The Moons Blood

A river of Red flows
Between my thighs

Two tall trees
Taste the trickle of
Thick,
Iron Rich Wine
That oozes abundantly
Toward the damp,
Fertile earth.

None may enter here
Today
Nor taste the sweet darkness of
This moist and sacred
Space
That pulls me to
The Ground…
To Ground

And, in time,
If they dare and are willing,
Only the initiated
May make their journey
Into this darkness
That can either consume or

Ignite the wildest passion,
The most intimate sense
Of purpose,
Of presence
In those who understand.

But not today.

Today is an initiation
Of another kind.

In the soft and dripping
Walls of my temple,
I curl up like a
Cat
Resting in a Slumber
Of immovable ecstasy.

I purr wildly.
I groan and moan from
That primal place
Deep within my belly
Of bellies

As my body Surrenders to
The blissful ache
Of another moon gone by.

I wrote this poem yesterday, on the first day of my blood, the super moon in Pisces shining down from the night sky, piercing into my body and cleansing the emotional realms of my being through my blood.

I wasn’t sure whether to post this or not. There is something very raw about it and I feel somewhat exposed in sharing it. I decided to share because I yearn for this kind of thing to be born out of the shadows and integrated into life in loving embrace of all that we are, not just the parts we want others to see.

So, here I am. Bleeding. Loving bleeding. Celebrating bleeding. Feeling the ache. Embodying the different archetypes that flow through me as I bleed. Honouring the sacred cycle that affects me and all the other women who attend to their womb space.

Growing up in a fast paced society  that is geared towards linear achievement and carries undertones of inconvenience towards the cycles of nature, there is part of me that has resisted my own inner nature that fluctuates as the moon waxes and wanes. I recognise this resistance in other women as well as men in their attitude towards women. I feel it is the result of a lack of education, a misinterpretation, perhaps, of the importance of honouring what is natural and wild within us. While the outlook towards menstruation is shifting, I feel, there still needs to be a shift of perspective that uproots the patriarchal attitudes towards women and the power of our blood.

There are so many subtle ways in which the lack of acceptance of the fluctuation of the feminine nature infiltrates into society. I think that there is still so much learning and unlearning to be done before a healthy relationship between the mature masculine and the mature feminine, the inner masculine and the inner feminine can be truly embodied and lived. My commitment is to do that inner work and allow it to be reflected in my relationship with others and the world.

There are many ancient texts, statues and images that depict the worship of the sacred feminine nature that exists within us all, women and men alike.  While I may be greatly inspired by books, images and wisdom teachings and teachers, at the end of the day, unless my relationship with myself, others, the environment and Spirit is a healthy one, I will be ever looking outside of myself for ‘the answers’. So I turn my attention toward my own embodied experience and to trusting the innate wisdom that abides within me, within all of us. ‘The answers,’ including the questions, are all here. They are never not here.

Allowing myself to flow with the cycle of my being, I can greater appreciate the different archetypes that live their way through me. At different times of the month I embody different aspects of myself. These can vary from a Lover, a Nurturer, a Shamana, a Queen, a Divine Slut, and even to a Hag / Witch. When I can accept the ever fluctuating nature of life, I can live with greater ease in beholding the many faces of myself. When I identify myself with any one of these archetypal examples, the running waters of life stagnate within me. I experience pain, confusion and separation. For I am none of these archetypes just as much as I am all of them. I learn to allow them to flow through me and, like my blood, I give them back to the earth when they have served their course.

The lover is an angel of devotion. Her heart is as big as the world and she sings melodiously, attracting bees to her nectar and the potential of new life to be born within her belly. She is easy to identify with because she embodies a concept of beauty that is easy to accept. She is ultra feminine. She can give and receive love in equal measure and make all those around her feel embraced by her loving attention and presence. She is an easy one to stagnate within because she adheres to so much of what popular media can portray as beautiful and good. However, if we cling to her too tightly then we will find it harder and harder to embrace the parts of ourselves that contradict her beauty; the days when we wake up and feel like crap, the times we need to set clear boundaries and say a firm no.

The nurturer is more like a mothering energy. She has the energy to embrace and behold in a non sexual way all that comes before her. She see’s the inner child in others and it appeals to her nature that wants to give, to feed and to keep safe and warm. She is useful on many occasions when this energy is needed and can also be a hinderance when the space is needed to allow someone to grow into their power by truly embracing the challenges that lie before them. In those times, they do not need a mother, they need their own inner strength.

The Shamana is a powerful medicine woman. She is somewhat unconcerned with the outer world as she tends to the unseen. She is magical and mysterious. She senses energy and can read thought and feeling. Used wisely, this energy can serve the times that we need to spend alone, to go inward and seek the council of the unseen and whatever that means to us personally. When we over identify with this archetype, we can become detached and cut off from others, and even see them as a threat to our sanctity, which will not serve us in our times of need.

The queen is also a powerful and directive archetype. She embodies nobility, integrity and inner strength. She is a natural leader, teacher and space holder. She cares deeply for those around her and acts in their service, often sacrificing her own needs for those she serves. Again, this can become an isolating archetype if given too much importance.

The divine slut is like part of ourselves who is fully embracing and comfortable in her own shadow. She can be seen as a negative force to those who do not understand the essence of her power. She allows us to see parts of ourselves that are less socially acceptable. In her immature form she represents the unhealthy abuse of power through manipulation, addiction and obsession with darkness. In her maturity she has the ability root herself into the darkness and feed on its pure energy, allowing alchemy to occur within her and the darkness to be born into wisdom. She can make ritual out of the parts of ourselves that we fear and keep hidden and, thus, birth them into the light.

This quote speaks to me of this archetype and others like her:

‘The wrathful dakini’s laugh and dance as they feast on the raw negativity that the unenlightened take to be demons.’ Miranda Shaw

The divine hag is the crone. She is the decrepit, hunched over, ageing mother of death who can be somewhat harder to embody if there is over identification with the lover or the mother or the typically more ‘status quo’ feminine archetypes we have been conditioned to accept. She is the turning over from one cycle to the next and I feel her very powerfully, usually on my first day of bleeding. She has the power to take anything that is no longer serving us and release it into the arms of death, which is really the only way that a new cycle can begin. When we give ourselves away to the earth, to life, when we surrender fully, then and only then can life flow through us and we can be rejuvenated with fresh energy and the cycle can appear to begin again. I embrace the hag in me and all she brings forth, the wisdom within her piercing exterior.

 

These are just a few of the archetypes that I notice play their way through me. My ability to ‘play’ back with them as they dance their dance through my being determines the quality of my relationship with life.

When we resist the different forms energy can embody, we create separation between who we are in that moment and who we think we should be. When we identify with them, we stagnate and the energy can not flow through us. When we embody them in their immature form, the pure essence of their energy becomes diluted with our judgements, beliefs, shame, blame, addiction and craving and we can enact them in unhealthy and, perhaps harmful, ways.

And when we embody them in their maturity the pure essence of potent energy that they behold can live through us. We can speak our truth, honour our needs and take full responsibility for all that we are. We can stand in our power, that is not a manipulative kind of power but a power that is attentive to and perceptive of the reality of the moment and can respond with grace, compassion and unabashed authenticity.

This, I feel, is the potential power of connecting deeply with our cycles, of showing up authentically through all the many masks we can consciously fashion. They are just masks after all. And, imagine, if we could be truly embody the wild array of life’s energetic forms in their mature expression, how integrated we can be! There lies the potential to feel the divine within everything, above and below, within as out with, in lightness and the depths of darkness.

May it be SO.