Widdershins

For Boann.
Dedicated to Darren Gibbs.
In memory of Jack Roberts.

Learn your folktales so that you know what story you’re in. —Oneida/Frank elder Dr. Apela Colorado

Truth in a ruler is as bright as the foam cast up by a mighty wave of the sea, the sheen of a swan’s covering in the sun, the color of snow on a mountain. A ruler’s truth is an effort which overpowers armies. It brings milk into the world. It brings corn and mast. —Táin Bó Cúailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley)

The Ceremony

My plane touched down on Beltane eve. After a sleepless harrowing red-eye to Dublin, I Hail-Maryed my way to my guesthouse with only a popped tire. Hoping the rocky transition would meet the trip’s disaster quota, I settled into my room. But the mechanic who fixed my car said disasters come in threes.

One new tire later, I drove straight to the Hill of Tara. I’ve been visiting this ancient royal seat of Ireland for 20 years, and have developed a routine of bringing gifts to the crows and the Sheela stone. Sheela-na-giggs feature old women bearing their vulvas, a complete expression of the goddess.

Every few years, the stones dream me to the land of my ancestors, where I can finally breathe. The land speaks in feelings, urges, and sometimes even words. After the offerings, I heard, go lay down in Cormac's house. I ambled over the grassy, concentric rings, and stretched out in the center of the soft circle where the good king lived. These old places are my doctors.

The grassy, concentric rings where the high kings of Ireland lived | photo by Erin Langley

King Cormac upheld fír flathemon, or right relation.[1] From integrity with nature flows otherworldly support. One day, the fairy king Mannanan Mac Lir, breezed into Cormac’s home to offer just that. He invited the human king to visit Mannanan's own ocean domain, where they encountered a strange plain of wells, each measuring inflow against outflow, to demonstrate exactly how much a person had taken.

At the end of their visit, Mannanan gave Cormac his cup of truth. Speaking lies over the cup caused it to break, but speaking words of truth rendered the vessel whole again. This would help Cormac make correct judgments—not just gauge factual accuracy, but uphold alignment with the natural order.

Sundown marks the start of Beltane, a high holy day when magic peaks, and spirits roam. Tara always bristles with myth, but tonight felt especially alive. Dusk began to blur the landscape, and I can’t drive in the dark. As soon as I stood up to leave, three women called me over to the standing stone on top of the Hill of Tara. I walked to the so-called stone of destiny, where the three women stood. They asked if I would join their ceremony for the sovereignty of the land, that its rightful stewardship be restored. Yes.

Ceremony at the Hill of Tara | photographer unknown

The Land

My mother named me Erin. Eriu and her two sisters Banba and Fodla came to Ireland as three goddesses of sovereignty—each of their names representing different aspects of the land. Eriu means fat, full, and abounding. Sovereignty here doesn’t mean personal empowerment or autonomy, but that Ireland herself can appear as a woman to grant kings permission to rule in partnership with her.

I’d arrived in Ireland sick. Not in the contagious way, but in the way that affects everyone of our epoch. Starvation sent my family away from Ireland, and I came back starving. Far from full, fat, and abounding, I was skin and bone.

When I told the women my name, they knew they were right to invite me. They’d also brought candles, but no lighter. I pulled one from my bag. Everything fell into place, and we began to pray. Each of us stood in one of the four directions, and shaped a world through our words. The land overflowed through us like Boann’s milk pouring over the valley.

sundown at the Hill of Tara | photo by Erin Langley

The Poet

The health of the kingdom expresses the character of the king. If he lacks integrity, crops fail, cattle become sick, and people suffer and die. When a corrupt king causes rot and ruin, one class of citizens has the power to oust him: the poets.

Seer-poet-historians, called filídh, cultivate knowledge and maturity to wield the power of words over many years. I learned the term long ago in a dream. Since their speech can heal or harm, the filídh hold the keys to the kingdom. The Irish word for poetry means “to shape.” Poets shape the world.

Kings kept broods of these high-class poets. When any leader invoked his own downfall through breached integrity, he could enlist a poet to publicly describe the offense. In rare situations, a poet could also act on her own behalf.[2] This form of poetic justice, called satire, ensures people in power continually earn their position by acting with virtue and integrity with the natural order. Poets punch up.

Jack Roberts and Erin Langley wearing Boann’s symbol at the Secret Garden in Galway, Ireland | photo by Erin Langley

The King

In a few days, I’d be heading to Galway. I heard about a fairy field next to an untouched neolithic passage mound that marks the site of just such an ancient regional chieftain. The farmer who stewards the land sees and speaks regularly with the sídhe (fairies). He is a doctor of sorts, who performs “land clearings” and speaks curing words over people. He inherited these gifts from his grandfather. The thought of sitting with this magical place thrilled me.

But first, I needed to see Jack. I stopped by the Secret Garden, where Jack displayed his beautifully-crafted jewelry. Jack Roberts was a true steward of the land. He animated the lore through his prolific books and illustrations of the sacred sites of Ireland, and brought people gently and discerningly to the fairy places. He was among the first modern people to rediscover the astronomical alignments at the passage mounds with the late Martin Brennan in the 1980s.

Jack asked questions and left room for quiet people to think and speak. He was wise enough to remain a beginner despite his expertise. He dedicated his scholarship on the Sheela-na-gigs to women, knowing he “[could] only take the subject so far.” Scanning the beautiful pendants he’d made, I saw one symbol that felt like a reflection from inside me. “That one,” I said. I put it on. “That’s Boann’s symbol,” he told me—the symbol carved in the basin of the innermost chamber of the passage mound of Knowth. The stone basin is so essential and so large that Ireland’s biggest passage mound was built around it. I am so glad I told Jack how much his work means to me that day because it was the last time I ever saw him.

Boann’s Well at the Hill of Tara | photo by Erin Langley

The Cup

In ancient days, otherworldly maidens guarded the springs and wells of the pre-Celtic Ireland, Scotland, Britain, and Wales. Anyone could visit the local well maiden to receive food and drink, or healing from the otherworldly waters they stewarded. The women and the waters were one, and flowed freely through their own generosity.

Well maidens could offer a prospective king a drink, or even her body to solemnize his right to rule. The tradition lasted well into Christian times. In the case of King Cormac’s descendants, all vying for Tara’s rulership, the maiden appeared as a “hag.” Among his four brothers, only Niall accepted her invitation for sex. As such, she gave his line full reign of the Hill of Tara.

The Sheela stone, which confers a king’s right to rule at the Hill of Tara | photo by Erin Langley

The Desecration

One fated day, an immature king ruptured the contract with the fairy realm. He received food, water, and hospitality from the well maiden, but it wasn’t enough. He saw in her something that he had forgotten within himself, and so he tried to take it. He raped the well maiden, and stole her golden cup. Following his example, the king’s men took whatever women they wanted. Because of this desecration, the well maidens hid their golden cups and retreated from the human world, withdrawing the hospitality, fertility, and otherworldly blessing.

On this day, the heart of the land broke. Soon everyone could see the bright green mantle of Brigid going brown and barren. The island became a wasteland, fallow in all things but war.

Over many years, the green crept back into Ireland, but brokenness still curdled deep beneath its surface. The wasteland grew inside of us, too. We found the will and the want to take, a hunger and a greed so consuming that we forgot to feed others.

We remembered and fed only the burning smallness of ourselves, a coal that kept the flames of war kindled. This invisible fire spread from island to island, continent to continent, until the whole world grew so warm that parts of it, parts of ourselves, began to combust.

the Sissapahaw forest and farmland being “developed” in Alamance County, North Carolina | photo by Steckley Lee

The Balance

Here in rural North Carolina, a developer has begun drilling wells for a thousand houses near the Haw River, where my son goes to school. There is no sewer or water main. He will pull three hundred fifty thousand gallons of water every day from the ground. This land is already known to fluctuate between drought and catastrophic flooding. Now neighboring wells may run dry. No one who lives here wants this, not even the human beings.

Out of balance, we violate as a matter of course, whether women, water, or land. We shun rest and sleep and death. As the wise Earth knows, life begins in the dark. Everything we bury is a seed, and nothing can truly be lost. It’s easy to play the maiden in the wasteland, the victim of a broken world, but we are also the king. We see and we want and we take.

The Well of Segais, otherworldly origin of the River Boyne | photo by Sarah Gallagher, Wikimedia Commons

The Well

Boann, the white cow goddess of the River Boyne, may have come into being after the well maidens retreated from the human realm. By the time we meet her, men own the wells and the cups. Only Boann’s husband and his three male cup-bearers can approach the otherworldly Well of Segais.

Nine hazel trees circled the well, which granted complete knowledge to anyone who drank from its waters. The Salmon of Wisdom was born here, having eaten the magical hazelnuts that enlightened the well.

Just after she has given birth to her child with the Dagda, “gentle Boann” approaches the cup-bearers and walks three times widdershins (counterclockwise) around the well.[3] The widdershins motion goes against the apparent path of the sun, which social order considers unnatural. But life moves both ways.

The well erupts, overcoming Boann. Three tremendous waves take her eye, her hand, and her foot, as she merges with the waters that rush toward the sea. Now the well and the goddess are one again, as Boann becomes the life-giving River Boyne, whose “milk” nourishes the entire valley. At night, we see her celestial river, the Milky Way, sparkling on the mirror of the River Boyne.

horse chestnut tree near a well-known fairy place in Galway | photo by Erin Langley

The Sídhe

On my way to the farm, the sídhe began speaking to me. They asked for tallow and gold. I looked up the meaning of tallow, and found some rendered duck fat at the market. I had a handful of Euros in change, and offered them as a symbol for gold.

His lovely and vibrant wife met me at the door, introduced me to her children and their pets before leaving to run an errand. Then after a long day of farm labor, he walked through the door. I could feel a good power, like a rising sun, when he entered the kitchen. We traded stories about our lives, noting uncanny common ground. I told him I was on pilgrimage, carrying a prayer for the sovereignty of the land. He asked if I wanted the tour. Yes.

I remember deciding not to freshen up or brush my teeth before we left. It was an uncharacteristic choice, but I felt exhausted from the long day, and I didn’t care if I looked or smelled good. He lent me a pair of wellies for the muddy trek, and led me deep into 60 acres of the most beautiful ancient place I’d ever seen.

A foal had just been born on the farm in Galway | photo by Erin Langley

First, we came to a fertility rock. He instructed me to sit on it, then made a bawdy comment. “Even if you don’t want children, who doesn’t want good sex?” He looked at me expectantly. I probably forced a laugh, chalking it up to the Irish sense of humor. Things start getting fuzzy here, but I want to remember. We ventured through thick, muddy terrain until we reached the fairy field.

I lay the tallow and gold at the entrance of the field, asking permission to enter the black and white hawthorn trees that marked a threshold to this extremely potent domain. A gentle breeze greeted me. I stepped inside.

Altered and literally entranced, I said aloud, “This place is too powerful for me right now; it will take me at least another day to arrive.” I’ll come back to the field tomorrow after a good night’s sleep. I lingered in silence. He asked if I would like to visit a nearby tree, where he offered healings. Yes.

an unexcavated passage mound in Galway | photo by Erin Langley

The tree stood near the untouched passage mound, where an old regional chieftain may have lived and died. I admired the farmer’s choice to turn the government away when they wanted to excavate it. With one hand on me and one hand on the tree, the farmer walked me through a healing visualization—a story of rebirth. After his prayerful words, he came in for a hug.

I remember the blue and white stripes on his shirt, that the top buttons were undone. I remember his large hands with dirt under his fingernails. I had to look back at the photos to help me remember the rest. I am surprised to learn that our walk began at 5:15 pm, and that we kept walking until 5:53. By 6:27, it had happened.

I watched in horror from what felt like outside my body as his hug turned into much more. I froze—incredulous. A split-second ago, I had liked this man. I had trusted him. I had met his family. I had seen dozens of photos of him smiling with the people he brought to his field. I’d read wonderful reviews about his Airbnb.

I pulled away. It wasn’t enough.

a stone abbey in Galway at 6:40pm

Weeks later, someone close to me asked, “How could you let him do that?” I don’t know. When I re-enter that moment now, I simply say no, like a mother correcting a toddler. We don’t do that. It’s not appropriate. In some ways, that’s how I feel about him and about what happened. It does not feel personal. Motherly concern even arises in the mix of emotions. But in the shock of that moment, which felt deeply personal, I simply waited outside of my body until it was over.

Does he think I enjoyed that? I remember feeling appalled that we still had more land to tour. I had no idea where I was. I had no idea what to say. I had no idea what to do. I floated above the landscape, as he told me that people have offered him thousands of dollars for his sperm, that we were soulmates, that I should move into the stone abbey on his pond. No.

Oneida/Frank elder Dr. Apela Colorado taught me to document everything. Occasionally, she would even instruct me and my colleagues to take pictures during ceremony. The highs and the lows—record it all. What happens in our indigenous (whole, connected) minds can seem unbelievable, so she encouraged us to prove it. Photos record stories so that we can share them, remember them, and digest them. I knew better than to take a picture of the fairy field, knew better than to take anything at all from that sacred place. But I chose to take a picture of him, after what he did to my frozen body beneath the tree.

His face in that photo documents everything.

the main passage mound at Loughcrew, Ireland | photo by Erin Langley

The Escape

As soon as I got back to the farm, I texted my husband Darren—texted because I was afraid that someone would overhear my cry for help. Dusk was setting in. I’d already unpacked all of my things. I’d already told his wife I’d be at dinner. In shock, I actually thought I would still spend the night there. Darren cut through my confusion. While the farmer fed the animals, I repacked my belongings, hauled everything back to my car, and bolted. I left 20 euros on my nightstand for dinner.

Darren found a hotel for me in Galway. I wrote to Jack to tell him what happened so that he would warn women away from the farm. I drove in the dark, weeping like a baby all the way to the city. I made it there alive, and slept poorly in a strange place.

When I woke up, the land spoke to me. Come to Loughcrew. I will take care of you. I knew it was the Cailleach.

Lar Dooley, warrior of Loughcrew | photo by Erin Langley

The Cailleach

I drove two hours to Slieve na Cailleach, one of the earliest Neolithic complexes in Ireland. Lar Dooley, a vocal protector of the site, generously shared its lore with me, as he had with countless visitors over decades. He taught me to first go to the local well to cleanse before approaching the ancient holy seats of my ancestors. I am grateful I recorded everything Lar told me during this trip—I would never see him again, either.

the well maiden at the Cailleach’s well | photo by Erin Langley

As I pulled my car off the narrow road, I saw a flesh-and-blood well maiden guarding the Cailleach’s well. May flowers decorated her hair and waters below. She opened her eyes and greeted me. “I don’t want to impose,” I told her, but she invited me toward the well. I washed my hands and face in silent prayer. Please help me. The land had instructed her to come sit at the well, and now she knew why. Tears and words came tumbling out. I told her everything. She hugged me, both of us weeping.

I was afraid to name him, scared he would retaliate. But the well maiden figured it out on her own. She led tours, and would warn women away from his farm.

We parted ways, and I wept my way up the long hill. At the top, I tied a piece of my hair to the clootie tree and asked permission to enter. The Cailleach guided my movements, showing me where to lie down. I remember the gravel felt soft as a quilt when I curled up on it. It confused me then, but now I understand that the Cailleach, the stones, and I were one.

the stones of Loughcrew | photo by Erin Langley

The Morrigan

That evening, I returned to my guesthouse at Tara. My hosts showed me kindness and concern. “Did you go to the police?” The thought hadn’t even entered my mind.

That night, I dreamed of drinking the Morrigan’s ashes. It’s the only time I’ve met her. She was full of warmth and grace, not what I expected based on how I’d heard people describe her: warlike. But I saw how she simply arrives as a mother does to defend her land and children. When I asked her for help, she gave me the answer only a true friend will give: Help yourself. Drink up, she said. Everything within me is within you.

Boann’s mound, Bru na Boinne, where she and the Dagda conceived a baby | photo by Erin Langley

The Dagda

The Dagda, first king of the Tuatha de Dannan built the passage mounds by dragging his “club” around the land. He holds a macehead that can kill nine men with one blow atop a healing wand that can bring people back to life. I needed the macehead to write this story. It had been lingering in my body for years, like a latent pathogen.

The same year as the assault, the ceremonial macehead of Knowth showed up in my mailbox. It’s a replica, of course. I’d had a picture of it on my altar when it arrived, so when I found myself holding the macehead in my hands, I burst into tears. It was one of those truly magical moments that Apela had prepared us for. The artist, Scott Knight, sent it to me, as a gift. I painted it to match the relic from Knowth, as part of writing this story.

the day I received the ceremonial macehead, 2023 | photo by Erin Langley

Separated, the macehead and the wand are equally lethal. The ceremony at Tara forced me to reckon with my own imbalance. I did receive a healing at that tree. It was a bitter medicine that has taken more than three years to digest. I know I am the maiden and the king, the predator and prey, the violator and the victim. I know I am the land. I know that I am story and that I am no story. I know that the day I finished writing this is the day that my months-long menstrual bleeding stopped. I had to tell my story, or it was going to kill me.

The Poem

Satire is a gift from the Tuatha de Dannan, the shining ones who descended from a ship onto a hill in Connacht on Bealtaine eve. Along with tremendous upheaval, they conferred their unparalleled gifts of poetry, art, warfare, and magic to the human beings of Ireland. Satire ranged from insult and insinuation to ritualized incantations that could “blemish” or even kill the offender.

How do you un-violate a woman? While researching his specific offense, I learned that he would have owed me six milk cows. Satire does not curse, but simply makes an unseen breach of conduct visible to the community.[4] The poet upheld fír flathemon[5], the truth of the ruler, including human checks and balances that prevent false accusations. A false satire causes the satirist to fall on her own sword, rather than impacting the honor of its recipient.[6]

The fili customarily gives the offender an opportunity to make amends before publicly revealing him. This can involve private negotiations to resolve the issue without resorting to satire. In this case, I spent one year grieving, grappling, and healing. I wanted my letter to be generous. After reading it, he blocked me.

No.

Holding the macehead and the wand at the door to my well, August 31, 2026 | photo by Erin Langley

I join the macehead with the wand. I walk widdershins around the well. I submit this satire in accordance with fír flathemon. The waters may come for me, but my cup has been restored.

I brought your family bread and berries,
Gold and tallow for the fairies—
I carried Eriu's Sovereignty.
You desecrated your own mother
When you drugged me with the land
and took me to the "healing tree."
I froze in shock: what-do-I-do-what-do-I-do—
how-do-I-get-back-to-the-farm-without-you—
My first thought was not of me,
but of your wife and daughters three.
You spilled your "power" on the mound,
spawning your own battleground.
Do you know you call the Morrígan
when you desecrate the land?
"How often does this happen," I thought to ask.
"Not that often," you said, unmasked.
"People like me can't be fenced in,"
you explained to me from your prison.
Six milk cows will not repay a debt
the land itself cannot forget.
No longer will you "heal the land"
or women with corrupted hands.
The time has come to be remade
in Her image, Sovereign.
Mace and wand in hand, I walk
Widdershins around the well,
Boann spills your secret now.
How many maidens? Know our names.
Pay what fír flathemon demands you pay,
Or you, Pat Noone, bring shame to Nuada,
the sidhe, your land, your name.
While we, the women upon whom you've preyed,
remain as Eriu, Sovereign.

Endnotes

1 Whitley Stokes, Irische Texte mit Übersetzungen und Wörterbuch in Irische Texte, ed. Whitley Stokes and Ernst Windisch (Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1891), vol. 3:1, 183–222 (183–184; 203–221).

2 Cath Maige Tuired [The Second Battle of Mag Tuired], §90, ed. and trans. Elizabeth A. Gray, Cath Maige Tuired: The Second Battle of Mag Tuired, Irish Texts Society 52 (Naas: Irish Texts Society, 1982). After wrestling the Dagda to the ground, the daughter of Indech “satirized him three times so that he would carry her upon his back” — an unusually explicit example of an interested party personally exercising satire rather than engaging a professional fili. Text and translation available through UCC’s CELT edition. See also §89: when the Dagda enters the Fomorian camp, Indech orders him to eat an enormous quantity of porridge “so that he might not satirize the Fomoire” — establishing that the Dagda himself was regarded as capable of directing satire against those who mistreated him, though none is delivered in that episode.

3 In Old Irish, túath means “left” or “north,” because when we face the rising sun, north is on our left side.

4 Uraicecht na Ríar §24, ed. and trans. Liam Breatnach, Uraicecht na Ríar: The Poetic Grades in Early Irish Law, Early Irish Law Series (Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1987), 114–15. The tract enumerates the elements composing satire, including congain comail, corrguinecht, translated by Breatnach as “magical wounding, sorcery.”

5 Fír flathemon, “the ruler’s truth”: see Audacht Morainn (The Testament of Morann), ed. and trans. Fergus Kelly, Early Irish Law Series (Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1976). The text catalogues the prosperity — peace, good harvests, healthy children — that flows from a ruler whose conduct upholds this truth.

6 Bretha Nemed Dédenach, ed. E. J. Gwynn, “An Old-Irish Tract on the Privileges and Responsibilities of Poets,” Ériu 13 (1940–42): 1–60, 220–36; see also the translated portions in Liam Breatnach, Uraicecht na Ríar, 42–57.

Entering the Murmuration

This story has no beginning, but I’ll start with the Hawk.

In the middle of the solar eclipse on September 21, 2025, the Hawk gave her alarm call. The first time I heard this call happened on July 6, the day Saxapahaw and Chapel Hill, land of the Yésah, catastrophically flooded. Human beings hadn’t seen it coming, but Hawk did. People lost everything—cars, homes, businesses, loved ones. The Red-Shouldered Hawk’s call sounded so distinct that I recorded it, and told my husband an alarm had been sounded.

Although the alarm carries other layers of perfectly commonplace correspondences, it emitted a unique urgency that distinguished it from the many calls I’d heard from my familiar friend. As she had in July, she called directly above the gazebo, the ceremonial hub of my land. A familiar clarity overcame me, registering her call as an alarm.

the fire circle | photo by Erin Langley | Image shows a blurred group of European-descended people gathered around a fire at night.

We were due to have our local gathering that night. A growing group of listening people share food and stories around a fire every new moon. I knew right away Hawk had enlisted me to share her message. We pass around an object—usually a large stone, but sometimes a walrus tusk, sometimes a whale vertebra—and take turns speaking. Almost as soon as the stone came to me, I disappeared into Hawk’s message.

“Become love like a dagger, immovable in the midst of escalating chaos.” I felt like a clean, hollow bone, sounding Hawk’s clarion call to remain in touch with what is real. Enter the softness of our animal bodies, hearts, instincts, and dreams. Nourish our closest connections with family, community, and land. Listen for the clear and subtle directives of nature, always expressing our indestructible togetherness.

Image shows a text message of a weather forecast including an image of a possible hurricane moving toward the Southeastern United States

A few days later, my husband texted a hurricane forecast for North Carolina. Exactly one year after Helene’s devastation of Asheville and ten surrounding counties, another storm was approaching. I visited my friend and neighbor Meg for a massage. Massage is a misnomer for what Meg offers. She creates literal sanctuary, deep and wide as whales, from which messages surface and wholeness finds us. She placed a Heron feather on my belly and offerings in my hands. She and her family founded a community farm dedicated to restoring balance between Earth and people.

Meg is one reason I can write this story. She has spent her whole life stewarding this land and community. The relationships she has tended through incredible effort over decades offer stability and natural protection that directly benefit me, and all of us. A nearby mountain orchestrated the unfolding alliance between our families to re-establish continuity with the land. We live less than a mile apart.

inside the sanctuary | photo by Meg Toben | Image shows a woman of European descent lying face up on a massage table holding butter and honey, with a Heron feather on her lower abdomen. Sprigs of foliage frame her face.

Meg also founded the monthly fire circles. Because everyone in the circle carries European ancestry, we decided to focus on remembering the European Indigenous Mind. Though we haven’t formally begun this work, it’s always happening in the background. Organically, we move toward our origins, as concepts that impede our belonging resolve. I have been explicitly unmasking my indigenous mind for twenty years, and facilitating this work for fifteen. If this sounds like I have changed something about my own mind, it really means I have rejoined nature, or opened into a continuous state of divination. To be fully alive is to touch everything. Belonging to our own people and to the lands that now hold us honors our ancestors as well as the tribes who have tended place for millennia.

Back in my car, still in an altered state, I heard the word “propitiate.” I recognized it instantly as an instruction. As I tuned in more, I heard, “Propitiate the weather.” Tenfour, I replied, likely out loud, as I hurried home to ask my husband what propitiate meant. He told me in his own words, and we looked it up to make sure. To propitiate means to make offerings that restore right relationship. The word is related to propitious, meaning "likely to have or produce good results" or "being a good omen."

I called my friend Steckley right away. She’s my teammate in Earth-listening, who invited me to the monthly fire circles six months ago. Although I’d become extremely comfortable spending all my time away from people, I said yes to Steckley’s invitation because I respect her so much. She’s a protector of water, children, and all of life, and she keeps her formidable power on the down-low. Steckley is incognito; people do not detect her relentless ferocity, dedication, and expertise. She is an unstoppable force of love, like water itself. My late teacher Liu Ming used to say that the most skillful people have tremendous impact without anyone’s noticing.

Though we had no plans to talk, she’d been waiting on my call. I gave her the word on the street—we’d been enlisted to propitiate the weather! She already knew this, of course. Steckley and I didn’t know specifically what propitiating would like or when it would happen, but we readied our offerings. We decided to go with the flow of our days, already replete with childcare, homemaking, and professional responsibilities. Let things happen when they happen is the tried and true modus operandi of the indigenous mind.

the fairy mound | photo by Erin Langley | Image shows a tree stump with a small red door in a wooded area on a sunny day. The stump is surrounded by a mound of moss of different shades of green and purple, with green moss on top.

That afternoon, I got the house in order, cooked dinner, and put offerings of butter at the well, the stone circle, and the fairy mound. It felt like setting the stage, making sure that my closest relationships—starting with myself—felt nourished. I didn’t want to bypass my inner circle and go straight to the weather. That is self-and-other. That is speaking to the manager. I performed this gesture to harmonize intent, creating cohesion between “inner” and “outer”—a distinction both useful and fabricated. We are the weather. We needed to move as one. 

Around the fire, Steckley offered a brilliant analogy. In a murmuration of starlings, each bird pays attention only to the six birds surrounding it. By attending only to its inner circle, the whole swell moves as one. Propitiation is not weather control, but attunement and direction from within the system. Propitiation is orchestrated love.

Watercolor paintings by Leigh Brown | photo by Erin Langley | Image shows a rotating display rack of small watercolor paintings of nature scenes and blue and purple organic compositions.

Now it was time to pick up my son Tenzin from school. Most days, we hang out at the playground, a forested haven of intergenerational and interspecies play. I’ve made friends there with Sue, a dear elder who watches her granddaughter in the afternoons. I love Sue, and for some reason I just knew that I needed to bring her an offering today. It also felt like more than that. Sue has a strong connection with the Great Blue Heron, who guides and guards the Haw River and Saxapahaw. It felt like I was being called to make an offering to the Heron, while honoring Sue as an elder. 

I popped into the local artists’ studio and picked up two beautiful stones and a small heron painting by a local artist. I brought them to Sue on the playground. Looking back, I understand this was propitiation, too. After we visited a while longer, Tenzin and I got in the car to leave. Only we couldn’t. Instead of turning right like I usually do, I had to turn left. Outraged, Tenzin asked, “Where are we going?”

I went back a different day to take a picture of the dock that called me to the Haw. | photo by Erin Langley | Image shows a sunny day on the shore of a river with a dock emerging from the left side of the frame. Shade dapples the tan, sandy riverbank, with shoreline foliage on the right and dark trees on the far side of the river.

The dock was calling. A nearby place where kayaks enter the Haw pulled us toward it. It reminded me of being in Ireland, where the land fully animates my movements. I told Tenzin we needed to go to the dock. He’d never been there before, but protested loudly and repeatedly. Everything was in its place. “But why do we have to go” he complained. “I don’t know,” I told him, “I think it has something to do with a Heron.” He is used to my cryptic way in the world, and has begrudgingly gone on many adventures with me because of it.  

Photo by Diego Madrigal, shared with permission from the artist. | Image shows a great blue heron standing on driftwood at the edge of calm water, its gray feathers against a backdrop of green water and foliage.

We pulled up to the dock, where we found a very kind man fishing and looking after two children while their parents finished their workdays. I discreetly sprinkled tobacco on the bank, thanking the place for calling us over, thanking the Sissapahaw and Occoneechee for tending these banks for generations. Tenzin settled immediately at the sight of kids playing. A girl made a seesaw out of a log and a board, while her brother hand-dug fish traps at the water’s edge. The man had been coming here for 25 years. He told us all about the land and river. It felt like meeting a guide. We watched a Heron glide low over the Haw and catch a fish. Then the man told us, “there’s a trail to the dam right down there,” and he pointed. 

I went back a different day to take a picture of the dam. | photo by Erin Langley | Image shows a wide dark greenish-brown river with white sudsy bubbles on top from the water that has moved over the dam in the background. To the right of the dam is a large, square brick building. To the left are shadowed trees on the far side of the river.

Now eager to participate, Tenzin and I found our way down to the dam. The recent flood has profoundly impacted the forested shoreline, which wants only very deliberate human participation. We walked carefully and kindly to the river. One of us did. Tenzin did his thing, which was the right thing, too. The land asked us to take nothing, not even pictures. My Oneida/Frank elder Dr. Apela Colorado taught me to document everything for record-keeping and storytelling. Once we enter our indigenous minds, synchronicity becomes a lifestyle. I have heeded her advice to a fault, but she also taught me to listen. Today, we could only take trash that had been washed up by the flood. 

the trail back | photo by Erin Langley | Image shows a clay-colored footpath winding through lime-green foliage.

As soon as I saw the dam, I understood that we had entered the time and place of propitiation. I offered tobacco and sang a protective lullaby in Irish. Then I disappeared into the murmuration. My son always calms down when oracle mode takes over. Clear, good words flowed with the river and the wind. After a few minutes, they delivered me back to shore. Tenzin chucked hickory nuts on the way back to the car. The air felt thick and smelled good. I gathered it like honey with outstretched arms along the trail. I asked Tenzin if he noticed a change in the air, and he said yes. 

We could see the other side of the dam from where we’d been sitting, and Tenzin really wanted to get there. We drove a ways and got out at the nearest trailhead, which was closed. We put down some tobacco requested permission to enter anyway. I asked Tenzin what he noticed. “Nothing,” he told me. Protocol bores him. A gentle breeze invited us toward the trail. I felt moved that the land let us in. In general, it just wants to rest. Debris obstructed our way to the other side of the dam, so we couldn’t get there. Instead, I sang another Irish lullaby, and we hauled out a sizable mound of trash. As we exited the trail, a bald eagle flew over. I asked Tenzin how he would “read” that. He pretended to not understand what I meant, but knew the Eagle was a good sign.

photo by Steckley Lee | Image shows Steckley’s offerings—large chunks of pink and peace fish and red and orange flowers at the base of a rock on the Haw River. White water crests the dam in the upper lefthand corner.

We made our way back home, weary from a long, productive day. Just as we walked in the door, I got a text from Steckley that made me forget my fatigue. She’d sent a photo of her offerings—laid out on the far side of the dam. Without knowing it, we had stood on opposite banks, singing and making offerings at the exact same time. I felt awestruck that the land had dreamed us together so strongly in this shared gesture of love. I sent her a very enthusiastic voice memo, detailing the living divination that led me to “my” side of the dam. Later that night, she retold her own revelations and the stories that brought her to the opposite shore. I learned so much from her journey, and am eager for her to share more.

Although bedtime was near, I felt excited now, not quite ready to wind down. I’d been in the “thrall” all day. Nonhuman clarity seizes me, and lets me know that I’m “on duty.” It hadn’t released me yet, even after the river propitiation. I felt the storm coming, and understood I’d be greeting the lightning later that night. This quietly thrilled me, but my energy started to wane. Around 10:30, I thought that maybe I should just go to sleep. As soon as I got into bed, the first peal of thunder arrived. I laughed out loud and put my clothes back on. From the outside, venturing into a lightning storm might seem dangerous, but I didn’t do it on a whim. Nested in the murmuration, the storm and I were one.

“Oxus Lady” with bird body. Oxus Culture, Eastern Iran or Central Asia (ca. 2200–1800 BCE). Chlorite, limestone, lapis lazuli. Private collection, UK. | Image shows an ancient relic of a woman’s upper body merging into wide, winglike forms patterned with waves and feathers. She has a long neck, downcast face, and simplified features. The textures are tactile, with ridges, curves, and smooth areas.

Thunder punctuated our prayer of call and response. Tears and lightning flowed in conversational cadence. This went on for a while. Sometimes the storm felt exactly like kittens purring. My elders taught me to keep part of the dream for myself, to use discernment about what to share. But the most important part of the night might have been the tears. Love poured out of my eyes, and I put it back into the Earth. I remember saying, “we remember, we remember, we remember.” 

At last, I was released. The grip of propitiation relented, and kindly sent me to bed. I didn’t sleep much afterward. The subsequent days are typically difficult. Outside traditional societies, propitiants rarely have access to the resources that arise naturally within indigenous communities or even small pockets of listening people. I won’t speak for all unaffiliated dreamers, but I have learned a lot the hard way.

Dissonance shows me what’s missing. I felt profound agitation while trying to have casual social interactions the next day. Oracular tenacity had not yet softened back into the human being. My eyes felt like lasers, and my arms like swords, too ready to cut through delusions that did not belong to me. Exhaustion begets dogma that robs people of their realities, and obstructs the ripening of their own revelations. Stepping out of sync exposed my own inability to relax into the waking dream. All of this showed me the importance of dispelling ritual charge.

I felt insulted and hurt when my husband did not make me breakfast the next morning. Obviously, I do not expect him to make me breakfast every day (although he often does because he’s the best). Registering the energetic lurch simply highlighted the need to be nourished and held. Celebration naturally follows ceremony. Without community scaffolding and land-sanctioned protocol in place, the propitiant likely becomes ill, as I did. It’s not personal—it’s a matter of balance. Understanding this, Tenzin and I brought Steckley some gifts. Being with a fellow propitiant felt good, but I could see that she was as overextended as I was.

Still from SpongeBob SquarePants, “A Day Without Tears” (Nickelodeon, 2010). © 2010 Viacom / United Plankton Pictures. | Image shows a close-up of a dam cracking inside of Spongebob’s exposed brain, with half of his giant, protruding veiny eyeballs showing beneath.

Global wind map from Earth Nullschool shows hurricanes Imelda and Humberto spinning over the Atlantic ocean in a figure eight.

I bushwhacked my way through the next couple of days, wrestling the gap between where we are and where we’re going. Tenzin asked if I would watch Spongebob with him, which sounded like the perfect speed. The first scene showed a dam breaking behind SpongeBob’s eyes, as he tried not to cry. I understood right away that flooding is unexpressed grief. Externalized tears become hurricanes, and huge whirlwinds of devastation perfectly mirror our collective behavior. Just as our everyday choices regulate the weather, so do our tears.

The dam perfectly symbolizes interrupted flow—not only of grief, but of life. Human beings are the flow of space and time. Flow is our birthright. Darren texted me the new weather forecast. A second storm had formed. Now two hurricanes swirled in graceful formation, dancing each other back toward their Atlantic origins.

Still from SpongeBob SquarePants, “A Day Without Tears” (Nickelodeon, 2010). © 2010 Viacom / United Plankton Pictures. | Image shows SpongeBob projectile crying from his bed with a silver ladder and a buoy against a red wall in the background.

Crying is a form of water sovereignty. Realizing this made me feel immediately better about all the crying I do. Life is so beautiful that it often just comes out my eyes. Other times, the horrors of Earth get lodged in my body, and ride my tears back out. Sometimes I cry because I am just so tired. Often, I don’t know why I’m crying—only that it’s good, or at least necessary. Letting tears flow acknowledges water’s right to move where and when it wants to.

Once we rejoin nature, we remember that we have always been the weather. Listening bodies and bleeding bodies constantly propitiate, composting war and grief, and changing the course of storms without our even knowing. As more of us remember, we relieve the significant burden that our collective misconduct places on frontline bodies like mine.

We will never know how Steckley and I—and countless unseen propitiants—affected the path of this particular storm, nor do we need to. This story is about following the Hawk, the Heron, and the Haw. It’s about how storms move, and starlings. It’s about remembering that six birds shape the whole system. I don’t conflate poetry with tidiness or ease. Entering the murmuration is extremely hardcore. Surrendering to the living flow requires complete energetic honesty and ever-deepening integrity with nature. We may be moved in ways that seem mysterious from the outside. But inside the murmuration, belonging awaits. We need only relax into place, and let ourselves be carried home.