Written by Ivo Dominguez Jr • Narration by James C. Welch
Chant: “Samhain’s Revels” by Ivo and from A Dream Whose Time Is Coming performed by the Assembly of the Sacred Wheel.
Pathworking:
Pour A Libation For The Dead.
Close your eyes and move inwards. Take a deep breath and become aware of any distractions from the outside world— sounds, sensations, thoughts and feelings that came with you to this moment. Gather these distractions together ••••• and bid them depart until you return from this journey. •••••
Open your eyes briefly and then close them again holding within yourself the image of where you are in the here and now. See a sparkling mist rolling, slowly filling your vision. See it grow thicker, and thicker, and thicker until you are enveloped in swirls of pearly mist, rosy mist, that glistens with sparkling motes. ••••• Although you are still, you feel motion all around you. Although you are still, you feel the fog swirling all around you.
The fog is dispersed by a cool dry breeze that sends a shiver across your skin. • You are in a well kept formal garden, perhaps you are on the grounds of a manor or a botanical garden. It is just past sunset and the sky is darkening. The summer blooms are long gone, but here and there you see some chrysanthemums, asters, and the last of the fall flowers. The trees are losing their red and golden leaves to the call of the wind. •
You look around to orient yourself and see a building with large Doric columns behind you. To your left and right you see a formal garden and statuary. • All of it is very lovely but does not call to you. • What does call your attention is a large wrought iron arch with a gate. Two old willow trees flank either side of the gate. The willows’ drooping branches sway slowly in the wind. • You start walking toward the gate and you see lights flickering in the distance. • • There are also orbs of light floating through the bushes and trees, softly brightening then dimming. •
As you reach the archway and the gate you realize just how massive they are. It seems as if it grew larger as you approached. • You step through the gate and with that step the sky grows dark. •
You are at the beginning of a vast labyrinth lit by countless candles. •• The air is filled with voices and whispers. •• You begin to walk the labyrinth, the lights twinkling at the edges of your sight. • As you walk, the path gently curves, then straightens, then curves again. •
You see motion at the edge of your sight and look up. • You see there are others walking the labyrinth as well. Some look much as you do. Others are oddly dressed. • It suddenly strikes you that some are ghosts and shades of memory. They glow. • They pass through each other. • They shift from human shape to orbs of light and back. •As you walk, the path gently curves, then straightens, then curves again. •
In the distance you see gigantic shadowy figures, taller than the trees surrounding the labyrinth. As you move deeper into the labyrinth they become visible and you can begin to discern their features. As you walk, the path gently curves, then straightens, then curves again. •
Clothed in shadows and vestments of night you see that the towering figures are various Goddesses, Gods, and Great Ones of Death and those that guide travelers in the • in-between places. •• • They are all gazing calmly at you. • You take quick glances to see which of Them have gathered this night. ••
You keep walking the path. The labyrinth’s path somehow has become wider as you walk and the distances stretch so it becomes huge. •• You smell the scents of life and death. • As you walk, the path gently curves, then straightens, then curves again. •
As you near the center you see hooded ritualists and hear their chant. •••• The path has gotten so wide that three people could walk side by side. • You can see the center of the labyrinth now. You can see the living and the dead swaying and dancing around something. •
You reach the center and see a stone garden urn overflowing with red liquid and red light. • The living are pouring libations into a garden urn from bowls and pitchers. The dead glow brighter as they come and dip their fingers into the urn. • The red light dancing in the liquid, dances in them as well. ••
One of the ritualists asks you, “Do wish to come forward to pour a libation to those on the other side?”
•• You pause and think about family, friends, and others that mean something to you that have walked on to the other side. ••
You decide that you will make an offering, and are given a bowl that feels heavy in your hands. You step up to the garden urn and pour the libation. As the liquid falls, time slows, and you see the liquid as a ribbon undulating slowly as it drops. • The ribbon of liquid expands and parts the veil between the worlds. •••
You see and hear guidance from beyond. •••••
Those that came to see you depart. •• You feel a hand upon your shoulder but no-one is there. A soft voice whispers, “Look once more, then withdraw. You may not linger here.” •
You see some spirits heading deeper into the land of death, the land of eternal Summer. •• You see others traveling to the heart of Winter, the eternal night. You see those spirits that would be born again pass through the Sun Spark gate. • And then, they pass through the Moon gate that leads to the wombs of Earth. ••
With a blink of the eye the way is closed. You see only a garden urn reflecting the Moon above. •
You turn and start walking outward and as you do the labyrinth shrinks, the path narrows, and a thick fog rolls in obscuring everything. •
All is a soft dove gray. • You feel the swirling and the turning all around you. ••
Little by little, the fog lifts and you flutter your eyes open and find yourself back in the here and now. Back in the place where we began. Back in the place you held in your memory so that you could return. •••
Take a deep breath. Move your toes and fingers. Be here and in the now. Be here and in the now. And you are here.