) represents a particular Seasonal Moment/transition and is placed in the corresponding direction. The small circle of eight stones represents the flow of the Solstices and Equinoxes and the cross-quarter Moments in between: that is, it represents the “Wheel of the Year” as it is commonly known in Pagan traditions. I have found this assembled circle to have been an important presence. It makes the year, my everyday sacred journey of Earth around Sun, tangible and visible as a circle, and has been a method of changing my mind, as I am placed in real space and time. My stone wheel has been a method of bringing me home to my indigenous sense of being. Each stone/object of my small wheel may be understood to represent a “moment of grace,” as Thomas Berry named the seasonal transitions – each is a threshold to the Centre, wherein I may now sit: I sense it as a powerful point. As I sit on the floor in the centre of my small circle of stones, I reflect on its significance as I have come to know the Seasonal transitions that it marks, over decades of celebrating them. I sense the aesthetics and poetry of each. I facilitated and was part of the celebration and contemplation of these Moments in my region for decades. It was always an open group that gathered, and so its participants changed over the years but it remained in form, like a live body which it was: a ceremonial body that conversed with the sacred Cosmos in my place. We spoke a year-long story and poetry of never-ending renewal – of the unfolding self, Earth and Cosmos. We danced and chanted our relationship with the Mother, opened ourselves to Her Creativity, and conversed with Her by this method. All participants in their own way within these ceremonies made meaning of their lives – which is what I understand relationship to be, in this context of Earth and Sun, our Place and Home in the Cosmos: that is, existence is innately meaningful when a being knows Who one is and Where one is. Barbara Walker notes that religions based on the Mother are free of the “neurotic” quest for indefinable meaning in life as such religions “never assumed that life would be required to justify itself.”[ii] I face the North stone, which in my hemisphere is where I place the Summer Solstice. From behind me and to my right is the light part of the cycle – representing manifest form, all that we see and touch. From behind me and to my left is the dark part of the cycle – representing the manifesting, the reality beneath the visible, which includes the non-visible. The Centre wherein I sit, represents the present. The wheel of stones has offered to me a way of experiencing the present as “presence,” as it recalls in an instant that, That which has been and that which is to come are not elsewhere – they are not autonomous dimensions independent of the encompassing present in which we dwell. They are, rather, the very depths of this living place – the hidden depth of its distances and the concealed depth on which we stand.[iii] This wheel of stones, which captures the Wheel of the Year in essence, locates me in the deep present, wherein the past and the future are contained – both always gestating in the dark, through the gateways. And all this has been continually enacted and expressed in the ceremonies of the Wheel of the Year, as the open, yet formal group has done them, mostly in the place of Blue Mountains, Australia. PaGaian Cosmology altar/mandala: a “Womb of Gaia” map Over the years of practice of ritually celebrating these eight Seasonal Moments – Earth’s whole annual journey around Sun, I have been held in this creative story, this Story of Creativity as it may be written – it is a sacred story. Her pattern of Creativity can be identified at all levels of reality – manifesting in seasonal cycles, moon cycles, body cycles – and to be aligned with it aligns a person’s core with the Creative Mother Universe. I have identified the placing of one’s self within this wheel through ceremonial practice of the whole year of creativity, as the placing of one’s self in Her Womb – Gaia’s Womb, a Place of Creativity. All that is necessary for Creativity is present in this Place. All may come forth from here/Here – and so it does, and so it has, and so it will. NOTES: [i] See Martin Brennan, The Stones of Time: Calendars, Sundials, and Stone Chambers of Ancient Ireland (Rochester Vermont, Inner Traditions, 1994). [ii] Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1983), 693. [iii] David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous (New York: Vintage Books, 1997), 216. REFERENCES: Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous. New York: Vintage Books, 1997. Brennan, Martin. The Stones of Time: Calendars, Sundials, and Stone Chambers of Ancient Ireland.Rochester Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1994. Walker, Barbara. The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets. San Francisco: …
A PaGaian Wheel of the Year and Her Creativity by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an excerpt from Chapter 2 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. for larger image see: https://pagaian.org/pagaian-wheel-of-the-year/ Essentially a PaGaian Wheel of the Year celebrates Cosmogenesis – the unfolding of the Cosmos, none of which is separate from the unfolding of each unique place/region, and each unique being. This creativity of Cosmogenesis is celebrated through Earth-Sun relationship as it may be expressed and experienced within any region of our Planet. PaGaian ceremony expresses this with Triple Goddess Poetry understood to be metaphor for the creative dynamics unfolding the Cosmos. At the heart of the Earth-Sun relationship is the dance of light and dark, the waxing and waning of both these qualities, as Earth orbits around our Mother Sun. This dance, which results in the manifestation of form and its dissolution (as expressed in the seasons), happens because of Earth’s tilt in relationship with Sun: because this effects the intensity of regional receptivity to Sun’s energy over the period of the yearly orbit. This tilt was something that happened in the evolution of our planet in its earliest of days – some four and a half billion years ago,[i] and then stabilised over time: and the climatic zones were further formed when Antarctica separated from Australia and South America, giving birth to the Antarctica Circumpolar Current, changing the circulation of water around all the continents … just some thirty million years ago.[ii] Within the period since then, which also saw the advent of the earliest humans, Earth has gone through many climatic changes. It is likely that throughout those changes, the dance of light and dark in both hemispheres of the planet … one always the opposite of the other – has been fairly stable and predictable. The resultant effect on flora and fauna regionally however has varied enormously depending on many other factors of Earth’s ever-changing ecology: She is an alive Planet who continues to move and re-shape Herself. She is Herself subject to the cosmic dynamics of creativity – the forming and the dissolving and the re-emerging. The earliest of humans must have received all this, ‘observed’ it in a very participatory way: that is, not as a Western industrialized or dualistic mind would think of ‘observation’ today, but as kin with the events – identifying with their own experience of coming into being and passing away. There is evidence (as of this writing) to suggest that humans have expressed awareness of, and response to, the phenomenon of coming into being and passing away, as early as one hundred thousand years ago: ritual burial sites of that age have been found,[iii] and more recently a site of ongoing ritual activity as old as seventy thousand years has been found.[iv] The ceremonial celebration of the phenomenon of seasons probably came much later, particularly perhaps when humans began to settle down. These ceremonial celebrations of seasons apparently continued to reflect the awesomeness of existence as well as the marking of transitions of Sun back and forth across the horizon, which became an important method of telling the time for planting and harvesting and the movement of pastoral animals. It seems that the resultant effect of the dance of light and dark on regional flora and fauna, has been fairly stable in recent millennia, the period during which many current Earth-based religious practices and expression arose. In our times, that is changing again. Humans have been, and are, a major part of bringing that change about. Ever since we migrated around the planet, humans have brought change, as any creature would: but humans have gained advantage and distinguished themselves by toolmaking, and increasingly domesticating/harnessing more of Earth’s powers – fire being perhaps the first, and this also aided our migration. In recent times this harnessing/appropriating of Earth’s powers became more intense and at the same time our numbers dramatically increased: and many of us filled with hubris, acting without consciousness or care of our relational context. We are currently living in times when our planet is tangibly and visibly transforming: the seasons themselves as we have known them for millennia – as anyone’s ancestors knew them – appear to be changing in most if not all regions of our Planet. Much predictable Poetry – sacred language – for expressing the quality of the Seasonal Moments will change, as regional flora changes, as the movement of animals and birds and sea creatures changes, as economies change.[v]In Earth’s long story regional seasonal manifestation has changed before, but not so dramatically since the advent of much current Poetic expression for these transitions, as mixed as they are with layers of metaphor: that is, with layers of mythic eras, cultures and economies. We may learn and understand the traditional significance of much of the Poetry, the ceremony and symbol – the art – through which we could relate and converse with our place, as our ancestors may have done, but it will continue to evolve as all language must. In PaGaian Cosmology I have adapted the Wheel as a way of celebrating the Female Metaphor and also as a way of celebrating Cosmogenesis, the Creativity that is present really/actually in every moment, but for which the Seasonal Moments provide a pattern/Poetry over the period of a year – in time and place. The pattern that I unfold is a way in which the three different phases/characteristics interplay. In fact, the way in which they interplay seems infinite, the way they inter-relate is deeply complex. I think it is possible to find many ways to celebrate them. There is nothing concrete about the chosen story/Poetry, nor about each of the scripts presented here, just as there is nothing concrete about the Place of Being – it (She) is always relational, a Dynamic Interchange. Whilst being grounded in the “Real,” the Poetry chosen for expression is therefore at the same time, a potentially infinite expression, according to the heart and mind of the storyteller. NOTES: [i] See Appendix C, *(6), Glenys Livingstone, A Poiesis of the Creative …
(Art & Poem) Spring Equinox by Sudie Rakusin & Annie Finch

A SEED FOR SPRING EQUINOX . . . till I feel the earth around the place my head has lain under winter’s touch, and it crumbles. Slanted weight of clouds. Reaching with my head and shoulders past the open crust dried by spring wind. Sun. Tucking through the ground that has planted cold inside me, made its waiting be my food. Now I watch the watching dark my light’s long-grown dark makes known. Art and poem are included in Celebrating Seasons of the Goddess (Mago Books, 2017). (Meet Mago Contributor) Sudie Rakusin (Meet Mago Contributor) Annie Finch
Imbolc/Early Spring – a Season of Uncertainty by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Traditionally the Seasonal transition of Imbolc/Early Spring, celebrated in early February in the Northern Hemisphere, and in early August in the Southern Hemisphere, has been a time of nurturing the new life that is beginning to show itself, around us and within. It is a time of committing one’s self to the new life and inspiration – in the garden, in the soul, and in the Cosmos. We may include in our celebrations and contemplations of this Season the beginnings of the new young Cosmos as She was, that time in our cosmic story when She was only a billion years old and galaxies were forming; and also the new which has continually emerged throughout the eons, and is ever coming forth. The flame of being, as it has been imagined by many cultures, within and around, is to be protected and nurtured: the new being requires dedication and attention. In the early stages of its advent, there is nothing certain about its staying power and growth: it may flicker and be vulnerable. There may be uncertainties of various kinds. There is risk and resistance to coming into being. The Universe itself knew resistance to its expansion when it encountered gravitation in our very beginnings, in the primordial Flaring Forth[i]. The unfolding of the Universe was never without creative tension. The Universe knows it daily, in every moment: and we participate in this creative tension of our place of being. Urge to Be budding forth Imbolc/Early Spring can be a time of remembering personal vulnerabilities, feeling them and accepting them, but remaining resolute in birthing and tending of the new, listening for and responding to the Urge to Be[ii]of the Creative Universe within. Brian Swimme has said (quoting cultural anthropologist A.L. Kroeber) that the destiny of the human is not “bovine placidity” but the highest degree of tension that can be creatively born[iii]. many flames of being, strengthening each other These times are filled with creative tension, collectively and for most, personally as well; there is much resistance, yet there is promise of so much good energy arising. We may be witness to both. This Season of Imbolc/Early Spring may encourage attention, intention and dedication to strengthening well-being: in self, and in the relational communal context, and opening to our direct immersion in the Well of Creativity. We may be strengthened with the joining of hands, as well as the listening within to the sacred depths, in ceremonial circle at this time. NOTES: [i]As our origins (popularly named as “the Big Bang”) are named by Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme in The Universe Story. [ii]As I name this determined Virgin quality in PaGaian Cosmology. [iii]The Canticle to the Cosmos, DVD #8, “The Nature of the Human”. References: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005. Swimme, Brian and Berry, Thomas. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era. New York: HarperCollins, 1992. Swimme, Brian. Canticle to the Cosmos. DVD series, 1990.
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 …
The Ceremonial Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an excerpt from Chapter 3 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. The Cosmos is a ceremony, a ritual. Dawn and dusk, seasons, supernovas – it is an ongoing Event of coming into being and passing away. The Cosmos is always in flux, and we exist as participants in this great ritual event, this “cosmic ceremony of seasonal and diurnal rhythms” which frame “epochal dramas of becoming,” as Charlene Spretnak describes it.[i] Swimme and Berry describe the universe as a dramatic reality, a Great Conversation of announcement and response.[ii]Ritual/ceremony[iii] may be the human conscious response to the announcements of the Universe – an act of conscious participation. Ceremony then may be understood as a microcosmos[iv] – a human-sized replication of the Drama, the Dynamic we find ourselves in. Swimme and Berry describe ritual as an ancient response humans have to the awesome experience of witnessing the coming to be and the passing away of things; they say that a “ritual mode of expression” is from its beginning “the manner in which humans respond to the universe, just as birds respond by flying or as fish respond by swimming.”[v] It is the way in which we as humans, as a species, may respond to this awesome experience of being and becoming, how we may hold the beauty and the terror. Humans have exhibited this tendency to ritualize since the earliest times of our unfolding: evidence so far reveals burial sites dating back one hundred thousand years, as mentioned in the previous chapter. We often went to huge effort in these matters, that is almost incomprehensible to the modern industrialised econocentric mind: the precise placing of huge stones in circles such as found at Stonehenge and the creation of complex sites such as Silbury Hill may be expressions of some priority, indicating that econocentric thinking – such as tool making, finding shelter and food, was not enough or not separate from the participation in Cosmic events. Ritual seems to have expressed, and still does actively express for some peoples, something essential to the human – a way of being integral with our Cosmic Place, which was not perceived as separate from material sustenance, the Source of existence: thus it was a way perhaps of sensing “meaning” as it might be termed these days – or “relationship.” Swimme and Berry note that the order of the Universe has been experienced especially in the seasonal sequence of dissolution and renewal; this most basic pattern has been an ultimate referent for existence.[vi] The seasonal pattern contains within it the most basic dynamics of the Cosmos – desire, fullfilment, loss, transformation, creation, growth, and more. The annual ceremonial celebration of the seasonal wheel – the Earth-Sun sacred site within which we tour – can be a pathway to the Centre of these dynamics, a way of making sense of the pattern, a way of sensing it. One enters the Universe’s story. The Seasonal Moments when marked and celebrated in the art form of ceremony may be sens-ible ‘gateways’ through the flesh of the world[vii] to the Centre – which is omnipresent Creativity. Humans do ritual everyday – we really can’t help ourselves. It is simply a question of what rituals we do, what story we are telling ourselves, what we are “spelling”[viii] ourselves with – individually and collectively. Ceremony is actually ‘doing,’ not just theorizing. We can talk about our personal and cultural disconnection endlessly, but we need to actually change our minds. Ceremony can be an enabling practice – a catalyst/practice for personal and cultural change. It is not just talking about eating the pear, it is eating the pear; it is not just talking about sitting on the cushion (meditating), it is sittingon the cushion. It is a cultural practice wherein we tell a story/stories about what we believe to be so most deeply, about who and what we are. Ceremony can be a place for practicing a new language, a new way of speaking, or spelling – a place for practicing “matristic storytelling”[ix] if you like: that is, for telling stories of the Mother, of Earth and Cosmos as if She were alive and sentient. We can “play like we know it,” so that we may come to know it.[x] Ceremony then is a form of social action. NOTES: [i] Spretnak, States of Grace, 145. [ii] Swimme and Berry, The Universe Story, 153. [iii] I will use either or both of these terms at different times: I generally prefer “ceremony” as Kathy Jones defines it in Priestess of Avalon, Priestess of the Goddess, 319. She says that ritual involves a repeated set of actions which may contain spiritual or “mundane” elements (such as a daily ritual of brushing one’s teeth), “whereas ceremony is always a spiritual practice and may or may not include ritual elements.” The PaGaian seasonal celebrations/events are thus most kin to “ceremony,” although I do not perceive any action as “mundane.” However, “ritual” is more commonly used to speak of how humans have conversed with cosmos/Earth. [iv] Spretnak, States of Grace, 145. [v] Swimme and Berry, The Universe Story, 152-153. [vi] Ibid. [vii] Abram speaks of “matter as flesh” in The Spell of the Sensuous, 66, citing Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Invisible and the Invisible (Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 1968). [viii] Starhawk used this term on her email list in 2004 to describe the story-telling we might do to bring forth the changes we desire. [ix] A term used by Gloria Feman Orenstein in The Reflowering of the Goddess (New York: Pergamon Press, 1990), 147. [x] As my doctoral thesis supervisor Dr. Susan Murphy once described it to me in conversation REFERENCES: Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous. New York: Vintage Books, 1997. Jones, Kathy. Priestess of Avalon, Priestess of the Goddess. Glastonbury: Ariadne Publications, 2006. Orenstein, Gloria Feman. The Reflowering of the Goddess. New York: Pergamon Press, 1990. Spretnak, Charlene. States of Grace: The Recovery of Meaning in the Postmodern Age. San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993. Swimme, Brian and Berry, Thomas. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era. New York: HarperCollins, 1992.

(Budoji Essay 4) The Magoist Cosmogony by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Part 4: Magoist Origin of Immortals “I maintain that Immortals originally refers to Mago’s descendants in Mago Castle, the Primordial Paradise. They are the primordial clan community of the Mago Species, comprised of the divine, demigods, and humans.” [This is a translation and interpretation of the Budoji (Epic of the Emblem City), principal text of Magoism. Read the translation of Chapter 1 of the Budoji.] Magoist Origin of Immortals: All in the Mago Species are given the original nature of immortality or transcendence. Readers are advised to set aside the literal meaning in the English language of the words immortals or transcendents. Immortals is a translation of the East Asian term seon (仙, xian in Chinese). I choose the translation immortals over transcendents not because it is a better translation but because it is the most commonly used term by Western Daoist translators.[i] Although it is known as a Daoist term, I hold that it is pre-Daoist, namely Magoist, in origin. Primarily, it refers to the Mago Species (Mago and Her descendants) who dwelt in Mago Castle, the primordial home, to be discussed in detail in later chapters. Likewise, historical figures known as Immortals are Magoist rather than Daoist.
(Bell Essay 8) The Magoist Whale Bell: Decoding the Cetacean Code of Korean Temple Bells by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: This and ensuing sequels are excerpts of a new development from the original essay sequels on Korean Temple Bells and Magoism that first published January 11, 2013 in this current magazine. See (Bell Essay 1) Ancient Korean Bells and Magoism by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang.] Singing Humpback Whales, wikimedia commons Whales as the Cosmic Music Maker That whales (Gorae in Korean) are foundational to the Korean temple bell remains subliminal to this day. How do we assess the cetacean code of the Korean temple bell? What is the relationship between these two seemingly unrelated objects? We are given the whale-shaped mallet of the bell to begin with. Intriguingly, two Buddhist temples are noted today for the wooden whale-carved mallet of their bells: Sudeok-sa in Yesan, South Chungcheong, and Seonam-sa in Suncheon, South Jeolla.[1] Other temple bells reportedly have the whale mallet as well, although not as much distinctly carved as the two. The Divine Bell of King Seongdeok the Great is known as such. What is the significance of the Korean temple bell that has a whale as its striker? However, the whale-shaped wooden mallet is only a visible symbol of Sillan cetacean veneration. The whale motif is not just physically present in the mallet but also signified in its name or title. Among many alternative names of the Korean temple bell are cetacean names; Janggyeong (長鯨 Eternal Whale), Gyeongjong (鯨鐘 Whale Bell), Hwagyeong (華鯨 Splendid Whale), and Geogyeong (巨鯨 Gigantic Whale). Here the character “gyeong 鯨” means a whale.[2] These whale names suggest that the bell itself is conceived as a whale. Korean temple bells are the code of Magoist cetaceanism. By the very nature of a temple bell that is to awaken all beings to put it bluntly, we can establish that the sound of a whale is elevated to the purpose of a temple bell. Or vice versa. The sound of a temple bell is identified as that of a whale. At the outset, suffice it to say that whales are admired and revered for their vocal behaviors so much so that they are represented in Sillan temple bells. The cetacean representation of the Korean temple bell comes unexpected to us. Why is the song of a whale not the song of a bird or another animal? And what does it mean that the Korean temple bell employs cetacean names? These are no small questions. Answering them requires digging into the deepest layer of what has gone under the surface about Magoist Korean whale culture. I have discussed elsewhere in detail about how Korean cetaceanism is steeped in linguistics, myths, place-names, and custom.[3] For the immensity and complexity of the topic, this essay leaves out the discussion of such salient features of whales as their pre-human origin, evolution from land to sea, sizes and trans-oceanic migratory journeys. Summarily, whales connect and bridge the human mind beyond anthropocentrism. Here we will focus on how cetacean veneration is encoded in the Korean temple bell, in particular the sound tube. Ancient Korean Magoists deemed whales as the cosmic music makers. The cetacean names of Korean temple bells redefine the bell as the acoustic instrument that conveys the music of whales. Note the plural in bells and whales. Korean temple bells are meant to be recognized as a chorus, like whales in the sea, to respond to the sonic property of all beings. In fact, the Korean temple bell is never an isolated single sound wave, to be discussed below. What is emitted from both is harmonized music. It is noted that the music of whales can travel hundreds of kilometers underwater.[4] That the song of whales travel as far as hundreds of kilometers underwater is juxtaposed with the sound of the Korean temple bells that travel far. The former is transmitted through water waves, while the latter is transmitted through air waves. Humpback Whales Whales compose music. Among cetacean species, known for their vocalizations are the blue whale, the fin whale, the humpback whale, the minke whale, and the killer whale.[5] In particular, such baleen whales as humpback whales and blue whales have been relatively well studied for their vocalizing behaviors. The range of humpback whales’ sound frequencies is known as follows: The range of frequencies that whales use are [sic] from 30 Hertz (Hz) to about 8,000 Hz, (8 kHZ). Humans can only hear part of the whales’s songs. We aren’t able to hear the lowest of the whale frequencies. Humans hear low frequency sounds starting at about 100 Hz.[6] In comparisons, the vocalizations of blue whales are known to range from 10 to 40 Hz at a fundamental frequency (the lowest frequency of a periodic waveform). It is also noted that blue whales off the coast of Sri Lanka make music of “four notes duration lasting about two minutes each, reminiscent of the well-known humpback whale songs.”[7] To be discussed below, the frequencies of the two most noted Korean temple bells range from 65 Hz to 103.02 Hz, which fall within the range of these whales’ vocalizations. A significant volume of scientific research has been harvested on the music of humpback whales. Katy and Roger Payne are, according to an article by Bill McQuay and Alison Richards, the first scientists who identified the calls of male humpback whales as songs.[8] They report that humpback whales do not merely sing but compose music. McQuay and Richards describe the song of humpback whales as follows: Surprisingly researchers have noted that at any given moment all males in a group will sing the same version of a song, even when separated over large distances, while whales in another region or hemisphere will sing a completely different song, but in unison with other whales in their area. These sounds are loud, deep and low-frequency (20Hz – 10 kHz). They can be heard many miles away and may go on for hours or even days. Individual songs can last anywhere from a few minutes up to a half hour at which point they may then be repeated again. …
(Pilgrimage Essay 2) Report of First Mago Pilgrimage to Korea by Helen Hwang

[Author’s note: The first Mago Pilgrimage to Korea took place June 6-19, 2013. We visited Ganghwa Island, Seoul, Wonju, Mt. Jiri, Yeong Island (Busan), and Jeju Island.] Part 2 Traditional Korea and the Primordial Home of Magoism It was the time for the sacred, ancient mystery of Magoism to be reenacted once again for the Race of WE! Mago Pilgrimage was an open invitation to the deep knowing that Korean Magoism unfolds beneath the surface of patriarchal consciousness. It was a call from the Background [to borrow Mary Daly’s term, which, I explicate, refers to the biophilic reality wherein the deep memories of Goddess are alive, unfettering from the foreground, patriarch reality] to be present with Mago, the Great Goddess, Here and Now! Third eyes flashed, while open hearts unlocked the doors to the path. We heard the whisper, the chorus of the natural, cultural, and historical landscapes of Korea, the arcane music of the Female Beginning. The magic worked its own feats. As could be expected, undertaking the Mago pilgrimage entailed daunting tasks for me. Nonetheless, it was proven to me time and again that the purpose creates the means. The Korean saying, “Where there is a will, there is a way,” spoke to it well. We, the intercontinental pilgrims, were made welcome by supporters, organizers, and volunteers from the locale. We attracted fabulous scholars, teachers, artists, administrators, and activists along our paths. It was the first cross-cultural and cross-gender goddess event to be held in Korea in modern times! Excitement and anticipation were high. As a researcher of Mago and Magoism, I knew the Mago pilgrimage was the right thing to do. In fact, I had been faithfully following the direction that my heart beckoned to throughout my life. The consequences were the actions that I took. This time, however, I was rewarded with the fate-ful encounter; the very research of Mago came as a revelation to me. The topic of Mago emerged from nowhere at the juncture of my labyrinthine journey to non-patriarchal [gynocentric] consciousness. I was a student of feminist studies in religions. Without knowing what was in store for me, I knew that I was not content with the feminist theology of patriarchal religions of the West and the East. If any theme of these religions had appealed to me — I wished at times, to confess to my readers — during those years, my path would not have crossed with Magoism. My radical feminist quest was the cause for encountering Mago.