Visions of Magick Magazine

right that you enter as you were made”,
entering this time between the sturdy
legs of one of them, into the bright and
burning circle.
Then the words, murmured in his
ears though none stood close: “Be that
you be, see that you see; shine, and in
the shining, show what you be” Ancient
words? Perhaps an echo. But by whoever
or whenever first spoken, potent now as
then. He felt enclosed, safe, yet at the
same time set free, poised on the breath
of a great beginning.
Other words, forgotten now, spoke of
the year’s turning, of the part each must
play in its continued restoration, its
endless making.
Then, the touch of hands, seven pairs,
on his back and arms and thighs, and
more words, whispered now, that he
could not catch. Then the thronged
‘punisher’ ‘To remind you always, who you
are.” The seven strokes and the three, and
then the five, and with the last, released
from the hand that had held it in check, a
thong on which was tied an arrowhead of
a long-past time.
Brief, burning pain. Some blood, soon
cleansed, salve applied that brought swift
relief and healing. Gentleness now in the
hands that touched brow and shoulder
and foot. Last words, half remembered:
“Shallow is the shadow world. deep
the world of earth and stone, where the
Seasons turn...”
Like a waking he hears them again,
remembers the thoughts they conjured,
that between the two worlds lay very little
space, and that they often overlapped.
That was only a part. Other truths
followed: that to be part of life was to
feel the flow of the earth’s own blood,
through the feet, mounting to the body,
until the head was filled with its fire; that
to be one with Creation was the greatest
gift, though little known and rarely
understood. They had always known,
had always sung or chanted its rhythm,
celebrating the round of the year in all its
patterns, below ground and above.
Thus, there could be no set initiations
in the understood sense; the coming
in was merely the open hand, the word
“welcome”, which had its own magical
volition. Beyond this, he was considered
ready, ready to have the key turned in the
lock, so that his understanding flowered
within him and he was attuned to the
inner harmony of the group, where no
one, man nor woman, spoke of having
greater authority, the seal of manstrength
or woman-power. He saw again,
more clearly now, the balance within
the group, the polarized strengths that
worked for one direction and that all
theirs, the ‘will’ of Creation.
Each acted out that will, singly and
in chorus, as the laws governing chant
allowed for one voice or two, three or
many, according to the song of the hour.
Earth sang, the Mother sang in answer,
and the stars fell into alignment, those
above reflected by those below.
He reflected, briefly, that there was
greater similarity between the concepts
of ‘High Magic’ and the work of the
family, than most would acknowledge; the
working in harmony with the inner realms
was at the heart of all their work.
Then, the last night, remembered still
with difficulty and some pain. A big night,
season-changer, a night of song and story.
Then, a summoning, all of them, and
he, drawn close and tight in the Circle,
chanting the end note and the dawn note
in changing harmonies, drunk with the
sounds, drawing ragged breaths full of
the night. And he, focused, no longer
aware of anything but the circle of light
before him and the power he sought to fill
with...
But what came there, what filled the
circle, overflowed across dark hill, drove
back the rest, overwhelmed them, was
something other. A man-shape cut out of
the night, a vast-seeming darkness that
shut out the moon and the stars, a great
voice roaring in his head: COME!
Just as violent was his response,
his silent-shouted NO! And then the
reverberation, the tearing aside of the
curtain, and the circle of faces, some
shocked, some bewildered, two at least,
angry. He remembered the anger for
a long while after, the shouted words:
“‘Be darkness and be fear and be not
of us!” After, long after, when he could
think again of these things, could seek
interpretation and meaning, he wondered
what had really occurred. Was it his own
psychism which had acted as a catalyst
to some waiting energy, releasing it like
a volcano from within the hill? Or were
they to blame, as another to whom he
spoke of this had suggested; had they
sought him as a gift to the numen of the
hill? But would they not, at the least,
have asked this of him? To go unwillingly
was not to go at all — or so he believed
- and trusted they would. Whatever the
truth he left that night and saw none of
them again. Not banished, but with the
unspoken understanding that the time
with them was over.
Was it, then, simply the
unexpectedness of the thing, for none
had foreseen it, least of all he? For many
years he was to wonder, following another
course that brought him back to that
broken circle, to that hilltop night, again
and again.
Often, he was asked the question
“Come, give up yourself, be part of the
circle again” meaning other circles, never
the first which was forever closed. But
always he refused, until another came,
who knew all the ways by intuition,
who was gentle and taught him again
the meaning of the way, until he was
able, in part, to teach her. But all was
fragmentary, forcibly suppressed through
26 ILLUSTRATIONS 1 - 8 BY JULIA JEFFREY .
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