Savage Temple (2014)

Savage Temple (2014)

b a c c h a n t e

a mix for frenzied worship and rites in the woods.

01. inertia creeps - massive attack // 02. she’s not there - nick cave & neko case // 03. happy house - siouxsie and the banshees // 04. rose - a perfect circle // 05. scratch - elysian fields // 06. human fly - nouvelle vague // 07. remain nameless - florence + the machine // 08. we were sparkling - my brightest diamond // 09. with teeth - nine inch nails // 10. helena - misfits // [BONUS] 11. you can be the boss - lana del rey

[L I S T E N]

Benjamín Palencia (1894 - 1980) Bodegón (Still Life),1926

I can’t be the only Pagan on tumblr who enjoys dance as a devotional or ecstatic practice.

That’s me last night, spinning hoops. I went to a dance club with a fellow Pagan last night. We both have described trancing out while dancing… feeling the sensation of being lifted, of my particles spreading out and pulsing to the rhythm of the music… of blissful union with divinity. 

I used to be able to reach this state with drums and fire only. Primal. But lately, lights and smoke and the pounding energy of other revelers have been able to get me there. It’s incredible energy. As I gaze into the lights after my third drink, my heart says a prayer to Dionysus, and I feel I am a maenad, tearing at the walls of mundane life, letting my soul (and voice!) scream and yell, and twirl and clap, and spin, and spin, and spin…

Is anyone else an ecstatic or devotional dancer? Anyone else make revelry of some sort a part of your practice? 

Anthesteria’s first day: Pithoigia, the Day of Opening Jars

We shall sing Dionysus On the holy days Him who was twelve months absent Now the time has come, now the flowers are here.

It begins with a procession.  They come to the waters, the motley fellows of the propompoi — maenads, satyrs, nymphs, and bacchantes, restless from the restrictions of winter.  There at the edge of the waters they find Him — the Masked Man, awaiting them in the marshes where earth and water meet.  Raising him up, they escort him back into the city once again, with song and dance, the maenads and bacchantes waving their ivy-wreathed thyrsoi, the satyrs hurling merry insults at bystanders.  They take Him to the sanctuary.

Once in the sacred place of Dionysos, the jars are brought out — the pithoi, great clay jars, casks, bottles, all full of wine that was buried over the winter to ferment, sent into the Underworld with Dionysus.  The first libation is poured out to Dionysos Limnaios, he of the marshes, Fair-Flowering, the Reveller, the Stormer.  Then the priestesses of the mystery, wine-stained maenads, mix the wine according to the secret rites, and all may drink.

There is dance, and song, and music, and merriment; even the restless spirits of the city’s faceless dead come to join in the revelry amid the flower petals and the lovely scent of wine.  The Eleusinian Mysteries are performed in secret, sacred places.  The Anthesteria has begun.

This is a Festival of Flowers, though it will also be a Feast of the Dead as it winds its way through three days’ celebration…

Also today we celebrate the divine conception of Dionysus, for this is when Zeus lay with Semele and together they conceived their divine son.