cunningwoman

[cunningwoman]

I’ve dreamt of the house many times before. it’s usually yellow or coral or green, always by the ocean. I see it from a distance, usually, though I have been inside it once. when I see it I am relieved, I feel like I’m coming home. like I don’t have to worry anymore where I’ll lay my head or how much I’ll have to pay for rent or if I’ll be safe.

sometimes it’s a farm, sometimes it’s a dormitory, sometimes it’s a halfway house. always it’s full of women who live there together and make things and grow things. they want me to live there too

[cunningwoman]

Sweet November Dream by donsutherland1 on Flickr.

[cunningwoman]

women are not free of the panopticon when they enter their “sacred spaces”; when they do their “witchcraft.”

so much of what I see on the internet in relation to witchcraft is wicca-lite, aesthetics without substance. if it can’t be artfully photographed and posted on instagram, it’s not worthwhile.

I see women mouthing words, touching stones, lighting candles, all under the watchful eye of the uber consumer, the anonymous one(s) who will invariably consume us. we brand ourselves for general public consumption — it need not be done to us anymore; we eagerly volunteer. we wear trendy clothes, impractical and revealing. we must collect sparkly gems and crystals. we must smooth out our skins in photoshop, because ~forest fairies~ don’t have blemishes. we must maintain the aesthetic. we believe we are products, and we sell ourselves.

(for that matter, ~forest fairies~ generally are not ethnic, do not sing loudly, do not dance with thundering feet and jiggling thighs, do not eat heartily, do not do anything much but perform thinly, cutely, palely, for onlookers.)

we desperately want to be approved of, because we know no other happiness, and ultimately the only approval that matters under patriarchy is the approval of men. ultimately, the goal of wicca-lite is the same as all other goals under patriarchy: white, European, thin, conventionally attractive, heterosexual, avidly materialistic.

women, whose blood runs with magic from birth to death, are alienated completely from themselves and the goddess. they learn that magic is just another commodity for them to purchase or sell, an accessory to wear to attract acquisitive eyes.

we need sacred spaces that are truly sacred, free from the eyes and hands of predators and purchasers. we need spaces where we feel free to be loose and open, uncensored, unpackaged, unbranded, unbought, unsold. this is where magic happens.

[cunningwoman]

Maria Merian – Scientist of the Day

Maria Sibylla Merian, a German artist, was born Apr.2, 1647.

read more…

[cunningwoman]

Spring is finally here! Snowdrops, like the ones above, are in the genus Galanthus. Though small, they grow from bulbs like other members of the Amaryllidoideae subfamily (daffodils, for example). Particular species of snowdrops flower in early spring, so they are often considered a sign of the end of winter.

Photograph by Steffen Flor.

[cunningwoman]

Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou, “The Song of Abayi”

[cunningwoman]

Dykes-Loving-Dykes: Dyke Separatist Politics for Lesbians Only, Battleaxe. 1990.

[cunningwoman]

Ivy by Sarah Gallaun

[cunningwoman]

Some Rad Words from '71

They Tried to Make It Personal

by Revolutionary Lesbians

A little while ago, my best friend and I became aware of a problem. For a while she had been real uptight about being touched and she stopped responding in her usual easy and self-assured way that she used to when I would stroke or caress her body. So we asked ourselves questions…what did my giving attention to her body mean? How had she been with other people? How had other people been with her in the past?

We began to see some stuff. For a long time she had always been very ‘smooth’ about reacting sexually. She’d given a lot to the two people who she’d lived with during the 10 years before we did…one man and one woman. Both of them had taken a lot…and Sandy gave a lot in terms of making them feel at ease…comforting them. She told me how the woman she’d lived with would go into fits of depression and self-hate whenever Sandy would tell her that Betty had hurt her…which meant that Sandy had to comfort Betty, when Betty had hurt her…and Sandy’s needs had to be shoved aside.

We recognized how much this was true of all women…that we’re constantly comforting, putting aside our own feelings. How we sense, that as women…we’re not valued by men…or by other women, so we make ourselves necessary by giving so much that the other person will be ‘grateful’…

And then we tried to get at what it meant for Sandy to be loved for the first time, for me to respond to her openly and out of respect that’s built on struggle. We asked what it meant for her to admit our love for each other by responding.

This time it became clear how hard it was for either of us to let the real depth of our love for each other in, …because in a society that rips everything away that we value…where we’re betrayed over and over again when we have opened ourselves up to people and where we have been treated as a piece of meat by men…and by male-world women…it’s real hard to admit to ourselves the love we felt for each other in fear that it would somehow be taken away. We felt ourselves constantly bracing our bodies for the possibility of one of us leaving the other…just so we could sort of shrug it off like it didn’t mean that much to us anyway…

And to let that love really sink in meant that we would really let ourselves in for FEELING what happened to us…and if we did bad things to each other it would HURT. We realized how we had both been testin things out…sort of feeling around…then numbing ourselves a little-just in case…

But this time we both began to WANT to let those feelings in. It was real clear that we really cared for each other and that we trusted each other…Sandy’s body was just testin things out a little more…she was making a decision by lettin her body get cranky. Before it had been easy for her just to climb into bed, into an argument, into a ‘relationship’ and to ‘comfort’ the other person. She had trained her body to respond acceptably on cue. If she didn’t respond right - well then all sorts of thing might happen to her. She might have to face the fact that the other person didn’t even care enough to notice that something was wrong…or she would be noticed and the other person would flee in the face of having to help her - so in order for Sandy to avoid all those terrifying possibilities (and they did terrify her for good reasons) she just got her body to ‘behave’. She now talks about it as tho it had been a plane and inside the pilot who would take a nap and just put the controls on ‘automatic pilot’.

I got really excited that her body was bein cranky and told her so. She just couldn’t believe my reaction - she thought I was puttin her on and began to cry…just from relief. I told her that sure it upset me a little…I wasn’t used to her saying things like - ‘stop - that tickles’ or ‘no - that doesn’t feel nice,’ but I was just really happy that she was lettin her body say things to me because I knew what a big thing that was. It meant that she was beginning to let me know her needs…her feelings - and she wasn’t satisfied to just react to my needs. Our love helped us to love ourselves enough to begin to express our own needs and to ask the other person to take notice. That is real hard for women to do…cause that is something we never get to do… we are trained from the beginning to be an endless source of compassion and strength for everyone else.

A mother can’t give into a cold…what the hell would happen to everyone? Look at all the women in ‘service’ positions…GIVE GIVE GIVE…Men use women for this all the time…- even if a woman gets raped - she ends up consoling her boyfriend or husband - she reassures him and then hopes he won’t hate her because she got raped…Women comfort men - they protect them from the world…from other men…to make it easier for the men. In the business world, the same thing happens…you put rows of women between the customer and the executive - if something goes wrong and he customer is furious - who do they yell at - who are they rude to…and that happens even when the customer knows what’s going on because the people really responsible for things hide…I know women who have been told in their secretary courses that their major purpose is to keep their bosses happy and to keep unwanted people away…they have been told that they are office ‘wives.’

Everyday Sandy and I go thru this same process…asking ourselves what we are feelin - what memories we are having…what we think might have made u react the way we did…what our parent said about that…and we start asking things like who benefits from the way we were trained to act…what purpose does such training have in the end? …how does this old value connect up to other things and how does all of this keep things running smoothly? And these questions, and many more are asked about feelins we are havin or the experiences we are rememberin and tryin to work thru. We don’t have our feelins and then at some later date examine them with a fine tooth comb.

What we know is that everything that goes on had a social reason…somebody is benefiting from all this shit coming down…and if you started talking about your most secret experiences or fantasies - you would soon find out that you ain’t the only one…so a distinction has been drawn - and values placed on different parts…what men say or have been saying for ever is that what happens to you in your gut…what you experience and others experience every day of their lives…your whole life…well that is called ‘personal’ and that don’t mean shit…because see that just happens to you and what are feelins anyway? Now ‘political’ well that’s somethin else - according to them…why that’s real important…and that takes a lot of brains to follow…and has to do with things like votin… or if you are beyond reform politics…well then it has to do with very HEAVY things…like Dialectical Materialism and Economics and statistics… BULLSHIT! There ain’t no distinction between personal and political…that distinction only exists for people who have a mighty big gap between what they say they think and what they do every day of their lives…

Yes, they tried to pull it off - they tried to define politics as something abstract and away from you and from your lives. They can’t afford for politics to be brought home…to have us know that things that happen just aren’t some sort of personal little events…for if we start makin connections - if we begin to understand what gets done in the family, in schools, at work, and if the rage that that knowin would release ever got started - why things would really start changin…there’s a lot of really angry women walking around…and we aren’t gonna believe those men (nor their male-world women agents) any longer…we know that strong women, who are close to their feelins, and who don’t have any particular investments in the way things are run, and who have real investments (like their lives) in thing changin - who are filled with rage at what has been done and won’t accept any excuses…we know that women like that can tear this disgusting beast to pieces…and well - that’s what I call real political.

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Revolutionary Lesbians were two Lesbian separatists living in Ann Arbor, MI who published a paper called Spectre from 1971-72. I found this article printed in the Lesbian separatist anthology For Lesbians Only. Highly recommended to all radical dykes and anyone who wants to find out what separatists actually wrote instead of what their critics said about them.

[cunningwoman]

Tee Corinne Cunt Coloring Book (San Francisco, Last Gasp Publication, 1975)

Lesbian artist Tee Corinne 1943-2006 “Tee consistently and conscientiously included women of color, fat women, older women, and women with disabilities as her subjects. Sometimes printers would refuse to print her works and art galleries would refuse to show it. In 1975, she self-published the Cunt Coloring Book, which is still in print today.”

[cunningwoman]

is your porch ceiling blue?

[cunningwoman]

I have no use for reconstructionism, which feels to me more like preparing a period outfit for the renaissance faire than worship.

I have no use for modern “triple goddess” imagery, which is a male invention I suspect was designed to compartmentalize the divine female — divide her up before conquering.

I have no use for gods, priests, and other deceivers.

I have more than use for Her, she who set my blood by the moon’s clock and made me in her image. it’s not so much use but need, passion, longing.

she is one, so great a one that she contains multitudes. she contains young and old, daughter and grandmother, dark and light, music and silence, and everything in between and beyond.

[cunningwoman]

your post about making the want was indeed helpful. thanks. im undercover with my parents too and the idea came to me this morning while watering the plants. im working on it now, going on intuition

hello friend, sorry but I somehow overlooked your message!glad I could be helpful. I hope it turned out great.

[cunningwoman]

[cunningwoman]

dear sisters:

you should never be pressured to share your worship with someone who makes you feel inhibited, uncomfortable, frightened, or triggered.

you are right to be distrustful of people who engage in this kind of pressure.

you are right to be suspicious of people who feel entitled to your sacred spaces and ritual energy.

you are not required to compromise your safety simply to make someone else feel more included.

[cunningwoman]

littleforestbats replied to your post “I’m working on a post about a certain popular sect of “witchcraft”...”

i've considered making a long post about it too.

I think you should.

[cunningwoman]

I'm working on a post about a certain popular sect of "witchcraft" (and why I'm not a member of it) but it's slow going.

I can't pretend to be objective. I am grossed out by it and so many people involved in creating and marketing it.

there are so damn many sites and articles that slavishly repeat patent falsehoods about these people and the religion they invented. there are so many willing to accept lies as truth with no investigation into the facts (it's enough if the liar is sufficiently "mystical"), and so many who become furious if their dearly held -- but blindly accepted -- beliefs are questioned.

I believe that esotericism hurts. it promotes ignorance and division. sickeningly often, it promotes the blatant oppression of women.

sunlight may well be the best disinfectant, but its benefits are lost on those determined to live in caves.