On the Lenaia...

a girl cries in a Vineyard.
she remembers, truly remembers, why she's here.
she looks with love at the bee that lands on her hand,
which in turn clutches a glass of wine...
wine from the very earth she stands on
and from the very skeletal vines she sees,
(so selfless, so purposeful, so sublimely crucified),
wine that lingers like memory and hope on her tongue,
invigorated by the sun that still, so miraculously, burns in the sky,
and she is not afraid.
she says,
"You may sting me if you wish. I promise to love you anyway."
but it has no barbs--just a natural curiosity
for the spirit of fermented grape and the leaves of rosemary she has crushed between her fingers.

The Daemon speaks to the Eidolon

There is this idea out there, foreign to me, that true love will never break your heart.

But I would have you know -- true love will break your heart many times, and every time.

How could it not be so?

Do you think you could step fully into the glory of it, and not be utterly transformed? And in the transforming and tempering, not be torn apart, if only to be remade into a better vessel? Love is an act of courage. Yet you must become unarmed - strip away the armor that you might have gotten so used to that you thought it was your skin. It will hurt. It will be messy. And it will be ongoing.

The secret is, if you would be open to this sort of Love, then you must also love the breaking.

She pauses for an immeasurable moment, then as if returning from a deep abyss, she speaks...

"You don't understand yet, but maybe someday you will. That this life...all of this... is just a story. A story that is sometimes a myth. And in those rare moments that you step off the normal narratives into the mythic one, it is no longer about you, me, or him. It is about Them. In the sublime light of divinity cast across the web of time, when we can see this pattern unobscured by our own fears and limitations, all questions dissolve. You see that the whole universe dances on the turn of a 'yes', and always has. A yes that you've been saying all along even while you fought tooth, nail and heart against reflections. Thinking you were alone. Doubting the meaning behind it all.

"Yes... Dionysos loves Ariadne.

"Do you doubt this?"

Help the Bakcheion

I am getting more and more excited about Many Gods West!  Can it be true, that in just a few short weeks, I actually get to MEET these people?  Those who have inspired me and those I have been privileged to conspire with?  It's hard to put into words how much this means to me.  It feels like it will be a culmination of all the trials and work of the last 2 years. And perhaps the beginning of a whole new phase.  All I know is that two years ago today I didn't even think I'd still be here.  But I am.  Life is crazy, my friends.

The community effort towards putting on an epic Dionysian ritual at the conference are still underway, but there's just 20 days left.  You can help!  Donate if you can, or if you can't donate money, then please spread the word!  We're still under 25% of the funds needed.  Funds go to the cost of getting the organizing members there and for ritual supplies and offerings.  There's some pretty nice perks as well.  (The one I'm contributing is a special blend of anointing oil.)  The fundraising page is here.

We've been ambitious in our vision.  But I have faith.  This needs to happen.  And it will be deep and cathartic and reverberating for many.

Thank you for anything you can do.  Really, truly, thank you.  

As I write, thunder shakes my house

Do the gods know our thoughts?
If not, they must know our hearts.
     .....

When on the verge of tears--
I must be doing something right
For beauty overwhelms,
I chase it like receding, teasing waves
     like the tide,
Yet it catches me by surprise.

Once you see your past for its perfection,
You may wrap all faith around your future.

But beware of daydreams--
     The gods live in those too.
          And yes, they will remind you.
               Oh yes, they will remind you.

                   

Meaningless measurements of time

An anniversary of an event seems like a pale and silly thing, in light of you and your LIGHT--the person you are and have been, which pervaded and transformed everything. And certainly all that I am. Not an event, just you. You who lived in such beauty and intention, I would not dishonor you by focusing on the unintentional. No, I wrap myself about all the other times, and the timeless... How do you make an anniversary of an eternity, anyway? (And so many exquisite eternities we shared.) Short answer... you do not. You just love, and remember, always. 

 There is not a single moment that I do not

Klexos

"Maybe we should think of memory itself as a work of art--and a work of art is never finished, only abandoned."

From The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

I'm relating to so much of these that it makes me wonder how neurotic I really am.  Such as:

exulansis

n. the tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it—whether through envy or pity or simple foreignness—which allows it to drift away from the rest of your life story, until the memory itself feels out of place, almost mythical, wandering restlessly in the fog, no longer even looking for a place to land.

Check it out... it's a rabbit hole.  I support whole-heartedly the effort of naming the minor melancholies that we all feel but don't often have the proper poetry to give voice to...