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Powers that Be
copyright Thorn (BMW) last update June 2002
VALUES (new Jun 2002)
WHATS IN A NAME (new Jun2002)
Apart from on the index page I tend to talk about The Powers That Be, or just the Powers, rather than listing out Gods. Goddesses, Spirits of place, Fair Folk, the Fae Ellyon. etc. Why?
Well it's a lot quicker for a start.
The Celts viewed the Otherworld as rarely more than a step away. Folktales right up to the end of 19thC tell of people following music and crossing over, of marrying water nymphs (or lake Faerie) as having happened in living memory - though usually to a friend of a friend.
We like to categorise and classify even or maybe especially the unknown; the old belief that naming something gives you power over it still exists. We're just to sophisticated to admit it. Well the Powers don't they'll slip our labels on and off as it suits them or they think it suits us.
If you meet a pigeon hitching a lift on the underground is it a 'real' pigeon, an air elemental, or one of the Gods shapeshifting. I don't know, and I'm not yet brave enough to engage it in conversation on a crowded tube to find out. Though I do wonder when some of them look at me with more wisdom than can be held in a pigeons skull.I can't know specifically whom you meet when the wind whispers, is it Math? Or a wind elemental or even a water sprite borrowing the wind's voice to call you. I know which they are when they speak to me -usually. Sometimes I'm a bit slow on the uptake but that's between me and them. - I don't want to put preconceived ideas into your head so I'm using the terms Powers that be .
Is there a contradiction here? If I can't name the Powers that you'll meet how can I be sure that they're native to the land. I just can it's a knowing thing.
How the Powers touch you is also very personal it can be a soft touch of a breeze that makes you stop and look at your surroundings and see them. It can be the gift of a smell that reminds you of childhood. It can be a wild creature that leads you into the woods.
If you meditate and learn to walk knowingly between the worlds it can be a rich an experience as the dream of Rhonabwy (one of the tales in the Mabinogion)
