The 77 Adorations of Ariadne

I conceived this project over 5 years ago.  I was inspired by Sannion's 99 Adorations of Dionysos, which I am fond of using devotionally, and thought it would be nice to have an accompanying set of adorations for Ariadne.  There's less sources to draw upon for Ariadne's titles and myths, so 77 seemed to be a reasonable and worthy goal.  Most of these lines were written in a couple bursts while contemplating and researching.  Others were revealed later.  The last couple were completed during my most recent celebration of my late summer festival for Ariadne and the Mountain Mother.  During this festival, I camp in a remote place alone in the woods and do ecstatic ritual under the stars.  I took some time to edit and rearrange the lines, and this is the final result.  Many lines reference myth (considering her as both an ancient goddess and also as a mortal princess of Crete), others are more poetic, and a few were revealed either by UPG or by my tradition's understanding and experience of Ariadne, but I don't think any of those latter are too much of a stretch.  

I was asked how I use these...The way I most often use them is repeating the full set as a prayer towards the beginning of a ritual to both praise that divinity and call to mind/focus on their broad nature and various aspects. I love the repetition of "I adore you...", it feels very intimate - naming them as beloved, while also having a rhythm that invites an altered state of consciousness. Sometimes I do it slowly and thoughtfully, sometimes more quickly and theatrically. I have used prayer beads with a set of Adorations, too, sometimes as a daily devotional thing when I'm not feeling spontaneous or don't have something more specific in mind. But one could meditate on one line at a time, if they wished, even using it as a mantra or reciting it a certain number of times.  I have also considered writing them all down on slips of paper or cards and drawing one at random per day for guidance or contemplation.  I'm sure there's other way they could be used. 

1. I adore you most holy one

2. I adore you Lady of the labyrinth

3. I adore you who bids us walk the path

4. I adore you wielding snakes

5. I adore you pure in the underworld

6. I adore you who nurses the chthonic child

7. I adore you who anoints the baetyl stone

8. I adore you priestess of the Mountain Mother

9. I adore you bestower of epiphany

10. I adore you of the ritual sacrifice

11. I adore you swinging among trees

12. I adore you wild and untamed

13. I adore you moon child

14. I adore you daughter of Minos

15. I adore you dwelling in deepest caves

16. I adore you whose voice is like the hum of bees

17. I adore you princess of Crete

18. I adore you light in the dark

19. I adore you leaping over bulls

20. I adore you sister of Asterion and Glaukos

21. I adore you who wields the two-sided axe

22. I adore you alighting on mountain cliffs

23. I adore you with wine dark eyes

24. I adore you muse of Daedalus

25. I adore you who dances gracefully on pavilions

26. I adore you who stands between two worlds

27. I adore you who offers the ball of thread

28. I adore you of the ever-winding wheel

29. I adore you whose lips taste like honey

30. I adore you who guides the hero

31. I adore you of the many-tiered skirt

32. I adore you bare-breasted one

33. I adore you shrouded in dittany smoke

34. I adore you speaking prophecies

35. I adore you who freed the Minotaur

36. I adore you born upon the sea

37. I adore you who surrenders to fate

38. I adore you who is remembered at the center

39. I adore you fractal longing

40. I adore you who delights in roses

41. I adore you who leaves everything safe behind

42. I adore you abandoned on Naxos

43. I adore you who summons the storm

44. I adore you mad with ecstasy

45. I adore you roused by the god who comes

46. I adore you riding a panther

47. I adore you hanging girl

48. I adore you whose nature is untouchable

49. I adore you wife of Dionysos

50. I adore you inviter to bliss

51. I adore you holy vessel

52. I adore you who endures deep sorrow

53. I adore you Ariadne-Aphrodite

54. I adore you wearing a wreath of plany flowers

55. I adore you bound and unbound

56. I adore you mother of paradox

57. I adore you weaver of stories

58. I adore you of the birthing cry

59. I adore you who bears the grape

60. I adore you punished by Artemis

61. I adore you with beautiful braids of hair

62. I adore you who unwinds trauma

63. I adore you who casts a net of dreams

64. I adore you who knows the ways of the spider

65. I adore you queen of the maenads

66. I adore you heart of the Underground

67. I adore you unconditional love

68. I adore you who welcomes the weary initiate

69. I adore you wearing a starry crown

70. I adore you utterly clear in the heavens

71. I adore you protector of tradition

72. I adore you soul of life indestructible

73. I adore you who achieved apotheosis

74. I adore you who meanders through my heart

75. I adore you who holds up a mirror

76. I adore you beloved of Bakkhos

77. I adore you my Goddess

Double Acrostic Prayer for Success

I wrote this to include in a Hermes exchange that we did in the Bacchic Underground a little while back, thought I would post it here since today is the Hermaia festival in the Starry Bull tradition.  Hail Hermes!

Hermes, luck-bringer, kindly blesS

Enchant, shift and coalescE

Reality bend my will to forM

Mercurial messenger, open the dooR

Even the odds with twinkling eyE

Sweet son of Maia and Zeus on higH

On the Melinoeia...

I dressed in black and white.  Silver and black eyeliner.  Fake pearls around my neck, twined with my wedding rings.  I read aloud some hymns and poetry to Melinoe, burned myrrh and peppermint, and offered a plate of foods that were a mix of dark and sweet, pungent and aromatic.  Dates, concord grapes, ginger preserves, dark chocolate, sprigs of fresh herbs, raw cheese, red wine mixed with cardamom syrup.

I also asked Melinoe if there was a devotional activity she would have of me, and drew from my Pithos.  “Write a hymn or poem to today’s spirit”.  Made sense.  Melinoe is one of only two of the Thiasos’ deities/spirits that I have not contributed to the communal hymns for.  (The other being Apollo, because he still escapes my understanding for now.)  With Melinoe, though she is arguably enigmatic, it was more because I was hesitant. I have been through grief-caused madness a couple times, and the worst and most recent felt too fresh, and I wasn’t sure how approaching Melinoe would provoke the sort of rocky equilibrium I currently have.  In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have been worried.

On the way to go dancing, I stopped spontaneously at a grocery store to buy a pomegranate, which I felt would come in handy later.

Once at the club, I used some of The Witch of Forest Grove’s Toad flying ointment and drank pomegranate flavored liquor.

There were some amazing moments on the dance-floor.  Although, I remember little of them now, which is typical.  Such memories are sacrifices to ekstasis.  I do remember actively manipulating energy and dancing in doorways for the dead (like on the Hekatesia). I remember feeling an emotional madness overtake me into a particular frenzy where I was manically pulling on my own hair. How crazy I must have looked?  Not crazy enough that I wasn’t approached towards the end of the night by two women on the dance floor, asking me questions.  They might have been flirting with me, but I’m a little immune to that sort of thing.  But I did have an inkling earlier in the night that if anyone approached me tonight they were going to have some repercussions of what I was doing — so when it happened, I just smiled.  If that smile had words it would have been saying “So you need some of this transformative stuff, do you?  I am somewhat sorry, but then I am just a vessel…”

I can’t recall what prompted it exactly, but one of them said to me, not without playfulness, “Anyone who comes to a club by themselves has issues.”  I smiled even more wickedly and replied “Oh, I’ve got issues- of a whole other variety.”  You have no idea.

When the night was over, I went home and took my pomegranate outside.  It seemed obvious what to do with it.  I tore it into little pieces, with my hands and some with my teeth.  I had no particular grief in mind when I did this, just thought of Melinoe and started tearing it apart – but as soon as I began the tears suddenly came — a real deep almost angry weeping.  My mind was completely blank.  I don’t even know what I needed to cry about, something unnamed or something residual perhaps.  But I didn’t feel the need to name it, I just threw the last bits of seeds and red flesh with particular vehemence as the juice dripped down my arm.  (I noticed later with curiosity that the juice dried in the shape of veins down my forearm to my elbow.)

I paced a little and breathed through it, but the emotion seemed to clear and then disappear completely once I splashed some water on my face.  I tried to watch an episode of my favorite ghost show, but I passed out almost immediately.  I had dreams within dreams.  One of a spider crawling on me while I slept.

I remember you, Melinoe.
You are the violence between Earth and Sky,
your lightning-scream so bright
that the resulting silence is as profound as negative space.
Melinoe, phantom queen, tear down the veil between
what the mind has lost and what the heart cannot forget,
so we may be pure of spirit.

[Cross-posted at the Boukoleon]

Khutroi

When I wake up, I dress in black and make some food for the dead…

I cooked up 8 different grains and beans that were in my pantry, and added some raw milk and raw honey.

I meditated for a bit, opened my last bottle of wine, and headed for the cemetery.  While driving there, my thoughts were going in circles, revisiting the night before, the past and the future, what I know and what I don’t know and all the sore spots in between, and I brought myself to tears several times before I even got there.  

I left my crown of creosote that I’d made the day before in the central tree of the cemetery, then made a wide circuit, pouring out wine and water as I went, murmuring soft greetings to the graves I passed.  A small detail struck me more than usual this trip -- the way that people buy joint gravestones or plaques and have their names on there but leave the year of their death blank in the meantime.  How strange this seems to me, these blank spots, just waiting for the person’s number to come up.  Practical, yes. Still, absurd.

The weather from Pithoigia to Khoes got suddenly warm (go figure!) and the weather today was also very nice -- as in, no jacket needed and I was quite comfortable in sandals.  I stumbled upon one rather curious bench that was not dedicated to any particular person, but simply to love.

After pouring out the porridge beneath a hedgerow, I burned and sprinkled tobacco, and burned incense.  I did another EVP session, as my husband and I had done on Khutroi two years ago.  I listened to it straightaway, but didn’t pick up anything.  I really have no idea if only those who haven’t crossed over yet can communicate in such a way. My husband and I would wonder about this, but besides him I’ve never met any pagan paranormal enthusiasts who could debate this topic with me. (I also wonder, can you theoretically capture EVPs of other spirits? Gods?)  If nothing else, the session got me talking out loud and into a receptive state.

I said a couple hymns to Hermes, left some coins at a hedge boundary.  I felt a sudden fondness for Hermes, perhaps because His trickster nature reminds me so much of my husband. (Which would come up later, too.)

I continued my circuit of the cemetery after that, picked up debris and poured out more offerings.  The sunset was very pretty and by that time I had the whole place to myself.  But it hit me as I looked around from the center of the cemetery to the hundred and hundreds of graves spreading around me, most with their own bunches of imitation flowers… No, I didn’t have the place to myself.

On my way home I stopped at my dad’s band rehearsal.  I had declined the invitation initially, because of Anthesteria, but suddenly I knew I needed the company and the experience.  I love that my dad is in a band.  Playing in a band is how he met my mom, back in the day.  Also, that’s where I get my excellent taste in music, in case you were wondering.  I had a really nice time, and felt much inspired to pick up my own musical pursuits again.  (Did I mention they did a Doors’ song too?  Yeah, they rocked.)

Back at home, I sat at my Anthesteria shrine again, and did one more thing… I listened to that EVP session from two years ago.

I had never listened to it before.

We had always meant to.  It just never happened.  And then he died, and I didn’t feel like I could. Hell, I wasn’t even sure I was going to make it up to and through Anthesteria… but if I did, I knew that this would probably be a good time to listen to it.  

And, it was okay.  No spirit voices, unless you count my husband’s coming back to me through the years.  It was nice to hear his voice. Not as painful as I expected, just nice.  He had said this spontaneous prayer to Hermes, and while I was listening to it, it just hit home… how devout and spiritual he was. And I don’t think many people saw that side of him, because of how intensely personal it was to him.  But we were lucky enough to share that with each other.  And listening to him, I thought, surely the gods and his guides would take care of this soul! This soul who loved them and just plain fucking LOVED so much.

I transcribed it, word for word, this part of the that session that turned into an impromptu praise of Hermes:

“Hermes Khthonios, I give praise and honor to you today.

Remember us.

Remember us remembering you, and our praise of you,

And our praise is Love.

I've recognized your work in my life,

I've been the receiver of your casual gifts.

You've changed the way I look at things.

I've always appreciated your luck,

I've always appreciated you gambling on me, and with me.

Anyone with a mind that is of the gambler's mind,

they know that they deal with ill fortune just as much as they do good fortune--

it comes with the territory.

Thank you for all the small things that have reminded me

that luck is a two sided coin

and pain doesn't last forever.

Praise be to Hermes!”
 

Well I got through the session without weeping, but not writing about it without weeping. Oh my beautiful poet.

And how strange to hear his voice say that death will come to all of us soon enough, as he talked to the dead.

Then this girl with the still-beating heart banished the Keres and hung up creosote branches in the doorways.  And now I’m going to go take a cleansing bath.

Just love, little flowers, just love.

Stepping outside myself for a moment

Tonight I lit candles at my shrines, and said prayers and made offerings on behalf of others, but none for myself.  I only put forth gratitude on my own behalf.  Partly this was inspired by Sannion's offerings for the community, the selflessness of which I think is very inspiring, and partly by being tired of my own self-pity.  I see nothing wrong in praying for oneself, or praying for guidance, but ideally even that should have a feel of gratitude and hope.  Too often, the focus on need seems to create this negative vortex. It's a hard hole to climb out of, and it doesn't feel like it puts me in the right space to receive anything.

Just love. (As my Love would say.)

Tomorrow I'm leaving for the Herbal Resurgence Rendezvous near Flagstaff.  Was particularly looking forward to meeting Sarah Lawless, and was very disappointed to hear she had to cancel at the last minute. But the event should still be rewarding.  Herbalism (and entheogens) has always interested me. I've made my own tinctures, incenses, salves, and such, but I've been gradually shifting my focus over the last several years to ways I might work with plants as spirits and teachers and not just as ingredients.