Beltane Blessings

Posted on April 30, 2023 by Dyanna

One of the animals associated with Beltane is the swan. The magical meaning of the swan is love, union, and partnership: swans mate for life. Just as the Goddess and God join in union on Beltane, swans reflect this eternal commitment in their own union. Swans also represent loyalty, fidelity, and faithfulness, reflecting the joining of Mother Earth and Father Sun when the sun is released from its bondage of winter and able to rule over summer and life once again. Swan symbolism includes grace, power, inner beauty, elegance, purity and balance.

Ostara/Spring Equinox

Posted on March 20, 2023March 18, 2023 by Dyanna

We celebrate the renewal of life as seen by the newly emerging life in many forms all around us. A resurrection from all that looks dead is seen as the Earth regenerates and renews itself. This is symbolized in resurrection myths in many cultures and traditions. There are many myths about the “Year Gods” ( Attis, Adonis, Osiris, and Dionysus) – who, like Christ, die and are reborn. He is symbolic of the vegetation, dying each year (at harvest) to be reborn in the spring.

Lughnasadh/Lammas 2022

Posted on July 31, 2022July 30, 2022 by Dyanna

What wondrous life is this I lead!
Ripe apples drop about my head;
The luscious clusters of the vine
Upon my mouth do crush their wine;
The nectarine and curious peach
Into my hands themselves do reach;
Stumbling on melons, as I pass,
Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass.
– Andrew Marvell, Thoughts in a Garden

Litha Blessings

Posted on June 21, 2022 by Dyanna

Ancient lovers believed a kiss would literally unite their souls because the spirit was said to be carried in one’s breath.
–Eve Glicksman

“Mine is the Month of Roses; yes, and mine
The Month of Marriages! All pleasant sights
And scents, the fragrance of the blossoming vine,
The foliage of the valleys and the heights.
Mine are the longest days, the loveliest nights;
The mower’s scythe makes music to my ear;
I am the mother of all dear delights;
I am the fairest daughter of the year.”
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Beltane Blessings

Posted on April 30, 2022April 30, 2022 by Dyanna

Prithee, smite the poet in the eye when he would sing to you praises of the month
of May. It is a month presided over by the spirits of mischief and madness. Pixies
and flibbertigibbets haunt the budding woods: Puck and his train of midgets are
busy in town and country.

In May, nature holds up at us a chiding finger, bidding us remember that we are
not gods, but over-conceited members of her own great family. She reminds us
that we are brothers to the chowder-doomed clam and the donkey; lineal scions
of the pansy and the chimpanzee, and but cousins-german to the cooing doves,
the quacking ducks and the housemaids and policemen in the parks.
– O’ Henry, The Month of May