June 5, 2013October 2, 2019 Mago Work Admin2 Comments

(Art) Sangwon-sa Apsara by Lydia Ruyle

Sangwon-sa Apsara Apsaras in Korea are youthful female spirits of clouds and waters who fly in the sky and communicate with people. As celestial musicians, apsaras adorn the oldest copper bell in Sangwon-sa Buddhist temple Read More …

(Essay) Green Goddess: Loving the Earth with a Fierce Devotion! by Pegi Eyers

“The essence of LOVE is found everywhere in nature, and LOVE is the vibratory field for the plant kingdom, the kinship of the creatures, the nurturing power of the Feminine, and elements such as the water.” In times of massive change, our task is to bond with the land, to revere nature again as our Ancestors did, and to see ourselves as part of this thin and fragile biosphere, Our Earth, the source of all life and our spiritual home. The love of the land has always been central to our most cherished dreams and memories, and if we delve far enough below the surface of the modern mechanistic overlay, we find that Gaia has been patiently waiting for us to return. We are all Children of the Earth, and at the heart of our roving discontent is a veiled desire to be reunited with our perennial family, the other-than-human world.
(Art & Poetry) Stolen From the Heart by Lucy Pierce

Art by Lucy Pierce All my art, is stolen from the clutches of my motherhood. Poems scribbled on napkins, and drawings traced on the backs of my babies as they stumble towards sleep. Whatever births, had better be quick, hot and fast. No presence residing to revise and to intricately labour. Just the raw pouring forth, before I’m enveloped again by the detritus of my service. All my poems are stolen from the mouths of my babes. So excruciating at times to feel Her rise, the Queen of my creativity, suddenly there in the kitchen amidst the breakfast dishes, emerging inexplicably from the dregs of my servitude, an unexpected grace that I barely have room for. I scramble for a pen and a spare piece of paper to offer her. There’s some space on the back of a shopping list, and a child’s dirty crayon. I clear a space on the cluttered table, and wipe away the toast crumbs from the chair, I ask her to sit down but tell her she’ll have to be quick because we have to hang out the washing before dressing the kids. All my art is squeezed through the eye of a needle. The gravity of the couch with the tangled limbs of my no longer babies, the fierce, sticky love, is never quite what you bargained for and sometimes it feels as though you gave up too much for the privilege of peace-keeping between siblings and the trimming of dirty fingernails. But other times, that same grace descends, from the blue, as you watch your boy, your shining sun, hurtle down the hill towards you, golden and grubby and you understand that motherhood is its own art, and the humans grown each a rugged masterpiece, and all the poems lost, for lack of time, and all the paintings unrealized for arms too full to hold another thing, but the wood and the dishes and the washing, have somehow woven their way into the fibers of the future, in these wild and wayward beings, who love and fight so fiercely and with such chaotic abandon. I hear threads of thematic resonance between all the songs I never wrote and my 6 year old daughters glorious abandon to improvised soliloquies. There is the stolen thrill of being let in so close to the pristine magnificence of a daughter grown, the exquisite softness of her in the cusps of my hands. All my art, flows through the great canyon lands of my heart, carved with the tears and the blood and the sweat of my motherhood, the great ask of this love to make of myself something and nothing, all at once. I am learning to see, what my world may deny, that all life is an act of art-making, of love-making, and not the least of which, is the crafting of a heart that can map the terrain of a love so mind boggling vast and mundane. All the tiny acts, the minute strokes that build the world, that paint a picture, that write a poem, that tend to the wayward tangles in the wild mane of our Earth’s future custodians, each an act of labour, each an act of love. And I wonder how it might be different if I were to reframe my perception. That rather than being the artist I am despite my children, I am the artist I am because of them. Because all my art, including my motherhood, is stolen from the heart, as a prayer of love to the future unknown. (Meet Mago Contributor) Lucy Pierce.
(Essay 1) The Terms ”Feminine” and “Masculine” by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited version of an excerpt from Chapter 2 of the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. It is popular for writers in the area of consciousness to describe different qualities of consciousness as “feminine” and “masculine”, (for example, intuition as feminine and rational thought as masculine), and to describe humanity’s move out of an original participatory mind as “masculine”. The image of St. George (masculine) slaying the dragon (feminine) has been, and is still, commonly understood to speak of a “necessary” move in the evolution of consciousness, both of the collective and of the individual. It is popular to describe the active differentiating force of individuation as masculine. To quote one such writer: “The birth and development of the masculine principle in consciousness revolutionizes humanity’s experience of itself and of the world.”[1] It is implied (and often explicitly stated) that “maternal” consciousness is simply amorphous and chaotic, and incapable of an evolutionary move. This is often seen as some justification for the patriarchal mind – that humanity needed to “get away from Mother”. Yet the move out of what might be named as “original participation” as a state of non-reflective consciousness[2] and the move into patriarchal mind appears to have been different things. There is now plenty of evidence of sophisticated, complex, matristic Neolithic societies – insights into “Goddess” cultures pioneered by the work of Marija Gimbutas and Merlin Stone in recent times, and developed by many scholars since. There is knowledge of many pre-patriarchal cultures with highly developed reflective awareness: indigenous traditions knowing deep Wisdom. Peter Reason expresses: It is difficult to believe that these complex societies were based on a pure form of original participation: that there must have been a high degree of purpose, planning and reflexiveness. Yet the social organization was articulated in terms of equality and partnership.[3] Reason also cites Paula Gunn Allen[4] who describes complex and sophisticated gynocratic Native American tribal cultures. He says that these highly developed, self-reflective participative cultures are “not a description of original participation in the sense of being unconscious and unreflective”.[5] And there is cause to suppose that it may well have been the female mind that instigated the radical changes in the way humans did things, that it was her desire for order, storage, abundance, tools, fire, medicine, art etc. that led to many of humanity’s inventions, settlement in villages, writing, counting and social complexification: as Barbara Walker points out, reflecting on the historical and mythic view of motherhood.[6] Walker asserts that it was precisely the female as mother who was the original “civilizing” force, who actually initiated the shift from spatial consciousness into time. The assumption that it must have been a “masculine” quality is perhaps part of the patriarchal mind set, which would rob maternity of its essential active creativity. Judy Grahn develops this notion also with her insights into “menstrual mind”, asserting the primal creativity of such a mind.[7] To fall prey to describing the shift in consciousness as “masculine” is rocky territory, and overly simplistic.
(Poem) The Egg on the Beach by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Piping Plover eggs – By Cape Hatteras National Seashore – 3-egg piping plover nest on Hatteras Island, Public Domain. I promised my Mother, the Great Creatrix of us all,  That when Her soft, strong voice was only infinite silence in my ears, I would come to this shore to breathe with the waves. An odd vow when made on that sunlit, happy, cherished day, But now that dreaded moment is here and I lie on my belly and pound the sand With wounded feet and battered hands scarlet like poppies. I howl, scratch my face to ribbons,  Push every breath from my lungs to still the reverberation Of the barrenness of my sorrowful body. Finally I lay still and remember my final moments with my mother,The loss of she who bore me the cause of my desolation.As she closed her eyes the last time, our two was now only one,And the wave of breath left her now quiescent body.Then, I felt the same grief as when I see overabundant algaeBlooming on the warming lakes,And animals foraging for foodThat no longer grows where it has for millennia.The birch and aspen disappeared,The bees seek flowers that have long since gone by. In answer I hear the waves flowing in and out, a relentless, hopeful heartbeat.I open my eyes and spy an egg on the beach.Tiny, sandy colored with black splotches, broken, its pieces scattered.Even in the midst of so much heart-break,I know that this egg is here becauseHumans have come together to protect it,To cheer each new hatchling as a victory1. By USFWS Mountain-Prairie – Piping plover on shore. Uploaded by Magnus Manske, Public Domain. A chirping warns that a tiny chick,The inhabitant of the broken shell,Is taking her first shaky steps on the shore.I watch in awe and gratitude.Now I see that when my mother’s breath stopped,The love that she brought to the world,Joined with my Mother’s tides and moon pull toEnsure that the waves continued their breathing.The tiny bird breathing with them. Nearby, our Mother is quietly hummingAnd making more fragile, exquisite birds egg masterpieces.We meet Her on the beachAs our human mothers told us to do,And we learn to take our mortal placeAs protectors, stewards, healers, maternal thinkers.What else can we do? In a few weeks the grown bird will fly away south,As its kin has done for millennia,Free for one more year at least.And the eggshell will decay and nourish new beings born in the sand.Next year I will come again to breathe with the waves.I will not pound the sand or howlBut quietly wait and hope that the bird,Now ready to be a mama, returns with a mate,That they will make a nest and fill it with brown speckled eggsAnd I will sing to them in praise with my breath that, for now,Flows in and out, trying to make the world anewWith my Mother, my mother, and another baby bird. Plover feigning a broken wing to protect eggs. By U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Northeast Region – Piping plover feigning broken wing to protect eggs at Ninigret National Wildlife Refuge, Public Domain. https://www.magoism.net/2016/08/meet-mago-contributor-carolyn-lee-boyd
(She Rises 2) Introduction by Trista Hendren

[Author’s Note: This is part of introduction to She Rises, Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality?” forthcoming June Solstice, 2015] Goddess has been a guilty pleasure of mine for the last twenty years, although it wasn’t until my mid-thirties that I was able to fully embrace Her. She had been hidden and demonized throughout my childhood in a way that took me a long time to recover from. I was always the quiet and submissive daughter that I was supposed to be. Once she was fully unveiled, there as no turning back on the rage that I felt and the power that slowly returned to me. This awakening cost me the relationship with my father. It has been a painful realization that my continued silence and subordination was a mandatory requirement for some of my relationships. Despite the loss that I still feel, I cannot revert to the person I once was.
(Prose) Fire, Her Bright Spirit by Deanne Quarrie

In Celtic Tradition our world is composed of Three Realms, those of Land, Sea and Sky. In the midst of these Realms we find the Sacred Grove, the place of flowing together. There the Sacred Fire burns, by the Well of Wisdom, beneath the World Tree. Sacred Fire is that which weaves itself throughout the Three Realms. It connects us and all of life to the Realms as well as to our gods and goddesses. Fire is Sacred Spirit, Sacred Inspiration, without which life would have no meaning. And so we come to Fire. We have taken a look at Body/Earth, Breath/Air, Water/Sacred Source and now Fire/Sacred Inspiration. It is the spark, the flame, the heat of passion. It is what ignites our creativity, fuels our passion and fires our hearts to love. It is the Dance of Life, the joy found in movement, sexual energy and the warmth that germinates new life in seeds. It is the warmth of sunlight on our skin and the ecstatic pleasure of orgasm.
(Poem) The Ballad of Cantalily by Robin Scofield

White terns cross the cobalt mountains turned fire in the river. My name is Riddle speaker, the taste of wings rising. The reflection tastes like mercury, but my teeth are sweet. With faces like catchers’ mitts, the old crones look twice. In my hands I find birds to carry the seed for winter wheat. My name is what the sandpiper says to the river. The wolf moon lights my name, not a snake on the path. My name is not Golondrina, not full throttle at dawn. My name is not Zopilote, yet I eat the dead. My name is not snow goose yet I am invisible. My name stops before limestone slabs in Smuggler’s gap. My name is a train whistle the gates coming down. Robin Scofield is the author of And the Ass Saw the Angel and Sunflower Cantos from Mouthfeel Press. She has poems appearing or forthcoming in Pilgrimage, Cedilla Six, Interstice, and Mezcla II. She is a poetry editor for BorderSenses who lives in El Paso and writes regularly with the Tumblewords Project. “The Ballad of Cantalily” is included in Sunflower Cantos, published by Mouthfeel Press in August of 2012. In the book, Scofield creates her own cosmology, set forth through the mouth of the trickster goddess, Cantalily. Cantalily is a liminal figure both very much of the present as well as of the time before time.
(Poem) Goodbye Vermont by Francesca Tronetti

Omar Rodriguez organizes bodies in the Gerard J. Neufeld funeral home in Elmhurst on April 22, 2020. New York Magazine. 610,000 dead in early August as county fair season starts While we argue over mask mandates in our schools As we fill restaurants and walk into stores faces uncovered While we try to squeeze in a few last weeks of fun in the sun 618,000 dead on August 11 while the Delta variant sweeps through As parents start moving their children into college dorms Stores advertise sales, trying to get people to buy out the stock And now we are hearing about the Lambda variant making a surge School boards vote on mask mandates in community meetings Which are disrupted by shouts and threats, ‘we know who you are’ People wave around copies of the Constitution, The Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist Papers, and the Bible. 624,000 dead on August 18, one thousand more that live in Vermont Another state has fallen to Covid-19, the Pandemic, the life changer American lives have been taken, American work may never be the same But the trauma does not encourage unity and safety, only anger. A hospital in Brevard County Florida sends out an SOS desperate for help Calling in refrigerated trucks which can hold up to 30 bodies each Doctors volunteer to run lab reports back and forth or sit with patients It still is not enough to help an overwhelmed system or nurses in the end. 2021 is surpassing 2020, the Delta variant is more easily communicable But 99% of those who are infected were never vaccinated, it wasn’t real Even now, knowing those who have died, or who have lasting effects of the virus They refuse to get vaccinated, because it’s a hoax, and they still have questions. It will be another year of working from home and online learning Another year of people being unable to pay their rent as the bills pile up But policies which could help, like loan forgiveness, or continued unemployment Are pushed to the side, ridiculed, and dismissed, those in power aren’t hurting. Politicians are entrenched, the Big Lie cannot be countered lest the profit fall So cultists continue to take the microphone, spouting buzzwords and rhetoric Plandemic, it’s all about the children, you will be tried for treason, Trump won I shake my head, how can you be so crazy, how do you not know someone who died? But they do know someone who died, they just don’t care anymore It’s not about taking care of each other, of getting through this nightmare together The madness has set in, the battle lines drawn, and no man’s land is outside the door The next fight will be over boosters, added to the passport I don’t want to write these poems anymore, not for another state They are no longer an outpouring of sadness, a reminder of the dead Instead, now they are my anger and my disbelief at what has happened My country has fractured, a cult has taken the minds of my neighbors. But we cannot deprogram them nor free them from its grasp Because to deprogram them we must stop the leader’s messages We must give them truth, hard facts, show them they have been hurt How can we do that when they have been told they cannot trust truth? We have lost two states worth of people, but they are small states Barely populated, only ranchers and hardy folk who love the elements The next Washington DC, a major metropolis, could fall by Christmas Would that be enough to shake the people out of the fog I wonder. Goodbye Vermont, with your college towns and university campuses No more Vermont cheddar, maple syrup, or Ben and Jerry’s ice cream If only that were true, if only this were confined by the borders of a state Would people care then, if they saw how many we’d lost? A state’s worth? (Meet Mago Contributor) Francesca Tronetti https://www.magoism.net/2018/11/meet-mago-contributor-rev-francesca-tronetti-ph-d/
(Prose) My Body is a Nation by Sara Wright

Photo by Sara Wright “The body is a nation I have not known. The pure joy of air: the moment between leaping from a cliff into the wall of blue below.” Oh, the pure joy of being weightless – I leapt to the stars, flung myself with abandon into the deep until the fire started burning and I was forced to surface for air… I was a stranger to my body, escaping messy feelings by living through my mind. I dressed her, made her behave – learning that I must have control at any cost. I cultivated a winning smile to cover anguish I could not name. Buried all fear. This last one backfired during infancy. I lived pure terror. I had no Voice. It was years before I realized who stole it. Being thin became an obsession. Food the enemy. The eight year old watched. Adoring a mother who stood on the scale who looked down at rising numbers in disgust the child learned. FAT was bad. She starved, a paper doll floating through thin air. Sex was a nightmare. Full of monster men with giant penises. To this day she feels a horror she still can’t name. To be sexual was a sin (and she wasn’t even catholic) so she learned to forget while she let herself be used. She split even further away from this foreign object that betrayed her. No wonder she chose the color red – Mary Magdalene – her only friend. She was born to be a mother but didn’t know how to be one. When Nature finally claimed her she began to fall to Earth. At first the chasm she fell into seemed too deep. Grandmother Moon rose over the mountain. Each month she bathed the woman in numinous white light until one day she longed to feel those moonbeams. Without body her soul was lost. Discarnate. She mourned. Ritual led the way. She vowed to develop a relationship with the one she had scorned. It took a lifetime to heal the split, and even now, against her will, some days she still leaves her precious pearls behind. Ah, the legacy of self abandonment… Postscript: Such a sad story but I think it is a common one for women. Our bodies carry our feelings and if abuse is part of our history, or pain intrudes with regularity for some other reason, then escaping into our minds brings relief. The danger is that this flight into mind and rejection of our bodies may become permanent. In my case, it was discovering the power of ritual that helped me heal my broken body – mind connection. This process began when I reclaimed my Native roots and discovered the power of the Medicine Wheel to orient me to the seasons and ritual celebrations four times a year. World mythology introduced me to the Celtic eight spokes of the year and these cross quarter celebrations seemed to fit the others so I added them to the other four. Finally, I included a monthly full moon ritual because it seemed to me that the moon was my real mother, and this mother celebrated her body. In time these rituals wrote themselves through my dreams, experiences with nature, and with humans. Often my intentions became clear through dreams. Because I wrote all my own rituals each remains fluid and open. I credit my monthly full moon ritual that focused on caring about and for my body as the seed that eventually helped me recover my broken body – mind through Beauty, Love, and Acceptance. (Meet Mago Contributor) Sara Wright

(Special Post 4) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality? A Collective Writing

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, 2014. We have our voices together below and publish them in sequels. It is an ongoing project and we encourage our reader to join us! Submit yours today to Helen Hwang (magoism@gmail.com). Or visit and contact someone in Return to Mago’s Partner Organizations.] Yvonne Lucia: “Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.” -British suffragist and journalist Rebecca West “When the God is male, the male is God.” -Mary Daly Yvonne Lucia sacredartportal.com Lila Moore: My first piece of performance art was a ritual inspired by Isis. However, as a young artist, my interest in combining art and ritual was devalued by my teachers and critics alike. I felt isolated and persecuted. Only after relocating to London was I able to gradually understand that my personal and creative aspiration was integral part of a collective and global feminine and feminist awakening. I realised that personal experiences of women have political perspectives, and that being a contemporary woman artist positions me in the midst of historical and cultural enterprise. As an artist-film-maker and scholar, I have regarded my work as a spiritual quest, exploring through dance-ritual and art films the interaction of the body and psyche with the natural environment and technology. In the 21st century, my interest in the healing and transforming aspects of images on screen has been combined with a growing sense of activism. It seems inconceivable to take images of nature out of context by ignoring the ecological holocaust which is evident everywhere. I have felt compelled to ask whether the needs of the body and mind can be separated from the needs of the Earth?
(Special Post 1) Nine-Headed Dragon Slain by Patriarchal Heroes: A Cross-cultural Discussion by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s Note: This and the ensuing eight sequels (all nine parts) are a revised version of the discussion that has taken place in The Mago Circle, Facebook group, since September 24, 2017 to the present. Themes are introduced and interwoven in a somewhat random manner, as different discussants lead the discussion. The topic of the number nine is key to Magoism, primarily manifested as Nine Magos or the Nine Mago Creatrix. Mago Academy hosts a virtual and actual event, Nine Day Mago Celebration, annually.] Helen Hwang: I am thinking of the Nine Goddess/Mago Symbolism or Nine Numerology. Insights connect the data that I have collected, otherwise seemingly unrelated across cultures and periods. We have reasons to celebrate the nine symbolism among us. As seen in this discussion below, Hercules is most aptly equated with Huangdi (Yellow Emperor, 2698–2598 BCE), one of the forebear emperors of ancient China, who is alleged to have defeated Chiu (successor of Goma), the representative of Danguk’s Nine Giants (nine sub-states). The Magoist history writes the other way around. Chiu won the war, the archetypal international/global war waged over the defense/overthrow of the Magoist throne. Old Magoists (Danguk founded by Goma) of Nine Queen-led States defended the rebellion of the patrilocal force, represented by the Huangdi. With this victory, Old Magoist Confederacy of nine sub-states was able to maintain gynocentric peace of the ancient world for about five centuries longer until a man, Yao, rose to give a way for the establishment of the first patriarchal rule, ancient China of the Xia Dynasty (c. 2070 BCE – c. 1600 BCE). Nonetheless, patriarchal ethnocentric Sinocentric historiography has proliferated to this day. Yu, the founder of the Xia dynasty, is depicted as the hero who slains the nine-headed snake. What I am saying is here that the Nine Goddess/Symbolism is pre-patriarchal in origin and possibly speaks of the same event across cultures! The slain of nine-headed snakes or dragons indicates the usurpation of gynocentric rule by a patriarchal hero across cultures. Let me show you some available information and images to open the discussion. Lernaean Hydra 1 oz Copper | The 12 Labors of Hercules “Hercules was sent to slay the Lernaean Hyrda for his second Labor. The multi-headed, snake-like monster was defeated by Hercules after he sliced its one mortal head. The last day to purchase the 1 oz Copper Lernaean Hyrda was the November 12, 2014. There is, however, time to order the 5 oz Copper Hercules Round, and 5 oz Silver Hercules Round. To read about Hercules and his 12 Labors, check out our blog for more information. If you enjoy the 12 Labors of Hercules coin series, take a look at more Silver and Copper coin collections offered by Provident Metals. After defeating the Nemean Lion, Hercules was sent to slay the Lernaean Hydra for his second labor. The Hydra, a snake-like beast with multiple heads, was raised by Hera to destroy Hercules — making this an inevitable match up. In the face-off between Hercules and Hydra, the son of Zeus used a sword to slice off each of the creature’s necks, according to one popular tale. When the heads grew back, Hercules enlisted his nephew to burn each of the necks to halt regrowth. The Hydra had one mortal head, however; so Hercules used his golden sword to slay the mutant and complete his second labor. The beast is displayed on the Second Labor coin, to be released in the 12 Labors of Hercules Series. The reverse features the multi-headed Hydra in a striking position, displaying the daunting task Hercules faced. LERNAEAN HYDRA and II are inscribed. The familiar obverse portraying Hercules with the Nemean Lion draped over his head as armor is shown on this round, as it will be on each round in the powerful series. “1 oz CMXCIX (999 in Roman numerals) FINE COPPER” is also displayed. The 1 oz. Copper Lernaean Hydra rounds will only be available for one month from Oct. 12 through Nov. 12. Make sure to keep your 12 Labors of Hercules Series collection current before time runs out! 12 Labors of Hercules Driven crazy by Hera, Hercules slew his family — only regretful after recovering his sanity. King Thespius purified the son of Zeus, but to atone for his crimes, he was sent to serve King Eurystheus. Eurystheus ordered Hercules to execute 10 Labors, which were a series of tasks carried out as penance for his actions. Hercules successfully completed all 10, but because his nephew helped with one and he planned to accept payment for another, Eurystheus forced Hercules to finish two more Labors alone. Hercules’ Labors adhere to the traditional order of the Bibliotheca: Nemean Lion – Sept. 12, 2014 Lernaean Hydra – Oct. 12, 2014 Ceryneian Hind – Nov. 12, 2014 Erymanthian Boar – Dec. 12, 2014 Augean Stables – Jan. 12, 2015 Stymphalian Birds – Feb. 12, 2015 Cretan Bull – March 12, 2015 Mares of Diomedes – April 12, 2015 Girdle of Hippolyta – May 12, 2015 Cattle of Geryon – June 12, 2015 Apples of Hesperides – July 12, 2015 Cerberus – Aug. 12, 2015 Commemorate the historic battle between Hercules and the Lernaean Hydra with this 1 oz copper round from Provident Metals.” https://www.providentmetals.com/1-oz-copper-lernaean-hydra-the-12-labors-of-hercules.html Helen Hwang: I looked for the answer to this question: How many heads did the Hydra originally have? It is nine, which accords with its icons to be shared shortly. Helen Hwang: Check out Nine-fold or Nine-Headed Phoenix. Not all iconographies of pre-modern China vilify the nine symbolism, which indicates the influence/presence/revival of Magoism. This image is much reminiscent of the blue crane with nine feathers, a Magoist symbol that we have seen in Mago Stronghold, Mt. Jiri during Mago Pilgrimage (to be discussed in another space). “This Qing-dynasty (1644-1911) print shows the nine-headed phoenix, a being from Chinese mythology with a bird’s body and nine heads with human faces. It is one of several hybrid creatures mentioned in the Classic of Mountains and Seas (Shanhai jing), where it is […]
(Special Post) To Contributors: Strengthening Our Roots by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Dear Contributors, Do you know that Return to Mago (RTM) E*Magazine is entering its fifth year this fall? And, thanks to our collective effort, we are still growing! As of today, our contributors have grown to more than 130 in number and our readership is from about 140 countries around the world. We have some hundred email followers as well as Wordpress blog followers. We draw 3000-4000 clicks per month on average; that is no small accomplishment for a Goddess blog that is named after a yet-to-be heard word, Mago (the Great Goddess), and that began from scratch.

Lammas – the Sacred Consuming by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Lammas, the first seasonal transition after Summer Solstice, may be summarised as the Season that marks and celebrates the Sacred Consuming, the Harvest of Life. Many indigenous cultures recognised the grain itself as Mother … Corn Mother being one of those images – She who feeds the community, the world, with Her own body: the Corn, the grain, the food, the bread, is Her body. She the Corn Mother, or any other grain Mother, was/is the original sacrifice … no need for extraordinary heroics: it is the nature of Her being. She is sacrificed, consumed, to make the people whole with Her body (as the word “sacrifice” means “to make whole”). She gives Herself in Her fullness to feed the people …. the original Communion. In cultures that preceded agriculture or were perhaps pastoral – hunted or bred animals for food – this cross-quarter day may not have been celebrated, or perhaps it may have been marked in some other way. Yet even in our times when many are not in relationship with the harvest of food directly, we may still be in relationship with our place: Sun and Earth and Moon still do their dance wherever you are, and are indeed the Ground of one’s being here … a good reason to pay attention and homage, and maybe as a result, and in the process, get the essence of one’s life in order. One does not need to go anywhere to make this pilgrimage … simply Place one’s self. The seasonal transition of Lammas may offer that in particular, being a “moment of grace” – as Thomas Berry has named the seasonal transitions, when the dark part of the day begins to grow longer, as the cloak of darkness slowly envelopes the days again: it is timely to reflect on the Dark Cosmos in Whom we are, from Whom we arise and to Whom we return – and upon that moment when like Corn Mother we give ourselves over. This reflection is good, will serve a person and all – to live fully, as well as simply to be who we are: this dark realm of manifesting is the core of who we are. And what difference might such reflection make to our world – personal and collective – to live in this relationship with where we are, and thus who we are. We all are the grain that is harvested and all are Her harvest … perhaps one may use a different metaphor: the truth that may be reflected upon at this seasonal moment after the peaking of Sun’s light at Summer Solstice and the wind down into Autumn, is that everything passes, all fades away … even our Sun shall pass. All is consumed. So What are we part of? (I write it with a capital because surely it is a sacred entity) And how might we participate creatively? We are Food – whether we like it or not … Lammas is a good time to get with the Creative plot, though many find it the most difficult, or focus on more exoteric celebration. May we be interesting food[i]. We are holy Communion, like Corn Mother. Meet Mago Contributor Glenys Livingstone NOTES: [i] This is an expression of cosmologist Brian Swimme in Canticle to the Cosmos DVD series.
(Art & Poem) Candelmas/Imbolc by Sudie Rakusin & Annie Finch

IMBOLC DANCE From the east she has gathered like wishes. She has woven a night into dawn. We are quickening ivy. We grow where her warmth melts out over the ice. Now spiral south bends into flame to push the morning over doors. The light swings wide, green with the pulse of seasons, and we let her in We are quickening ivy. We grow The light swings wide, green with the pulse till the west is rocked by darkness pulled from where the fire rises. Shortened time’s reflecting water rakes her through the thickened cold. Hands cover north smooth with emptiness, stinging the mill of night’s hours. Wait with me. See, she comes circling over the listening snow to us. Shortened time’s reflecting water Wait with me. See, she comes circling From Calendars (Tupelo Press, 2003) Art is included in Celebrating Seasons of the Goddess (Mago Books, 2017). (Meet Mago Contributor) Sudie Rakusin (Meet Mago Contributor) Annie Finch
(Essay) Conceiving, Imagining the New at Samhain by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

It is the Season of Samhain/Deep Autumn in the Southern Hemisphere at this time. In the PaGaian version of Samhain/Deep Autumn ceremony participants journey to the “Luminous World Egg” … a term taken from Starhawk in her book The Spiral Dance[i], where she also names that place as the “Shining Isle”, which is of course, the Seed of conception, a metaphor for the origins of all and/or the female egg: it is the place for rebirth. Artist: Bundeluk, Blue Mountains, Australia. The “luminous world egg” is a numinous place within, the MotherStar of conception: that is, a place of unfolding/becoming. The journey to this numinous place within requires first a journey back, through some of each one’s transformations, however each may wish to name those transformations at this time. The transformations for each and every being are infinite in their number, for there is “nothing we have not been” as has been told by Celts and others of Old, and also by Western science in the evolutionary story (a story told so well by evolutionary biologist Elisabet Sahtouris, particularly in her video Journey of a Silica Atom.) Ceremonial participants may choose selves from biological, present historical self, or may choose selves from the mythic with whom they feel connection; from any lineage – biological or otherwise. Selves may also be chosen from Gaia’s evolutionary story – earlier creatures, winged or scaled ones … with whom one wishes to identify at this time. Each participant is praised for their “becoming” for each self they share. When all have completed these journeys/stories of transformation, the circle is lauded dramatically by the celebrant for their courage to transform; and she likens them all to Gaia Herself who has made such transitions for eons. The celebrant awards each with a gingerbread snake, “Gaian totems of life renewed”[ii]. gingerbread snakes Participants sit and consume these gingerbread snakes in three parts: (i) as all the “old shapes” of self that were named; and (ii) remembering the ancestors, those whose lives have been harvested, whose lives have fed our own, remembering that we too are the ancestors, that we will be consumed; and (iii) remembering and consuming the stories of our world that they desire to change, the stories that fire their wrath or sympathy: in the consuming, absorbing them (as we do), each may transform them by thoughts and actions – “in our own bodyminds”. When all that is consumed “wasting no part”, it is said that “we are then free to radiate whatever we conceive”, to “exclaim the strongest natural fibre known” – our creative selves, “into such art, such architecture, as can house a world made sacred” by our building[iii]. This “natural fibre” is a reference to the spider’s thread from within her own body, with which she weaves her web, her home; and Spider has frequently been felt in indigenous cultures around the globe as Weaver and Creator of the Cosmos. Spider the Creatrix, North America, C. 1300 C.E., Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess, p.13 In the ceremony, participants linked with a thread that they weave around the circle, may sail together for a new world “across the vast sunless sea between endings and beginnings, across the Womb of magic and transformation, to the “Not-Yet” who beckons”[iv]: to the Luminous World Egg whereupon the new may be conceived and dreamed up. Samhain/Deep Autumn ceremony is an excellent place for co-creating ourselves, for imaginingthe More that we may become, and wish to become. This is where creation and co-creation happens … in the Womb of Space[v], in which we are immersed – at all times: and Samhain is a good season for feeling it. References: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005 Sahtouris, Elisabet. Earthdance: Living Systems in Evolution. Lincoln NE:iUniversity Press, 2000. Starhawk, The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. NY: Harper and Row, 1999. Swimme, Brian. The Earth’s Imagination.DVD series 1998. NOTES: [i]p.210 [ii]a version of this Samhain script is offered in Chapter 7 PaGaian Cosmology [iii]These quoted phrases are from Robin Morgan, “The Network of the Imaginary Mother”, in Lady of the Beasts, p.84. This poem is a core inspiration of the ceremony. [iv]“Not-Yet” is a term used by Brian Swimme, The Earth’s Imagination, video 8 “The Surprise of Cosmogenesis”. [v]note that creation does not happen at the point of some god’s index finger, as imagined in the Sistine Chapel – what a takeover that is!
(Essay) Walking with Bb by Sara Wright

Walking with Bb: a story exploring the psychic connection between one woman and her bear. Preface: The black bear – hunting season in Maine is brutal – four months of bear hell – five if one includes the month where hunters can track bears for “practice” with hounds – separate mothers and cubs, terrorize them, tree them and do anything but legally kill them. During the legal slaughter, Hunters bait bears with junk food by putting old donuts etc. in cans and shoot the bear while he or she is eating. Most bears (82 percent) are slaughtered in this manner, the rest are killed by hounding and trapping. The season begins in August and lasts through December. Trapping, by the way, is illegal in every state but Maine. Black bears are hated, and that hatred will, of course, eventually result in their extirpation. I had a shy (male) year old black bear visiting my house this past summer with whom I developed a friendship, and what follows is part of our story: Last Saturday I was walking down the road when I remembered that I had not done my daily “circle of protection” imaging for Bb (standing as he was the day he visited me at the window early in August). When I began to do this another picture of Bb moving on all four feet with his face turned towards mine super-imposed itself over his standing image. I could almost see his expression, but not quite. I didn’t know what this imaging meant beyond that we were communicating in some unknown way, and he was in the area (not a good thing on hunting Saturdays). He had not been coming in most nights and I was worried… That night he came. He is still making nightly visits five days later, the most sequentially consistent visits since September 15th, the day I believed that he had been shot. This experience prompted me to write about telepathy and precognition. It is close to All Hallows and the full Hunter’s moon (Nov 3). I keep listening to Charlie Russell’ story which reminds me that loving bears (especially male bears) is hard, almost a sure recipe for disaster, and that I was not alone in this deep concern for and fear of losing Bb. I can barely stand to remember my other bear losses and I can’t stand feeling them. Even after I wrote about the incident with Bb, the experience seemed to carry a charge that didn’t dissipate. Had I missed something? Next I wrote “Root Healer,” exploring the possibility that as I continued to act as Bb’s “little bear mother” now employing psychic techniques to keep him safe (in some desperation as it was the only means left open to me to protect this very vulnerable yearling), that Bb’s presence might also include a gift for me and that it might involve some kind of root healing for my body because Nature thrives on reciprocity. One idea I missed completely, for it was so obvious. Bb’s image was communicating to me that we were having a psychic conversation in that very moment. It was the first time in three months of imaging protective circles that moved with him that I had confirmation from him that we were communicating effectively in this unknown way. This rarely happens. Normally when I do this kind of work, I just do it. I don’t get direct confirmation that it’s working from the animal itself (except with Lily b). Knowing this helped me make another decision I might not have made so intentionally. The hunting season will last into mid December, and I will be traveling during that last month. I keep thinking that putting actual physical distance between Bb and I might pose more of a threat for his life and I have to remind myself that psychic phenomena are not distance dependent. I should be able to image that protective circle every day and feel that it is working. Bb has already shown me that it can but I fear adding distance because I don’t completely trust my own perceptions.* I suspect believing might be an additional dimension of ensuring success when it comes to psychic protection for this bear. But how do I incorporate belief into a picture that is so clouded with personal/cultural doubt? Half the time I don’t believe myself and virtually no one except Rupert Sheldrake, Iren and Harriet have ever taken my experiences seriously. I have to remind myself that I have done this work many times dealing with doubt and it worked anyway. The point of writing this reflection might be to put me on a new edge of increasing Bb’s odds of survival. If it’s possible that an attitude that embraces believing in what I do could help me protect Bb more effectively until hunting is over and its time for him to den in peace I want to claim it. The question I need to answer now is how to go about moving into a more trusting self as a woman who continues to walk with a bear at her side? The night after I wrote the above paragraph I dream of the doubters in the roles of my parents, and in a friend. I take these dreams seriously as doubters inside me and out. These dreams may be telling me that it is unreasonable to expect me to believe that what I do works when no one else does? The problem with this idea is that on some level I do believe. I feel as if I am walking with this bear, every single day. I think about him constantly. The only thing that got me out of the house yesterday was that he was out of chocolate donuts. Something is intensifying my relationship with Bb although I never see him. I am caught in a field of bear energy and information, perhaps through some version of beauty and the beast. That an archetype is …
(Poem) Samhain by Annie Finch

In the season leaves should love, since it gives them leave to move through the wind, towards the ground they were watching while they hung, legend says there is a seam stitching darkness like a name. Now when dying grasses veil earth from the sky in one last pale wave, as autumn dies to bring winter back, and then the spring, we who die ourselves can peel back another kind of veil that hangs among us like thick smoke. Tonight at last I feel it shake. I feel the nights stretching away thousands long behind the days, till they reach the darkness where all of me is ancestor. I turn my hand and feel a touch move with me, and when I brush my young mind across another, I have met my mother’s mother. Sure as footsteps in my waiting self, I find her, and she brings arms that hold answers for me, intimate, waiting, bounty: “Carry me.” She leaves this trail through a shudder of the veil, and leaves, like amber where she stays, a gift for her perpetual gaze. From Eve (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2010) (Meet Mago Contributor) Annie Finch
Imbolc: Through Goddess Eyes by Carolyn Lee Boyd

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

(Goma Article Excerpt 2) Goma, the Shaman Ruler of Old Magoist East Asia/Korea and Her Mythology by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: This essay was first included in Goddesses in Myth, History and Culture, published in 2018 by Mago Books]. Background Discussions Hanung (Her Title) and Sindansu (Divine Goma Tree) We will peel off the layers of patriarchal and Sinocentric devices that conceal her unparalleled supreme manifestations. In a conventional interpretation, we are told that Goma and Hanung are two different persons as the mother and the father of Dangun. This proves to be an androcentric invention to divest Goma of supremacy. Goma is not the consort of Hanung. Nor Hanung the male counterpart of Goma. Goma and Hanung refer to the same figure, not a heterosexual couple. It is her title (Hanung 桓雄) that is split from her (Goma) and made into a male ruler. Androcentric interpreters have noted the two homonyms “Ung (熊 bear)” and “Ung (雄 hero)” but made them two different figures. Thus, they deem that the former “Ung” refers to Ungnyeo, the bear-woman, whereas the latter “Ung” to Hanung, the male ruler. However, the latter “Ung” does not mean a male. It is true that logographic characters are characteristically polysemic. And Ung is no exception as it means “a hero,” “a great person,” or “a male bird.” When it is used to mean a male, it refers to a male bird or animal. The literal meaning of Hanung should be the heroic ruler (Sovereign) of Han (the People of the Creatrix). In short, the character “Ung (Hero),” as is in Cheonung (天雄 Heavenly Hero) and Sinung (神雄 Divine Hero), refers to Goma, the heroic founding ruler (Sovereign) of Danguk. The idea that Hanung is the male ruler remains unsupported. First of all, the present myth is rife with female symbols and images including the cave initiation, the divine tree, conception, and procreation. Indeed, the Goma myth is a completely pacific or rather pacifying story, void of conquering, killing or raping. Secondly, the idea of Hanung as a male founder is left without a direct connection with the bear clan (Ungjok) and the Goma words, a topic to be explicated in detail at a later section. Most critically, if Hanung were the male ruler, his association with Sindansu would be too superficial to give due meaning to the Korean foundation myth. The present myth ascertains that the protagonist of the Sindansu (Divine Goma Tree) motif is a female. Sindansu, the tree of life or the world tree, to be explicated at a later section, is credited with one of the most pivotal mythemes, if not the most, of the Korean foundation myth. It is the cosmic tree, which Goma envisioned for the common origin of all beings from the Triad Creatrix and prayed for conception without a male partner. The syllable, “dan (檀)” in “Sindansu,” refers to the divine tree in Mount Taebaek. It is the eponymous root of the terms that indicate the Goma people. It is used in such words as Danguk (Goma State), Dangun (Head of the Goma State), and Danmok (Goma Tree), to name a few. Note that “Danguk was the strongest among the states of the bear clan,” headed by queens,[1] indicating that Danguk was the the confederal mother state that led the nine daughter states. Put differently, Danguk represents the matriarchal (magocratic, referring to a society ruled by a Magoist shaman queen) confederacy of the bear clan states.[2] Goma’s alternative epithets including “Ungssi-ja (Decendant of the Goma Clan), “Ungssi-wang” (Ruler of the Goma Clan), and “Ungssi-gun” (Head of the Goma Clan) substantiate that she is the ruler and head of the bear clan.[3] Also note that Dangun, Goma’s dynastic successor, “was enthroned as the Descendant of Heavenly Sovereign, as she established the capital in Danmok, Asadal, succeeding Danguk.”[4] Danmok is another word for Sindansu. Its alternative meaning “the birch” comes from the sound of “bakdal (박달).” Prominent Koreanists tend to agree that the character “dan” is related to “barkdal (밝달),” “baekdal (백달),” and “baedal (배달),” all of which indicate the Korean people.[5] However, they do not seem to see the multi-connection among Sindansu, Danmok, Baedal and Goma (Ungnyeo). Thus, they fail to see the Magoist context of the Goma myth. The Goma myth is about Danmok and Sindansu, Goma’s tree in Mount Taeback (Great Resplendence). The Divine Tree of Mount Taebaek is wherein Hanung Goma descended to rule the world. Goma has been commemorated as Ungsang (熊常Eternal Tree) and Dangmok (堂木 Shrine Tree) throughout history. The Goma tree sheds light on the origin of the tree worship in Korea and beyond. According to the Handan Gogi, the veneration of Ungsang originated from the time of Danguk and revived throughout the period of Dangun Joseon.[6] In traditional Korea, it is enshrined as Dangmok (Shrine Tree) in village shrines, Seonhwang-dang. It is not haphazard that Korean women are noted for their prayers of conception under the shrine tree. Splitting Goma into Ungnyeo and Hanung has resulted in awkward phraseology especially concerning her procreation in the story. Ultimately, it proves to be an androcentric device to dismiss the mytheme of her parthenogenetic birth to a child, the virgin birth, a contradictory concept to the patriarchal mindset. She, the shaman queen of the bear clan, was enthroned as Hanung, the dynastic founder Hanung of Danguk. Also, her offspring, Dangun, is the new queen-founder of Joseon who succeeded Danguk, rather than her biological son. The Goma myth is the story of a polity not a family. I maintain that the shaman rulers in Old Magoism (Hanguk, Danguk, and Joseon) are predominantly women.[7] In addition to “Hanung,” other titles of Goma include “Cheongwang (天王 Heavenly Ruler),” “Cheonung (天雄Heavenly Sovereign),” “Sinung (神雄 Divine Sovereign),” “Cheonhwang (天皇 Heavenly Empress),” “Seonhwang (仙皇Immortal Empress), and “Daeung (大雄Great Hero).” The Goma worship in Korean culture remains too pervasive to be recognized. As suggested in these alternative epithets, it has shaped the landscape of Korean popular religions, in particular Shamanism and Buddhism. Most prominently, the Goma worship manifests in the form of revering the Shrine Tree (Dangmok) in Seonhwang-dang (Seonghwang-dang or …
(Photo Essay 2) ‘Gaeyang Halmi, the Sea Goddess of Korea’ by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Part II: The Lost Iconography of Gaeyang Halmi We visited the Suseong Shrine a second time on July 11, 2012. I looked inside the Shrine wherein a shaman ritual was being performed by a Mudang (Korean Shaman)[i] and her assistants. The Mudang in colorful ritual outfit appeared to console her female client on behalf of the spirit. The ritual continued another hour or so and we waited outside until she finished her performance. We had come here on the day of arrival in Jungmak-dong, Buan. The shrine was locked, apparently not being in use. On our second visit, the shrine was packed with four people and their instruments and equipment. It was so compact that it left no room for another person to sit; however, it was pumping up the sober energy. In fact, I have no recollection of which musical instruments were being played inside the shrine. Nonetheless, it feels like that I was hearing the sharp and high banging of the kkwaenggwari (gong) accompanied by the janggu (hourglass drum) rhythm [symbolizing the sound of thunder and rain respectively]. The “musical” sound that I heard shook off the debris of ordinary thoughts and took me to the Other Side of Reality. I began to see things clearly the way they are. I was stepping into the history of this place that I was going to discover.
(Essay 1) Returning Home with Mago, the Great Goddess, from East Asia by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: This essay was first published in Trivia, Voices of Feminism, Issue 6, September 2007.] I come from Korea. When I say I came from Korea, I do not mean “Korea” in a nationalistic sense. Nationalism, reinforced by international politics as a cardinal rule of the global community, precludes the agency of women; it is a game of the patriarchal controllers. When I say I am Korean, I mean I am a Magoist Korean, a gynocentric Korean. My Korean identity refers to my cultural and historical root. Fortunately, I have found my Korean gynocentric root in the tradition of Mago, the Great Goddess, from East Asia.1