Return

It looked just like I remembered it.

And yet not.

It loomed before me, in silent rebuke. Yet I knew the Temple would never judge, never scold. The rebuke --and the cowering-- were all in my heart

The rustle of dried leaves across stone as the breeze pushed deadfall along the paving stones ahead of me sounded like the rip of snagged fabric. Of dry skin scraping across pumice. Like a snake shedding old skin.

There was not a soul to be seen. Not a single red-footed priestess, nor a vulture in the sky.

I opened the doors to the Temple, fully expecting the hinges to creak and groan from years of disuse, but the doors swung open with the same perfect balance they always had, with not a squeak of protest as well-oiled hinges gleamed, as well-polished as the great door handles.

"Think you the only visitor to the Temple?"

I spun around, and the old priestess raised an eyebrow. Her skin was brown as a betel nut, as wrinkled as the driest raisin, lips pursed in that way that belied a mouthful of missing teeth. And yet she spoke without any trace of a lisp, though her voice creaked as much as I had expected the hinges to. Her red robes swept along the floor, hiding most of her small frame.

Tired now, weary in a way I had never been before when visiting these hallowed grounds, I simply raised my eyebrow back at her. "Considering this entire place is within my own mind, yes, I think myself the only visitor to the Temple."

She chuckled at that, shaking her head. "Such youth, to be so headstrong still." But then her eyes gleamed. "And yet finally showing a hint of wisdom, that your backbone is straight and tall now, speaking thus to a pomegranate priestess."

"To an equal?"

She inclined her head. "Perhaps."

"My feet are red," I said. "Perhaps I did not record it, as I have every visit in the past, but I do clearly remember a priestess telling me --laughing at me, as you all seem to do-- that my audacity in staining my feet was the only way to be a priestess. No one can tell me I am a pomegranate priestess except my own self. My feet are red."

She pointed. "And you still have the scar." Her finger traced a line in the air, straight down, and my hand flew to my breast. It was not visible on the flesh, but in spirit I could still feel the scar from the vulture goddess' crescent blade splitting my chest open with my beating heart open to the sky. I remembered that pain, and it was as nothing to more recent pains. Pains that split my being, with my soul open to the infinite void. Pains that chopped me off of my family tree, with no roots to take in the coolness of the earth or drink in the rains, no leaves to feel the warmth of the sun, a kiss of the breeze. A dead branch.

"Why did you come?"

"I don't know."

"It's been calling you."

"The Temple?" I paused. "Yes."

"You come when you are tired. Confused. Why do you never come here when there is joy? You could see it as others do, then."

"No one comes here but me."

The priestess laughed.

Now I was getting impatient. Why did they always laugh? When they weren't intimidating me, anyway.

"You said I was the only one who came here."

"You said that."

"This place is my invention, in my imagination."

"Yes, and no. Why are you here?"

"I don't know. I just know it's been too long."

"That's partly true."

I sighed. "The Dream Incubation Chamber."

She stared at me, silent.

"I misused it before, I think. I wasn't Dreaming to learn." Heat rose to my face suddenly, and burned in my chest. Burned along the invisible scar in my shame. "I was trying to Manifest, not Dream."

The priestess shrugged. "Partly true. Dreaming is manifesting. You were trying to force the Pattern instead of learn the Pattern."

Wasn't that the same thing?

"No!" Her rebuke cracked like a whip against the walls, the echo sharp in the ear. I hadn't spoken aloud, but she still heard. It never seemed strange here, in the Temple, the way thoughts and reality and the unseen and unheard were meaningless. It's only later, writing it down, that the lopsidedness ever really stands out. "Not the same thing! Now you're just being lazy."

"Fine, I was being lazy," I said, feeling my ire rise. "I wanted answers for once, not more questions."

She narrowed her eyes. For some reason, it was only then that I noticed the form and thoroughness of her own priestesshood.

Most priestesses had the red feet. Some had red palms as well, but those were extremely rare. I had only ever glimpsed one such. Some, the truly harsh, were bloody all the way up their calves, the hems of their robes perpetually dripping fresh blood that stained their calves and shins and feet. Some had the patterned dots and whorls whose meanings were still a mystery to me.

I had at first thought this ancient priestess' robes to be red. Looking more closely, the horror and revulsion swept over me as realization rose like gorge in the back of my throat.

The richly red priestess robes were not cut of draping cloth. It was a curtain of human flesh, flayed and draped into the appearance of robes. The spatter coated her face and neck, the splatter pattern looking as if it sprayed upward as she hacked her own clothing.

I blinked again, staggering back, and the old woman in beautiful, flowing red fabric stood before me once more.

"I hate when you guys do that."

She blinked up at me placidly. "You do it yourself. Who do you think I am, to enjoy wearing my robes?"

I frowned at her, not comprehending. "I came to walk the Dream Incubation Chamber," I said, heart beginning to beat faster.

"How can you take even a step, burdened as you are?" She shook her head. "You think you have lost so much, until your arms are empty but for a very few things. But your shoulders drag beneath the weight of so many skins. All of the dead things you clutch, the dead weight you carry, wearing the skins because in your mind you still are these."

Reeling now, for the first time I looked at this horrible priestess. Really looked. And I saw the same round head, the high cheekbones and flat face, the broad nose. I saw her bottom lip had the scar from when a dog had bit her lip and split it into two when she was only three. I saw the beauty mark on her right cheek, and the other on her neck, that only one girl every generation inherited on her mother's side. As recognition dawned on my face, she laughed again, and almost against my will I recognized the way her right eye scrunched up more than her left when she smiled, the way all on her father's side did.

Goddess! Was this what I was? What I would be in the Temple? This horrible, flesh-wearing priestess, drenched in blood from head to toe with the harsh laugh that carried no mercy?

"It is part of you, yes," she said. Then she waved her hand dismissively. "Oh, I know you wish to become like one of the warrior priestesses, one of the vultures with the bones in their hair and the curved blade, and the dripping hems. Even as the peace and healing priestesses fascinate you with their blood marked in pretty pictures upon their skin.

"Instead, you get me."

"Not if I have any say."

"Oho!" she laughed. "So we have a fighter, after all."

Damn it all. Some people get babbling brooks or dreams of some dead relative coming to give them words of peace and comfort. I get my toothless crone self, draped in flayed human skin, laughing at me.

"I thought the pomegranate priestesses were enlightened," I said. "I thought their blood was an expression of their wisdom."

Crone me raised an eyebrow. God. How could I have not noticed the snark in that gesture? "And was there not wisdom today, seeing me?"

"Nothing good," I muttered, but only because I'm stubborn.

"The Menstrual Temple of the Funky Grail is all-where and nowhere. All time and outside time. Sometimes, if you have very bad luck --or very good luck-- you meet yourself here." She paused, and her dark brown eyes squinted at me, the gleam in them malicious and dark and terrible. "When you go back, if you still condemn me to wear this infernal, dripping, stinking robe the rest of my life, I will never forgive you." She jabbed me in the chest hard with her wiry finger, and the scar along my chest burned straight back to my spine. "You know what you have to do."

"I don't think I can." It was on my lips before I knew that I was even going to respond.

"Well, now there's a bit of truth," she muttered. "No more difficult than lugging this around all my life, and maybe less!" Out of nowhere she pulled out the terrible curved blade I remembered all too well, and swiped at my neck as she cried, "Go!"

I jumped back with a cry--

--and found myself jumping back from the door to the Temple, yanking my hand off the handle as if burned. The clear, cloudless blue of the autumn sky dazzled overhead. The dry leaves scraped along the stone path.

I knew what I had to do.

Back on the Grounds

The snow bit at my bare feet, toes beginning to burn from the cold. Large, fat flakes caught on my eyelashes and dampened my hair. It was snowing at the Temple: plump, wet snowflakes sticking to everything and dampening sound to a muffled whisper.

 Ice floes like teenie glaciers floated by in the great river running through the temple grounds. The great fruiting trees lining the banks were bare and stark against the white sky, and not a bird could be seen.

So different, being upon the grounds and hearing not a single cry of an irritated raven. The statues on the grounds were oblong mounds of white mystery, like buttes in the desert. I tucked my head down until my chin touched my chest, wincing as my double chin squished like a water balloon.

I was not the same as when I left.

Why did I leave, anyway?

Oh yeah. The Vulture Goddess had split apart my chest and laid bare my heart to the sun, then left me to bleed downriver and learn to either embrace my role as One Who Bleeds But Does Not Die, or to believe the lie until I imagined my death by exsanguination so well that I died.

My feet didn't make a sound as I walked the path I remembered, my footprints the only thing to mar the pristine beauty of a perfect snowfall.

I was shivering by the time I entered the temple, dripping half-melted snow on the red tiles. I winced at the mess, but there was nothing at hand to mop it up.

"Just leave it."

I spun to my left. She was standing by a pillar, half-hidden by the shadows there. Her feet were also bare, and I saw the hint of red lining her toes. Yearning filled me, and embarrassment, that my feet were still not stained the red of the Pomegranate Priestesses. I wanted it so badly.

"Do you really?" she asked. "If so, why have you not done the requisite work? Something must be holding you back."

I shrugged. "I am still a fool to give this all up if just one person would love me."

"Why?" She stepped out of the shadows, and I saw her hair was buzzed close to her head. She had subdermal implants in her skin, just by her left eye. It was a scroll mark, the Sanskrit a, with an accent over it in red ink. This, I knew, was not the first sound. This was not the life breath of the formless god. This was instead the root word for maya, removes depression, brings hope, sharpens the intellect and talent.

Why would Maya meet me at the door, half frozen and pathetic?

Why, indeed?

"Fool, yes, but not pathetic," she said. The tiny bells on her anklet and trimming her skirt chimed in minor sevenths. An odd chord, but strangely appealing. It drew me in. "You find this supposed love appealing enough to forsake the Menstrual Temple because you do not love you."

"That's what I just said."

She laughed at me. Actually pointed and laughed. "I wasn't talking about you."

Goddammit, were all the priestesses given classes on being cryptic?

"Do you still have the small vial of blood you were given before?" she asked.

I shook my head. "The glass dissolved when I began hemorrhaging, and it all just mixed together."

She nodded. "That can happen. When one does not realize the sacredness of their own, bleeding is seen as an injury instead of a sacred duty."

I blushed. This was not what I'd wanted to hear. I should just go; I would never be worthy to dwell within these walls.

The priestess laughed. "You take these walls with you! Wherever you go, there is the Temple." She pointed. A door appeared across the foyer, small, with no visible door knobs or hinges. It was just a crack in the marble.

"Go now."

"To what?"

"It is the dream incubation chamber."

Well. That told me a whole lotta nothing, but I could tell by her face that was all I was going to get. The sickle tied at her belt gleamed in the gentle light in the temple. A chill raced through me; I remembered my last encounter with one of those sickles.

A line burned down my breastbone in memory.

"Dream incubation chamber. Got it."

"This time," she said after me, "don't run."

I bit my lip. My hand hovered just over the door, and my fingers balled into a fist. This time, she'd said, don't run. If that wasn't a warning, nothing was.

I pushed open the door and stepped inside. The ruins of a great and ancient city, dusty and tattered, met me. I looked over my shoulder.

The doors were gone.

Next

i'm taking it back

in my quest to inject massive amounts of Funkalicious awesomeness back into my life and stage a r[E]volution in my own life, i've been throwing my own version of what boho mom calls a "feng shui tantrum."

i decided that in order to focus more on abundance and gratitude, i had to focus on what it was that i had so much of in my life that i could give it away with joy and love. you cannot give what you do not have, so rather than focus on the lack of things in my life, i'm focusing on what i have to give away.

in this, i've begun sorting through all of my possessions --and even Little Owl's-- and am parceling away 10% to give away. if i'm so lucky and fortunate and blessed to have more to give away, then give it away i shall. i've been going through my books, clothes, movies, baby clothes, toys, and even my time. i'm giving it away.

today i found a piece of paper hiding at the bottom of a huge bin of clothes i was sorting out. it goes to show just how long it's been since i truly went through the whole thing with more than just a cursory sift to find something i wanted. i've been sitting on a wealth of stuff! lucky me, i was able to give away half that bin. i'm excited!

but even more than that, i had to share this. it's beautiful, and i think it was just waiting for a reemergence at the right time. it was the proto-Temple, the place before the Menstrual Temple of the Funk Grail...

by the sacred power inherent in the very blood, bones, and breath of every Woman here, this is now sacred space. the ground beneath our feet holy ground. this is our place, the blessed womb of the goddess. 


She of Ten Thousand Names stands with us, and each of us is Goddess. therefore begone all you insidious voices that poison our goddess hearts! begone the voices which laugh at us, which call us worthless and stupid. silence, you voices who whisper we are ugly, or fat, or lazy, or foolish! we shall not listen to your hateful lies one moment more, for we are Goddess! beautiful and wise and filled with the holy blood of woman, so that we shine as a beacon for our sisters who are lost in the darkness those voices create!


our circle is cast. that which glorifies not the sacred feminine shall not enter!


so the fuck mote it be!


this was written in 2002.  i might've been trapped in a lot, but the proto-Temple was in my heart already.

it always was, i think.

brezsny-on-the-blog

i was lying upon my naked back and staring up at a sky as vivid as a bluejay's wing. clouds decorated the blue expanse; big, fluffy bundles like the goddess had come with a huge frosting applicator and squeezed out perfect little puffs of white frosting.

was the weather always paradise perfect, here in the Valley? it couldn't be Paradise; i wasn't dead. perhaps it was enough to simply be, to feel paradise around me. perhaps it was Her telling me that anywhere is paradise, depending on my own state of mind.

it was difficult to feel, though. the pomegranate priestess' words had pierced straight through me. i reached up and rubbed the place between my breasts, where the other priestess had invoked the blue-skinned, flame-haired vulture goddess aspect within and lain my breast in twain with her sickle.

there should have been a scar there. the wound had rent the bone, leaving my beating heart open to the sky as my life's blood poured into the River Funk. but my skin was smooth and perfect. i had long ago discovered if i brooded too deeply upon the remembered pain --vivid and sensitive as my memory was-- the wound would reopen of its own accord as if freshly cut. if i focused on the lessons learned, the wound closed. if i brooded, i bled.

lesson learned. self-pity and holding onto past trauma injured my body, mind, and soul as if freshly inflicted..and i was the one applying the pain. musings upon the lesson, and the strength i gained while floating half-dead along the River, strengthened me. nourished me.

the skin between my breasts itched. i was brooding, and i knew it. so many questions, and no experience in my entire life was sufficient to lead me to an answer. how to choose among the sisters? how to know to which sect of them i belonged? i felt a kinship with them all.

the vial was its own weight, and dilemma. whom to bless with its contents? who was deserving, or in most need of a baptism in blood? the mystery of turning water into blood was mine, but how? what to do, how to use it? such responsibility weighed heavily upon me, and i could feel it in the weight of the vial itself. it grew heavier by the moment.

to leave Valley-in-the-Glade? its beautiful colors and gently rolling hills were no longer a safe haven for me; i felt it in my blood. the presence of the blood priestess had changed all that. i was free to remain there as long as i wished, but i knew it was time to leave. however, leaving terrified me. i didn't know how to leave, or even if i truly wanted to. i was comfortable there, and all my needs were attended--

...no, that wasn't true. not entirely. something within me ached, but i couldn't name what it was. the longer i remained in the Valley, the more of its bounty i ate and by every pampered night, it would feel emptier and emptier to me. soon i would be starving. but for what?

i closed my eyes and gave up trying. all i was doing was going 'round in circles trying to figure out something that couldn't be solved.

"the last mystery of the Valley," said a voice.

i sat up, startled, and looked around. up above me sat the most beautiful man i had ever seen. for once and all i knew the Valley was not only alive, but aware. how else, then, could it know to show me my ideal man, perfect in every detail to my own tastes from his long hair and stubble around his mouth, to his broad shoulders, barrel chest, kind eyes and broad proportions?

i was breathless. he was naked, as was i, and i was blushing!

cheeks burning, i curled my legs beneath me to hide my sex, and shook my dreadlocks to cover my bare torso.

he laughed. "too late. i already got a good eyeful." at my pained expression, he laughed harder. "but i shall pretend i saw nothing and that my mind is as pure as the water of the pool in which you bathed earlier."

my jaw dropped.

"you're very pretty," he said.

i buried my face in my hands and squealed with shame and embarrassment. suddenly i felt hands around my shoulders, large and warm and gentle.

"come now," he said. "is it so terrible to know you had an admirer watching from the trees? like actaeon as he spied artemis at her bath."

"and was torn apart by her hounds," i finished, face still buried in my hands.

he chuckled, and gently pulled my hands away from my face. "true, but you have a much more generous heart than she perhaps had, and would have mercy on one such as me. i was simply unable to keep silent any longer. and you looked in need of a friend."

i shook my head. "it's nothing," i said. "it's stupid. but it's nothing." i was already burying it deep down, hiding it from him as i had always hidden everything from everyone.

"dear priestess," he said gently. "now don't do that. don't bury it. i don't care what you feel, as long as you don't feel nothing. get inflamed with hunger or justice or sadness or beauty or love," he laughed, "or embarrassment at being caught naked when you thought you were alone. but don't submit to apathy."

...apathy? was that what i had been doing? no, surely not! all i was doing was putting it away, where it wouldn't get in the way of what needed to be done. emotions always got in the way, were painful distractions and conspired against me to leave me tender after yet another betrayal, yet another abusive relationship as the illusion of love disintegrated and i saw it for what it had always been. by shoving them down into the deepest, darkest little corner of my mind, i had made sure my emotions did not rule me.

pragmatism and a refusal to romanticize things had been what kept me from hurting. from wondering why i was so unlovable that everyone i had ever loved had thrown me away. that was what i had been doing...right?

he smoothed the back of his hand down my cheek. "don't let yourself be shunted into numbness. you can't afford to be cut off from the source of your secret self, even if it means having to feel like hell for a while." he leaned in closer to whisper in my ear. i closed my eyes and inhaled his nearness. "and the odd thing is that if you're willing to go through hell, you won't have to go through hell. so to hell with your poker face and neutrality and dispassionate stance."

eyes still closed, i gave a small, wry smile. "be a wild thing, not a mild thing, huh?"

he kissed my forehead. "precisely."

Ex animo, Delena

i looked at the priestess for what seemed an eternity. the small vial of water-turned-blood was as heavy as sin, and getting heavier.

"you feel it calling, don't you?" she said.

i sighed. "more like i can't deny its calling any longer," i said. "i've stuffed it down for so long; my whole life. but now...lately...it's shouting so loudly it's like some white noise in the background that has slowly gotten louder until it's all i can hear." i shook my head. "everywhere i turn, it's all i can see. every sound is drowned out by it. every lesson turns me back to it. there's just no escape."

"and why would you run from it, then, sister?" she said, smiling. "if it is tied to you, it does not matter how you run, for it will always follow you. do you not recall our sister, skeleton woman?"

"but reprieve!" i almost shouted. "not one second of peace! i need a break from all that noise so i can think! i know she's down there, and i know i need to deal with it. but i need time to get used to the idea and decide what i'm going to do about it."

the priestess shook her head. "and how much time have you had already? you knew everything was there, and you ignored it. that part of yourself you run from. how long have you ignored her, trapped her down, silenced her, kept her in the darkness and neglected her?"

the vial of blood weighed as much as a mountain now. the loose knot holding the ragged scarf around my head came apart, and my dreadlocks tumbled down my back. i remembered how my silhouette had looked so medusan, and in the back of my mind i could hear the faint sound of many snakes hissing in my ears. they sounded angry. ever growing, snakes continually shed their skins, and i could almost hear words in their hissing as they reprimanded me for refusing to shed my own skin.

"she needs to stay there," i whispered, horrified. "she gets in my way."

the pomegranate priestess stood, then, and brushed herself off. "then perhaps we were wrong, and this affinity for our path is only on the surface. stay here in the Valley, then, little sister. for apparently this is as far as you go."

she turned to walk away, but i reached out and snatched her blood-stained hand in my own. i was staring off into the distance, unable to look up and meet her eyes. "she's hated," i said. "perhaps not by me, but she is hated. when i embrace her, i am scorned. they mistreat me, and scold me, and cheapen me, and use me. i am not some cheap, simple thing to be cast aside!"

"they don't understand," she said gently. "they have lost their own innocence, so when they see yours they cannot bear it. some would subsume it, as ancient societies believed consuming the body would absorb the spirit as well. others would destroy it within you, for your obvious power reminds them of their starving lack. this part of you, this other, is someone you run from because of the pain you believe others inflict upon you because of her.

"i say to you that you have done yourself --and her-- a grave injustice. you have misunderstood her, and yourself. you have hidden her away so none could abuse her, yet you continue their work and abuse her far worse than anyone else could ever dream. and so i ask you, sister, why you curse those who have deeply wronged you, why you refuse to forgive most of them, when you do nothing but continue their work upon yourself? do you do this for some measure of control? to please them? to make sense of things you could not possibly have understood when you were young? some other reason entirely, or perhaps some combination of them all?

"whatever it is, my dear sister, it is something you will need to conquer before we can allow you your first crimson of our sisterhood." she pulled her hand free from mine. "if that is still your wish."

and she left me there in Valley-in-the-Glade, naked and trembling and clutching a vial of my own blood. few ever come this far, they had said. fewer survive.

...i was beginning to understand why.

#400

she looked at me, red tattooed face almost glistening as if the red ink were fresh...or as if she had been upon that battlefield with me. amazed, enthralled, i slowly turned my head to look at her. she smiled, and let go of my hand.

i hadn't even noticed she'd been holding it. had she somehow given me the vision...?

"that was from you," she said, her voice lilting and hypnotic. "it was none of my doing." and she looked at me as if she truly had heard my thoughts. but then she smiled and the fierce countenance of the vulture goddess disappeared, and the impish gleam of the revolutionary trickster goddess flashed in her eyes. "you truly are one of us now, sister." she adjusted her skirts --which still dripped slightly with a red that stained into her skin-- and tucked her legs beneath her. she folded her hands and leaned forward, toward me.

it had been so real...the smell of horses, the sound of my men beating their fists against their armored chests and rattling their swords and spears, the feel of my blood pulsing through my body charged with battle lust, the terror and exhilaration of fierce battle...the exhaustion and exhilaration of learning the secret to taming my Inner Flaming Narcissist...

"...have you given any thought to which sect of us you feel most at home, sister?"

her question jolted me out of my reverie. as i looked at her, i saw in my mind's eye every single sister of the pomegranate priestesshood i had met up to that point.

there was the gentle, soft-spoken sister that greeted me when i first stepped onto the grounds of the menstrual temple of the funky grail, smelling of amber and rose dust, pomegranates and peace; the pierced one with the blood-red pendant who spoke to me of anti-role models and rent open my breast with her sickle; she who met me in Valley-in-the-Glade, who first called me "sister"; and the one who sat beside me now, with tattoos of a very different nature, marking her as a very particular sect within the pomegranate priestesshood...those who go into the death.

those who understand the simple yet intimate dance of Life and Death and Rebirth; those who look Death in the eyes and smile at Her eons-old companionship; who are comfortable with their robes dripping with staining blood, taking on the drips and patterns of blood --of life and death-- upon their own bodies; those who understand the balance of All Things...

...those for whom i have a deep affinity, in their eyes.

i looked away, down at my toes deep in the cool damp grass by the blood river, still holding the vial of water-turned-blood. ...i'd never turned water into blood before.

"yes, sister, you have. this is what you don't see," she said.

"you're in my mind," i said. "how?"

she smiled again, tucking a narrow dreadlock behind her ear. the bones and beads decorating the ends of her dreadlocks clacked softly. "it is you who is in mine, sister," was her reply. "we are all within each other's minds, connected through la salvaje dea, 'the wild goddess.' all there is to do is open your mind, which you do by nature of your soul, sister, for you are already open. in fact, you have always been so. those years when you believed yourself so closed, so cold, that was only your outer trappings, for you could never hide what you were.

"how is it you could hear, for a decade and more, la salvaje de la dea call to you?"

i pondered her true question, how it is i had felt deep within me the true Wild nature of the goddess through all the shit and doubt, and all the lies that had been fed to me. i had believed myself to be dead to it all, yet She had called, quietly at first. it had taken me long to understand the true song i was hearing.

now, the pomegranate priestesses called me "sister."

it was a good question: which sect did i feel i most belonged to?

...i thought about it for a very, very long time.

the price of love pt v

to read the price of love from pt i, click here

"sullen and stubborn melancholy hath never become of any human," my friend said.

i looked up at him, hot words burning the tip of my tongue, but one look into his golden eye --the slit of his pupil narrowing to a line thinner than my smallest finger-- and my heated words cooled. so i did as he bade me and stopped pouting.

"do as you will, my friend," i told him, frowning. "i need to think."

i made my way across the plains, down where the land sloped a bit, and found a gently flowing river that sparkled in the sunlight like a dragon's hoard tumbling with gemstones and pearls and glittering, glittering gold. the blue of the water was sapphire blue, darkening like the night sky the deeper the water ran toward the middle. fish leapt like dancers, catching mosquitoes and water skates for their meals. reed birds rustled in the tall grasses, scolding and calling one another with their "chirrr, chikirk! chirrr, chikirk!"

i stripped out of my armor, the delicious breeze a cool caress on skin hot and dampened with sweat from wearing such heavy armor through an eternity of battles, of blood on the boil from such a close hunt of such a hated enemy. and with each item i loosened and let drop to the ground, the lighter i felt. the breeze cooled the back of my sweaty neck, dried my tunic, ruffled my hair which i had unwound from its battle braid. it truly felt as if i were letting go of more and more of my worries and setting them down along with my armor.

at last i was able to close my eyes and truly listen to the wind and hear what it was telling me. in one swift motion, my tunic and leggings came off and i was letting the current take me downstream. how long i was out there bathing, swimming, basking in the sunlight before i swam back to shore, i do not know. i should have come out miles from where i'd lain my armor, but there it was...waiting for me.

i sighed. i might be able to lay it down for a time, but it would still be waiting for me to take it up again.

instead, however, i sat by the reeds in the shallows listening to the wind sough through them, hearing their wisdom whispered to me. as the golden glitter on the river turned to orange and salmon and lavender, it finally made sense to me.

insanity is what it was, what the reeds whispered to me by the water, but as i had tried all else without a mote of success, perhaps insanity inspired by the wind and the water was what was called for. perhaps the essence of what they proposed was insanity itself. no one ever said This Thing i was attempting ever made sense...

i stood up and brushed my hair with the curled witches' fingers that grew among the reeds, but kept it loose. i put on my tunic and leggings, now dried and stiff from the sun.

my armor i left by the river and returned to the cave. my old friend and companion, the fire dragon, was gone.

the entrance to the cave both threatened and mocked me with its deep, enveloping darkness. she was in there, i knew. my Inner Flaming Narcissist lay in the deepest hollows, biding her time, raising my worst selves from the dead. but it didn't matter.

i took a deep breath and closed my eyes. the wind took my hair in its hands and stroked my face encouragingly. the earth pulsed beneath my bare feet. somewhere beneath them, i knew, She walked.

...and so i sang.

i'm sorry but i'm just thinking of the right words to say...
i know they don't sound the way i planned them to be...
but if you wait around a while i'll make you fall for me
i promise you, i promise you i will...

i sang every fitting song i could remember.

something in the way she knows
and all i have to do is think of her...
something in the things she shows me.
i don't wanna leave her now.
you know i believe and how...


and when you speak...angels sing from above--
everyday words seem...to turn into love songs...

bronze and salmon and lavender hues on the horizon gave way to the deeper blue-black shadows of night. stars came awake across the sky, and the milky silver ribbon of moon tears stretched from one end of the horizon and disappeared into eternity. the grass took upon itself the silver sheen as the moon rose three-quarters full. sweat beaded across my brow and tickled down the side of my face. i felt it streak down the middle of my back and between my breasts, and still i sang.

i saw a world enchanted
spirits and charms in the air,
i always took for granted
i was the only one there.
but your power shone...
brighter than any i've known!
i'm under your spell
nothing i can do...
you just took my soul with you.
you worked your charm so well
finally, i knew
everything i dreamed was true
you made me believe!

through the night i serenaded her, though my voice grew hoarse and i had to wrack my brain to find new things to sing. but still, however silly it seemed--

it's not unusual to be loved by anyone
it's not unusual to have fun with anyone...

--i sang it. at some point before the darkness gave way to the first hint of dawn, i had fallen to my knees in exhaustion. now i pleaded with her, romancing my Inner Flaming Narcissist with every love song i had ever heard, and as the first touch of gold crept over the horizon, i saw movement by the mouth of the cave. i gasped!

...and it disappeared.

i merely closed my eyes and began again.

hello, hello!
i'm at a place called 'vertigo'
lights go down and all i know
is that you give me something i can feel...
feeeel!
you're teaching me...
your love is teaching me
how to kneel.
kneel!!

and there she was. with outstretched arms she came to me and embraced me.

and as the sun burst over the horizon to bathe the sprawling hills in dazzling light, as the birds and insects began their morning songs, one more song arose within me, and she joined in. by the time we finished, there was...

give me strength to find the road that's lost in me.
give me time to heal and build myself a dream.
give me eyes to see the world surrounding me.
give me strength...to be...

...only me.

-------------------------
songs in order of appearance:
when in rome, "the promise"
the beatles, "something"
louie armstrong, "la vie en rose"
buffy the vampire slayer: once more with feeling, "under your spell"
tom jones, "it's not unusual"
U2, "vertigo"
over the rhine, "give me strength"

continued from pt iv

dark moon

and she looked at me, finger to her lips. her only visible red tattoo the stain on her palms, but i knew the pomegranate priestess. she said to me:

"most people celebrate the full moon.

they feel her strong pulse, are drawn to her bright light. she speaks to many, beautiful and pale and radiant.

my power has always lain in the dark moon.

not the "new" moon.

dark moon.

(and no, i'm not emo, thanks...)

she's beautiful in her own way.

silent, yet profound.

infinite, powerful depths to her, each bit of knowledge something one must work hard and unfailingly to receive.

promising riches...if you can withstand her.

powerful subsonic call, vibrates the marrow.

crone energy.

dark wisdom.

in the dark, your pupils dilate wiiiiiide open to see vague shapes in the chairoscuro shadows. you must be wide open and accepting --even unto pain and great risk-- in the dark moon.

...nothing is as it seems.

...you must learn your own dark power to interpret the dark shadows, to hear the dark music.

nothing is the same to any two people.

there are things only blossom in the dark of the moon. things only found to those who can find them...

...those who are wide open.

it's not for everyone. it's not even for most people.

only a small some.

there are those who honor Her in Her Darkness, who respect Her.

few are Denizens.

for those who hear it, the celebration is thunderously loud, powerful, and beautiful. how can silence be so loud?

it can.

Her language is of deeper knowing.

be deaf, mute, and blind for a time...and feel the dark moon awaken the sixth sense so you hear more clearly, see further, and speak more deeply than you ever had before.

the dark moon illuminates what lies beneath the deep ocean, while the full moon makes shine the foam on the shore.

one Moon Goddess, two aspects. both necessary for full understanding.

most of Her children awaken in Her full light.

some of us come alive now."

"thank you for calling Support..."

i know technically it's saturday, but i haven't gone to bed and awakened to a new day, so to me it's still technically friday night. just really late.

anyway.

so today i called up holosync support because a.) i've been meaning to, and b.) after my last blog post, it really just hit home for me why i really needed to not put it off any longer.

the guy on the other end of the line told me what *ks* had told me the other day, confirmed what i said in my last post, only he was able to really elaborate. and he was able to tell me that what's happening to me happens to a lot of people.

which is a relief, because i thought i was seriously regressing to Old Delena. like, pre-Kali Summer Delena.

scary.

(aka terrifying)

i haven't been having any outbursts. i'm more the implosive temper type, y'know? but i can't exactly hide it completely; i just work my hardest to avoid inflicting this targetless negativity upon anyone else. sometimes, though, it's been a very real challenge not to, and sometimes i wonder how obvious the internal, titanic struggle truly is.

because there are days when it sounds like Clash of the Titans inside myself.

it's physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting.

very exhausting.

i was told it's my resistance of and struggle with this that's creating the suffering, which i figured. however, i couldn't quite understand how to avoid both struggling with it (creating suffering) and simultaneously avoid inflicting this anger on anyone else.

of course, all of this probably makes very little sense without understanding how holosync actually works. it's like power-meditating, receiving all the benefits (and challenges) of years and years of meditation very quickly, but it also causes all these stressors to be released from your subconscious and nervous system, and it's a soul detox. so toxins are being released, and the deeper i go into this, the harder i push myself (like an athelete would, only i'm training my mind and soul) the more gets released.

something he said...something about how i'm trying to stop the flow of the river, which is impossible. something about how i'm pushing and pulling and trying to keep control so hard that i'm exhausting myself...and finally i'll just learn to let go, or through sheer exhaustion i won't be able to fight anymore.

yet more lessons in How To Let Go, which i've never been great at.

something he said just hit me so hard, i was standing there in the kitchen crying like a total idiot. and i didn't even really know why, except that his words had reached like a hand inside me and gripped my solar plexus in his fist.

something he said just enveloped my entire difficulty with so many very deep things --my difficulties letting go, my encompassing block against crying, even Freedom Revolution-- and there i was, with tears down my stupid face. i hate crying. ironic as it sounds, there's this part of me that wants to learn how to cry so badly. how the hell does someone cry without feeling like a total fucking idiot? how does one cry without being utterly disgusted with one's self? i have no idea how.

but yeah. what he said punched right through me and squeezed my solar plexus. you know how you can squeeze silly putty in your fist and it oozes out between your fingers? that's the visual i got of my chakra, and just about as violent: a fist punching through me, squeezing the crap out of my poor little yellow gut chakra. it almost knocked me onto my ass chakra.

apparently the only thing to do is continue to detox, which means continuing to do exactly as i've been doing, and just wait it out. i wish there were some sort of spiritual ipecac or meditational castor oil. maybe stick a finger down my throat chakra? hork it all up, then tuck me up on the couch with blankets, soft pink fuzzy socks, lots of herbal teas, and lemme watch practical magic and the last unicorn.

yeah. i wish.

the price of love pt iv

last time, on iGoddess...

“She Who Never Lets Go is out there,” I said.

She Who Never Lets Go. She Who Never Forgets...nor Forgives. i had many names for her, primary among them My Inner Flaming Narcissist.

i leapt onto my warhorse and meant to simply gallop in search as i had with all the others. my warriors let out a resounding roar as i wheeled my mount and he reared up, beating the air with his mighty hooves and bellowing out a blood-boiling whinny of his own. my heart pounded in echo of his bloodthirst, but just as i tightened my grip on the reins, he began to morph right before my eyes.

sleek chestnut neck elongated, grew scales that deepened to the smouldering redblack of still-burning coals. swift, straight legs thickened like oak stumps and bent in upon themselves. stout hooves grew into five-toed, leathery feet with obsidian talons the length of my sword and as thick as my thigh. the swishing horsetail was shed and in its place grew a powerful tail with wickedly curved spikes at the end. my steed unfurled expansive wings that ruffled like canvas tarp in the wind, and --astride a great red dragon-- took to the air.

my companions grew smaller as we lifted higher into the air. i felt a pang at this, leaving them with nary a farewell, but somehow i knew they were still with me. all ninety-nine of them.

flying low, we could not find my Inner Flaming Narcissist, and so I pointed up and the dragon rose higher. there! running full tilt through the barley as if the hounds of hell itself were after her. perhaps hellhounds would have been preferable, compared to myself astride a red dragon?

i pointed at the small form running, and the dragon opened his mouth and a veritable fountain of liquid fire gushed forth and flooded the countryside in flames. just before it hit my enemy, she dove headfirst into a small opening in the side of the hill. not even the barley caught fire. not so much as a whiff of smoke on the air once the dragon ceased his onslaught. we circled around for another dive, and this time the dragon spat fireballs. circle and dive, this time raining brimstone.

again and again he barraged the hillside with sulfur and flame, but it was no use.

once more i pointed to the ground and he nodded, coming to land right beside the mouth of this tiny hole in the hillside. from the air it seemed tiny as a rabbit hole, but in truth it would have fit a child quite easily. however she had shrunk to fit, or the cave mouth had widened to accommodate her…it was an ability she alone possessed.

i had to doff my armor, even leave my sword behind before i could fit. i squeezed through the mouth of this cave and crawled, but it widened a few paces in and i could walk freely. it was blacker than hell and i could not see my hand in front of my face. the only light came from the mouth of the cave, where i could see –in great detail—the clear sky to the horizon, each stalk of barley, and the red dragon watching me carefully.

a few more paces and the tunnel forked three ways. immediately i knew She Who Never Forgives had taken the middle fork, but still i hesitated. somehow i knew that a few paces beyond the fork, the tunnel curved sharply down, became almost a chute that led deep, deep into the earth. and it was a maze down there, i knew. somehow, i just knew.

i had lost her but could not admit it. i struggled with myself, wanting more than anything to go after her and be done with it! but i also knew that i would very likely lose myself if i followed. get lost? no. i would lose myself...whatever that meant. i was a warrior, not a philosopher! but somehow i knew it was a dangerous maze down there, filled with the unknown that was all the more monstrous and dangerous because it was the unknown. if i went down there, i would never see sunlight again.

a deep, rumbling voice echoed from the cave mouth. “my friend and lady knight,” said the dragon, “how dost thou intend to proceed? thy quarry is lost in a warren of twists and folds even thou could not hope to unravel.”

draconic, the language of the draq, was a very high and formal speech, i knew. and this was as informal of speech as a dragon could manage; we were very old friends, he and i. but the old forms must be met. again, something a philosopher or perhaps a historian would understand, but i was a simple warrior. all i knew was that old friends through lifetime after lifetime, it was enough for me that i just knew. “i am conflicted, old friend,” i confessed.

before i could continue, the dragon spoke again. “thou art out of thine element, sister, and deep in thine enemy’s lands.” the warning was simple but elegant; his telling me the advantage was not mine would have been redundant.

and yet i lingered, torn between chasing after my Inner Flaming Narcissist and admitting defeat, but the dragon was right. i just could not admit it gracefully. i could not let go of the chase. not when i was so close to utter victory!

"pride blinds thee," he said. "thou wouldst follow Destruction to its end and salvage thine dignity, even as thou risks all."

i laughed, but it was a bitter sound. he was right, as usual. i wanted to save face, to save myself the trouble of hunting them all over again, to save myself from feeling stupid and like i had failed by not cutting off the head of the hydra. and yet i was willing to risk my life to save face. he'd said it: i was being stupid and egotistical. i couldn't see any alternative, however.

finally, gritting my teeth and fighting not to punch the walls and scream in frustration, i turned heel and climbed back out of the tunnel. my friend waited as i lost myself in thoughts. i was wallowing in my dark mood, defeated and frustrated beyond words. how could i get her?

...how could i destroy her?

to pt v.

"the golden prayer"

"prayers are nothing more than throwing what you want out into the universe."
--kotabear

there was this was the lovely opening in my freewill astrology newsletter, a quote by deepak chopra, and it's been sticking with me ever since yesterday. and, of course, it actually got me thinking about something else from my catholic childhood that sticks with me to this day. i wanted to throw it out there, because i think deepak really expresses the concept of yielding with love and understanding in order to receive those things in return...yet in the giving of them, receiving them for yourself becomes less important than the simple act of reaching out to another soul.

because i've recently learned that it's really true: whatever you're feeling is what you're resonating, and whatever you're resonating is what you're attracting.

"Once again we face a paradox, for it appears that softening your heart and gently tending its wounds will protect you from evil. Building a fortress and defending yourself behind it will only make you more vulnerable. Healing your own heart is the single most powerful thing you can do to change the world. Your own transformation will enable you to withdraw so completely from evil that you contribute to it by not one word, one thought, or one breath."
-Deepak Chopra, The Deeper Wound: Recovering the Soul from Fear and Suffering

this quote really --finally-- brought home a prayer i've always loved, from the only saint with whom i've had a connection and continued to feel connected to even after almost a decade after leaving the Church.


Make me a channel of your peace,
Where there is hatred let me bring your love,
Where there is injury your pardon Lord,
And where there's doubt true faith in you.

Make me a channel of your peace,
Where there's despair in life let me bring hope,
Where is darkness, only light,
And where there's sadness ever joy.

O Master grant that I may never seek,
So much to be consoled as to console,
To be understood; as to understand,
To be loved as to love with all my soul.

Make me a channel of your peace,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
In giving of ourselves that we receive
And in dying that we are born to eternal life
--Prayer of St. Francis

the price of love pt iii

last time, on iGoddess...


the body lay still, face down, and i stared at her hair rippling in the wind. my army cheered for the victory, but i did not. it would only get more difficult. “to Doubt,” i said, staring down at the body. the call was taken up by the rest of my warriors until it was a thunderous roar like a whirlwind around me.

i blinked.

and suddenly i was back upon my warhorse, galloping across the countryside, my companions running as if fresh and rested. we chased down Doubt and surrounded her so she was forced to face me. every time she tried to run, she ran into a solid wall of bodies and shields and my fighters shoved her back into the circle they’d cleared for us.

one by one we chased my enemies down. blood enemies. foes against whom i had struggled for lifetimes. eons. somehow i knew this day was the day i would strike them down for once and all, and be their puppet no longer.

one by one we hunted them down like animals. there were so many i cannot recall every single one, but i know there was a certain order to defeat them or else all my fighting would be for naught. contempt needed to be slain before Arrogance could fall, and yet i had to face Self-Importance and False Pride first in order to weaken Contempt enough to face her and win. and yet, i could not defeat False Pride without first felling Self-Loathing. and so it went. there was only one proper order, and it was a delicate puzzle i had to work out on the fly, in the rush of battle and drunk on adrenaline.

somehow, i remained clear-headed. and every single enemy wore my face, my body, cried out with my voice. i died a thousand deaths that day; i watched as i handed myself violent and bloody death a thousand different ways.

every time we were on the hunt, i rode my steed at a gallop and my companions easily kept pace. and every battle, i would suddenly find myself on my feet and my warhorse gone. after the first few engagements i realized my companions only grew stronger and had more energy after every fight, not weak and tired and winded. but i grew tired enough for a hundred men. and in the heat of battle there was never the stink that covers a battlefield like a thick blanket.

every enemy had her own horde of minions, which my companions fought and kept clear of me, and which i never saw. my own comrades i never saw clearly, either, only caught glimpses from the corner of my eyes. the air remained as crisp and clear as ever, and the barley swayed and rustled as it brushed against my armor. the chill in the air grew sharp as the breeze dried the sweat from my skin, but i felt clean. for all the blood and sweat, dirt and death that covered me from head to toe, i was clean.

the moment i had run Despair through the belly with my sword, i turned and my companions parted for me to walk a clear path…and suddenly Rage was there. she loomed until she filled my entire vision, my likeness in every way except her colors were more vivid, as if the background had faded to a pale, washed-out version of reality and rendered Rage in stark clarity. down to the red plumes on her helmet, Rage was identical to me in every way, only larger than life.

she grinned at me and my stomach jumped into my throat, then plummeted to my feet. in one swift motion her greatsword was out of its scabbard and arced upwards toward my head. i parried, and the jolt reverberated down to my toes. Rage was strong! far stronger than i. and as we fought, she grew. only slightly at first, but if we were perfectly equal in the beginning –not even counting her superior strength—any growth was her advantage. and she never stopped smiling at me, a dark smile that seemed all pointed fangs, and her eyes glittered with malice. she was making me pay; exacting her revenge for everything that had ever angered her, and i was Rage’s blood sacrifice.

but i held onto my own righteous, berserker frenzy and it was barely enough to keep up my defense. Rage fought me back and back. and she grew. and she was powerfully strong. i was losing.

i lost my footing and fell, bracing myself up with one elbow as i blocked another jab. i deflected the sword’s point, but not enough, and i took a wound high in my right shoulder. Rage’s sword did not pierce me through, just grazed me with the edge, but it was enough. the pain flooded everywhere at once, however, and somehow i knew it would leave a scar i would carry forever no matter how anyone tried to heal it. i remember only hoping that i would still be pretty despite the scar.

thinking herself the victor, Rage threw herself at me. but she was overconfident and underestimated me. i repaid her for my wound, and as she staggered back in utter surprise, i pushed myself to my feet and swung my sword with all my might...

...and her head went flying from her body. before my sword had completed its arc, Vengeance and Malice sprang from the pool of Rage’s blood at my feet.

they were peculiar. if i injured one, an identical injury appeared on the other. fighting them was like dueling two foes with one mind. one fell after i tore a hole through her heart, the other with her skull split. at that point, however, i could no longer tell them apart.

and on it went until there were almost none left. i rode my horse, my companions ran alongside me. we came to the spot i knew my next foe, Deceit, would be, and she was not there. confused, all one hundred and one of us looked around, searching for her. i knew she could not have gotten so far as to escape, and yet Deceit was nowhere to be seen! just then i caught movement from the corner of my eye and noticed that one of my companions wore her armor that did not quite fit as properly as it should. she carried her sword awkwardly, and her helmet was just a little too big.

she caught me staring at her and gave a start, her eyes growing wide and nostrils quivering like a deer that had caught the hunter’s scent. and i knew. she knew i knew.

i had found Deceit hiding among my own ranks.

“Deceiver!” i shouted, barreling straight for her at a dead run. i bashed her with my shield and then stabbed her in the chest with my sword as she lay stunned in the dirt. it was over almost before it even began.

“there is only one,” i said to myself. only one left out of all of them...and she was the most dangerous, the most important, and the most elusive. with her still free, i knew that it was possible my slain enemies could be resurrected.

in fact, it was most certain.

“She Who Never Lets Go is out there,” i said. She Who Never Lets Go, She Who Never Forgets...nor Forgives...

to pt iv

the price of love pt. ii

...continued from pt. i...

i was standing in the middle of eternity, the countryside rolling in gentle swells as far as the eye could see. gone was the river of blood, where upon its blood-muddy banks i had sat with the pomegranate priestess. instead of the river, now i could see the rippling plains covered in barley swaying in the breeze which held a touch --a mere hint-- of ice.

it was the time of year when late summer was just changing hands with the darkening autumn, the chilled fingers of the turning seasons reaching into the heat of midday to raise goose chills on my skin even as I dripped sweat in the heat.

i stood alone on a hilltop, dressed for battle save for the general’s helmet tucked under one arm, its crest of red plumes fluttering ever so gently on the restless air. i looked around, expecting to see the pomegranate priestess with her blood tattoos, but she was gone. strands of hair had worked themselves loose from my braid and blew across my face; the breeze came from the north. death was in the wind this day, i knew. i ran my hands across the heads of barley and knew somehow this was the last moment of peace i would see for a long time, and i wished time would stand still.

silence fell.

even the breeze stopped and the barley froze in mid-sway. every tiny detail of the world stood out in cruel relief, simple as it was: the sky cerulean perfection, flawless; the hills so gentle it seemed the land was flatter than it truly was. it seemed i could run to the horizon and never get winded; the breeze sent the barley bowing and swaying in waves; the air crisp and fresh and smelled like…

i blinked my eyes and the peace shattered before me. suddenly i was sitting astride a warhorse just as garbed for battle as i was, a huge chestnut steed with black mane and tail. it had a red saddlecloth with gold trim; a red to match the plumes on my helmet. i alone in my army wore red, however, as was i the only one to have a horse.

this horse was no gelding and only half broken, fierce and rearing and whinnying and difficult to control. no one else could ride this horse, i knew, but even i had to give all my concentration to controlling my mount. i couldn't handle this horse casually at all but give it my full care and respect.

all this i knew in an instant as time resumed and i found myself suddenly astride this massive warhorse, my war party behind me shouting and roaring and beating their swords on their shields to get their blood racing.

i drew my greatsword from its sheath and pointed it forward, heralding the charge downhill. my enemies were here, concealed in the barley, occupying the beauty of the picturesque landscape in the heart of my queendom. “Onward!” it was a full-throated roar as i kicked my mount to full gallop.

the rest of my army, one hundred elite warriors of legendary skill and power, ran afoot alongside my mount. the horse, i knew, was a necessity born of the fact i could never have kept up with my companions running as easily as they kept up with my horse galloping.

i led the charge downslope, no enemy in sight and yet i knew that we were not alone in that vast field of barley.

And we fell on the enemy. the first of many: Fear.

i was screaming Fear’s name, waving my sword in the air and spurring my horse even faster. the bloodlust was a roar in my ears and a fire in my veins. there would be a reckoning this day!

and then i was upon her, and my horse was gone. i was on foot. my companions were fighting as well, but i could not see their adversaries. unseen foes accompanying Fear, nightmare conjurations of every form imaginable, but all i could see was Fear herself. my companions kept Fear’s minions away from me, defending me so i could face my enemy unhindered.

i raised my sword, screaming in the heat of battle. i looked into my enemy’s eyes.

my first mistake.

again time lurched, slowed to a crawl. i took in the sight of Fear from head to toe. her eyes held me. they were my eyes.

she had my round face, the scar on her bottom lip, her left cheekbone slightly puffier than her right from the day in high school when she cracked it. she was exactly my height; her hair exactly the length of mine; the mole on her neck; the scar on the knuckle of her right forefinger that i saw as she held up her hands…everything. she was me.

Fear was me.

i hesitated, my sword trembling in my hands. i wanted to weep. i was terrified. horrified! i would just as soon turn my sword upon myself!

Fear fell to her knees, hands in front of her face as if to deflect the blow she knew was coming. i knew exactly the expression i wore because Fear wore it as well, and i knew she would not weep no matter how terrified she was unless i wept first. it was then i noticed she wore no armor, no protection. all she wore was one of my favorite grungy, layered outfits i had loved back in middle school: forest-green shirt with a pocket at the left breast, faded and fraying denim shorts, black leggings underneath, black socks, black boots, black sweatshirt tied around her waist.

how could i kill an unarmed child? she certainly looked twelve years old again. i was trembling. an enemy as my equal, met face to face in armor and armed to the teeth i could slay, but i would not be a butcher of children! oh, how i trembled...!

...and then i realized this was her tactic; this was Fear’s great Weapon. she manipulated me as if i were the child!

anguish welled up within me. screaming anguish and defiance, i brought my sword down and sliced Fear clean across the chest, a diagonal gash that gaped horribly from her left shoulder down to the ribs on her right side. her breastbone made an ugly, wretched crunch as it was crushed. her blood sprayed across my face, splattered my armor, but i did not wipe it away.

upon the death of my first foe, my army rose up in a deafening cheer. “Onward!” I called, jabbing my bloodied sword straight up into the air.

to pt iii

the price of love, pt. i

the valley treated me well. after my resurrection and baptism, there came a renaissance of childhood where i was given every good thing, feasted upon the delectibles of Nature's bounty with no thought other than that it gave me joy. i had my chores, yes, but afterward there was only play.

i had stood tall in the face of the pomegranate priestess, confident in my new knowledge, had stolen her sickle and torn a strip of her robes to tie back my hair. it fluttered about and caressed my naked body in the breeze. there was nothing but me, the sun, Valley-in-the-Glade, the Sentinels guarding our peace there with their majesty and patience, and the laughing river sparkling like rhinestones over the rocks.

in the Valley, gravity worked differently. when i got up to run, i ran like a pegasus on the air, my toes barely touching the ground and my hair streaming behind me. when i swam, the water was so light and clear it was like song on my skin, and when i breathed it was like inhaling liquid laughter. i lay on the grass beneath the sun, watching clouds play into shapes for my amusement, and the grass reached around to cradle me.

there was nothing i needed, and i wanted for naught.

my hair had been left hanging free down my back, and it had begun to form thick tendrils on its own. catching my shadow on the ground, it seemed as if snakes sprouted from my crown and twined about me with minds of their own. sometimes, if i stared long enough at my shadow, i could almost hear the whispers as they hissed wisdom in my ears. i could almost feel the caress of their forked tongues against my shoulders, the back of my neck. in play, i became quite good at twining my red scarf about my head, coiling my dreadlocks into elaborate piles atop my head, leaving one or two to twine around my neck as my only adornment.

for i was a wild thing in the Valley. when i thirsted, the river gave me drink. when i hungered, the Valley offered up delicacies like spongy mushrooms, tender shoots and berries. squirrels shared their nuts with me, birds their seeds. i slept when i tired from my play, played with whom i would, climbed the trees to hear their thoughts, and never wanted for anything.

"have you enjoyed your stay here in the Valley?" she asked.

i looked over at her as if she had always been there. i had not seen her in what seemed an Age, and yet her appearance did not surprise me. she looked much like me this time, only her robe was a red so deep at the hem it seemed black. the color lightened as it went up, as if the black seeped upwards until at about knee-length her robes were the same vivid blood-red as all the others. the black hem glistened, hung heavy as if wet.

her feet were tattooed, as were her hands. except instead of the whorls and spirals, dots and serrated edges to which i had grown accustomed, her tattoos were in a very unique spatter, with large spots of red, some of which remained perfectly round while others had been fashioned as if the red dribbled down her feet. beneath her toenails had been tattooed a deep red, and around her cuticles. the same for her hands. there were splashes up past her elbows, and her hands were almost completely stained red. there was even a few splatter-tattoos up her face.

the entire effect was...

i looked down at her hem. it was dripping. droplets of a red so dark it could only be blood splashed onto her feet.

those weren't tattoos.

"oh, they're quite real," she said. then she grasped the hem of her robes, flicked them sharply, and more blood spattered onto her face. i watched in breathless amazement as the blood seeped into her skin, became a blood tattoo etched permanently into her cheek. "my caste is a small one within the priestesshood." she gave me a dry smile. "not all of us wield a sickle, flash blue skin and red hair, and lovingly burn heaven to the ground. they talk of Those Who Bleed but Do Not Die and yet know only what is common and necessary." she shook her head, and the bones decorating her dreadlocks rattled like hollow reeds. "they do not go into the death."

she looked at me then, and i could see the red in her eyes. the bone ring through her left nostril glinted dully in the sunlight. "you have enjoyed your stay, yes?"

"my stay?" i replied. "have i overstayed myself?"

she laughed, surprisingly rich and genuine for such a dark priestess. "you may stay until the end of days when the Jiggy Snake swallows his own tail once more, for all we care. it is completely up to you." she shrugged, looked off across the water. "you have paid your price."

"yes..." i narrowed my eyes at her, wondering. "i have paid, and worked, and endured. i have learned and grown..."

"and i understand one of my sisters has called you sister?"

"she did." my heart was beating hard beneath my breastbone. "she said few make it this far, and fewer survive. are you here to kill me?"

again she laughed. "my goddess, no! i am here to invite you. there is within you a deep affinity for this path of ours." she tapped the vial of river water still in my hands. "you hold on for the chance to bless someone else, but perhaps your blessing would be better used for your own power?" she tapped the vial again, and i saw there was blood inside instead of water. i gasped, and she only leaned in closer. "you hold the power of the darkness of the moon inside you," she whispered, "and the little death within you triggers the possibility of new life to burst from you in the form of a seed. it is there, this seed, hopeful and waiting in the nest of your blood, waiting for a male seed to join it and beget life. when it dies, you wash in the river of this dark power, and again the cycle is renewed."

she wrapped a blood-stained hand around my wrist. "your death triggers life. the dead before you have given you life." she raised a brow at me. "i wonder, my sister, how you will go about making your amends to the dead?"

to pt ii

year of the delena

so we come to the close of the Year of Secrets with its Season of Temporary Insanity, Invasion of the unFunk, the writing of the Funky Love Letter of Closure, the Inner Demon Tea Party and Imminent Fatal Gorge-Fest, the Multiversal Jiggy Snake and Funktastic Yayness, Delena of the Funkywild, and my return to How It Used To Be.

depressed much? you have no idea.

i suppose this is where i express what it is i've learned this year about life, about myself and the world around me. i suppose this is where people expect to hear that i've finally come to learn that i don't need a man to define me, that i don't need to be part of a pair to be complete and that, in fact, i am complete unto myself and giving away any part of that is to give away my fundamental power as Woman. or even as Human.

and to that i say THHHHHHBBBBBT--

the very thought makes me wanna fart really loud.

what i've learned is that I Am As Am. i've learned i am as am, and to deny that is to deny what it is to be delena. i deny my Self. if conflict is to come into collision or opposition as of one idea, desire, or activity with another, and if in psychiatry conflict is a mental/emotional struggle arising from opposing demands or impulses, then i have learned why my life has been conflict ever since that saturday morning on the patio when my calves and the backs of my knees came into intimate contact with a baseball bat.

i've been trying to be what everyone wants me to be, whether it's my bio-parents, my culture, the modern womens' movement, modern psychology, my friends, and even myself. but i am who is, and who was made to be as she is.

the latter half of this Year of Secrets has helped me see this.

it's archaic, provincial, and downright primeval, perhaps. so be it. so fucking be it.

i was made to be One of Two. i am complete unto myself, a whole person, yes. but when i shine is when i am one of two: one half of a working pair. and like a siamese twin, i will die when my other half stops working to help us flourish. he can be his own person all he wants to. this is all right with me. but my life's blood comes from when he tends to our partnership. i was made to be a partner, equal yet supporting. it's shown up in other aspects of my life as well: the faithful lieutenant, the devoted acolyte and successor (until the Kali Summer destroyed all hope of that), the support network at the salon. i shine when i am working towards the good of the whole, the good of the family, the flourishing of the partnership.

as i told *m* earlier today, everything about me was made and geared to be One of Two: when i truly love someone, when i hold him inside my body is the only time i truly know peace and the only time i feel whole. it occurs to me that eve was made for just this purpose, and yet my patroness is lilith.

i am no milksop to say, "as you wish," and lie complacently on bottom, do as i am told and yield all independence and individuality over to the masculine. fuck no. there is equality where i dwell, an honor and reverence for our different-yet-syncratic powers. and no matter how i may shrink in on myself from despair and pain (for depression and i are old friends and fall into familiar patterns quite easily), i never quit fighting.

never.

lilith, the night mother, always reminds me of equality and retribution when she is denied her due. *m* had disrespected and disregarded my heart, body, and soul...the trinity of Self. so i told him as much, and then i ended it. and i didn't take him back when he asked.

but he did ask, and so i give him the chance everyone deserves when they ask for it. but i do not compromise my needs, and i do not put him first yet again. if he can earn back his place at my side, then i will be very happy to have him there. and i will happily admit that i will be better with him there, rather than incomplete like that lone sock in your drawer whose mate was devoured by the washing machine.

i also accepted that i am a denizen of despair and there are some depths i simply can't deny to myself. i tried for so long not to give in to my depression, trying to hold myself together by sheer force. my last blog post was myself finally allowing myself to plunge into those dark waters and swim as deep as i was able.

and yes, i burned again.

but as soon as i allowed myself to go that deep, then and only then was i able to begin the ascent into the light once more. trying to "be strong" and "not let him get to me" and "see i don't need a man to complete me" and all that other helpful-yet-not-understanding advice under which i was being buried...it was advice i knew was good, that i knew was "supposed" to be what was good for me. yet it was keeping me in this limbo of trying to force myself to rise above it when what i needed was to sink down into it. and if i touched the slimy, silty bottom of the black mere of despair, if i got the mud and algae of it under my fingernails and in my hair, then so be it.

--i learned i had to cut through the bonds of modern convention, thick and unforgiving as cold iron, and be as i had been made to be.

--if i am to rise above something, i must first sink into its very own cold, black depths.

--i am made to be One of Two. i define myself by my emotional ties and relationships, and i am nothing without them. the most important of these is the bond with my life partner, and i simply am not complete without his love.

--compasson is part of my calling, but equality and retribution are equally my calling and my power lies in the Darkness. my gods are not of light and healing and hearth, but of war, destruction, and the purpose of death to clear away what does not matter anymore.

--if nobody likes any part of this, they can suck it.


let the Year of Secrets be done. so fucking mote it be.

rainbow dreams

this week's rainbow dreams is brought to you by the Inner Child Tarot, winkies, and divine madness.


being clothed only in one's own skin never mattered if you were on the grounds of the Menstrual Temple. if anything, there were some rites you could not experience unless you were wearing the full and gloriously free beauty of your own skin.

the magical thing about the Funky Grail was that there was no room in it for modesty, or self-consciousness, or even that hateful, wriggling little worm of self-loathing as it criticized every wrinkle and stretch mark, every saggy spot and jiggling lump and scar. something about the Temple would bear no ill thought against the Self. and admittedly, after eating candy calaveras and talking to clouds, drinking rainbows and holding the laughter of the earth in the crude matter of my body, it was impossible to even remember what those things were i hated about this glorious vehicle i'd chosen this time around.

the grass was soft and cool beneath my feet, which had been softened by an Age i spent in the mud learning to leave myself only to find the most magical destination was...mySelf.

instead of continuing to search for the path through the wood which had led me to the valley, i decided to walk the length of it and see where it took me. the sun was warm on my skin and turning it a beautiful golden brown. i could hear birds singing and talking in the trees. when they weren't chattering about the weather, their eggs, or scrubbing around for grubs and beetles, they were squawking variations of, "hey! hey! HEY!" and somewhere in the deadfall was an absent-minded squirrel muttering as it forgot where it had placed a well-stocked cache of nuts.

"do you like the Valley?"

there she was, the pomegranate priestess. the sight of the blood red robes and red tattoos made the scar on my breastbone itch, the one where a half-moon sickle had laid my breast open to the sky. this particular priestess wore her hair loose to her waist with only one narrow braid behind her ear and tied with golden thread. it was adorned with seashells and glass beads, small semi-precious stones carved into shapes like leaves, stars, spirals, and even the sillhouette of the venus of willendorf. a similar piece of jewelry adorned her ankle, complete with bells so her every other step was music. her tattoos sparkled in the sunlight, as if there were glitter, or ground mica, in the ink.

blood red, with a touch of gold.

her palms and the bottoms of her feet were completely inked, and it traced up her feet and hands in what were now familiar patterns of dots and whorls. only these traced up her legs to disappear beneath her robes, and up her arms to her shoulders, and beyond. i could see narrow tendrils of the gold-glittering red ink at the nape of her neck, at the hollow of her throat. one tattoo fell across her brow and beside her right eye, almost like delicate vinework...only those curves were serrated, and at the tip of each was a teardrop-shaped rhinestone.

like drops of blood glistening at the tips of the cruel sickle of the vulture goddess.

never had i seen such intricate tattooing on a pomegranate priestess before. never had i trembled so in the presence of one of them, though well aware of the mortal dance that was any interaction with them. the presence of a pomegranate priestess was blesséd danger. holy risk.

divine madness.

but for all that, where before i would have bowed with respect before speaking, instead i planted my feet firmly and stood tall. "the valley, Lady?" i asked.

she smiled, and i saw approval in those honey-brown eyes. "Valley-in-the-Glade," she replied. "few know to search for it. fewer still find it. none stumble across it unknowingly. the Valley calls whom it calls."

"then i am a denizen?" my palms were sweating the longer i stood in her presence, and it made my grip on the vial of springwater unsure. i kept twirling it in my hand, working it like a worry stone.

"all are denizens of the Valley," was the reply. "it's a simple matter of acceptance."

"and what is it i have acc--"

"your wounds are healed, then? you choose to use your gifts rather than be nourishment for those who would not waste their talents?" those brown eyes glittered like the rhinestones on her face. it was a challenge, i knew, and a threat if i gave the wrong answer.

She giveth, and She taketh away.

i let my own eyes glitter. "i am of Those Who Bleed But Do Not Die. i bleed to nourish others, i leave a river of blood as a path to guide others into wisdom. i bleed to remember what it is to be human, to always relate to All That Is. if others wish to devour me for their own ends..." i gave her my best feral smile, "let them come take me."

she raised a brow at me, but there was approval in how she held her head, in the set of her shoulders. "you once allowed all others before you. you sacrificed your Self, your Selflove, and even began to do their work for them. you said it was your place, that you did it out of love. what such Love is so twisted you would throw yourself away and deny yourself happiness? what sort of god allows such precious children to create such misery in their souls in the hope of a later joy? it seems to me a lifetime of sorrow does little to equip a soul to handle the undiluted Joyful Funk that is Oneness with Her."

i laughed at her challenge. "such a soul wouldn't begin to know how. such a soul would shy away from it. only a soul who knows she has a right to such happiness would even be willing to reach out and take hold of it. but such a one must first Know their importance and sacredness as a shining being."

she laughed at me. "and you think you are such a one?"

in one swift move, i snatched her sickle from the loop on her woven belt and cut a length of her robe. her eyes never so much as flickered as i did this, nor did her unreadable expression grow any clearer as i wound that length of blood red, billowing fabric around my head and let the rest of it trail down my back. i handed her back the sickle.

"i know i am," i said.

and then my breath caught in my throat as she bowed to me, palms pressed together, fingertips resting just beneath her chin. "welcome, sister," she purred. then she straightened, took my head in her hands and kissed my forehead, my eyelids, and my lips.

"the journey is now truly begun," she said. "most do not come this far...

...most do not survive it."

rainbow dreams

this week's rainbow dreams is brought to you by the Inner Child Tarot, bells, and the letter Q.



i ran.

fleet-footed as the soulful-eyed doe who had greeted me upon my rebirth from the earth, from Earth, i ran through the dark forest along paths no human foot had trod for hundreds of years. she leapt and gamboled beside me, her dappled hide seeming to shift in the muted sunlight and shadows from the canopy above, as i ran faster than thought, silent as shadow, through the thick undergrowth.

my mud-heavy hair bumped against my back with each stride. my feet were cut on sharp stones and thorns. low-hanging branches left rose welts on my flanks as i crashed through them in my haste. my nipples hardened in the cold, damp morning air. the mud on my body dried in the breeze of my passing.

and every sensation of the stunning standard and numinous normal was a note in the spectacular song of the Funky Jive. my breath rasping in my throat was rapturous.

together, the doe and i broke through the dark wild wood into a sunlit clearing, in the middle of which grew a single maple tree. a small creek burbled and danced along the inner edge of the clearing and formed a pool on the other side of the maple. long sweetgrass and heather grew thick in the clearing, the heather shining with every delicate color nature could imagine. the thick perfume of heather mixed with the fresh, warm scent of the grass and water to tantalize my soul.

the doe bounded into the clearing, stopped to bend her head beside the pool for a drink of water, then with a leap was gone. she vanished back into the wood once more. i ran to follow her, but a few strides into the clearing i felt the woods fall away. suddenly, i found myself in a wide and fertile valley, white-capped mountains cradling me as if i stood in the palm of a verdant hand. the cloudless sky was as high as birdsong and as wide as joy.

but what took my breath was when i realized i was still within a circle. elm and oak, pine and apple trees stood at the four cardinal points. they were ancient sentinels, i knew, and gentle guides. and standing at four of the five mystical points were four other sacred Trees, with the mighty oak standing as head of both, to create a powerful Circle of nine sacred trees. with maple at its core.

the maple was my tree. the tree that bleeds, and in its blood gives nourishment to others. the tree that Bleeds But Does Not Die.

"Daughter of Earth," said the Sky, "Bathe thyself. Be cleansed of what was."

i knew i couldn't bathe in the pool, but downstream a small ways was a shallow dip, waist-high with a sunning rock the perfect length for me to stretch out upon. testing the waters, i found the creek so warm and aerated it felt like laughter soughing across my skin. i scrubbed the mud from my hair with sand, then crushed handfuls of heather and rubbed them into my hair and skin. as i sunned myself upon the rock, i took handfuls of spiraled pond grass and ran it through my hair so it would dry straight and untangled. when it was dry, i wove my hair into two long braids over each ear, then wound them around my head as i'd seen my great, great grandmother's portrait. she'd been a beloved curandera in her village when she was alive, healing the sick of spirit as well as fostering health in the body.

i had not seen it while bathing, but as i came out of the water i found my wounds had been completely healed. there was a pale scar, like a birthmark, where the Pomegranate Priestess had lain my heart open, in the shape of a star burst. there was a serpentine scar around my upper arm, pale and thin. but i was whole, and hale, and my time within the Earth had given me perspective into what my problems truly were:

Not That Big a Deal.

"Child of Water," said the Earth, "Immerse thyself and drink. Be freed of what is."

the small pool beckoned. only a moment did regret flicker inside me as i thought about my freshly dry hair getting wet all over again. i suppose even meditation and perspective can only go so far for vanity. but my steps were sure as i lowered myself into the pool. i cupped my hands together and lifted the water to my lips. it tasted sweet, and rich with minerals. it went to my head like a sip of brandy.

"it's just..." i heard myself sigh. "the idea of peace with him, like a holy grail, only i watch it tear me apart and i can't stop crusading for it."

my path had become, without my knowing, the path of compassion, of love and mercy and the never-ending struggle for understanding. and yet my own fear of being laid waste again was too powerful to allow me to surrender fully to compassion. i still saw it as giving permission to another to cause me pain. and the harder i struggled, the more it ripped me apart. there could be true compassion within me, and it didn't have to cost my Self. compassion, forgiveness, and mercy could be given, but it did not require me to treat the other person as a lifelong and trusted bosom companion. to truly pardon required only forgiveness of an offense, and anything more which led to my demise, again and again, was my own naive folly.

it was time to leave hopeful childhood dreams and idealism behind. there would always be room for beauty in the world of magic, but there could be no trust given freely where it was not first earned.

i cried for myself, then. deep inside myself, i had always prayed that someday i would be forgiven by people i loved and could then be welcomed back with open arms and laughter to resume my place among them as if nothing had happened, once my penance was repaid. and in my hope to receive that, i had given that very thing to many others, foolishly, and with disastrous results. with enough compassion, forgiveness could be given. but the time had come to accept that my place among them was lost a long time ago, that others' places in my life were gone, and sometimes there is no such thing as happily ever after together.

no matter how much the child within might want it so.

"Sister to the Sky," said the Water, "wash thy tears and dry thy face. Take, and hold it in trust for what will be."

i washed my face and stepped from the pool. immediately i was dry. sitting upstream at the edge of the creek was a crystal vial with a carved stopper. i filled it with water and clutched it to my heart.