To SSDD — Pathways of the Sacred

“Wisdom is given as a gift to the wise”

So I turn to you
A spectre from the distant past
Or a living presence in the subtle realm?
Magician, priestess, writer, teacher, actress, saint
Dare I call upon you?
Are those furtive smiles breaking through in my moments of deep silence
Rising from wish fulfillment
Or do they mean you are near and close?

Ah, to be in the fin de siècle, that age of great women
Who through their magic, art and practice
Began to turn the terrible wheel of the deadened western world, the wasteland
Back to the feminine source.
Turned the legacy of the Roman Church’s slaughter of the Languedoc, the
Inquisition’s torture of innocents,
The murderous burnings, drownings, hangings over more than a hundred
generations of women healers and saints
For practicing ancient crafts.
Turned all this to the descent of spirit
That is yet still overflowing
If we just lift up and open our arms,
Still our minds
Make ourselves empty
Surrender to the wisdom of nature.
In the age of darkest repression, these women
Spoke once more from the sacred wells.

Your great beauty survives
Not just hinted in aging, tinted photos and line drawings
But as inspiration to those who seek,
A vital, palpable presence for those
Who long for the sacred chants and incantations,
The magical transmutations that align the spirit and the body.
Do I hear that resonant, commanding voice at the very edge of vibration?
That somehow calls me, somehow causes me to remember
What I once knew long before this birth but have since forgotten.
Calls to all of us in the age of greatest danger, greatest betrayal of our
Mother to be still and let love flow.

New music from old words, old words restored to meaning,
Old meanings recalled once more.
Do I sense the flowing of the shekinah into the vessel?
Is that vessel before me now?
Yes, The Priestess returns bearing the Grail.