Dog Fish Guinea Pig Funeral
March 14, 2023Doesn’t this little circle of pets say everything? We come in beauty, we pass in beauty. We are all connected, here to revere each other as sacred even as we struggle with loss.
Tag: psychopomp
Not Wiped Away
February 18, 2014Death comes into our lives in many different ways. People sometimes think that because we get to work with spirits, and the processes of the psychopomp, that death transforms into something easy, perhaps even palatable.
Persephone Returns!
January 28, 2014Just two days ago I invoked a number of my deceased friends as part of a ritual performance I had the great honor of performing for the Foundation For Shamanic Studies Council gathering. It was a way of calling out to those who I felt suffered from the lack of any real method of accessing the worlds shamans know so well.
The Packa Tree
October 16, 2013Tadg has always called him “Packa”, a little ones abbreviation of the more difficult “Grandpa”. The Packa tree’s ruby red fruit hung for months, darkening to a cherry-black red.
Papa Prayer
June 20, 2013He comes to me when I’m in the midst of my most mundane parenting tasks. “How would Shaun have done this”, I ask myself. “How can I do this better”, is what I really want to know. Is it possible to cherish my children more?
The Waters of Forgetting
April 9, 2013For a brief moment he must have escaped the suffering that was slowly eating his mind away. I wonder if he was being chased by the true knowledge of what it was to be human.
9/11/1857 – 9/11/2001 The Wakeful Dead
September 11, 2011154 years ago today another tragic massacre occurred in southern Utah. A group of a 120 immigrants, making their way to a new life in California, were slaughtered by a group of Mormon militia men.
Assemblage
July 19, 2011I’ve come to believe traveling is unnatural in some way. If you really live somewhere, you leave a part of yourself behind when you go.The more invested in our homestead I become, the more it feels like I have to break myself up into pieces as I go. “I can’t take the compost part with me, defiantly not the chicken coop-cleaner part.”
Blessed Bees, Magical Beets and Slain Lambs
July 12, 2011The sweet earthy flavor of the beets felt the same as the energy of the dreams. Flavors and feelings mingled with the soothing breaths of sleeping wife, son, dog and cat. I swear those beets gave me the dreams.
Knotted Me
July 5, 2011Last night I found myself sitting up late again, grateful for the blanket of post-midnight darkness. It seems like every few nights I have new knot in myself to sort through.
You Died A Year Ago Today
April 11, 2011I have dreamed of you more in the last year than I’ve ever dreamed of you before. Always crystal clear, sometimes laughing, sometimes imparting mysterious messages, a few times crying harder than I knew you could cry.
The Cauldron of Autumn
September 9, 2010Autumn used to be the time to savor my most intense feelings. Wrapping them tightly in earthen bundles, I’d carry them into the woods on aimless walks.
Separatio
April 29, 2010Alchemy only works when you begin with separate elements. A little of this+a little of that = gold.
Things I learned when my Dad died.
April 19, 2010The sudden death of someone close is like walking away from a really bad car crash. Even though you’re unscathed, every molecule in your body suffers an impact.
Stepping Over The Edge: Open Message To The Dead
March 18, 2010I’m telling you this now because I want you to know something – I’m coming for you.
Checking Out Early
April 27, 2009This essay has been thirty years in the making, finally coming together one morning while reading a NY Times article titled “Midlife Suicide Rises, Puzzling Researchers”.