People ask me, “if your religion isn’t about gods, what, really, is the point? Why do you do it?” It’s a valid question, because there are several things that Atheopaganism isn’t for. It isn’t for worshiping. It isn’t for entreating supernatural assistance, nor for attempting to influence the physical Universe through…
The Sabbath of Water
In my Wheel of the Year, the cross-quarter which lands around the beginning of February is Riverain: the Feast of Water. That’s because where I live, in Northern California with its Mediterranean climate, that time of year is the heaviest with rainfall. The mountains grow emerald green with winter grass, the…
The Avalanche–A Poem for January
The avalanche took our home. A wave of ice drove us before it, And everything we thought we had we loaded on our backs And fled, but no luck: the cold fist ground us under. Home. Years. Love. Work. Health. We cried as it passed over…
Mulled Wine
It begins where the smoke hits your eyes: smouldering peat, Mutton stew on a broad iron hook, Deep snow. How can it ever have been summer? Apples wrinkling and mice in the barley— With so much to fear, thank fortune for company! We’ll tell our…
It Starts with Just One Thing
It’s a gunmetal grey day, portending welcome rain. The last of the autumn foliage is still evident, this being Northern California, and somehow it is calm and silent in our neighborhood despite the proximity to shopping districts. Today is the day I declare it: the season of Yule has begun.
A Winter Spell
O cold, inexorable darkness Draw back now beyond these circling walls. Should fear, and want, and danger walk It shall not be, it is not here. Let this place of warming light Bulwark against freezing night: a promise Holding through the day that we, come nightfall…