Bokelskere.no

And Tokyo is the cherry blossoms, the sunset at dusk, dawn sunlight through her windows, the cry of the crow, the cityscape of darkened rooms on a rainy evening, the depth of feeling in her eyes....

Later we walked from rue des Écoles to Odéon in the heart of the Latin Quarter. There was a fine drizzle typical of late winter and early spring, not cold just slightly cool, and the streets were filled with students. Dusk in the Latin Quarter was like a fairy tale or a love poem, like a Klimt mosaic, like glowing, rose-colored clouds reaching toward the heavens... a swath of gold ringed in a misty-blue halo, this was the Paris that most entranced me. None of us had brought an umbrella, and the other three women hurried ahead while I nearly burst with glee, singing one song after another deep down in my throat in unintelligible (to them) Chinese. They turned back to make funny faces at me, glowering, scolding, smirking. Their golden, chestnut-brown hair dampened by the rain, glittered in the sunset. They were beautiful, Paris was beautiful, and I and them, I and Paris, my life felt so dear. We were four children under heaven, without nationality or student credentials, far from home, each abandoned by their beloved.

Life has suddenly become overcrowded. Too many people I can care for are swarming in and filling up my chest. Too many things I want to do are rushing headlong into my new life for reasons unknown to me. All of a sudden my new life is like a field overgrown with strange flowers and exotic grasses or the shimmering, starry sky of my unbridled imagination...

When the heart is dead, all is dead, though the victim may not fully realise it for a long time.

Conventions are, indeed, all that shield us from the shivering void, though often they do so but poorly and desperately.

In myths, the hero survives.
The evil is vanquished.
The world is set right.
Sometimes there are celebrations, and sometimes there are funerals.
The dead are buried. The living move on.
Nothing changes.
Everything changes.
This is a myth.
This is not a myth.

The trouble is that there is little the dead can do; otherwise they wouldn't be the dead. No! But on the other hand, it would be a great mistake to assume that the dead are absolutely powerless. They are powerless only to give the full answer to the new questions posed for the living by history. But they try! Whenever they hear the imperious cries of the people in a crisis, the dead respond.

It is only when nothing is considered sacred that this destruction is able to occur. The origins of androcentrism are written into Genesis as a dominator meme, the script runs thus: everything belongs to us and for us, amen. It is a rapists charter. Christianity has been laid aside, the justifications have changed, but the mechanism remains flexing its iron jaws. Jahweh is now the market piggybacking on industrial civilisation, the tools it has are more than bronze axes, its appetites insatiable, rare earths, metals, oils, gas, animals, fish, birds, plants, cattle, men. John Michael Greer highlights the logical fallacy of infinite growth on a finite planet, but this is the slogan of those who will cut down your last trees, poison your last wells and slaughter your people. It is a continuation of the actions we find enshrined in Isaiah. We may be called perverse for our beliefs, but this is an obscenity. We must engage in deliberate enchantment, draw the line which cannot be crossed. Our land, our ancestors, our bodies and our kin are inviolable. Our enemies can be slain.

Our civilization is not one of life. It is not the lioness muzzling the breath from a gazelle, nor the striving of a virus, nor the honesty of a bronze blade. It has no sense or awareness, no presence or orientation.

Witchcraft is defined in that it acts. This is not a path of contemplation, but of engagement. There can be only one reason to engage, and that is that the action is imperative. Witchcraft grew from need. In shamanic culture the role is very clear. The shaman is expected to deal with issues of life and death on a daily basis. Hunger is a reality, starvation, war, disease, cursing, theft, murder, childbirth, hunting. For us, huddled in the narrow apse of the technological age, these concerns seem remote. Each of these skills has been prised from us. The shaman must act because the stakes are high, it is survival, life that hangs in the balance. He is expected by his community to produce results, or be considered worthless. His night flights have purpose, his cures and curses are in demand. His reading of omens, his telling of story, his organising of hunt or war, are vital. Compare this to the state of the West. Our ritual specialists do not have to demonstrate any competence or effect. There is no need but simply want. With nothing to play for, with no stakes on the table, the game inevitably becomes an empty charade.

Why does tragedy exist? Because you are full of rage. Why are you full of rage? Because you are full of grief.

Det er ikke bare dyrearter som dør ut, men hele arter av følelser. Og hvis du er klok, vil du ikke synes synd på fortidens mennesker på grunn av det de ikke visste, men derimot på deg selv på grunn av det de visste.

Nature will rise. We are not only coming for your children, we are your children and all those who will inherit the ruins of the world. Welcome to the Apocalypse. This is the moment when we realise that the climate is broken. It's all blood and roses from here on in. As witches we should prepare to fly on the wings of the storm.

This is not simply destroying the mythic structure of the Christian Church which gave man nature to despoil, just as it cut down the cedars of Lebanon, but the final ugly phase of Yahweh: corporatist fascism. We are the final line of resistance.

While our culture laments, what have we done wrong? Has no concept of sin, but only consumption. It still knows that something is going dreadfully awry. Infantilised it helplessly repeats, what, what have we done wrong?
It is simple: Mankind has broken the covenant with nature.