The Staff of Spring By Circle Cithaeron The Staff of Spring, made from a fallen tree limb, is the focus of this Circle. Coveners should bring vines, flowers, ribbons and other symbols of Spring to twine around the branch. The Staff may be topped with a pinecone, if desired. Ground and center according to personal practice. Spend a little more time than usual feeling your deep connections to the Earth and the pulsing rhythm of the new life emerging with the Spring. The Elements may then be consecrated, followed by the consecration and cutting of the Circle. The Quarters are invoked and the work of the Circle may begin. A covener takes the unadorned tree limb to the center of the Circle and holds it high overhead. This covener then proclaims: Elders of the ancient wood,
Sylvan spirits all,
Tonight we bring
the song of Spring,
Hearken to its call! Coveners then pass the branch around the Circle and tie on the vines, ribbons, and other symbols of Spring and rebirth that they have brought with them. As the Staff of Spring is being created, the Circle may chant a rune such as the following while concentrating on investing the Staff with the Spring's power of rebirth: Seed and grain, seed and grain,
All that fall shall rise again.
Hoof and horn, hoof and horn,
All who die shall be reborn. Once the construction of the Staff is complete, it is taken to the center. Then power is raised and focused into the Staff. Once the Staff has is charged it is passed hand to hand around the Circle again. As each covener takes the Staff they draw on its power, to shout out, calling back from the dark of Winter those aspects of the Ancient Forests they wish to see return. These may be names of wild places that are threatened, or endangered plants or animals of the deep woods, or whatever the covener feels may benefit from the call. The chant may be continued during this time, if desired. Once all have finished, the staff is returned to the center and the coven may enjoy Cakes and Wine. At the close of the Circle, the forces that have been reawakened should be thanked and dismissed so that they may return to their realms. The following rune may be used: Elders of the ancient wood,
Forest, grove and glen,
Return you now from whence you came,
Return to live again! The quarters may then be dismissed and the Circle taken down. The Staff of spring should be buried in the woods in a secret spot so that its energies may continue to bring new life to the natural surroundings. Guided Visualization This meditation should be done while laying prone on the floor or earth. Breathe deeply and relax thoroughly. Once prepared, you may proceed with trance induction methods familiar to you. Once in trance, the pathwork may begin. The Grandfather Tree Feel the contact zone between yourself and the earth; feel the earth pressing against you all along your body's length and wherever you touch Her. All along these points of contact, a tingling begins and grows. Wherever your skin touches the earth, your skin begins to sprout tiny, hair-like roots. The tingling increases; the roots grow thick, strong, ropey and begin to delve deeply into the soil below you. Deeper and deeper the roots probe, into the recesses of the earth, past vast caverns, through underground lakes and rivers that have never seen the sun, past the roots of mountains long since worn to sand and the crust of mountains yet unborn. They pass the deep, dark fastness of the earth to the pulsing, beating heart of fire at the earth's core; living, breathing fire; the molten lava that is the blood of the earth. Feel this living fire well upward in you, filling you with warmth and light and vitality. Now feel the boundary between yourself and the air around you. Savor the boundary wherever air touches your body. Just as before, a tingling grows at the point of contact between yourself and the air. Tiny buds form wherever your skin is caressed by the air—fleshy buds that burst into leaves and branches swollen with your blood and the blood of the earth, branches and leaves that thrust upward into the sky, stretching toward sunlight and fresh air. Breezes tickle the leaves and branches that you have become. You are an ancient oak in a vast forest; you have seen the great herds of animals that moved across the plains, you have seen the peoples come and go across the land bridge to Siberia, you have felt the wind blowing chill across the glaciers of the last ice age and sweltered by an inland sea when the polar icecaps melted. Your roots reach to the fire below you in the earth and your branches to the fire above you in the sun. Experience the seasons as this great oak. Winter: cold, bitter winds rattle along your limbs, sap stored sleepily beneath the frozen snow. Spring: bright new leaves and showers of pollen, golden on the rain-soft air. Summer: birds living in your branches, violent thunder, lightning among your topmost branches arcing to the ground. Autumn: scars forming beneath each leaf, which dies in a blaze of color but clings stubbornly to the branch; the dry leaves shelter flocks of migrating birds as they have for millennia. Change that once came slowly now races through the forest. From your great height you look across the forest, and see patches where roads cut a jagged scar through the trees, leading from clear-cut to clear-cut where all the trees have been harvested. Rain washes the bare soil into creeks that run sluggishly with mud. The rumble of mechanical equipment and the whine of chain saws throb in the air. Winter again, and this year the snow lays heavily on your branches. The weight of the snow, and of the years, is too heavy; a late winter storm settles ice on your branches. A sudden shifting of the wind, a pulling on the deep roots that once anchored you, a brief blur of bark falling and wind rushing, and your great bulk crashes to the forest floor hundreds of feet below. Spring comes, the snow melts, the forest that once fed you now eats you, bit by bit, sap and bark and heartwood. Years pass; the buzz of saws and earthmovers halts abruptly. Another warm spring, and sunlight falls on the glade where your passing has cleared the way for new growth. A Bluejay drops an acorn on the molding remains of your once mighty trunk. It sprouts; tentative new roots absorb the nutrients that your roots wrested from beneath the earth hundreds of years ago. The roots thrive in your rotting wood, suckling on your decomposed flesh as piglets seek the teats of a sow. All along your trunk other acorns are sprouting and beech and pine, showy orchids and ladyslippers, lilies and wintergreen. Your wood is broken down and shared as a feast, carried aloft in new oaks and beeches and pines, themselves delving deep into the earth and thrusting into the sky. You are part of each, and of all; you are the new seeds blown into the sky, to the far mountains, to the rivers; to the bare soil where only stumps and brush piles remain. And the nourishment that you provide gives new life to these barren wastes, and a new forest springs forth with the new spring. This ritual is from MoonWeb, a periodic mailing of rituals and pathworkings designed to be worked simultaneously by Pagan solitaries and groups across the U.S. and Canada. MoonWeb is not copyrighted, and they encourage sharing this ritual. You can subscribe to MoonWeb for the cost of postage only, at the rate of two U.S. first-class stamps per issue (or check equivalent, payable to MoonWeb). For subscription inquiries, please send a self-addressed envelope with two stamps to: MoonWeb, Circle Cithaeron, PO Box 15461, Washington, DC 20003. | 
