At the Dark of the Moon

Introspection, trance work, self-evalution

Dream work

Fast or eat sparingly

Don't overwork

Wrap yourself in a covering or veil of some kind, arranged so you can breathe properly (oxygen deprivation is not an essential part of the experience.)

I especially like some slow and evocative sound for this--Tibetan temple bells, for example.

Close your eyes and go into a cave. As you go deeper in, the light becomes fainter and fainter, and you have to feel your way with your feet and hands.

The passageway becomes narrower, and more difficult to negotiate. You go deeper and deeper into the earth.

Then after a time you will suddenly lose your footing and go floating in free fall, around and around, down the passageway, until you land in a cavern deep inside the earth.

There you may find something, or you may meet someone.

You may be told something you need to know, or you may be given something to take back with you.

Perhaps you will find or be given something that must remain in the cavern, but which you can return to again.

When you are ready to leave the cavern, you will find that you can float up and out the passageway, by the same way you came.

Then you will find your footing, and make you way along the passage, feeling with your feet and hands, until you return to the mouth of the cave.

Smithsonian Article

The Air Tide Flows

This season, between Beltane and Midsummer, is called the Time of Change--possibly because Beltane is one of the two hinges of the year that herald dramatic changes in energy and conditions.

The crops are sown, and now the fragile seedlings must take root and grow. The fields must be weeded and watered, relatively light work if diligently done. But now, the outcome of the past season's sowing depends on the vagaries of chance; the weather, the whims of marauding birds, forest creatures, otherworld spirits.

The veils between the worlds that opened at Beltane still remain thin. Connections are loose. All things are possible. The Lady and Lord, wholly absorbed with each other, leave their children to shift for themselves.

The time is more auspicious for divining than for sorcery. The lot-casting methods--the runes, Tarot, geomancy, the I Ching--will be the most effective ones.

On the Waning Moon

End projects and relationships
Sell property
Clean house
Sort and throw things away
Prune, weed and cut back
Harvest root crops
Trip hair or nails to make them grow more slowly

Auspicious for:
Vacations and retreats
Evaluations and examinations
Magical workings for cleansing, banishing, warding, protection and exorcism
Surgery (wounds will bleed less)

GRADUATION EDIQUETTE

1. NO CELL PHONE USE DURING THE GRADUATION

a) No Calls Please!

b) No Texting Please!

c) TURN THE CELL PHONE OFF. THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

d) No Talking to Your Neighbor Once You Are Seated On Stage!

2. NO SLEEPING DURING THE PROGRAM

a) Pease Be Alert and Pay Attention Through-Out the Entirety of the Program - Speeches and Presentations.

b) We want our Graduates to Feel Special, and the Audience to SEE That You Believe Them To Be Special, and the Graduation Ceremony as well.

3. REMINDER! IF YOUR NAME DOES NOT APPEAR ON THE GRADUATION PROGRAM, DO NOT APPROACH THE PODIUM/MICORPHONE - AT ANY TIME!!!

THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!!

This was on the faculty seats on the stage along with our commencement programs, for us to peruse for our edification after we processed in.

We are not in the Ivy League, here. The sound system didn't work, and the keynote speaker was pretty tiresome, a fledgling local politician who was not only boring, which is par for the course, but embarrassingly off-topic. She grabbed us as captive audience for her campaign speech, only acknowledging our new AA graduates for a moment at the end, to encourage them to be inspired by her example. At least so I gathered, through the deficiencies of the sound system.

But the musical numbers were great, in spite of the sound system. We don't worry much about test scores around here, but we have got rhythm.

And our valedictorian was splendid, as is often the case. This year, a middle-aged Filipina with an articulate and radical economic agenda to save public education, which had a mostly black and brown crowd of 1500 standing and cheering. Somebody out there ought to be listening.

Merry May!

A Tree Song

Rudyard Kipling

Of all the trees that grow so fair,

Old England to adorn,

Greater are none beneath the Sun,

Than Oak, and Ash, and Thorn.

Sing Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, good sirs,

(All of a Midsummer morn!)

Surely we sing no little thing,

In Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Oak of the Clay lived many a day,

Or ever AEneas began.

Ash of the Loam was a lady at home,

When Brut was an outlaw man.

Thorn of the Down saw New Troy Town

(From which was London born);

Witness hereby the ancientry

Of Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Yew that is old in churchyard-mould,

He breedeth a mighty bow.

Alder for shoes do wise men choose,

And beech for cups also.

But when ye have killed, and your bowl is spilled,

And your shoes are clean outworn,

Back ye must speed for all that ye need,

To Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Ellum she hateth mankind, and waiteth

Till every gust be laid,

To drop a limb on the head of him

That anyway trusts her shade:

But whether a lad be sober or sad,

Or mellow with ale from the horn,

He will take no wrong when he lieth along

'Neath Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Oh, do not tell the Priest our plight,

Or he would call it a sin;

But - we have been out in the woods all night,

A-conjuring Summer in!

And we bring you news by word of mouth-

Good news for cattle and corn-

Now is the Sun come up from the South,

With Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Sing Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, good sirs

(All of a Midsummer morn):

England shall bide till Judgment Tide,

By Oak and Ash and Thorn!