Patreon Poem/Prayer/Song 71: For Tyr

If you want to submit a request for a prayer, poem, or song to be written to you privately or to be posted on this blog or my Patreon for a God, Ancestor, or spirit, sign up for the Ansuz and above level here on my Patreon.

This request was made by Emi for Tyr.

Flames lick the sky, Muspel burning bright

The hoary frost loosing the river’s run

Ýmir’s blood bloomed behind You

Your Name brings victory, twice signed on spear and sword

So too the Brothers’ blades were bloodied

Red-marked Runes wrought Their ruin

When the waters receded, rede You gave

Foundations were placed, great posts dug deep

Hófs and walls rose resolute

In council You sat among the Æsir

Your wisdom was worked in law and war

Blessing the holmgang rite and law-rock

Fierce and hungering was the Wolf whelp

By Your hands was He raised on red meat

Loving devotion to the Dire Wolf

When Fenris grew fear could not find You

Though His fangs grew long and maw mighty

You persevered in Your compassion and care

True You stayed to Your Son

Oathing hand given for the biting bind

Tears to the treachery

You teach the truths of legality and loyalty

To each test You bless with bravery

When choice is razor and rock

Yours is wisdom’s edge sliced in stone

Relentless, Your strop hones the hearty

Who seek Your guidance and gift

Týr is the name of surety and severity

Whose echo calls the weapon worthy in war

Who forges mind and magic in Fire and cools them by Ice

Patreon Poem/Prayer/Song 69: For Angrboða

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This request was made by Maleck for Angrboða.

Great Wolf, I hail You

Ferocious and mauling-mouthed Mother

Who leads the Ironwood with care

Taufr-strong, I hail You

Calculating and megin-mighty Magician

Who keeps Her loved ones safe

Bloodhand, I hail You

Sacrificer and woe-wielding Witch

Who knows the secret Ways

Motherwort, I hail You

Leader and hale-whole Healer

Who mends Her peoples’ wounds

Gyðja, I hail You

Leader and hamingja-holding Host

Who guides Her peoples well

Angrbóða, I hail You

Angrbóða, I hail You

Angrbóða, I hail You

Ves þu heil

A Lay for the Wild Hunt

The horde roaves roads of forests,
Roaming the wild of the world
Across field and fen, frost and flame
The host fairs forth

Gods and great Dead are the vanguard,
Wolves and wild things follow and watch the ways
Above come ravens and crows in the wake
Between are those borne and brought into stride

The sunsets are stained dark with blood
Shadows teem and swallow the night
The sound of their sumons are hooves and howls
Carrying the calls of the Wild Hunt’s host

Offer, lest the door be darkened
Good beer, bread, or blade freely given
For many are the mouths of the might Hunt
And satisfaction ever They seek

Join, if you are of a mind to journey
To scout and slaughter, by blade, bow, or bite
Among man and monster one may find their kin
Blessed by the ways of the Wild

Patreon Topic 64: On The Pack Spirits

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From Maleck comes this topic:

“Now that you’ve finished the prayers to the Pack Spirits, what have you learned?”

I was honestly surprised when Maleck approached me to do the prayers for the Pack Spirits. I had been introduced to Them as spirits belonging to an initiatory tradition and had not ever thought they would be a group of spirits I would have interaction with, let alone be able to write prayers for Them. When I reached out to Them, not only did this group of spirits respond, They were eager for me to write prayers for each of Them.

The Pack Spirits are just that, and while the particular mysteries and training of the Pack Tradition are closed to initiates, the Pack Spirits Themselves are quite accessible. So, I have learned how these archetypal and yet communal/collective/individual spirits operate, and at least some of my own ‘placement’ with Them as an outsider. Sometimes you need an outsider, and while I connected very readily and well with these spirits, connecting with Them and writing prayers for Them just confirmed that remaining on the outside of this particular initiation is a good thing. It allows me to see aspects of Them others would not from the inside, and it allows a kind of fluidity in relationship with Them that I may not feel were I an initiate.

Writing for The Pack, The Pack Ancestors, Earth, Silence, Pack, Howl, Sky, Hunt, and Prey has allowed me to connect with these Míkilvaettir (Big/Power Spirits) and has given me insight into connections that They carry with many of my own Ginnreginn, and myself. It has allowed me to feel those connections, eg through the Earth, in new and dynamic ways that differs from connecting to Jörð. She is distinctly Her, and yet, through these different vaettir, a new understanding and connection with the Earth emerges. Likewise through each Míkilvaettir and the associated Beings I could name in conjunction with Them. It broadens and narrows the scope of Who I am interacting with, experiencing, and coming to know.

Something that emerged through the prayers as I wrote them was personal connection. Many of them are written in “I” format, as I experienced many of the prayers directly before I wrote them down. Sometimes it was being taken in my hamr, my second skin, to another place and made to experience Them. Sometimes it was a personal revelation that They brought forward in me, whether through an inborn experience of something that They hit in me or something that really struck me in experiencing it in my hamr. Sometimes it was the feeling of wildness that I reveled in and had to somehow bring that experience forward in the poem, prayer, and/or song. Sometimes it was the conflicting emotions, or even the various vaettir I experienced within the experience of the individual Míkilvaettr. Each brought something forward in me, each called in to me as it were, and brought something out of me to put into the poems, prayers, and songs that I wrote. Though each is a powerful initiatory Being unto Itself each gave a non-initiate powerful insight into Them in dynamic ways.

Through the experience of each of these vaettir, and the experience of having to translate each of those experiences into poems, prayers, and songs, I have learned new understanding of and appreciation for these Beings, and the connections that each brings forward. The connections each brings with/to us is dynamic, and if we let it build, can be quite powerful whether the connection is found within us personally, through the old Ancestors like the first ones to have domesticated wolves, or in new ways with Gods we have worshipped for a long time. They bring a kind of ancient yet fresh wisdom, power, and ferality I think could be a source of profound experience for folks, whether or not they initiate into Pack Tradition or Pack Magic.

Patreon Poem/Prayer/Song 66: For The Pack

If you want to submit a request for a prayer, poem, or song to be written to you privately or to be posted on this blog or my Patreon for a God, Ancestor, or spirit, sign up for the Ansuz and above level here on my Patreon.

This request was made by Maleck for The Pack.

We are countless billions of voices

Canidae, Wolf, Dog

Jackal, Coyote, Fox

Pup, Juvenile, Adult

We are the Ones who found your first Fires

Our first shared Ancestors

We are the proud guard and misshapen pets

We are the ‘yotes living on the fringes and dark places of your cities

We are the haunters of graves and crossroads

We are the salvation of humanity and we are its outstretched hands

We are feared and beloved

We are hunters and warriors

We are carriers and seekers

We are predator and sentinel of prey

We are the snapping jaws

We are the slathering tongues

We are the steady paws

We are the howling maw

We are Magic

We are of the Wild Hunt

We are beloved of Gods

We are Gods

We are Ancestors

We are Spirits

We are Ancient and New

We are Many and Whole

We ARE The Pack

Patreon Poem/Prayer/Song 63: For Prey, Partners in the Great Cycle

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This request was made by Maleck for Prey, Partners in the Great Cycle.

The grass guides Us

Waving in the cooling air

Strands of hair we shave down with soft bites

Chewing, chewing, chewing

We have walked ahead

Far behind you lope

Wind hides your scent with wary steps

Padding, padding, padding

No sign betrays you

The hunt is on

Fear grips the herd with furious panic

Running, running, running

One stumbles down

The Pack descends

Death brings life in dragging bites

Eating, eating, eating

This is the Cycle

Each balances the other

Prey eats of the Earth, Pack of Us

Dancing, dancing, dancing

Patreon Poem/Prayer/Song 62: For Hunter, Will Made Manifest

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This request was made by Maleck for Hunter, Will Made Manifest.

I am the keen nose that tracks the scent of My Prey

I am the paws that range over the smooth snow and sucking mud

I am the heaving chest that powers the pursuit

I am the tireless legs that carry the Hunt

I am the rippling jaw that makes the kill

I am the teeth that tear the skin and rend the flesh from bone

I am the tongue that laps the blood and cleans the carcass

I am the mind that sets the Hunt in motion

I am the heart that sees the Hunt finished

I am the Spirit Who Wills the Hunt to be

I am Will Made Manifest

I am the Hunter

I am the Prey’s End and Beginning

I am the Hunt Itself

The cycles will continue

Patreon Topic 62: On Writing Prayers for the Pack Spirits

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From Maleck comes this topic:

“What has it been like, writing these prayers for the Pack Spirits?”

It has been interesting, that is for sure. It is like….touching something, Beings, who are so close and yet are far away. It is being invited into Them and They into me. When I do sacred poetry I do cleansing, grounding, centering, and shielding. Sometimes I am guided to certain songs by Whoever I am writing for, and sometimes I write in silence. Sometimes I get imagery and visual experiences that makes it into the poetry, sometimes I get feelings, sometimes I get full-body experiences, sometimes I get words, smells, sensations, and other times just a fierce, bone-deep knowing that this, this is what I have to write.

The Pack Spirits are quite close in terms of proximity but far away because I am not initiated, nor do I think that is in my wheelhouse for this lifetime. Yet there is…something there. There is connection and power, a fierce connection that I make every time I interact with one of the great Pack Spirits. There is a depth of feeling that goes into my soul and yet there is something held back. I am touching the periphery and yet I am delving deep, and that thing holding me back from fully grasping Them that also makes doing this poetry so fascinating and powerful for me is that lack of initiation.

My most recent experience with Hunter, Will Made Manifest was a full-spirit experience. He took me with Him on a Hunt, on a Hunt where we were separate and one. I was the Pack and the Wolves, I was the Hunter, and I was the Prey. Now, the line “I am the Prey’s End and Beginning” originally read “I am the Prey” but it was not right and I had to look back to my experience of Hunter to realize why. Prey is something Else and Other, part of the sacred cycle but not Hunter Itself. Mainfestly needed but also necessarily not Hunter. I felt the loping as the Hunt began, felt my lungs expand, the snarl of excitement, felt felt felt. I was. In a very real sense my sacred poem, prayers, and songs invite me into union with Gods, Ancestors, and/or vaettir I may not otherwise have the call to, and with these Spirits Who are present but to whom I am not initiated They have a powerful pull.

It has been…experiences…writing for the Pack Spirits. It has been interesting, insightful, powerful, beautiful, and familiar while also being distant. The contrast between familiarity and distance has been fascinating. In a very real sense the Mysteries of these Spirits keeps Themselves because without that inititation there are things that I cannot reach, and yet because I do not have that initiation there are thins I can reach to, express, understand, and share that initiates just…cannot. It is fascinating. It is a privelege. It is good.

I Ask You

Is this how you feel

Having watch the world turned,

The Worlds burned

In vision tortured

Without distortion?

Is this how you feel,

this deep-seated pain

like a knife when you see

the cycles ’round again?

Is this how you feel

As grief heaps up

And all that lies before

and behind, your son?

Is this how you feel

That your stand still must be made,

Before the mouth?

Is this how you feel

Melancholic resolve forged in pain of love?

Is this how you feel?

Patreon Poem/Prayer/Song 56: For The Silence Who is Death

If you want to submit a request for a prayer, poem, or song to be written to you privately or to be posted on this blog or my Patreon for a God, Ancestor, or spirit, sign up for the Ansuz and above level here on my Patreon.

This request was made by Maleck for The Silence Who is Death.

I am the closing jaws

I am the yawning maw

I am cold tongue

I am the clenched teeth

I am the muffled wail

I am the grasped throat

I am the torn neck

I am the gasp

I am the pant

I am the murmur of blood

I am the clouding of eyes

I am the numbing

I am the quiet

I Am

The Silence Who is Death

When all fades

I Am There