“What foolishness is this?” Cerridwen’s voice railed in exasperation and anger over the drone of my inner voice as I reread Her myth. Not waiting for my reaction, She continued.
“I look out over your world and see how my gift of inspiration has been misused, the opportunity for divine creation taken away from most people in your age of celebrity and the idolatry of fame and fortune, leading to a dulling of your world and imaginative catastrophe. My story as you have heard it has beauty and meaning but perhaps it is now time to change perspectives and see it also from another point of view. Let me tell you a second version of the story.
“When my son was born he was called Afagdu, ‘Utter Darkness.’ Because he did not look like other children, it was feared he would never be accepted by society. What child is ugly to a mother? If no one else would love him, I would make up for it by loving him a thousand times more, not by having him drink some overboiled elixir.
“Brew up a potion from herbs to give him brilliance and wisdom, they said. Do they think that I do not have the power to see into the future, that I do not know what would happen? That evil servant Gwion stole the concoction. And the cauldron burst open and poisoned the world. Or so they thought. I did indeed make a mixture of herbs, but not the one they believed.
“They said I chased Gwion aided by my friends who let me borrow their bodies, the greyhound, an otter, a hawk, and a hen. Knaves. Why would I chase someone who stole something that can never be stolen, if indeed it had been genius? Or that, in reality, was worthless to him? Did they think I couldn’t make more potion if I had wanted to, if the potion had been what gave the gift of the muses?
“They say I ate the traitor Gwion as a grain of wheat and gave birth to him as the great bard Taliesin. Who thinks I could be forced to unwillingly give birth to such a one? Gwion escaped our household and made up a tale to explain his odd origin when he wished to be perceived as a great bard of mythical origins.
“I did give birth when I heard the story he had conjured, but not to a being, but rather to a revelation that inspiration belongs not to the gods and their chosen elite, but rather to all. Brilliance comes not from memorizing hundreds of stories, poems, and genealogies like the bards, but from hard-won life experience and the knowledge it brings that love is our only true muse.
“But I let the story continue to be told far and wide. I did not speak against it because it uttered helpful truths, but here is another beneficial true story. How much love must a mother have for her child to carefully forage and prepare the herbs, then place them in a gigantic pot, and ensure they are carefully tended for a year and a day? Would not Afagdu have received from this not false genius, but the knowledge that, though he was reviled by everyone else, his mother deeply loved him? Might this have not given him the confidence he needed to find the virtuosity within himself to write dazzling poetry and be the most celebrated bard in history had not Gwion intervened? Might his name Utter Darkness instead have meant the womb inside the Earth and within each of us where we take the manifestations of love and make them into artistic jewels that shine, sometimes in their terribleness, sometimes in their joy of being? Might not the works of Gwion, later known as Taliesin, actually have been those of Afagdu, the credit stolen by history once both were long gone from the human realm?
“When the cauldron broke, it was not poison that spilled across the world, it was imagination and artistry. The gods had wanted the genius of creation to be under their control, to be only for those they chose, with no love, grace, or passion for life’s everyday beauty. They thought that since I was immortal, too, I would be their servant and let Gwion steal the potion. But I did not, nor did they know that the potion was nothing more than random herbs and that the love of its making was the magic.
“Instead, once Afagdu had been made luminous by the mixture made possible by my motherly love, I spread the potion over the whole world, into those places that ordinary humans, as the gods call them, (Are there ordinary humans? No, anyone who survives life as a mortal is extraordinary) venture but never the gods. I infused inspiration into the daily and seemingly mundane acts of romance, into human cries of grief heard only by themselves and those close to them, into the warmth of small acts of friendship, into the billion exchanges between parents and children that happen every day, into the often silent human yearning for the sea and forest. It is now inextricably part of everything on Earth that bridges humans to other elements of their cosmos, all that helps them find and fulfill their place in the realm of mortality. The bounty of the cauldron was not a potion, but love and the knowledge of how to use it to create works of beauty, wisdom, and truth out of the struggles and delights of daily human life.
“Taking inspiration from the tyranny of the gods and giving it to humanity is how I now choose to use my own enlightenment.” And then Her voice was silent.
In the 21st century’s world it can seem as if Cerridwen’s cauldron is soon to run dry. We look into it hoping a drop has remained, weary and exhausted by the apathy, fear, hate, misery, and despair all around us. What can we possibly create to remake such a planet? But look, Cerridwen is now brewing a special potion just for us, made from our passionate desire to make a better world, from our looking at our sisters and seeing in their eyes just enough fortitude to put together three drops of hope, from our own love of self that has survived all the traumas as well as been nourished by all the love we have received in our lives. It is fragrant with roses and lilies for beauty, basil to banish negativity, bee balm for the blessing of the fairies, daisies for luck, lavender for healing body and soul, marjoram to offer solace for grief, spearmint for courage, and so many more. What else could we need?
Look into it and see what is missing from your life and your work. Put in your thumb and taste three drops. It is not only allowed but encouraged. You might be surprised at what comes out – perhaps not what you wanted but for sure just what you need. Our world may seem short on love at this moment. When we draw on our loving relationships to be inspired we not only bring into being artistry of genius, but we make more love when it spreads to everyone who experiences what we have conjured and constructed in an ever-growing web of love and life.
Now it is your choice how you use Cerridwen’s gift to you. When you seek inspiration, will you look to the outside world to see what others desire you to make or will you seek inside yourself for what you love most? Will you use it to strengthen and make radiant the affiliations between yourself and those beings and places you cherish based on what you have learned during your days here on Earth, making all of Creation shine? Cerridwen is here to give you all you need to do the work you were born on this Earth to do.
She made her choice and now it is our turn to make ours.
This post will be included in The Wisdom of Cerridwen: Transforming the Cosmic Brew, an anthology of poetry, story, personal writing and art to be published by Girl God Books in 2025 edited by Emma Clark, Pat Daly, and Trista Hendren. You may pre-order the book here now.
Sources:
Original story of Cerridwen’s cauldron from Monaghan, Patricia, The New Book of Goddesses and Heroines, St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn Publications, 2000, pp. 82-83.
Herb correspondences from the Herb Chart of the Salem Witch Museum, Salem, MA.