Gathering and Preparations for The 13-TRIBE WEAVING

The first week in Glastonbury this year was quite difficult.
My mission seemed nigh impossible: to find the rest of the tribal representatives -only seven were confirmed!- of the twelve source races of humanity, to be woven together by piercings in the chest (one of the less important methods of Anahata chakra activation in the rite but the one which I expected to meet most resistance) in the 13th-Tribe Weaving. I was only a few moonths into my travels in a foreign country (as an Australian in the UK) and had only two weeks left for my task.

Every day I was spending many hours in overpriced email cafes sending out messages to various groups, online notice-boards and individuals attempting to find the last few cultural representatives needed for the 13th-Tribe Weaving.
As the solstice drew closer I became quite concerned that the 13th Tribe Weaving wasn't going to come together in time, although there were several people flying in within a week from far places to participate. I felt like I should have engaged more thoroughly in the process of finding the right people earlier, it was such a major and important working imminent.
However it became obvious later that the gathering could only really be done at the last minute like this, as the very first candidates I found -last year- actually pulled out due to big changes in their lives...

I began to understand why I had felt to invoke the Messenger-God Hermes in London recently -attaching small wings to my ears as I had done when first calling this deity years ago on my first fly agaric trip- for I was caught in a web of intensifying Communications needed to bring the vision of the physical 13-pointed web into Ma-nifestat-ion.
Ultimately most of the contact work had to be done in person -after all how many people would respond to emails from some weirdo wanting to pierce their chest and weave them into a geometric web with 11 other cultural representatives, without at least some idea of the magickal currents and symbols involved?
I was thankful that there were some Order of ChAOS astral in-it-I-ates and Horus-Maat Lodge members I had been corresponding with for some time who were into the idea enough to come from afar, but began to worry that they would be wasting their time and money if I couldn't find the last few initiates...
And all this while coming off a considerable recent marijuana habit, beginning the gradual process of cleansing (caffeine was next!) towards the working.

During this time I kept finding tiny spiders on myself. The first one that swung down from my head in front of my eyes was brushed away instinctively -crushed accidentally before I realised what it was. The second time -later the same day- I began the same reactive motion then realized and stopped, carefully removing it by silken strand instead. I took this as an indication of the care and delicacy that would be necessary to execute the heart-chakra weaving and its preparations.
At least one spider a day continued to alight upon my person!


I was very glad to have synchronistically met Mark and Daphne of the Planetary Art Network (PAN) in London and taken a lift up to Glastonbury with them.
Sharing the vision of the 13-star through their work with the 13-moon calendar of the Mayans, they were very encouraging and Mark introduced me to many people in the Glastonbury community -and some people further out such as Simon who ended up participating- who aided and supported the process greatly.

I kept being told by cosmic locals (and there is no shortage of them in Glastonbury town) that it would come together, somehow, if it was meant to be, and I found this alternately reassuring and frustrating according to my mood! I knew there was still a lot of practical work to be done to make it happen, but there were many wondrous synchronicities and omens along the way which gave me hope when I was beginning to wonder...

Primary amongst these was meeting David. He immediately resonated with my vision (in fact it brought tears to his eyes!) and offered his land 20 minutes or so out of town as a place for us all (when the others begin to arrive) to camp while preparing for the rite. His property is at 'Wagg' on the tip of the tail of the Dog, 13th land formation in the Glastonbury Zodiac which reflects the constellations above, and thus a very apt place for the 13th Tribe to gather...
Well he took me out there for a preview and I was blown away! What a beautiful place...



Lush gardens and fields (where we could camp) around a gorgeous round-house thatch-roofed stone temple.
When he showed me its interior I understood his resonance with our vision -it seemed almost made for this work:

The round house has as its ceiling wooden beams forming a hexagram/six-pointed star (or 'Star of David' in this case I guess!) -which is the symbol (in the Hindu system) of both the Anahata (heart) Chakra our working was focused upon (Glastonbury being the Heart Chakra of Gaia and this being the fourth in a series of rites at each, to culminate at the Global Crown Chakra in 2012), and also the primary corresponding sephiroth Tiphereth on the Hebrew Tree of Life.


There are 13 pillars forming the round framework of the temple, and each bears a small painting of one of the formations of the Glastonbury Zodiac in the Somerset landscape, inc. the 13th: -the Dog -which I now discovered used to be the Unicorn before major earthworks (to disguise it?)- the area where the temple itself is located in Wagg.
I related the (black) dog also to Hecate as a lunar congruent of Arachne, the spider-Goddess I was more familiar with as the 13th sign of the Zodiac, and to Sirius (the 'Dog Star').





The altars in the temple were resplendent with artefacts and talismans from all over the World, including a porcelain face of AkhNaten and a large white ostrich feather (symbol of our patroness Maat of ancient Egypt, though David was then unconscious of this).

There were other little synchronous details I noticed later: the calendar on the wall with various mandalas from different cultures, and the one for the current month of June (inc. our solstice working) was the Anahata Chakra mandala.


So I returned to Glastonbury town recharged and full of fresh hope, though days later with potential tribal representatives pulling out (by email) even as I found others, I began to despair.
I was doing daily yoga, breathing exercises and meditation and managed to (mostly) stay relaxed, but did start considering contingency plans if the weaving as planned didn't come together!


Ultimately I had to just go with the flow and TRUST that the rite would come together somehow if (and how) it was meant to. This was a major part of my own personal transition from the WILL of the Manipura (solar plexus) chakra to the LOVE, feeling and intuition of the Anahata (heart) chakra. Ultimately it was about balance between these energies, as I knew that I still had to project my Will somewhat to make it happen, but also trust in the flow and allow the changes as they came...
Thus I gained a new understanding of the Thelemic axiom, 'Love under Will'...

On the full moon (Friday the 13th!) just one week before the Summer Solstice, the energies began to pick up. I chilled out and played some violin at a small fireside gathering at the bottom of Glastonbury Tor.

The following evening I had promised (in emails) to be on the Tor from 6pm onwards to meet those arriving for the working and its' preparations.
In the meantime there was a week-early (nearest full moon) Druid ceremony on the Tor that afternoon, which I attended: about 200 (mostly) robed eco-priests from O.B.O.D, the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids whose abbreviated title has a strange resonance with my own initials (Ob and Od being also the primal serpents of both Jewish and Voodoo pantheons).
Just after they closed their celebratory circle I stepped in before dispersal and announced our own imminent solstice rite, inviting their attendance and if anyone was interested in further participation come and speak to me about it. Well only two did (Druids generally being into only their own tradition) but one of them -Kieron- ended up being the Celtic-Germanic tribal representative in the weaving. When a few days earlier previous candidate Puck had expressed by email that he couldn't participate after all, I was not particularly worried about that one as in terms of blood-links at least it was the easiest representative to find in Celtic lands. But it was good that we ended up with someone well versed in traditional Celtic lore and had a lot to offer towards the rite's design and execution, who also actually lived in Glastonbury.

Not many of those expected that night turned up until a few days later, but we had a first small circle on the magical Tor with a magnificent sunset as a backdrop. Starshadow -an email contact from the global Horus Maat Lodge had driven up from Milton Keynes and chanted the chakra tones with Jasmine, Natasha, Adam, and myself. He returned home to show the tones to the rest of his coven (six members) so they would all know them when returning on Solstice day to give their voices and support to the working.

This night was also my first flesh-meeting with ChAOrder astral initiate Adam Trimurti, and we resonated well in person. Funnily enough, he and Natasha -the Cutter of threads for the rite, whom I had met in a fetish club in London last year- had both flown in from Montreal Canada that day, yet didn't meet until they both arrived at Glastonbury Tor.
Listening to them chatting together in French gave me a good feeling about the multicultural threads of the weaving beginning to draw together.

A good start, but I still felt a bit aghast at how It could all coagulate in the mere week remaining...

The next day I walked into the Glastonbury town backpackers pub to use their email machine there to contact Marios (amongst others expected to arrive soon), wondering where he was. Well, he was on the backpackers email machine, emailing me!
Marios had told me earlier in Edinburgh that he felt the weaving had its own momentum, and the right people would appear. At times I wondered about this, but ultimately it did seem to be the case...


A major turning point was meeting Bayard. Of all the cultural representatives I needed to find, the one that had me most stumped was the one for the Kalahari Bushmen/ Pygmy tribes. As a separate type of people from the other African tribes (for which Nathan had suggested his friend Richard, a voodoo priest initiated in Haiti), they needed to be represented by another individual with cultural resonance (if not direct blood-links) with these specific peoples.
How on earth was I to find such a person? I had emailed several people who had been involved with various groups aiding the survival of the bushmen what with current gold-mining on their lands, to no avail, and though one person who had spent many months living with the bushmen was suggested to me by several different (and unconnected sources) it turned out she was currently in Mexico.

Then one strange day I had a sudden feeling to talk to a negro man I had seen around Glastonbury town a few times, whom I had felt a good vibe from. I approached him outside the magickal red and white sacred springs, discovering he had indeed grown up in Africa, and after a brief expression of our intent for Solstice enquired if he knew anything about the Kalahari bushmen. He shook his head but before disappointment set in I said with little expectation, 'What about the Pygmies?' 'Yes!' he said, 'My tribe lives next to their tribe. We speak each other's languages, know each other's cultures very well...'

On my further excited explanation of our ritual, he agreed to participate with an 'Okay, why not?' and said he could come out to the first real gathering that night at David's 13-pillared temple and gardens.
He had been hanging out with Baba, a dreadlocked traveller from Kathmandu who had agreed to represent the Siberian/Mongolian peoples in the weaving (Baba however did not turn up that night and remained evasive to the last...)

Meeting Bayard was one in a rapid-fire sequence of Magickal synchronicities that day. Another was meeting an American astral initiate of the Order of ChAOS who had been hoping to attend the weaving as she would be in Europe (Belgium) for an operation as part of her (formerly his) ongoing gender transition. However doctors had told her that this would not be possible as they needed to keep close tabs on her for a few days after the operation which was just before Solstice.
So instead she unexpectedly came to Glastonbury before the Solstice, just for a day, and we didn't have time to arrange any contact point.
We met by 'chance' just as she was leaving to catch her bus back out of town! Not only that, but -funny considering my own trip with hermaphroditism also- we met on the road between the two holy wells of Glastonbury, the female (iron-rich) red waters and the male (zinc-rich) white waters. She did not know of these so I told her as she was about to rush off to catch her bus, and she drank from and washed her face in each, then hurried off towards her operation! �


The first gathering at David's was wonderful. His partner Susan cooked a delicious meal for everyone then we gathered around the bonfire, those who did not already know each other beginning to get to. There was a good feeling that we had all come together from afar to do this special thing together. We had a short but powerful initial chakra tone chanting session in the Roundhouse. Bayard had to go to London next day but promised to return for the Solstice rite.

The next four days were mostly blissful, though challenging at times. Each morning we would all do yoga together, each sharing our favourite exercises and asanas (from Hindu, Tibetan, Egyptian and personal sources and systems) with the group and stretching and bending in new ways and directions. Various mantras were also shared.

Evenings were long chanting and meditation sessions (breaking the tones colours and other qualities down into individual chakra work then rebuilding the octave/spectrum) in the intensifying atmosphere of the candle-lit roundhouse. The energy and the affinity between us grew progressively. We went progressively from eating fruit and nuts to just fruit juices and water then back to nuts and grains. Of course this and all the sitting still stuff brought up various aches and pains and problems for people, but in the sharing and open environment we had co-created all flowed out and on quite smoothly...

That seven of us formed the foundations of the rite is significant in that seven and thirteen are the sacred or mystic numbers of the Mayans, the Jews and I think several other ancient cultures, and have a strange interconnected resonance with each other. There was a simple clay sculpture in the roundhouse of seven people around in a circle arm in arm.

More joined us for the last few days, and the energy stepped up yet another level. It was coming together, the absence of several of the tribal representatives still was mostly ignored as generally the work seemed to be flowing onwards�


Towards the end of our stay at David's, Kieron and Adam were initiated (veiled back-to-back) into the Horus-Maat Lodge by Evan (from Australia) Marios (from Scotland) and I.
I was amazed by the spiritual, magickal and religious as well as cultural and sub-cultural diversity of the people who were assembling: we had everything from post-Chaos-Magic Mayan daykeepers to Thelemic Maatians, Luciferian Witches, Voudou priests to mystic Christians! And we were all co-habitating and co-operating with respect and peace. True Unity in Diversity, of beliefs and traditions as well as races and colours...


A few days away from the distractions of town and I began to feel very high from the fasting, daily yoga, chanting and breathing exercises, and the general feeling of sharing, truth and trust.

Our representative of the Mayan, Incan and other southern/central-American peoples �Simon, who lives half his time in Mexico- turned up with an interesting story: only hours after I had rang him (on Mark's recommendation) about the Weaving he had found a huge snake (much bigger than he'd ever known to exist in his semi-suburban area) trapped in a net in a neighbour's garden. He had extracted the man-length venomous serpent and carried it (very carefully with hand clasped behind jaw) back out to the forest. The 'Serpent-Handler' constellation lies opposite that of Arachne in the heavens, and is considered by Astronomers to be the 13th sign of the zodiac, while James Vogh and apparently also more ancient Astrologers had the spider as theirs.

The snake was certainly a potent symbol for the energies we were dealing with, both on an individual level as we began to stir our kundalini serpents with voice vibration and visualisation, and also the serpent/dragon energies of the Earth, the Gaian Kundalini we are resonating with in these global chakra workings. These two layers of serpent fire were also the current concern of the Crystal Court of the Mayan calendar Kin group who met up with us on our second-last night at David's sanctuary. They had no venue that moon (they meet every thirteen days), so because of the resonance of their own work with ours, the circles were overlapped, with us all chanting the chakra tones together after some general discussion of synchronicities, personal sharing and presentation of ritual intent. A few misunderstandings arose, one Kin person in particular unsure of our methods and/or motives and challenging aspects of our proposals.
This was ultimately effective in getting any doubts out for contemplation and consolidating our purpose, will and love.
After the Kin group left (most expressing their support and appreciation -several ended up participating in the solstice rite as elemental-sacrament bearers) we continued our work for a while, beginning to nut out a basic framework for the overall ritual by collating and arranging the ideas and possibilities that had come up so far from our workshops and discussions.
As those who were too tired to maintain focus drifted off one by one, there ended up being just four of us left by the dwindling fire, still discussing the opening circle-casting. Once we realized this -that there were four of us discussing the four directions and elements, as perceived by the four basic human types of red, white, yellow and black (before each sub-divided into three to form the twelve tribes) -the basic shamanic colours of most primitive cultures- the pattern clarified:

We decided to cast each direction from four different cultural viewpoints, after creating an initial four-path Crossroads vev� (a term from the Voudoo traditions for a magical symbol on the ground). The other three still up were aptly red, white and black representatives respectively, and we realized there was as yet no yellow -the three Asian representatives- consolidated (though the elusive Baba still assured his participation when briefly seen in town).

It then occurred to me that there was a general lack of Asian culture and magic in our work and space so far. Even the altars in the roundhouse contained no real oriental artefacts or talismans, though most other cultures were represented. We had done no Asian mantras, rites, dances, postures or prayers... While this was of course partly because we as yet had no Asian (inc. Chinese, South-East Asian and Japanese, Siberian and Mongolian) representatives attendant, it worked both ways and that if perhaps we did some Asian ritual the right people would appear...

So after the four quarters opening map was established and its self-designated priests and callers retired, I crept into the office to crawl the wwweb in the dawn hours, searching for information to increase my scant knowledge of Asian cultures and magic.

I was mostly looking for an Asian quarter-casting, but in the search came up with several sites concerning Kwan Yin. She being an appropriate Asian (Chinese and Tibetan Buddhist, and also with a Japanese equivalent Kwannon) deity to invoke for Heart Chakra work -as a Goddess of Mercy, Healing and Compassion, I entered one of her wwweb portals. The first site I opened began with, 'Quan Yin's 2nd(?) Birthday -19th June' and I realised with awe that this day had begun that very morning as I looked at the site...

So I finally went to catch a few hours' sleep, knowing that the growing group's morning activity would include a bit of an improvisational Asian rite and birthday party for Quan Yin.

The Puja to Her I had extracted from the wwweb was a water-blessing, appropriate as our rite on aeonic cusp concerned Aquarius, the Water-Bearer (as glyphed in its 'double current' symbol). The solstice ritual would be upon the Tor, which is the spiral throat of the Aquarian Phoenix shape in the Somerset landscape (below its corresponding constellation above).

Evan put a photo of a Quan Yin statuette (funnily enough next to my hermaphroditic spider-doll made by Innana) in the centre of the circle next to the special curvaceous golden glass water vessel Sunbird had given me for the rite, Natasha contributed a Chinese fan, and we chanted, 'Na Mo Quan Yin Boddhissatva' as each in turn bowed to Her.
Then, primarily because it was really the only Chinese we knew -as a result of the SilkMilk Magizain magickal launch on Chinese new year- be began chanting the Chinese words for happiness, while drinking the blessed water, which I realised later was an apt mantra for a (happy) birthday celebration!



After the short morning puja to Quan Yin a few of us went on various missions into Glastonbury town. I went to connect with a few people and hopefully bump into some kind of Chinese mage or sage! I tried the Chinese herbalist, who although western seemed a possibility with his cultural resonance and oriental acupunture practises! But he was too busy to even hear my proposal.
I began to feel very depressed, having slept little that morning and on a low ebb in the purgative process of the fasting. It seemed like the working could not possibly come together with several representatives still missing only a few days before the solstice.

I knew it was getting desperate when the others went into a Chinese restaurant to see if they could find any Asian representatives there. It was not just any Asian we needed, but someone who could relate to both the intent and methods of the work and was into ritual or spirituality. I stayed in the car, feeling very down; sure enough they returned saying the staff there just wanted to take their orders, and added (they were still fasting too) that the food smelt really good!

We began to drive out of town -my impossible mission apparently aborted- when as we passed two people hitching on the side of the road (in the opposite direction), I suddenly felt a very strong and pretty inexplicable urge to communicate with them. I asked Kieron to stop the car, got out and walked back, began to tell the thin bald bearded man on the corner �Andy- about our ritual. I got a really good feeling from him, a calmness and centred-ness. He was very interested in the ritual, and revealed he had indeed spent most of a year in Japan recently and resonated with their culture. Halfway through the conversation -which was already being interrupted by the other hitchhiker (who in typical cosmic Glastonbury style was telling me what alien race I was from because I had snakeskin tights on, and that because my jumper was red I was into blood sacrifice)- they got a lift, so I quickly wrote down the phone no. of where Andy was hoping to get to that night for further discussion later.

I got back into the car feeling a bit lighter. When I rang Andy later that night he confirmed my intuitions in that although he had not practiced ritual magick as such he was a very experienced meditator, having done several Vipassana courses, etc., and would therefore have the necessary focus to be involved, in addition to the gentle enthusiasm and understanding he had already demonstrated. So in such work it seems very valid to trust crazy hunches; Intuition seems an attribute of the general emotional open-ness of an activated heart chakra...

The other Asian representative that miraculously manifested that same (birth)day was Louie, Mark's returned housemate who was also a meditator, having set upon this path in Tibet. He joined our chanting circle that night, and enjoyed it but expressed anxiety that his severe back problems may make participation difficult, although he hoped to transcend that. The idea of him being in pain and needing to step out or sit down when we were all interwoven certainly gave me reservations also, despite the encroaching desperation of the situation.
When he rang next morning to cancel I was simultaneously disappointed and relieved. Simon and Jasmine went round to his house later that day to give him an extended (massage and Reiki) healing, which all seemed part of the Anahata journey also.




We had all gone into town together this last day before the Solstice. Half-way in we stopped -two carloads full- at the ancient Yew Tree next to the old church at Compton Dundon. I climbed up then down inside this amazing gnarled hollow tree (estimated to be about 1700 years old!) and chanted through its various orifices and openings while the others joined me while encircling it. Oddly the earth below me felt and sounded hollow underfoot, resounding to my stamping feet like a big bass drum.
In Celtic and Norse traditions the Yew is the gateway to the Underworld, personally validated by how spaced out I felt after even this brief visit. I found out weeks later that there is a grove nearby -on the edge of the woods considered to be the ajna (third eye) chakra of a giant face of Akhnaton in the landscape- there was a circle of the thirteen different trees of the Druidic lunar zodiac our final weaving would be representing (amongst its other layers of multi-cultural symbology) -a shame we had not been aware of this at the time to visit but at least we resonated nearby. This whole area -inc. the ancient Yew- is part of the Gemini land formation in the Glastonbury Zodiac -most apt to our work in that the Aeonic Double Current of the Sacred Twins Horus and Maat was eminent to our purpose. I acknowledged them with mudra and mantra before we left the area.

Imagios of the Horus-Maat Lodge was picked up in Glastonbury town, having just flown in from The Czech Republic for the ritual. I had only discovered his local presence the night before due to yet another synchronicity, this one involving the very number of synchronicity itself. Usually I delete the contents of my bulk-mail folder without looking at them, as it's where my email account automatically puts advertising (sometimes for both breast and penis enlargements in the same day) and other junk, but this day I checked it just because there were 23 messages. Sure enough, Imagios' message of arrival -wondering how to contact and meet up with us- was for some reason in that folder.

Imagios had come to Glastonbury to be a part of the rite but didn't expect to be a cultural representative, however thankfully he agreed to be a reserve, taking the missing part if Simon's half-Chinese friend Ben (a DJ from London) failed to turn up on the Solstice day itself! Although Imagios had no real resonance with Asian or South-East Asian cultures, he did have an appreciation of the intent of the work and an understanding of the magickal currents involved, and we figured that at this stage (although a bit sad) having one 'token' cultural representative would be better than the whole thing not happening due to one absent representative. My friend Zya from Australia -whose words had helped inspire the vision of the global chakra workings- had hoped to participate but could not get to Europe in time. She being half-Malaysian, the South-East Asian representative being the only missing party kept suggesting to me that she was meant to be there, but I had to usher out this recurring thought pattern to allow psychic space for someone else to turn up for the part....

He did �half-Chinese London DJ Ben- but only on the Solstice day itself, much to our relief in the completion of the preparation of the work. Such a quickening!
Even on this final morning, there was much last-minute shuffling around, but somehow all the pieces fell into their right places in the End and it came together into full glorious Ma-nifestat-ion!:

These final adjustments were made after a wonderful raw food feast we broke our fast with the night before -figuring that we needed to maintain the health gained from our fasting but needed a burst of nutrition-fueled energy to give us the strength needed for the solstice rite itself. It felt really good to all gather together -the most of us assembled so far- for this informal celebration on the eve of our Great Work. We were camped this final night in a field halfway between the Tor and Gog and Magog, the ancient Oaks of Avalon and guardians of the Gates to Faery.


Unfortunately most of us did not really get a long sleep on this final night, as by the time we had run through the ritual format again around the fire, there were only seven hours or so before our early rise to perform the slow Labyrinth-walk spiral up onto (/into!) the Tor next morning.
Personally I only got about two hours sleep, as I sat up for several after everyone else had retired, trying to work out how the hell I was going to weave a twelve-pointed star between everyone that could then be transformed at dusk into a thirteen-pointed star without unweaving and reweaving the whole thing. This had come up (fortunately!) in the discussion, an enquiry as to how exactly I was going to do this, to which I suddenly and rather drastically realised, 'I don't know yet!'
With everything else I had been co-ordinating, I had given little attention to such a practical consideration as to how the physical web itself was to be woven!
Miraculously, I worked out how to do it in an hour or so, and relievedly went to sleep for a short while...

After our early rise, Schwing who had offered to guide us through the Tor Labyrinth walk (half of the paths being obscured over time) didn't turn up anyway (I later found out he had a fever that day).
It was probably better for us this way as we were actually able to just chill out for several hours instead, preparing the finishing touches to costumes etc. in a more relaxed manner than expected.

It was very hot. The sun was beating down and we assembled in the shade at the base of one side of the Tor for a while, consolidating aspects of the rite.

I climbed back up to the top at about 1pm to see if anyone else had turned up. To my relief both Baba and Bayard (who had only just driven back up from London that morning, having retrieved from there a beautiful bark-woven patterned loincloth amongst other Pygmy artefacts) -the final representatives- were there, and we joined them, preparing the space in a crater-like dip in the grass near the medieval tower (which was unfortunately covered with scaffolding for repairs) at the Tor's summit.

Then Ben turned up too and the weaving seemed able to happen in full splendor after all, with genuine cultural representatives of all twelve tribes or source-races of humanity assembled.
While others also turned up to assist us -the four elemental sacrament-bearers and Venom the spinner/piercer of Fates three- there were last minute problems with some of the cultural representatives:

Baba revealed that he was not into being pierced and woven in, denying that he had known this was what was entailed although I had gone through it all with him several times over the last week when managing to locate him on town visits. He had seemed half-hearted (!) about it all along, so I wasn't surprised but obviously concerned by his withdrawal and at a loss as to what to do. Then as about to break down I suddenly realized that with Ben now present, Imagios could take Baba's place as Siberian-Mongolian representative. He agreed and confirmed that unlike the other Asian parts he was previously reserved for this WAS a culture he had some affinity with. Of course! �Czech is just on the edge of this region and has a similarly Slavic language- the last piece in an intricate puzzle fell into place!

My relief was however followed abruptly by another problem: Bayard also objected to the piercing aspect -not in his case from lack of commitment to our rite or its intent but simply because as a spiritual practice he never marked his body.
However my anguish was allayed by his suggestion that the thread could be attached to the talismanic panther fang which hung from a necklace over his heart. I agreed, and felt a surge of utmost relief and joy that everything could -and I was now finally sure would- go ahead as planned. With so many difficulties miraculously overcome already, amidst a flow of synchronicity and intuition which even upon my own exceptionally Wyrd Way was unprecedented, victory must surely be ours.