Love is indeed heaven upon earth;
since heaven above would not be heaven without it;
for where there is not love, there is fear;
but, “Perfect love casteth out fear.”    ~Penn

How shall I do to love? Believe.
How shall I do to believe? Love. ~Lord Leighton

Perfect love and perfect trust…we have all heard those words many times and yet we all still ponder and wonder at what they may mean. They are simple words, love and trust, but how simple is it really to feel them in anything approaching a perfection of grace. Though, when it comes right down to it, what do we really know about love or trust.

Countless movies have been made about love, numberless books, articles, essays, plays, songs, both secular and spiritual. But, despite all that, love itself remains a mystery. This should be clue number one—that Love, capital letter “L” Love—is not something that can truly be understood, because it is something that in its totality is beyond mere human comprehension.

All that we see and call love, is not truly Love, but an extension into our world of a more than physical power. Not that it can’t be a beautiful, even joyful thing to know here in the material world, and not that it cannot lead to opening yourself up to an experience of the greater Power that all physical expressions of it but represent, but it is fundamentally so much more than that. Like the Divine, Love wears many masks in our world and though it is all around us, we cannot experience it fully while yet in the flesh. Though, we may at times come close, or glimpse it for but the briefest of moments.

The same holds true for Trust. For a perfect form of Trust is also a great power, one that we may only hold shades of in our normal everyday life. For a perfection of anything means that it is pure, complete, and utter—and who may claim to have an utter trust in anything, one where not a single doubt creeps in ever. We live and so we doubt, for that is part of being in a physical body which ages and will eventually die.

But Love, perfect Love, may be felt within the spirit. And when one feels that perfection of Love, then one also knows perfect Trust, for the two go hand in hand. This is not the love of romance, the kind of love which needs to possess, which involves making demands or fearing eventual loss or betrayal, though that is the form that most love takes in life today. This is the Love which is modeled after Divine Love, which is also called agape. Agape is Greek for “love feast,” and it means a form of brotherly love, the plural of which is the love of the brethren for each other. And certainly, we are all brothers in the Craft (although some of us are more properly sisters) and we do feast together.

Agape is the pure power of Love. It is the sort of Love that is the essence of the Divine presence in our lives, which gives life to our very spirits. And so this kind of Love can only be properly felt when you are in accord with your innermost Divine nature, when you stand in the sphere of the spirit that resides within you. The key to accomplishing this is to open your heart, for only then can you touch your soul and feel that Divine Love, feel agape for all, and know utter Trust, which is but another way to describe having absolute faith.

Perfect Trust, Divine Trust, is having a pure and utter confidence and faith that all of your expectations and desires will be fulfilled. Which means that there can be no doubt, none at all, inside you, for perfection of trust is a complete and accomplished fact. It is not a hope, it is not a wish, it is not something you think about and ache for…for if you have such an unalloyed Trust, then you just know it will be. It is having a true faith in the Divine Will, of which you are an integral part, a simple and perfect knowledge that what must happen, will happen. And that it will be a beautiful and joyous thing.

Knowing Love and Trust in their Divine forms within your heart means being at one with your own self as spirit, and so being at one with the world around you and all that happens and does not happen. It’s being absolutely aware that, when it comes right down to it, that “it’s all good.” Though, when you think about it, it does rather sound like a spell—to feel and know with utter certainty that you are one with everyone else and the whole of creation, and that the connection between it all is the power known as Love. While, at the same time, you have an utter certainty of Faith that all you truly desire will be fulfilled. Of course, it must be what you truly desire as an incarnated soul, not the desires born out of fear or anger or shame, to name but a few, all of which throw you out of yourself, out of your center, and involve something rather less than perfection.

But then who among us can know this complete and utter Love and Trust so long as we do not know our own center of being? To achieve this perfection of Love and Trust, you must enter into a different state of consciousness, an altered state of consciousness, and that involves opening your heart, which is the doorway to your spirit. For in our daily lives, we all know doubt, we all know pain and fear and loss and many of us do not know where we are going, let alone trust that we will get there. Some of us do not even know for a certainty who we are. When you open your heart to your own spirit, your own personal spark of the Divine, then you will know…for your spirit does not doubt and is not swayed by any outside influence, good or bad. That is perfection and purity; to be completely and utterly yourself, to be who and what you were born to be.

The words faith and fate are intimately connected, and fate is what is meant to be. When you are in this altered state of consciousness, you know peace and joy, for you also know that all that happens is what is meant to happen. You know that you are immortal, for both life and death are but passing phases. You can see the beauty in all things and in all people, even the one who may be sitting with a crabby face over their coffee at the next table at Starbucks. You wish them all well, but you know that they must each discover their own path for themselves, perfect themselves. You are not moved from your own center by either their happiness or by their fear or anger, even if it is directed at you.

This is Perfect Love and Perfect Trust—and it is not dependant on anyone or anything else in the universe, except existing in your own heart and soul. It does not mean that you need to find just the right people to be in a coven with or to circle with. It has nothing to do with another person’s ability to love or trust you, or with having to find people that you can love and trust. Anything that comes from outside of your self, that is dependent on what someone else does or doesn’t do, is not and can never be perfect.

A pure and complete Love can only come from being absolutely removed from and yet infinitely attached to the world, both conditions to exist within you at the same time. This may sound impossible or contradictory, but when you are in the altered state made possible by being at one with your heart and spirit, then you can and will feel this form of “dispassionate compassion.” You care for the world, for the people around you, but yet this depth of caring can neither hurt nor alter the essential you in any way, for you are complete unto yourself. You know who you are. You know you are the center of the universe. You have Faith. You have Knowledge. And you know peace and joy beyond any earthly measure.

All of which does not mean that you just sit there, communing with the Divine inside you, and do not act. It only means that you act in accord with your own perfect nature and with the Divine Will, which you have placed your own will in alignment with. When you have Perfect Love and Perfect Trust, you will do what you are meant to do, what the Divine put you here in the world to do.

If we are all to stand in Perfect Love and Perfect Trust in our circles, then we need to come to stand there within the boundless circle of our own hearts. It means that our hearts have to be open, so that our spirits may express the Divine light through our bodies…so that we may be Shining Ones. Bright stars come down to the earth to show the way to the Gods. We must be truly free, and yet still be bound to our flesh, for there is a reason we are born to it and we all chose that reason. We all chose to come here, to return again to the world of man.

When we kiss each other in the circle the kiss has ever been more than a sign of simple affection; it is a declaration of loyalty, love and spiritual unity, a hail and a greeting and a mutual sharing of the magickal Powers that give life and form to the universe. One of which is Love and one of which is Trust, two sides of the same coin, the minted gold of which is the Will of the Divine.

© 2009, Veronica Cummer

Europe was conquered over a thousand years ago by a faith which was not its own, that did not spring naturally out of its forests and hills, its mountains, rivers, and valleys. For the Gods of old Europe were the Gods who belonged there, who were native to the land and the people that they served. They were and they remain the Gods who best speak to the spirits of those with European ancestry and Who still reside in our very blood. We belong to Them and They belong to us, and that has always been the relationship between God and Witch.

And so we ache and long for a rebirth from the ashes of the restless dead. We hope and pray for the Old Religion to return to us and be renewed in the coming Age. We reclaim and rewrite our rituals time and again, finger through book after book and search the internet, hoping to stumble across the way back to what was taken from us. We seek after the heart and breath and bone of our own selves and of the faith of our ancestors, for the two are intimately intertwined. But, perhaps, the problem is that we are looking in all the wrong places.

The religion of the witches, the religion known as Wicca, is not Christian in any way. Its roots have nothing to do with Christianity, for like all native religions, its symbols, rites, stories, and traditions spring from the land from whence it came. It speaks to those who yet live in Europe and Britain and to those whose heritage is of that place, for it is our overriding archetypal spirit. And so, to truly understand Wicca, one must come to understand that inborn heritage. We must find within us that which speaks to us, what stirs our blood and moves our souls.

Those of us who are reborn as Witches, we seek the powers which once resounded through those ancient rites, and they are here to be called upon. The connection only lies in wait to be renewed. The key is in finding the doorway within ourselves, the road back to what was once thought lost. If we come to know our true selves, what lies below the surface of what is laid upon us by the culture and dogma of centuries of Christian faith, then we shall come to know again the Old Gods, the Old Ways, and the fourfold powers shall rise. For these powers lie within us, as much as without.

No religion can truly satisfy that intense longing for meaning, unless it is one that makes sense not only to the mind, but to the body, heart, and spirit. Just as the powers of the Four Quarters of earth, air, fire, and water come together to make the circle, so our bodies, minds, hearts, and spirits need to be in accord. If they are not in accord, then it is all the more difficult to make the leap to that which lies beyond them, the spirit that moves within the religion itself. The living faith of the living Witch.

We have dreams, visions, desires, and this longing, this feeling that something is just there, just over the horizon, and if we could but find the words for it, we could summon it into being. If we could only find the way to reconnect to that source, to the spiritual beginning place of the Old Religion, then we would know where and how to begin again for ourselves. We would know what building blocks need to be set in place for the world to be made anew, the world we all long to live in.

But it is not a simple or an easy task to shake off the beliefs of the non-Wiccan religions that many of us were raised in, let alone the constraints and of a cultural mindset heavily invested and built up by those same beliefs. It can be a slow and even painful process to shed the skin and be reborn as what we were truly meant to be. The process is made even more frightening by the fact that we are not even entirely sure what we desire to replace it with.

The clues to this new-old world are as buried treasures in what has come down to us from the past. Despite the fact that some today, even those use the name of Wiccan or Witch to describe themselves, now deny or doubt that anything has survived. It must be said, though, that all must make their own choices on this matter and if they so wish to believe that nothing has survived from that ancient heritage, then, for them, nothing shall.

But as we all have been born from the past, as we all have lived many lives, it does live on. It lives on in us. It lives on because we are those self-same witches from centuries ago, though we are now born to different bodies. It lives on because their blood did not die, but spread itself down through the many generations who have come since. And so the ways of the Old Religion have not been truly lost, nor ever can be, for they can only be forgotten.

We are the children of the past and the progenitors of the future, and it is an unbroken chain. What makes a Witch is remembering this, remembering who and what we are and all that being a Witch means. No book can teach you that if you cannot touch what lies inside you already, if you are not ready and willing to look for that spark and incorporate it into your life.

For as we are the descendants of those who once danced within the forests and upon the sacred mountaintops, who lifted up the flame of their own bodies and hearts to work magick for the good of the land and the prosperity of the people, as we are their descendants and we are them, no one can take that from us. Only if we deny who we are, if we turn away from what stirs in our blood, will we have no past. And those who have no past, have no future, for time goes not a straight line, but a circle.

We are all “hereditary” Witches if we but wake to what was given to us by virtue of our birth. It lies dormant within us, occasionally turning over in its sleep and throwing off dreams of what was and what can be again. To wake fully as Witches is to reclaim our birthright, our heritage, our powers and our place.

It is not a light matter to state that those of today’s religions that base themselves upon the struggle of duality, of light versus dark, good versus evil, have finally had their day, but that they have. They have run their course and now too must face a choice—to change or to fade and die. That is the way of things. Some might like to deny it, to deny the transformation of the Piscean paradigm to that of the Aquarian, but the slow grind of the wheel of the sky, the wheel of the Ages, is inexorable. All the prayer in the world cannot stop it. Though, no doubt, a few would like to try.

We have lived in the shadow of those who wanted us to be as they would have us and not as we desire to become. But now the light of the rising dawn will serve to reopen the doors to what was and what may be, and we stand in the middle, as always. We as the world’s Witches can sense it as other worlds draw close, as magicks and the Old Gods converge upon that inner door. As the secrets stir within us, the secrets that many in Christianity had hoped we would forget. Secrets about who we are and where we come from and what we may do. Secrets of the world and secrets of the stars and secrets of our own nature.

We have only to walk through that door to know again our heritage. We have only to give ourselves over to the living faith of our past to find again ourselves, our Gods, and our purpose. All the rest will come in time, once we have laid the foundation for it.

Veronica Cummer © 2009

Snatching up the remote, I paused the show at that moment and went to go get one of my baby name books (always good for finding names for characters when you’re a writer) and soon discovered that the name “Roswell” is actually Old English for “field of roses.” The minute I read that, the odd feeling turned into an overwhelming “yes!” sensation and I knew then that it was no coincidence that this particular “UFO crash” had happened at Roswell. I knew that it had happened for a reason and that this reason was both symbolic and also related in some fashion with the forces at work in that region, in particular the ley lines that exist in America and the power nodes that connect them, the currents that flow through and empower this land.

Of course, the concept of a “field of roses” has appeared before in relation to the past and to the Craft. Carlo Ginzburg wrote about the Benandanti in his books, a folk who went in spirit four times during the year to battle for the fertility of the land, once “over the wheat and all the other grains, another time over the livestock, and at other times over the vineyard.”2 There, they “fought, played, leaped about, and rode various animals, and did different things amongst themselves; and…the women beat the men who were with them with sorghum stalks, while the men had only bunches of fennel.”1 The place they went to they sometimes called the Field of Josafat and it was said to be the “meadow of the dead overflowing with roses.”3

It seems a common theme and idea that roses are linked to the Craft. Roses of the past were pink rather than red—much like the wild rose which remains today—and had only five petals. Thus, they symbolized the five-pointed star, the Four Quarters plus the center. Earth, air, fire, water, and spirit. Roses are also ancient symbols of love and of sacrifice; roses were special to Venus and red roses represented the fallen blood of Adonis. Roses also symbolize both life and death and the Rose of the Winds is drawn as a circle enclosing a double cross, thus displaying eight directions. While, in Rosicrucian belief, the rose placed in the center of the cross becomes the unity between the four elements.

Years ago, oddly enough, we had once asked the Goddess about the incident at Roswell. We were discussing the faery at the time and how they relate to us, the witches. The Goddess seemed both proud and sad at the same time when She spoke about the incident, and there was this feeling that it had involved a sacrifice of some sort on the behalf of the faeries. (Faeries being the same kind of being as the “aliens” that people see today, just under another guise.) She gave the impression that in Roswell there had been a reaching out in some way, a testing of the waters, so to speak, about whether people were really ready to deal with them.

A close reading of the Whitley Streiber book about the incident at Roswell, “Majestic,” gives much the same impression. Definitely, it seems that there was a reaching out at that time from the Otherworld, from beyond the veil, and the people of the day—mostly government and military folks—had been found wanting. Perhaps, mostly of having open minds?

Instead of an alien crash, what really happened back on that fateful day and the days immediately afterward, was more of an attempt at a kind of spiritual awakening and connection to other planes of existence (like most “alien abduction” experiences, despite the media portrayal of them and UFO fanatics sometimes paranoid thoughts of rectal probes, wars in space between “greys” and “Nordics,” human-alien hybrid experiments, organ harvesting, etc, you take your pick). Unfortunately, the people of the day simply couldn’t handle it and so it transformed itself into something that they could understand: aliens and spaceships and invasion scenarios and super-advanced technology.

Be that as it may, the fact that Roswell means “field of roses,” makes it seem likely that the whole experience of what happened there had more to do with sacrifice and the Otherworld and making those kinds of connections. It was intended as a flowering of sorts, and so it had much more to do with symbolism than in some actual spaceship crashing out there in the desert and the government ending up with some alien bodies to autopsy (or not).

According to Whitley Streiber’s book, some spiritual/metaphysical experience did seem to be going on at the time with those involved, as of a door being partially opened, and it was only closed again when it was realized that they couldn’t deal with it, that they weren’t ready for it. Or, maybe, it was only intended to plant the seed for some eventual and hopeful future. One where connection with the Otherworld and with those called the faery/aliens could happen and not have people freak out.

Shortly after this, back in the 50’s, all those movies started coming out with bad and evil aliens starring in them, which was probably the inevitable knee-jerk reaction to what happened in Roswell and all the UFO sightings which happened around that time. People just weren’t ready to deal. However, by the 60’s and 70’s, the science fiction movies and television shows that began to be released had more to do with nice aliens than bad ones, or aliens at the very least who had very human impulses and emotions and could end up being either friends or enemies. ET comes to mind, and Star Trek, Star Wars, and Enemy Mine, just to name a few. Aliens were no longer just feared because they were alien.

This transformation of perception seems pretty typical. When UFO’s first appeared back in the 40’s, they seemed more cigar-shaped to those who spotted them. Then someone claimed that they looked more like plates or saucers in an article and the term “flying saucer” was born and rapidly caught on. The UFO’s seen after this article appeared then tended more towards this shape instead. Expectation had altered the experience. Or, in other words, the things and beings of the Otherworld had changed to match how people thought they should see them, or how they could perceive them.

Faery or alien or angel…the shape that those of the Otherworld take on changes and changes again. William Butler Yeats found this out when he went around the Irish countryside collecting tales about faeries and ghosts in order to publish them before they were lost forever. One old woman he talked to said that the faery could be either tall or small and that it was all in the eye of the beholder as to how they appeared. Whitley Streiber also mentions how those alien beings he came into contact with could transform to match or deliberately contradict what he was thinking about them, mostly in order to sooth his fears or to prove a point or make a statement that needed making.

So when those faeries or “aliens” appeared to the government and the military people back in the 40’s, they were perceived through that particular lens—the lens of men who had just come through World War II and were terrified and paranoid of Communism and had acquired, or were in the process of acquiring, the Cold War mentality. They were afraid of the new and different and so saw what happened as a threat and responded to it as a threat. They weren’t ready or able to handle a spiritual transformation or revelation, an opening of the mind and heart and soul which is needed to forge a bridge to Other. Not then, and probably not now either.

Except that times have changed and are still changing; even if the government remains behind the times and isn’t ready to believe, there are many who are. Roswell has been a hotspot for years now, drawing in folks from all over the world, folks seeking to have some sort of experience or vision. Of course, many of them probably don’t know what they are really asking or looking for, but the first step is that they are looking…and might, just might, one day find something else looking back.

The television show Roswell was yet another link in the chain, another step along the road towards acceptance. I doubt that it’s a coincidence that the aliens in the program, along with their human friends, were the “good guys” and that the government officials were seen primarily as being the “bad guys.” Or that the alien kids and humans were portrayed as forming close relationships and working to both protect each other and to discover their origin. Or that they could even fall in love with each other.

If this was some sort of experiment on the part of the faeries, then there are probably multiple meanings to it and it was never just any one thing. But, to be sure, something important happened out in the desert of Roswell, New Mexico back in the late 40’s. Something that people are still investigating and fixated on and arguing about and going on pilgrimages for today, about sixty years later. Of all the so-called UFO experiences, it is the one which is most remembered and the one that seems to have had lasting repercussions on the human race.

Obviously, it was a pivot point of some kind. And finding out the origin of the name, what it means, only lends credence to that concept—that of the ancient and Otherworldly field of roses, the field of the dead, where spiritual battles are fought that will have a powerful and lasting impact upon the world of men. Where flowers spring up from sacrifice. Where there was an attempt to make a connection that still has its echoes today. A field of roses in the middle of the desert, a flowering where none should be—how symbolic is that?

Language of Flowers

The Victorians rather famously had a whole language of flowers. What blossoms you chose to send to someone or to put in their May Day basket related a message to that person. You would put several flowers together, for example gorse which means endearing affection, with heart’s ease (also known as the pansy) which means think of me, add in jonquil which stands for return my affection and lemon blossom which represents discretion, and finally, put in nutmeg geranium which means I expect a meeting, and you have made an attempt to set up a quiet rendezvous with the one you love and whom you hope loves you. We no longer use flowers in quite this deliberate a way, but picking them by their meaning for ritual or divinatory use, or simply for good luck, can certainly add to any magick.

Eventually, flowers became associated (along with gemstones) with each month of the year or birth sign, and can be used in conjunction with regular astrology techniques. For example, the carnation is the flower of January, the primrose is the flower of February, the daffodil of March, the daisy is the flower of April, the lily of the valley for May, the honeysuckle for June, the water lily is for July, the poppy for August, the convolvulus for September, the dahlia for October, the chrysanthemum for November, and finally the holly stands for December.1

In Victorian flower language, the carnation means disdain, the primrose means early youth, the daffodil means chivalry, the daisy means beauty or innocence depending upon the color it is, the lily of the valley means return of happiness, the honeysuckle means the bond of love, the water lily stands for eloquence, the poppy means consolation or sleep of the heart also depending on the color, the convolvulus (or bindweed) means uncertainty, the dahlia means forever thine, the chrysanthemum means in love or truth also color dependant, while at the last, the holly stands for foresight. Certainly, the holly would be a good choice then to use in conjunction with scrying or some other means of divination, most especially at Yuletide.

Flower Lore

But flowers have greater and more ancient mystical associations than those from Victorian times or months of the year. Flowers have long had a link to the land of the dead; shamans in the past and those still practicing today often relate experiences of seeing blossoms of incredibly vibrant colors in their journeys to other planes of existence. The smell of flowers has also been linked to travel to the Otherworld. Quite often, these flowers of the dead and of the land of the dead were said to be roses.

Roses

Roses have a history involving death and magick. Roses were grown in little gardens on the graves in ancient Rome as symbols of resurrection and were also involved in the rites of Egypt sacred to Isis and Osiris.2 Roses were also emblems of Aurora, the Goddess of the Dawn, and sacred to Dionysus and the nine Muses.3 During the Middle Ages, legend has it that the rose was first created when a maiden was accused and sentences to die on the pyre. Through her prayers, the fire was extinguished and the brands which had caught fire turned into red roses and the unburnt brands into white roses.4

A circle with eight spokes coming out of it, thus forming a wheel, was sometimes called The Rose of the Winds,5 and is clearly related to the compass rose or the compass found in certain lines of Traditional Craft. Roses were also considered emblems of secrecy. Hence sub rosa meant to keep your silence beneath the rose. As a result, roses were often carved or painted in chambers where secrets were meant to be kept, thus making it a fitting symbol for the power of silence inherent in Witchcraft.6

Lily

The lily, oddly enough, is also linked to death and to the lands of the dead. However, lilies were also considered to be flowers sacred to the Goddess Queen Hera where they represented the sacred marriage. Their white color came from the fact that they were said to have grown from Hera’s own milk.7 This probably has ties to Hera’s other symbol being that of a cow, the same as the Egyptian Goddess, Hathor. Lilies, especially white lilies, are said to represent innocence and pureness and some consider that their use at weddings may be linked to this idea, but quite possibly it actually hearkens back to Hera who was, after all, the Goddess of marriage. Still, there is another old tradition that lilies came from Eve’s tears as she and Adam were driven out from the Garden of Eden.8 Either way, lilies have long been emblems of France, seen in the golden fleur-de-lis, in much the same way that roses have been linked to France’s ancient rival, England.

But while lilies are said to stem from milk (or tears), the rose traditionally has its source in blood, particularly the blood of Adonis. It shares this history with other flowers created by spilt blood such as the violet, stemming from the death of Attis, and the hyacinth, from the death of Hyachinthus. As one story goes, Attis was the most beloved of the goddess, Agdistis (a Goddess who was both male and female) and She made him go crazy in order to try and keep him all to Herself. Attis, in his madness, castrated himself and from this the violet first grew.9 Violets, probably due to this, are considered to presage death if they are seen blooming out of season, though they thought to be good luck if you dream of them.10

Poppy

Poppies also have their beginnings in blood and battle. Poppy Day or Remembrance Day was created on November 11^th to honor the those who died in WWI on the battlefields of Flanders, where many poppies grew, and artificial flowers are sold to mark the occasion.11 But, primarily, the poppy remains a flower of magickal properties, in particular that of divination, as poppies represent the “sleep of death.” This can even been seen in the movie The Wizard of Oz when the Wicked Witch of the West tried to stop Dorothy from getting to the Emerald City by creating a field of glorious yet deadly red poppies. They also symbolize the Great Mother because of the “sleep” of plants during the winter and so are tied to Demeter, Persephone, and Venus, as well as to various sleep deities such as Hypnos and Morpheus.12 Clearly, this “sleep” was tied to shamanic journeying and achievement of various altered states of consciousness. An altered state that the poppy can readily provide so that you might travel to the land of the dead.

Other flowers also have their links to death.

Periwinkle

In Italy, the periwinkle was one such blossom because they “used to adorn dead babies with garlands of periwinkle and in former times heretics burned at the stake were given periwinkle crowns.”13 In Wales, picking periwinkles from a gravesite was said to result in nightmares about the person who was interred there.14 Not to be outdone, the Lily of the Valley, while it represented sweetness and humility, also originated from spilled blood or from the sorrow for the sacrificial victim. Accordingly, they have an alternate French name, “Our Lady’s Tears.”15 Daisies are also said to stem from tears, in particular those of Mary Magdalene, and there’s even a story that they came from seeds scattered by the spirits of still-born babies.16

Flowers in Alchemy

The meaning of the particular flower could change, though, in conjunction with the color of the bloom. For example, white flowers in alchemy represented silver and so were sacred to the Moon and the Goddess. Red blossoms represented gold and the Sun and the God. Blue flowers, on the other hand, were basically considered to be a “flower of the wise.”17 Just as when a violet was white it meant innocence and when the violet was blue the meaning changed to that of faithful love,18 so the virtue of a rose also changed in accordance with what color it might be. The golden rose meant perfection, the red rose denoted passion and desire and blood, particularly the blood of sacrifice, and the white rose symbolized purity and spirituality.19 White roses were “planted at the graves of virgins, while red roses on the graves of lovers.”20

Flowers for Seasonal Festivities

In the past, how you went about gathering the flowers was also of import. For example, flowers that were specifically for festivities on May Day or Midsummer both had rituals attached to how they should be picked. Sometimes, it was specified that they should be picked while still fresh with the morning dew, as dew represented both blessings and fertility and was considered sacred water from the sky.21 May flowers should be gathered early enough that the dew was still on them or, if that was impossible, they should be dipped in dew. People would also wash their faces in dew on May Day. While, on Midsummer, people used to roll in the dew in order to promote fertility.22 Of course, today, that all becomes rather more difficult unless you own a garden or know someone who does as bouquets at the grocery store or florists usually don’t come with a ready supply of fresh dew.

Flower Numerology

The number of flowers also was important. For example, the daffodil, which is an excellent spring flower, was considered good luck, but only if you picked them in bunches and never as a single flower.23 Like the daffodil, primroses were bad luck if you only had one of them—foretelling a death in the house—and so should only be gathered in bunches of thirteen.24 Long tied to love as well as to blood, roses could also be used in divination and magick. For example, a girl would fold up a rose in paper on Midsummer Eve, keep it until Yule, and then unwrap it. If the petals were still soft and fresh, then she would wear the blossom and the very first man to “admire the rose or remove it” would be the one to marry her.25

A few other May Day flowers included the marigold—a flower tied to death and remembrance of the dead in Mexico—which was even called “the herb of Beltane.”26 The honeysuckle and the hawthorn blossom were made into a wreath for the Queen of the May.27 She would wear the wreath much as the ancient Gods did when they were carried around in processions before their worshippers, a tradition you can still see today in some countries where they carry a flower-bedecked statue of the Virgin Mary through the streets. Another flower linked to pagan celebration was the yellow blossom of St John’s Wort, though its name underwent a change when Midsummer became associated with John the Baptist.28

Though some Witches do pick any stones to be worked with or colors of candles or altar clothes for ritual use with a certain amount of forethought and care, the language, meaning, and mystery of flowers has been given less consideration of late. Yet, flowers are a powerful and ancient symbol, one well worth taking account of. They are tied to love, life, and resurrection—which isn’t at all surprising since the vast majority of them appear in the spring—yet they are also of long association with sacrifice, sorrow, loss, and death. In many ways, they bridge the veil between the worlds; they are the blood of the king and God who makes the ultimate sacrifice and they are also the tears of the Goddess who had to give Her love up to death.

In Norse mythology, there is a rainbow bridge called Bifrost that links the world of Men and the realms of the Gods, but there is another rainbow which bridges the physical and the Divine, and that is the system of the chakras.

Chakras are spinning vortexes of energy that sustain our spiritual bodies, as food and water sustain our physical ones. There are seven of them in number, though some traditions add to that number by also naming additional chakras at the feet and hands.

These vortexes are further connected to lines of energy called nadis, which create a network throughout the body. These vortexes and lines are vital to existence and good health, for “the freedom with which energy can flow back and forth between you and the universe is in direct correlation to the total health and well-being you experience,” and so any blocks in this energy flow in your chakra system will be “expressed as disease, discomfort, lack of energy, or an emotional imbalance.” 1

The first chakra is known as the root chakra and it is associated with survival needs, with the element of earth and the color red. Some people downplay this chakra, preferring to focus on the “higher” chakras, but it is from this chakra that the need to have the basic necessities of life comes, necessities such as food, clothing, shelter, protection and even the desire to procreate.

As any successful undertaking needs to stand on a strong foundation, so the root chakra must be in order and stay in order so that the rest may be built upon it. It is through the root chakra that you remain in touch with what is necessary and “real.” It is our connection to physical reality and mother earth and it is through the root chakra that excess energy can be grounded out.

This can be done through normal grounding exercises that most pagan traditions teach, or it can be done through physical activity such as walking, dancing, or even cleaning. This chakra is all about feeling alive and self-reliant. It is our anchor to the earth, without which we can feel lost or run the risk of living only in our heads.

When this chakra is unbalanced, a person is insecure about having their basic needs met. And, until your basic needs are met, it will be difficult to concentrate on other pursuits, including those of spiritual exploration and growth. You may also be uncomfortable with your own body and its needs or continually feel tired or clumsy.

It is the root chakra that is stimulated in some religious traditions in order to waken the kundalini, also known as the serpent power since it is depicted as a snake coiled at the base of the spine. When the kundalini is aroused, energy shoots up through the chakras and you feel an incredible rush of power and strength, strength enough to perform physical miracles and face incredible hardships. You feel intensely alive and aware and wildly creative for as long as this “rush” lasts.

But there is a danger to rousing this energy without proper preparation, because if any of your chakras are blocked or damaged in some manner beforehand, then this rush of energy—especially if you are not really ready for its effects, or if it is not grounded out properly afterwards—can further damage them or even leave them unnaturally wide-open. All of which can lead to mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion and other health problems, depending on which chakras are involved.

The second chakra is that of the sacral. Its color is orange and it is associated with sexual energy and the element of water. It is no coincidence that sex and desire have sparked so much creativity in the arts. This power is in constant ebb and flow and, like love and desire, it can strike incredible highs and lows just as emotions can inspire us to both the depths of despair and the heights of passion.

The sacral is where both your physical and spiritual bodies can be cleansed of impurities. It keeps things moving in our bodies, hence any problem that has at its core an imbalance of fluids means a corresponding problem with the second chakra. This also means needing to be fluid in how you handle stress in your life. The response of the root chakra to danger is the instinctual “fight or flight” reaction, but the sacral involves being able to handle change with more flexibility. People with a good functioning sacral can more easily “go with the flow,” and adapt to change.

After your basic needs are met at the root chakra, the sacral leads you to seek pleasure in life and connection to other people. This may be sensual or sexual in nature, an exploration of the senses. A well-operating second chakra means that you have a reasonable and balanced passion for life and what it offers to the five senses. An unbalanced sacral chakra may lead to addictive behavior, as you seek pleasures in such things as food, drugs, sex, alcohol and cigarettes, just to name a few. But as long as the sacral remains the central focus in your life, these pleasures can never truly fulfill, because they fade and you are left continually seeking more.

If you do not have a good grounding in your root chakra, then too much emphasis on the sacral can also create boundary issues between you and others, and a constant need to reach greater emotional and physical highs. But a functioning second chakra will lend itself to creativity and charm and exploration of the sensual that is sublime.

The third chakra is the solar plexus. Its color is yellow and it is associated with fire and will. It is here that we claim the power to say “no,” or “yes” to life and the world and what we want from it. It is here that we learn self-control and restraint and how to choose which battles we will fight with the world. To put our abilities and strengths behind getting what we want.

At the solar plexus, you learn to create boundaries, because it is a chakra of protection, courage, and self-assertion. It is also closely tied into your immune system, also a protective function. It is here that we realize just who we are and what we are about, and the focus is on building individualism.

However, if unbalanced, this same power can lead to controlling, if not downright egotistical behavior as you may believe you are better or more deserving than anyone else. It can lend itself to promoting power struggles between people, as each strives to have their own way and force others to bend to their will or tries to push their own sense of right and wrong onto everyone.

It is from the third chakra that you develop and hold onto your sense of self and come to feel effective and secure about yourself and life in general. The solar plexus is about being able to defend yourself and your beliefs, but not being defensive about them. It is also where the urge to compete arises, to be successful.

The first three chakras—root, sacral, and solar plexus—are the “hot” colors of red and orange and yellow, and through them one relates to the physical body and the material world. They all need to be in working order for one to be truly grounded and reach for what lies beyond.

The next chakra, the fourth, is when the jump to the spiritual begins, starting with the heart and leading upwards to an ever-expanding awareness of the greater world around us, including that which is normally Unseen.

The heart chakra is associated with the color green—though, when open, it also contains the color pink, as well, pink the shade of rose petals—and also with the element of air. It is through the heart chakra that we come to know our own souls, all we are and all we are meant to be. For through our heart chakra, through knowledge of our souls, we connect back to the Source of All.

There are many books out there about the heart chakra; more has been written about the fourth chakra and how to court it than any of the other chakras combined. Possibly, this is because it is the link between the physical and the spiritual, or perhaps because it is so closely intertwined with our own souls. Of course, it could also be because this chakra is about something of vital importance to us all: love.

It is the heart chakra that is coming into play with the dawning of the Aquarian Age. As humankind as a whole gears up to make the leap of faith and joy to a more spiritual bent, rather than fixating on the physical needs and desires of the first three chakras. From focus on basic survival instincts, sexual pleasure, and struggling for power to trust and belief in abundance and that all will work out exactly as it is meant to.

When the heart chakra is open and healthy, then one is filled with love and peace and innate understanding of your own self. Not peace, love and joy as singular goals or ideals to be lived up to or strived for, but an actual state of being—perhaps even an altered state of being—where you feel completely and utterly in harmony with yourself and the universe, because you are perfectly centered within your self and are intimately aware of your connection to the Divine.

The heart chakra is about freedom, freedom to be who you are meant to be. It is also about being secure enough to allow others to be themselves, for “no matter how much you have shared with, taught, sacrificed for, and loved someone, letting them be themselves is the greatest gift…and enables both of you to grow.”2

As there are ley lines and nodes of energy upon the earth, feeding energy into a web work across the earth, so the energy of the Divine comes into our solar system through the connective link of the sun. The sun gives both light and this spiritual energy to us, as the earth gives us our physical forms and material sustenance. When you open your heart chakra, then that energy can be called upon fill and infuse you—giving power and grace and greater understanding. It is by allowing this power to flow through you that you may gain the ability to heal with touch, as the power comes through the channel of your heart chakra and goes into the secondary chakras in your hands.

But you must be careful, because there is often a tendency to use one’s own personal energies in this manner. Your own personal energy can, of course, be used in this way. But the danger is that you will use it too much, rely on it too much, and end up burning out because of it. To give all and leave nothing for one’s self. This can easily happen to both spiritual style healers and Priests and Priestesses who do not know how or do not understand when to back off and take the time and care they need to renew themselves and their energies.

An imbalance in the heart chakra can be seen in those who may be called “bleeding hearts.” People who make the mistake of over-associating with others and other people’s problems or are filled with constant grief for all the suffering in the world. Who either give and give and ignore their own needs, until they find they have nothing left for themselves, or only give in order to get something in return, whether that be acceptance or control over others. Which means that you are not truly operating out of the fourth chakra because it’s being overshadowed by the continuing needs of the lower chakras.

You may also go to extreme measures to avoid conflict or other painful situations, simply because your heart is so open to the energies flying around you. Or you may have a tendency to focus only the good in other people, to only see their potential, rather realizing who they actually are at this particular moment.

Once the heart chakra has opened—which requires a leap of faith—it can lead upwards to the other spiritual chakras. Which, when also activated, can create additional altered states of consciousness.

The fifth chakra’s color is blue and is located at the throat. It is associated with the element of spirit and involves being able to step back from the world in order to more clearly see the bigger picture, to see the truth of things. Since it is connected to the throat, it also involves being able to not only see the truth with clarity, but to speak the truth with equal conviction. This ability to temporarily withdraw yourself from a focus on the cares of the world and your own private problems and worries allows you to more clearly see the proper course of action.

For example, if a good friend comes to you and asks you to do magick for them to get a better-paying job and find an affordable home, you will more than likely be quite happy to do so. However, if after you do magick for them and they get both the better job and the home, and then proceed to lose both because of choices and situations that are well within their own control—say, blowing off work and spending their mortgage money on several gambling trips to Vegas—and then they return to you and ask for more magick to be done for them, it would be best for you to consider it carefully first. Which may mean stepping back in order to see the bigger picture, what would be best for both parties, especially if the other person attempts to play on any of your own insecurities by resorting to emotional blackmail, for instance, in order to get you to help them again.

The powers of the fifth chakra can help you to better judge what you should do in a situation like this. Perhaps, the better choice would be to let them solve their problems on their own, so that they can learn the lessons in life that they need to learn, that they are here to learn. Or, perhaps, if you still wish to do magick for them, it would aid them more for you to work to get them a lesser-paying job, but one that will involve something they love and would actually want to show up to work for. Or that will lead to them bettering themselves in the long run. What people want is not always what will make them grow as a person, let alone as a soul.

The fifth chakra also requires a leap of consciousness. The energy of the throat chakra is quick and ultimately beyond control; you must learn to simply go with this energy, rather than attempting to make it do what you want it to do. This is a chakra of truth that goes beyond mere information, beyond the constraints that have been set upon us by society or childhood upbringing.

This chakra is where language is born, the ability to communicate. It is here that the energy of the other chakras can be expressed best, through singing, chanting, writing, acting, or any of the arts that appeal to you. Here, also, you can learn to be a teacher—to have both the discrimination and the ability to disseminate information, while also being able to step back from your own fears and needs in order to keep from potentially distorting the message you are giving to those you have chosen to teach.

If this chakra is unbalanced, you may argue or disagree simply for the sake of disagreeing. You could become a rebel, fighting against the mores of society, simply to be anti-establishment. Your life might even mean constantly going to extreme measures in order to prove how “different” you are from the rest of humanity. And you may also experience a lot of anxiety, especially if you do expend time and energy trying to control these sorts of energies or if you fear them overwhelming you.

The sixth chakra is associated with the brow—or, as some might say, with the third eye—and its color is purple or indigo. It is this chakra that opens you up to dreams and visions, the world of the imagination and fantasy, and the powers that lie beyond physical reality.

This is the chakra of signs and omens, insight and revelations. It is through the sixth chakra that you need to work when you lay out a tarot spread or work other forms of divination. All of which requires a necessary detachment, in order to more clearly view what it is that you are seeing. Here is the flash of intuitive understanding, knowing something simply because you do. Here is understanding without words. As the fifth chakra was about language, the sixth is beyond language. It is living in the realm of dream imagery and symbolism.

Time is meaningless here, as are the constraints of space. Here, the impossible is normal and the fantastical, mundane. But you must learn to focus your ability to dream when in contact with the sixth chakra, so that you are not using this power to wander in past memories or fantasies that do not further your spiritual development. This is where the idea of “creative visualization” truly comes into play, in a world beyond words or thoughts, a world where you are directly plugged into the realm of images and symbols and where change can occur simply from imagining it.

Problems at the sixth chakra can mean seeing yourself as more special than anyone else. Or you may run the risk of disengaging yourself from reality in a dangerous fashion. For this is the place from which mysticism is born, the gift of prophecy, but it can also lead to delusion and schizophrenia.

Unbalanced, the powers of the brow chakra can mean fantasizing about—and so bringing to life—your own worst fears. For example, if a devout Christian is very fixated on the idea of Satan and sin, they can end up using their own energy and power of imagination to inadvertently bring into being the very thing they fear the most. So their lives may end up being filled with temptation and sin and evidence of an Evil influence, since they have created it themselves. They will have made their own reality.

But the sixth chakra is beyond polarity, beyond concepts of good and evil. It is a holistic viewpoint where you can find yourself in what some traditions call the “astral” or “astral plane.” A world where belief is everything, for through belief you will create the very world that lies around you, making it either a place of joy and abundance and love or one of fear and doubt and betrayal. Which makes it all the more imperative that you have fostered the ability in yourself to be able to step back and become an observer of your own life. For then you can take a good, objective look at the life and world you are creating and choose to make changes, if needed.

These three chakras—heart, throat, and brow—are considered the spiritual chakras. Their colors are “cool” colors of green, blue, and purple, which emphasize the fact that they involve being able to step back from the cares and concerns of the material world. It is these chakras that allow you to see further and to pursue a greater understanding of the metaphysical realms, for the “sixth and seventh chakras enable consciousness to move beyond the physical universe.”3

The seventh chakra is not associated with a part of the body, but is considered to be just above your head. It is called the crown chakra and is usually displayed as being clear crystal in color, for it is a direct link to the Source of All and so contains all the colors of the spectrum. Perhaps, it was a vision of this chakra which inspired the idea of halos, a brilliant glowing light just above or surrounding the head of a holy man or woman.

The crown chakra is about becoming one with the Divine. Which, for most people, only happens when one is on the verge of death, because it grants complete and total understanding of the All. A perspective that is normally rather hard to keep, let alone maintain, while still in physical form. Very few people can reach or learn to sustain this level of awareness, because it requires a complete surrender of the ego and an utter lack of personal fear.

However, it does occasionally happen that people do have this chakra open for a brief moment or two and this may have a long reaching effect on their lives. For, though the memory may fade, part of you will always remember what it was like to be absolutely in touch with the Source of all things, understanding all things, if only for an instant or two.

When in touch with the seventh chakra, you will know with absolute certainty your purpose in life, your path, the meaning behind it all. In Lakota belief, attempting to follow this path is called “living in a sacred way,” which means living the life you were meant to live, in accord with Divine Providence. If you can live both in the world and yet removed from it at the same time, be in accord and full understanding of the Source, then you are one with the Ultimate Divine no matter how you call it.

Imbalances here usually occur because you either have lost touch with the lower chakras—and so end up risking disconnection from reality—or by following inappropriate teachers or teachings. Teachers who may claim that they can put you in touch with the Divine, only to end up leading you astray instead.

In general, this is because they may have made the mistake of adhering to and teaching a particular “mask” of the Divine, rather than looking to provide a way to have a direct experience of the Divine itself. Which is something that no one else can truly give you, though a good teacher can sometimes point you in the right direction and realize when to step back and get out of the way of your progress. No single way is going to be right for everyone.

All the chakras need to be crystal clear and in balance for you to keep your own balance. You need to be able to live both in the now, in the moment, fully aware of the senses, while, at the same time, finding yourself able to step back and remain detached from it. It is then that you will be able to be an observer, not only of others, but of your own life and your proper and natural place in the universe. It is this detachment that allows you to see disharmony, to divine the cause, and know how to best remedy it.

This is not a disconnection from the physical, as is stressed in some Christian faiths that believe that only the higher pursuits are those that are worthwhile, and that the needs of the body and of this world should simply be ignored or dismissed. In order to fully achieve a flowering of the heart chakra—the connection force between not only the soul and body, but the “higher” and “lower” chakras—you must keep the chakras concerned with physicality in tune and working well. Denying the physical does not lend itself to spiritual pursuits through the chakras, living in harmony with them does.

For example, disharmony can occur if you end up living primarily out of the lower chakras, but disharmony can also happen if you primarily live out of the higher chakras. When you may end up living only in your “head,” and so be unable to honestly find much enjoyment in physical existence. Whereas, if you exist mainly in the lower chakras, you might end up bouncing from pursuit of one pleasure or need to another and yet never feel really satisfied with anything.

Balance is the key, not stressing either this world or the next. Both worlds need each other, as the higher chakras need the lower ones and vice versa. As we need both the earth and the sun and the God and Goddess in order to survive and flourish. Working with the chakras, either in a Craft context or otherwise, is one way to bring yourself into accord with the physical and the spiritual aspects of your life, and open doors to the Divine.

There are many books that can teach you about the chakras, and how to work with them, but they are also only signposts in the end, the same as with most of the books currently available about the Craft. Experience is what matters at the last, not simple words on a page, for only experience can show you the way to becoming your Higher Self. Only experience can let you ride the rainbow to the Beyond, where all things may be known and all things are one.

1. David Pond, Chakras for Beginners, Llewellyn Publications, St Paul, MN, pgs 5-6. 2. Sue and Simon Lily, Healing with Crystals and Chakra Energies, Hermes House, Anness Publishing Ltd, London, 2003-2004, pg. 216. 3.  ibid, pg 232.

(c) Veronica Cummer