A New Hearth

A new hearth and a new plot of land. The present year has found me once again nesting softly into a new living space. This time, it feels more grounding. I have help. My partner and I have come to find ourselves sharing a home together.

My sacred space has once again recreated itself. The homogenous philosophy of sacred space is something that I’ve always had a knack for believing in. My immediate space is the same space that I have always dwelt in, yet often in different rooms, in different towns, with different individuals, etc.

I have lived in different places and called other bedrooms my bedroom. I have painted the walls green to calm my nerves, and I have played tirelessly with the arrangements of furniture. Yet most of those dwellings exist within another time. The only one relevant is the one in which I find myself presently. My sacred immediate space. 

It is the place of comfort.

I have often noticed the sedating affect my space has had on others. When people seem tense during social gatherings, I place them in my bedroom, where they are free from the chaos of awkwardness. I suppose, in a way, this is an unconscious display of my own vulnerability so that they do not feel uncomfortable displaying their own. My nurturing nature running amok. 

My quiet, green room has always been my safe space. I’ve never been under the impression that others don’t go through what I do, everyone should have a place in which they feel completely sheltered from the world. A place unfettered by the arguments of politics or the chastisement of social expectations. 

My partner is the only one who ever truly gets to experience this sort of intimacy with me. This quiet time of the soul. His humor abounds, and he’ll make fun of me for using vocabulary, but I love him for it. 

Learning to truly love and let oneself be loved is a process, especially for any kind of developmental challenges resulting from social dysfunctions during the early years of one’ life. A friend once told me that we are all unevenly developed, so you’ve got to make do. 

During this learning and growing into the future, we should always remember who we are and where we came from. My quiet, green room reminds me of myself. My hopes, my dreams, my struggles, my successes. It gives me life and a place from which to dream. 

In my closet, now big enough for actual storage, I have set up both apothecary and altar. My temple of medicine and magic. When my belongings are sorted, my mind is clear and my purpose is succinct.  

I am hopeful for the coming spring. 

Talk later.

A Spagyric Essence

 

Roughly one year ago, I purchased The Green Book, by Heliophilus from Scarlet Imprint. It was a leap for me, since I was accustomed to keeping my reading list in the realm of generalized witchcraft, folk magic or herbalism.

What piqued my interest was the notion of plant alchemy, and having read nothing practical on the subject before, I purchased the book. This was my introduction into Spagyrics.

For those of you who do not know, Spagyrics is a term that refers to plant medicines that have been crafted through alchemical procedures. The various components of the plant’s chemistry are extracted, purified, and then recombined to form an essence more chemically, and therefore spiritually, inclusive of what the plant has to offer.

Much has been written on the subject, and I encourage you to do more research.

Heliophilus’ book was both an awakening and an enigma at my first devouring of the literature. A romantic example of classical potion making, if only I could find the competence to digest the arcane verbiage. It has been almost a year to the date since I began this sideline endeavor, and it has taken this long before enough of the material has made enough sense for me to put it all together. I won’t credit my incompetence as the primary hindrance, however, as acquiring the necessary glassware and equipment has been a slow, but steady process.

Regardless of my gentle pacing, I have completed an experiment.

I decided to practice with wormwood, albeit “tree wormwood” (Artemisia arborescens), but wormwood nonetheless, as my first Spagyrical Tincture. Despite the darkling witchy vibrations I’ve always felt from this necromantic wort, its fragrance has become quite soothing.   

Andrew Chevallier in his Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine says that the plant is an anti-inflammatory, eliminating worms and easing stomach pains; and David Hoffman in his Holistic Herbal says that the plant’s tonic action should help many different conditions thanks to its benefit on the body in general.

A word to the wise would be to research an herb before you decide to take it internally. Or apply it externally for that matter! As I’ve read, most of the warnings for wormwood are aimed at pregnant women since this plant can cause miscarriages, being a confirmed abortifacient. Being a male identifying “cissy” boy, I think I’m safe. I’m going to be extra safe, however, and not take the plant for more than two weeks at a time. I want the chemicals to give my digestive system a little boost, not coddle dependence.

For those reading and wondering about the effects of wormwood on the body, I am obliged to send you to this site for further investigation from a reputable source.

I used the woody variety, since it’s what I could find at the greenhouse. As the foliage came to a waning period, I took this chance to harvest it before it died back for the year, being sure to harvest on a waxing moon.

150 Proof Everclear™ is my next requirement. Pure grain alcohol.

I need a strong solvent of spirits to pour over my dried herb. This sits for three months on a dark shelf in my closet. In this time, what I’ll call a vulgar tincture is produced. The essential oils and all the chemicals that are soluble in alcohol are transferred to this liquid.

Strained and filtered, my tincture has a lovely, deep green color, smelling strong of its original fragrance, only tinged with alcohol this time. I set some of this aside in a dropper bottle, and pour the rest of the liquid into my retort.

I’m sure many an herbalist out there have a more sophisticated distilling apparatus, but me, I make it up as I go. I found this glass retort online, and the receiving end turns out to be a clear “potion” bottle I found at Target. I mix and I match and I make do.

The retort sits in a dish of sand, which gets heated on the stove. The receptacle sits in a dish of ice water that slowly melts from the heat coming off the stove.

The tincture is left to distill for a few hours as I clean and plots around the house. My cat watches me lazily as I sing emphatically to Beyoncé, the passion growing deeper and stronger the more white nationalism I see on the news. Her soulful ballads assuaging my guilt and my grief as water cannons are turned on the indigenous people protecting their clean water source.

While the medicine purifies, my attention turns to the plant matter that was left over from the original tincturing. By now it’s been rung out and left to sit, encouraging any remaining alcohol to evaporate off. If only the republican party and their corporate fascism would evaporate out of American politics.  

As I digress, the distilling is now done, and I have a beautiful clear liquid that smells richly of wormwood. My essence changes form.

I use a chopstick to scrape as much of the congealed vegetable residue left in the bottom of the retort. Impurities, which now join the dried-out plant matter left to evaporate on its own accord.

Now, with the stove-top unoccupied, I can put my tiny cast iron skillet to work.

The still green plant matter gets put into the pan, and up the dial goes on the stove top. After roughly thirty minutes of sizzling and cooking, I continue stirring the stuff, letting it brown and blacken. This procedure is best done outdoors, so don’t follow my lead, as you’ll have one hell of a smoky apartment.

   

We live, we learn, and we open the kitchen windows.  

The smoke will continue until there is little left to burn. The smoldering ashes are what is eventually sought after, so do not quit until you get there. After that, the heat will just continue to reduce the ashes further and further down. This process is what is referred to as calcination.

When the ashes have become significantly lighter in color, the leaching process can begin.

For this I use two measuring cups and a Black Teavana® PerfecteaMaker. An indispensable device that I encourage everyone to have.

 

 

 

With the calcined ashes poured into the filter, I pour distilled water over them and it collects in the measuring cup receptacle. The color of the water is now a sooty grey, as it has picked up some of the ashy debris.

My goal through this process is for the mineral salts that dwelt within the growing plant to dissolve into the distilled water. Along the way, some of the dirtier bits get through. This is okay, as it is my first filtering. Once I’ve completed about seven or nine filterings, pouring the water back and forth over the ashes, I’m left with what I want.

I keep the number of doings at a sacred numeral, for this is sacred work. My go-to numbers are three, seven, nine, thirteen, twenty-one, forty-two, and seventy-two. You may have your own significant numerology, however, so use it.

I pour this ashy liquid into a heat resistant Pyrex beaker, and boil off the water. With my rudimentary and make-shift laboratory, the microwave helps with this. I’m sure much is lost in such a crude process as this, but it’ll have to make do. What I’m left with is a mixture of mineral salts and ashes.

With a razor blade and a butter knife, I scrape off the sides of the glass, and collect what I have. The color is now a paler grey then what I started with, but it needs to be paler. Ideally, it should be white, but I’m only going to do two of these evaporating processes.

 

The ash and salt is poured back onto the little cast iron skillet, and turned on high. No smoke this time, but the powder turns almost blueish grey on the heated metal. Further calcination.

After it has lightened up considerably, I pour the powder back into my filtering system, and leach off more of the plant salts with distilled water. This time, there’s less debris, so once I’ve sufficiently dissolved the salts in the water, I pour the solution back into my Pyrex beaker.

This water is evaporated off once again in the microwave, leaving me with a lighter salt than before. I scrape this off the glass one last time and mix it with a little bit of distilled water.  A linen cloth is used to form a pouch-like filter over the mouth of a glass receptacle. I pour the solution through the mesh, filtering out any remaining caput mortuem. I am left with a transparent solution of distilled water and mineral salts. 

 

 

 

 In a holy and matrimonial coupling, enacted with anticipation in the evening sunlight, I pour the salty solution into the glass bottle containing the distilled tincture. My Spagyric is complete.

  

Chevallier, Andrew. FNIMH. Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine. Second American edition. 2000. DK Publishing Inc. pp. 66 “Wormwood”.

Hoffman, David. Holistic Herbal. Time-Life Books. 1998 Reprint. Pp. 64 “Wormwood”.

Heliophilus. Alchemy Rising: The Green Book. Scarlet Imprint 2015. Pp. 41-43 “Tinctures”.

https://www.drugs.com/npp/wormwood.html

Image from J.D. Mylius Anatomia Auri 1628, via alchemywebsite.com

Enter: Mandragora

I will begin our conversation with a word of gratitude and thanksgiving. Let us begin this endeavor as auspiciously as possible.

I am so dearly thankful for the available media with which our voices can be voiced, as well as the “enlightened” times that we live in that make these outlets possible. I call our modern age enlightened purely by contrast to those darker eras gone before us, though when considering
the tidal nature of our chronology thus far, perhaps we will all come full circle once again. Perhaps I say that the times are enlightened as a sort of satire. Regardless, I’m thankful for them.

I am grateful for the opportunities my many privileges have shown me, though I am not proud to have them at the expense of others. I am thankful for all of the magnificent people in my life who have helped and encouraged me along my path. Without them, I would be nowhere. 

It has been said many times before, and it will be said many times again, that witchcraft is the refuge of the oppressed, the downtrodden, and the destitute. At a time of environmental instability, social restlessness and political upheaval, I feel that the practice is still very much relevant.

What you can expect from me, should you choose to continue reading my words, is the perspective of a magical practitioner. I wear many different masks, as we all do: that of an artist, an herbalist, a socialist sympathizer, a loving partner, a friend, and several others, all of them accurate descriptions. In this space, however, due to the nature of my writing, I will assume the audacious self-proclamation of a witch.

In this guise, I am a mythical creature, and less constrained by the agreed upon establishment that dictates how we should be. My journey down this path began for me on my fourteenth birthday, perhaps unconsciously in protest to the dogmatic rigidity of the Christianity that tried raising me.

It’s what felt right to me, and I haven’t really given it up yet.

Here and there I will be exploring the ethnobotanical and folksy medicinal uses of various plants in the spheres of both Western Herbalism and different Western Occult Traditions. From time to time I will offer the overflow of my productions for sale, but these will mostly be sold as Plant Talismans to be used at one’s own risk.

I learn the more I practice, so I invite you to learn with me. 

My craft shows itself through my artwork, and it is here where I begin my branding. This is where I attempt to write with integrity
and consideration that the general populace may be watching.

I’m a shy creature, you see, and prone to be clandestine in order to avoid the evil eye. That being said, I’m also a public figure, having a loyal clientele of exceptional individuals who decide time after time to return to me, of all people, to have their hair done.

Let’s see where this goes.

I operate with my anchor in an amalgamated tradition of Western European and North American Witchcraft, yet sometimes digress off subject. I need you, however, to know that this is where my religio-magical loyalties reside.

I came from the year 1990. I grew up reading Harry Potter, watching Xena, the Warrior Princess, and studying both witchcraft and gay porn on the internet. I assume that some of today’s young witches come from similar backgrounds.

Millennials.

An alien and pretentious sounding word when I hear it used in conversation. As if I’m part of some separate race of humanoids born gullible enough to be legitimately scared that the turning of the year 2000 would literally result in planes falling from the heavens.

I have come a long way from being ten years old, and as a young adult now, in my mid-twenties, I must constantly remind myself that I’m doing alright.

I’ve been maintaining fairly well for about a year now. I’m learning to manage my finances, I have a wonderful job at a beautiful salon, and I’m learning how to love and be loved by a wonderful man who never ceases to amaze me with his gentleness, his understanding, his humor or his virility.

I’m doing alright.

Despite my Depression, I try to stay in the light as much as I can. I believe that we make the world around us by our thoughts. I believe that we have the power to shape reality to our liking. This is coming from someone who calls themselves a witch, so of course you’re going to get some airy faerie bullshit from time to time.

A dear friend once told me that, “people like us, we need the magic in our lives.” This is one of the teachings that helped ground my spirit, no longer being ashamed of seeking the magic out.

I try to stay pretty grounded wherever I can find footing.

I try not to compare myself to others, attempting to deal with what I’m dealt. This dealing with takes on two forms: attempting to understand the nature of reality without denial, as well as improving upon what’s already there. I try to be kind to others, treat people how I want to be treated; But some days, I’m awkward and introverted. This is me.  

I wanted to make sure that I thoroughly introduce myself to you before you hear anything else from me. I need you to know from what center I grow, my background, my perspective.

As a magical practitioner, I feel obliged to elucidate how that shows itself in practical reality. On one side of my nature, I have an artistic compulsion interacting with my mental illness. On the other side, I have my upkeep. The upkeep is what’s essential.

In my opinion, our demons must always be kept in check.

So, as we arrive on the subject of demons, I shall formally begin the Study.

Enter: Mandragora.  

I realize that this classic totem of the magical cabinet may seem overrated and an exhausted point of conversation, yet it’s always held fascination for me. When I began studying in my adolescence, the information available online seemed hit or miss.

As the years marched onward, however, more and more practitioners began coming forward with little snippets of how they utilized the infamous familiar, the Devil’s Root, in their own craft. This inspired me.

 With a penchant for the weird, I tried growing White Mandrakes by seed. The repeated failure to seduce the herb was taken as a sign to leave it be. I was not ready for the medicine that it offered. I saw the successful growing of the fabled mandragora as the pinnacle of my identity as a witch. Without success, I was forced to find other pinnacles, other ways to impress myself. An Ego trip at best and a dance with delusion at worst.

If the grounding point of a magical practitioner is “mine will be done”, at least in Thelemic philosophy, then I count myself accomplished. Struggling with Depression, one is always second guessing oneself, and it’s easy to overlook the fact that, “haven’t all of my spells worked?”

Am I not continuously raised out of the mire by the ambition to find a way out? I resort to a powerful magic within me when the expedited urgency to overcome obstacles becomes imminent. A thaumaturgical endeavor that rushes forth, shrouded in night. Quite the motivator.

Yet, for the first time in my life, I can say that I have pride in myself; and that self I share with you here.  

My name is Michael, and these are my Mandrakes.