StarLight and RoOt; the path of going betwixt and between...
with James Birch and Preston Vargas
at
CALIFORNIA WITCHCAMP
Sunday June 26th through Sunday July 3rd 2016
Northern California, Mendocino Woodlands
Who are the keepers of the Faerie Gates? We are the guardians, the watchers, and the weavers who facilitate the dynamic balance between the human sphere and the world of the Fey. The keepers of the Faery Gates can choose to appear as unassuming observant redwoods, as peculiar humans with generative questions, or as the magnificent beasts of epic folklore. Those of the Fey realms are just as incredibly gifted with the arts, sciences, and technologies as they are feral; in essence they are the Erotic life force...
We believe that this too is our birthright. Their queerness, like ours, offers the gift of being present at the intersections of many worlds. And this gift grants us a peek at the otherworlds and a chance to exist without the constraints of dualism. So, we will nurture our alliances within the realm of faerie. And we glamour you to join our sacred play! Will you create tribe and walk through the woods and into the untold other worlds? Beware, for we are not wholly human. Our lineages run strong with the Fey. So we find that this story of Rhiannon is not solely a human story and not just a human experience. We hold that if we were to stay locked only in the human a deeper mystery within this story could not be experienced much less understood. And so, we go beyond...
Our path begins with the human art of science as a reference point to understand the Wonderland that is the land we live and dream in at camp. By delving into the interdependent relationships of the green ones, red bloods, fungi, streams, we create a strong tether to this land-place as we travel amidst the worlds. So we’ll be introducing ourselves to the beings of the woodlands and rediscovering the power in a name. Not the power over another but empowerment in a relationship with those who share with one another their true names that overlay their common name; the Fey language. We intend to know by name the beings who hold the web lattices of this world and it’s Otherworld counterparts. And in turn to be known by our names. These are the long held allies of the Faerie. So it is our intention to embark from this crossroads...
From there, we will use the intuitive arts of our ancestors to more fully enhance and expand our understanding. We will work with trance and seeing through the eyes of our forest allies as well as taking that next step into playing with our consciousness as another sentient being, i.e. fungus, tree, toad, raven, Fey. Not only will we learn to shift our perception but also how to shapeshift how we are perceived-invisible, shadow, animal, shining, or animal creature- as the Faerie so often do. And with playful movement we’ll revel in the delight of these transphysical practices of being now this….and now that...
In the places where we sense the veil is thinnest, we will venture into opening and closing the portals to the Faerie world as adeptly as we shift our consciousness at will. Concepts of dark matter and string theory ignite our witchy inspirations to play with reaching into the heart of the cosmos. We will uncover theories and techniques to mold dark matter to pierce the veil, call the misty shroud that shifts the planes, weave the string theoried threads of the great loom into bridges, and enchant stones circles into illumined gateways. With respect to the local ecology we will work with our personal Fey allies to construct a ring of stones at camp. And path-goers will have the option of gathering with the teachers in the evening to awakening their cairns and weave starlight into a Faerie ring...
We will use a technique of creating spirit chariots and, together, journey beyond this plane and through the Faerie Otherworld realms that overlay this camp. Path-goers will also have the option of working outside of path-time to paint these maps. As sacred cartographers and as a service to the community we will re-present these spirit maps for the exploration of campers and the embellishment of our ritual experience. But we know that the lands of the Faerie cannot be tamed by our maps.
As the Otherworlds continue to evolve and shift around us, this becomes not a journey with a fixed destination but a journey about journeying. This path becomes a journey about learning how to uncover points of reference through land-based allyships, shift ourselves as the worlds shift about us, facilitate portals of overlaying dimensions, traverse and map through the Otherworld, and embrace the feral queerness of the Fey and the gatekeepers of the crossroads...
with James Birch and Preston Vargas
at
CALIFORNIA WITCHCAMP
Sunday June 26th through Sunday July 3rd 2016
Northern California, Mendocino Woodlands
Who are the keepers of the Faerie Gates? We are the guardians, the watchers, and the weavers who facilitate the dynamic balance between the human sphere and the world of the Fey. The keepers of the Faery Gates can choose to appear as unassuming observant redwoods, as peculiar humans with generative questions, or as the magnificent beasts of epic folklore. Those of the Fey realms are just as incredibly gifted with the arts, sciences, and technologies as they are feral; in essence they are the Erotic life force...
We believe that this too is our birthright. Their queerness, like ours, offers the gift of being present at the intersections of many worlds. And this gift grants us a peek at the otherworlds and a chance to exist without the constraints of dualism. So, we will nurture our alliances within the realm of faerie. And we glamour you to join our sacred play! Will you create tribe and walk through the woods and into the untold other worlds? Beware, for we are not wholly human. Our lineages run strong with the Fey. So we find that this story of Rhiannon is not solely a human story and not just a human experience. We hold that if we were to stay locked only in the human a deeper mystery within this story could not be experienced much less understood. And so, we go beyond...
Our path begins with the human art of science as a reference point to understand the Wonderland that is the land we live and dream in at camp. By delving into the interdependent relationships of the green ones, red bloods, fungi, streams, we create a strong tether to this land-place as we travel amidst the worlds. So we’ll be introducing ourselves to the beings of the woodlands and rediscovering the power in a name. Not the power over another but empowerment in a relationship with those who share with one another their true names that overlay their common name; the Fey language. We intend to know by name the beings who hold the web lattices of this world and it’s Otherworld counterparts. And in turn to be known by our names. These are the long held allies of the Faerie. So it is our intention to embark from this crossroads...
From there, we will use the intuitive arts of our ancestors to more fully enhance and expand our understanding. We will work with trance and seeing through the eyes of our forest allies as well as taking that next step into playing with our consciousness as another sentient being, i.e. fungus, tree, toad, raven, Fey. Not only will we learn to shift our perception but also how to shapeshift how we are perceived-invisible, shadow, animal, shining, or animal creature- as the Faerie so often do. And with playful movement we’ll revel in the delight of these transphysical practices of being now this….and now that...
In the places where we sense the veil is thinnest, we will venture into opening and closing the portals to the Faerie world as adeptly as we shift our consciousness at will. Concepts of dark matter and string theory ignite our witchy inspirations to play with reaching into the heart of the cosmos. We will uncover theories and techniques to mold dark matter to pierce the veil, call the misty shroud that shifts the planes, weave the string theoried threads of the great loom into bridges, and enchant stones circles into illumined gateways. With respect to the local ecology we will work with our personal Fey allies to construct a ring of stones at camp. And path-goers will have the option of gathering with the teachers in the evening to awakening their cairns and weave starlight into a Faerie ring...
We will use a technique of creating spirit chariots and, together, journey beyond this plane and through the Faerie Otherworld realms that overlay this camp. Path-goers will also have the option of working outside of path-time to paint these maps. As sacred cartographers and as a service to the community we will re-present these spirit maps for the exploration of campers and the embellishment of our ritual experience. But we know that the lands of the Faerie cannot be tamed by our maps.
As the Otherworlds continue to evolve and shift around us, this becomes not a journey with a fixed destination but a journey about journeying. This path becomes a journey about learning how to uncover points of reference through land-based allyships, shift ourselves as the worlds shift about us, facilitate portals of overlaying dimensions, traverse and map through the Otherworld, and embrace the feral queerness of the Fey and the gatekeepers of the crossroads...