Litha

Welcome to the Litha Tarot Blog Hop, whether you’ve hopped from Kerry Ardilla’s blog or Chloe’s Celtic Lenormand Oracle.

Happy summer solstice! Being the big cosmology fan that I am, I borrowed a space illustration of how the Earth’s seasons work. That one on the far left is the summer solstice in the northern hemisphere. All that we are, and all that we live, is reflected again in the largeness of the universe.

Or this is Litha, as I am informed by our intrepid blog hop wrangler, Sharon Cumming. A very long-time celebration of warm weather, earliest harvests of summer foods (we have tomatoes already here in the subtropics of southeast Texas) and the burning of bonfires to reflect the heat of the sun in its longest sojourn of the year. I remember when I lived in England how much longer the days were at this time, with sunsets at 10 pm or later. Here in Texas, the difference is not so great between summer and winter, but 8:30 pm for sunset will do!

Sharon has challenged us to shine like the sun and show off our own personal creative impulses today (anything from recipes and knitting to writing and music and visual art).  Today is the longest session of daylight for the year, and it’s a good time to expand our own creative lights.

I’m not much in the way of a visual artist or craftwoman. My cooking skills are quite good, but I like to follow other people’s instructions. My husband is in charge of kitchen experimentation. 😉

I do indulge in a bit of verse-making, though, so I’ll share with you the Tarot card (from the effervescent Ciro Marchetti) that came to me as symbolic of the thinning of the veil between the worlds of the physical and the spiritual at these times of marking and celebration, when the faery folk dance and become more visible, and we find it easier to hear our own muses speak. And although the High Priestess is associated with the Moon and not the Sun, the Moon reflects the Sun’s light to pull back the veil and reveal the mysterious journey to the soul. Sit for a moment, eyes closed, breathing deeply, chest to belly, in and out. See her sitting, flying, or standing softly in the distance; hear her calling to your soul to go deeper to find your own light to lift and guide you to the peace on the other side.

As part of the design of my Cosmic Whispers deck, based on some pretty cool pics of the larger universe beyond the Earth, I wrote a little poem about the High Priestess, which I share here along with my image choice from the veiled moon Enceladus at Saturn as my gift to the solstice and the blog hop:

Incense and smoke wind
through a torchlit labyrinth.

She strokes the shadows,
traces marble cracks

where darkness oozes
black onto her icy feet.

The other side of visions;
the other side of stars

she bows low before it,
a bright white veil waving.

Behind it, an altar looms
but no blood nourishes

these gods, only a great book.
Bound she is to its secrets,

alone she stretches hands,
raises dark gray eyes.

She murmurs sybillas
through scarlet lips.

Her curved skin shivers
along its length, shifting.

Behind the veil,
beyond the stars,

She flies into darkness
to bear a message back.

Look upon her pale form,
gaze into those smoky eyes,

and fall yourself into the deep.
Time for consciousness to sleep.

And spirit to awake.

Thanks for joining me for this Sun and Moon celebration of all the worlds.