The Descent’s Sacrament

how many times have we descended?
how many times our hearts offered as sacrifice to the abyss?
why?
why do we do this?
why do we insist on giving everything up and over?
we are obsessed and i know - i once gave sacrifice as a gift
as a bond i swore it

inside a volcano i took it back
i took everything back
instead i claimed and offered love, adventure, prosperity…

i once had a dream
in high school
of my grandmother
we were in the beautiful desert
in a place i would many years later spend my birthday within
she kept gesturing at everything
and exclaiming - SACRAMENT
i only just found out that word is a fusion
a fusion of latin and greek
roots
a joining of consecration and offering
and mystery…
of initiation and consummation
SACRA MENT
Sacred Mystery…
i devour
i take in

My Goddess does not descend to make me sacred
She does not descend to become sacred
She does not give anything away
She brings HerSELF holy and wholly
She brings HER SELF as SACRAMENT
to the domain of death
and she comes to learn
that secret of life
of which we may never speak
nor write
only sing or fuck and remember anew

the secret of course
is there rippling in the heart of things
upon your heart
that secret sits
within you always
that secret

just as i always receive freely from the words of the church
to further my own heretical witchery
as all who dance around stones
and mate with stars
know
this week i heard these words:
when my religion comes between me and my neighbour, i will choose my neighbour
and the old faith that I am enjoined to
commands me the same
the complete fierce love and liberation of my neighbour as myself
and myself in the arms of my neighbour

so though many today
do not know the secret name of my Goddess
nor keep the rites of her descent and return
i know they all possess the same secret
that moves us all to take the sacrament
of the holy eros that births and shapes all things
and the love that binds and frees us all

and so we descend
for everyone
for all of us
for the whole, wide, strained, hurting world.

*the theologian Barbara Brown Taylor