Eclipsed
Lunar Eclipse and Blood Moon 27 July 2018
My dear friend Susan Rossi who is a gifted astrologer (https://openchannelastrology.com/) has taught me to pay close attention to eclipses and the, so called, annual Eclipse Season. She tells me that eclipses act as gates or portals for human consciousness we can pass through. If we handle the challenges right we can even unhook from “karmic theatre” – meaning that we can put long-standing dysfunctional dynamics between us and others to rest. Easier said than done, but when we achieve it there is instant relief and head space.
In November last year I discovered some cysts in my breast which opened a period of medical investigations married to deep inner work on Mother Issues:
- Myself as both mother and “shadow mother” of three teenage sons, parenting with great delight all my personal imperfections
- My real life Mother and my Inner Mother (the magical place within where I can mother myself because I am a grown-up now!)
- My Mother-In-Law and life-giver of my husband
- People who have reached out to me in maternal ways during my lifetime. (Women who have nourished my soul and afforded me shelter under their wing when I needed it – I am eternally grateful to them all!)
As a family we plan our summer around our children’s school holiday. We did not consult an astrologer but nevertheless we were at my mother’s house in the Netherlands the day the July 12th eclipse occurred and my mother-in-law was here with us in Sweden for last night ‘s lunar eclipse and Blood Moon.
You cannot make that up!!
Anyway, I decided to walk through these Eclipse Gates intuitively. It is tempting to read other people’s interpretations and astrological interpretations as there is a myriad of on-line articles just one click of the mouse away.
Here in Sweden forest fires rage and everyone is praying for rain. Last night’s eclipse brought that rain!! Actually it started raining the exact moment I started writing this article! I performed an informal rain dance, naked in the forest, at 4 a.m. this morning and a passing wild boar family grunted at me. One bat nearly landed on my head. – I must have done something right…
We took my mother-in-law for an outing on the lake in the early evening (this involved requesting permission from the local castle and land owner to use their jetty – and permission was granted!)
The first sign of the eclipse was a most peculiar cloud appearing over the lake. Our whole family collectively shifted into an altered state of consciousness.
This was followed by some sightings of a beaver swimming alongside our boat.
A few hours later the Blood Moon rose: hard to spot, the palest orange outline against a metal blue Scandinavian sky. All photographs of it failed. They just show darkness – as (I guess) the Moon wants them too. (I do not want to be photographed either when I disrobe and step away from prying eyes).
The next stage of the eclipse process looked like a red horse shoe birthing a new galaxy – or possibly an embryo gestating in deep sacred darkness:
This article will now continue in the form of photographs and poems as I do not yet have access to mainstream linear words for the Lunar Eclipse that occurred within me.
The Queen of Blood
In one eclipse vision
I meet
The Queen of Blood and Lineage
Seated on her throne
Within me
She hands me her star-spangled cape
Says
Time to stop wearing
The Midnight Sun!
Stir the cauldron
That is the eclipsed Moon
Make the Night Sky your altar cloth
The Big Dipper your ladle
Remember the woman in the supermarket
Who had
The Milky Way
The Winter Street
Tattooed on her back?
You are She!!
You are the mother bear
Whose spine is the Milky Way
As she walks The Winter Street
And leads the way through Darknesses
So it is safe
For the Moon to return
Another day
When I die
Wrap me in tonight’s sky
Let the Morning Sun
Burn me in a watery blaze
The Eclipsed Moon
Is my Home
I am
And I am not
Simultaneously
Eternally
This phase was followed by the tiniest crescent of reflected sunlight returning.
As this crescent expanded and we saw all phases of the Moon in one evening: a true once-a-century spectacle!
Next planet Mars, at his closest point to Earth and fiery red, rose over the tree tops (I was observing all this from a forest by the Baltic Sea).
I meditated on all the occasions when I had felt eclipsed –
and/or played my part eclipsing others:
Eclipsed
During this
Total lunar eclipse
I no longer feel eclipsed
by people
I gave too much power
They stood with me
As a male wolf-serpent ate the Moon
And a female serpent-wolf called Blame
Unwound from my heart
She joined the Great Wolf in the Sky
Where she swallowed some stars
But soon vomited up even more stars
My pain, my fear,
My attachment to that old self
Now twinkle overhead
In the neighbourhood of the Pole Star
Next Mars rises
The colour of pulsing rage
As he did so
Three gunshots were heard
In the deep dark forest
They killed a phantom
The Old Me
As a crescent of light
Reappeared on the Moon
I stood naked
Resurrected
Safely wrapped
In a wolf fur sky
Dream: I am the Universe
A few nights ago
I dreamed that I was the Universe
Brimming with stars
Planets and black holes
Cosmic Breath
A turning inside-
And outside-in
Weaving in and out of existence
Rhythm
So this is
The sound of
One hand clapping…
Skulls don’t lie
I look at the sky
Where puffy clouds lie
Skulls with pincers
Crabs
Lobsters
Dis-ease
On a hot day
Hidden in plain view
Something in me dies
Whenever I tell
Polite lies
I look at the sky
Where my own skull
Grins right back at me
Wild Boar Medicine
(A small dose)
Right above
Solstice Rock
The Resurrected Moon
Rests in a tree
To meet all eyes
Gazing up at her
They become one giant
Golden eye
That will greet The Rising Sun too
With awe
Without question
Fifteen baby wild boar
Return her gaze only briefly
While grazing in the field
Believing that
The Resurrected Moon
Is the Morning Sun
In the Scandinavian
Sky
Having faced
My fears and phantoms
I stand reborn
A Wild Boar Person
With solar attitude
A great love for solitude
At this point I decided to go to bed but my bed turned into an art studio and “poet’s corner” as I cannot possibly sleep when the energy is so high!
Imelda Almqvist, Sweden, 28 July 2018
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About the Author:
Imelda Almqvist is an international teacher of sacred art and Northern European shamanism. Her book Natural Born Shamans: A Spiritual Toolkit for Life (Using shamanism creatively with young people of all ages) was published by Moon Books in 2016. She was a presenter on the Shamanism Global Summit with The Shift Network in 2016 and 2017. In 2018 she is a presenter on Year of Ceremony with Sounds True. She divides her time between the UK, Sweden and the US. Her second book Sacred art: A Hollow Bone for Spirit (Where art Meets Shamanism) will be published on 29 March 2019. She is currently working on her third book: Medicine of the Imagination.
www.shaman-healer-painter.co.uk (website)
https://imeldaalmqvist.wordpress.com/ (blog)
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=imelda+almqvist
(Youtube channel: interviews, presentations and art videos)