The Ice of Change

On Runes, Solidarity, and Not Being Okay

“what didn’t you do to bury mebut you forgot that I was a seed” — Dinos Christianopoulos, 1978“They tried to bury us, they didn’t know we were seeds.”— Mexican Activists, 2013

It’s okay to not be okay.

I know I’m not the first person to type or say these words, but this week? I’m repeating them for myself.

Times are rough. Really rough. Folks are freezing in detention camps, on the streets, and in their homes. People don’t have enough food. The pandemic still holds us in its grip.

We all know these are perilous times. Well, except perhaps for those insulated by so much wealth they can avoid seeing anything beyond the golden latches on their doors or their trips to Cancun.

That said, together, we’ve done our best. We’ve done well. We’ve helped each other. We’ve made countless pots of soup. We’ve wiped noses. We’ve figured out how to work online, or get through endless holds with unemployment. We’ve kept our children fed, somehow. Gotten some exercise. Binged some television. Maybe even read a book or three.

But dealing with rolling wave of disaster after disaster with no end apparent?

It’s hard, my friends. And I’m feeling that this week.

One morning, after meditation and prayer, I puled a rune. I wanted insight. Some advice, maybe.

Carved into the wood, was a sort of H shape. Hagalaz. The hail stone.

“Shit,” I said, as a first reaction. “Thanks.”

While that “thanks” was tinged with a sarcastic “thanks a lot” it also led me to ponder what pulling that rune might mean.

We are, of course, in the midst of massive ice and snow storms in much of the American continent. The rune is partially a reflection of that.

But Hagalaz not only signals the ice of destruction that lays waste to crops…

Hagalaz is not only “the sickness of serpents”…

Hagalaz is also “the coldest of grains” and a reminder that the ice will melt, and water the fields, so something new can grow. In its other form, which looks like a cross hatched, simple snowflake, it is said to hold the seed of creation within the heart of destruction.

I often relate Hagalaz to the Tower in Tarot. Some have said we’ve been living in the Tower for a long time.

The old ways are crumbling, struck by lightning. We tumble through the air, not certain when, or if, we will ever land.

“We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old.” — Solidarity Forever

This week’s reminder of the seed of creation embedded in the center of destruction reminds me that:

Within ourselves, we have the power to destroy.

Within ourselves, we have the power to create.

We are—right now, if we choose it—seeding the possibility of a better new world that can and will grow from the charred and soggy rubble of the old.

Every action we take that says we still believe in one another…

Every poem written and song sung…

Every time we say “no” to the machinery of greed and oppression…

Every meal shared…

Every hard conversation had…

Every defiant facing off with eyes mirrored behind shields and visors, tasers and guns…

Every dream and vision spoken out loud…

Everything we love and act to protect…

All of these are seeds.

So yes, these are the worst times I’ve lived through—and I’ve survived some very bad times, and acknowledge that others have not survived. But the bad times I’ve lived through? They were all leading up to this. They were all part of the long, slow, shaking of the Tower crumbling, and the hailstones hitting.

And all these years, those I love have been frantically planting seeds.

Times are bad. It’s okay to not be okay. But please know, that even in your worst struggling, and even on the days you might give up, seeds are being planted, everywhere.

You are not alone.

We are all planting and germinating, and nurturing together.

February, 2021

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This is reader-funded writing. One thousand blessings for my Patreon supporters, who make this work possible, every month. You’re the best.

Waking Up Worried

the day after the inauguration…

(I began a different essay this month, but it will have to wait. As Inauguration Day wore on, my brief flash of joy that Trump was gone slowly descended into feeling not right. I slept for ten hours—a feat for me—and woke up uneasy. Worried. For those of you still breathing sighs of relief, I don’t blame you. But my worry is still present and quite real. I needed to write about it. I hope you don’t mind.)

There is no ebullience in my heart today. No sense of relief. Instead, pressure pushes at my chest. It takes concentration to sink back into meditation. To follow my breath. Listen to the whir of the furnace kicking on. Watch the flickering candle flame.

The pressure on my chest is a deep sense of worry.

The trauma isn’t over. The healing has nowhere near begun.

Perhaps this is a vestige of my childhood trauma, reaching up to grip my heart with its tiny, fragile, fist. That fist knows the tyrant is never really gone. Perhaps he is sleeping. Or drunk in a bar. Or off building houses. That tiny fist knows that violence is random, quick, irrational, and never far away.

There is always another shoe, waiting to drop.

Yes, perhaps that is some part of this.

But that is not all this worry is.

I’ve worried for months, of course, about what will happen when people’s unemployment runs out, or when the eviction moratoriums cease. I’ve shouted at politicians since March about rent and mortgage freezes and forgiveness, not this deferral of future disaster.

But at least for the past six months or so, I knew that as many of us as possible were pulling together to make sure people were taken care of if it was at all within our power. We shared resources. Gathered food and delivered water. Checked on neighbors. Taught children. Showed up for Black and Indigenous communities…

I did not have to worry that all the people who only woke up to realize there was a problem in our country back in 2018 would fall back into complacent sleep.

But I’m worried about that now.

Worried that the status quo will return to its oppressive, crushing equilibrium inside us, and be an unshakeable force once more.

We must still shake the tree, my friends. We must still share what resources we have. We must still rage in the streets. We must still hold fast to one another and make sure that we don’t starve, or founder in exhaustion, or drown.

Love does not sleep, my friends. Love keeps watch on what it loves.

Love also keeps watch on the enemies of love.

Now that the proximate threat has flown off in a helicopter, do we even see the danger anymore?

There is no “wait and see.”

There is no “give it time.”

Too many are dead. Too many mourn. Too many live on the knife’s edge of precarity.

White supremacists still threaten people’s homes with fires and people’s heads with bats. They still threaten immigrants and activists and anyone they perceive as not exactly like them.

The day after inauguration, after waking up with the worried pressure in my chest, I saw the news from my local streets. A cop pulled a knife on a protestor. Neo-nazis called a reporter “jihadi.” That same reporter was later sent to the hospital outside of the ICE facility because BORTAC and DHS set off a flash bang near her ear and filled a candlelight vigil with clouds of CS gas without warning. They arrested indigenous women with flowers, and a white man in a wheelchair.

The NYPD are still tackling people to the ground. Our prisons and jails are filled with Covid and lock downs and suffering. The carceral state is still the only weapon our country seems to use as a tool of justice. There are still drones to drop bombs.

The bulk of our resources still go to punishment and war.

There are children in cages.

We still seek to punish, when what we must seek is accountability.

And across the country, people still don’t have clean water.

And across the country, people still sleep on icy sidewalks.

And across the country, billionaires hoard wealth and resources as their workers die.

The abusive tyrant has not gone away, because the abusive tyrant is a great dragon snaking its way through every level of our society. It whispers in our ears that it will keep us safe as it drips poison into the water from its venomous fangs.

Dig in your heels. Hold out a hand. Find a way to love. Find an action that speaks that love to the world. There are thousands of small connections to be made. Millions. We are all cells in the same body. We can help one another survive, and even thrive.

We need accountability from all of those who hold the knife—and they are legion.

And we need to continue to do our best to help each other through. To fashion a new society that is better than the old.

We need to dream better, wilder, dreams.

We need to breathe.

I’m with you, my friends. I hope that you are with me, too.

Don’t Give Up.

January 21-22, 2021

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This is reader-funded writing. One thousand blessings to my Patreon supporters who paid for me to write this, so I can give it away for free.

Clearing the Old Year

I wanted to end 2020 by talking a bit about space clearing.

We’re going to start with this meditation about clearing the space closest to ourselves: Our energy fields.

My amazing Patreon supporters paid for the recording, editing, and captioning of this video: Clearing Space for Possibility.

Once you’ve done that, we can move on to cleansing our physical space.

It’s traditional in my form of the Craft to clear and cleanse spaces counterclockwise, and then call in blessings in a clockwise direction. You can do this clearing with salt water, with incense, with bells, or with laughter. Move through your home, or your bedroom, or whatever space you want to clear in a counterclockwise direction (if you are in the southern hemisphere, you may wish to reverse these instructions). If it’s too hard to move in a circular motion, place yourself as close to the center of your space and revolve around yourself.

Ring bells, scatter salt water, sweep, or burn incense with the thought that any unhealthy influences be banished from the space. I like to open windows as part of this process, too. That’s up to you.

If you used salt water for any of this, you can cast it out on a front walkway if it is concrete, brick, or stone. You can also simply pour it down a drain. If sweeping, sweep the old right out the door if you can, or shake it out a window. If you physically swept the floor, you can also empty the detritus into a garbage can. Take it to an outdoor can as soon as possible.

Then, move clockwise through your space, while saying words of blessing. Call in any influences you’d like to bless your space in the coming year. You can spritz scented water in the four compass directions, plus above, below and center. You can burn more incense, too. Or wave feathers, dried lavender, or scarves to get the air moving. Whatever feels right to bless your space is fine.

I wish you a blessed, healthy, prosperous 2021. May we continue to hold fast, and to help one another.

blessed be — Thorn

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Some news:

Because so many people are having a rough time, I’ve set the ebook of Witches of Portland Book One to free, as my gift to you. Please pass this link along to other book lovers who could use a magical escape: By Earth

Also, I have a new Solstice short story collection out: A Flame for Yuletide.

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