That said, I’ll give him credit for one thing: taking practices that may read like a twisted garbled version of Latin and Old English from other sources, and printed backward at that, and making them much more comprehensible. I particularly liked his Rite of General Offering (pages 53-55), even though – in goosestep with the Twinkies I always grumble loudly about – he didn’t cite any sources for it. As I said on numerous occasions, I don’t care if he made it up himself! Just say so. If he took the general idea from other sources and revised it for the contemporary tongue, that’s fine, too. But say so!
I mean, come on, people. How difficult is it to cite your damn sources??? Do us all a favor and make THAT your “Sorcerer’s Secret” for the day.
(Deep breath)
Moving on ... as I said, I liked the idea of the Rite of General Offering. Basically, the Rite involves offering a basic form of offering that all spirits could accept (he suggests incense and liquor), OR, making a gesture of energetic offering with your hands and allowing the spirits you’re inviting to take what they prefer from your energy offering. What I particularly liked (in part) was the spoken invitation that supplemented the Rite – he basically invited every possible spirit he could think of to partake of the offering, the point being that even the crabby ones might think twice about messing with you if you’d treated them as an honored guest. I liked that concept. Open, non-judgmental, polite and (hopefully) beneficial for all concerned.
There were a few spots in his spoken invitation that I questioned, like “Spirits of the firmament of earth and of ether!” That bothered me, so I double-checked “firmament” – and my memory was correct – “firmament” was the (now proven erroneous) biblical term to refer to the vault of the sky – and by that I mean the solid vault of the sky, from a time when everyone thought the sky was solid and arched over the earth, with the stars embedded in it (more or less) – a relic of geocentricity. So how did he get “firmament of earth” out of that concept?
I can’t recite that line without wincing, so I may need to re-write it into something like, “Spirits of the cosmos and of ether”, or something along those lines.
The idea behind it, though, was to respectfully gain their good-will and attention, before invoking any of them. I liked the idea.
Il Volo Naked
I recently looked at the blog stats for this blog and discovered why at least 2 people ended up here. This tells me what they were searching for:
“Il Volo naked”???
Hey – whoever you are!!! – if you find photos of Il Volo naked, you let ME know! At the present time, I can’t help you with that, I’m truly sorry to say. No, really. TRULY SORRY, you have no idea. Even worse, I have the misfortune of living in the U.S. which has been overrun by a bunch of super-fundamentalist twits who see a naked body and call the local chapter of the Spanish Inquisition. So I doubt I could post them, even if you did find photos of “Il Volo Naked”.
One of the other search terms was, “Piero Barone shirtless”. That one I’m happy to say, I could provide. Here. Here. And here.Wow, I had no idea I had such a collection of “Piero Barone Topless XXX” photos.
Anyway: glad to help. No, really. VERY happy, you have no idea. The guy inspires more fantasies with those shirtless photos than he could have possibly imagined when he took them.Ahhhh, the joys of the human female imagination. And mille grazie again for the photos, Piero ... women all over the world thank you for them!
Il Volo, by the way, naked or not, has not announced any appearances in New York or Boston during their June tour ... I’m only semi-devastated by that. I’ll be in the middle of moving, unpacking, taking business trips, so it’s probably a good thing that they’re not contributing to the general state of chaos I’ll be experiencing in May and June, because – naturally – I’d be compelled to go see them. And there’s always YouTube, so I hope everyone plans on doing what they usually do: take videos of everything!
Back to business!
Synchronicity
– I happened to catch a photo of the brother of the deliciously shirtless l’uno e solo, by whom I mean the guy with the naked torso. His brother: Francis or Francesco Barone by name. Not important. (Well, unless you’re him, and in that case – I apologize, your name is extremely important to ... somebody, I’m sure; it’s just not relevant to this discussion.)
Anyway, he posted a photo of a tattoo he received on or about July 9th of last year, but I didn’t see it until a few days ago. Apparently he has a beautifully constructed design of an ouroboros tattooed on his upper chest.
 | |
| Francis Barone's Chest |
Among the many things this symbol (“Ouroboros”) represents?
Reincarnation.
Now, Francis said it meant “eternal life”. But it also stands for Kundalini energy, which is part of the ... chakra system. Just as I’m getting ready to begin learning about chakras.
According to the second century Yoga Kundalini Upanishad, "The divine power, Kundalini, shines like the stem of a young lotus; like a snake, coiled round upon herself she holds her tail in her mouth and lies resting half asleep as the base of the body" (1.82). Another interpretation is that Kundalini equates to the entwined serpents of the caduceus, the entwined serpents representing medicine in the west or, esoterically, human DNA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros
I would love it if someone could read the letters on the belly of the snake’s body. I cannot read them.
Looks mystical or even hermetic to me. Damn! Francis is as mysterious and interesting as his younger brother is vibrational, IMHO.
March
I woke up in the rain today
Gentle pearlescent jewels
Black twigs against leaden sky
Dark stains on cold Earth in pools
Slow slumbering spring awakens
Changing from snow to rain
Leaf and twig on burgeoning bough
Wheel of the year turns again
Gentle watery sunlight
Leaps and sparkles on rippling lake
As glistening ice retreats
Low cast light in pink cloud break
To wake to joyous chorus
Earth softens now free of ice
Nesting birds with eggs to hatch
The air a-twitter with expectant life
Light lasts longer now
Lingering late in the lane
And I will walk along the hedge
To the warmth of my hearth again
“Greenman”, http://www.pagan-heart.co.uk/poems/march.html
As pretty as that is, I’m used to my Corn-Maiden song ... which is sort of a combination of ancient Greek and native American mythology condensed into a song I’ve been singing every year since I learned it at Enchantments in Manhattan. I tried to look it up, but can’t find who wrote it – my apologies to whoever did:
Hail to Koré, divine maiden
She who grows all things above the ground.
Hail Corn Maiden, lady of the fields,
She is beauty and bountiful love.
Koré, Koré, Koré,
Keep us all safe, keep the evil eye away.
Very simple melody; just a song of joy, really. It went through my head a few days ago when I saw my first forsythia bush of the season, covered with yellow flowers. If I hadn’t been on a bus at the time, I would have burst into song.
I still haven’t progressed beyond the fuzzy whitish-grey outline, but we did practice seeing auras in class. I know I’m going to keep getting better at it, because I’m seeing a (very) slow but steady improvement already.
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