Tag: Crossroads

Blessings as we near the cross quarter turn of the wheel at Imbolc, in between Winter and Spring. I can feel the seeds and prayers and dreams awakening underneath the soil finding room the breath. A quickening of becoming who and what we are. As it happens, these cross quarter and seasonal alignments are portals for entering deeper realities in dreaming. A blessing to remember the otherworld as among the community of beings with whom we share this world in the past, present, and future.

1/30/25 Time Jumping into the Otherworld

Last night in dreaming, I was time jumping into the past, traveling through house after house going easily through walls and windows until I reached the time I was tracking in the 1800’s to a village in Ireland. The second story building I was moving through became solid suddenly and when I went through the picture window, the glass broke and I fell to the ground. I was time tracking movements of a wild white horse, and my journey had brought to this time and place. I could see the worn deer trail alongside a railroad track and caught a glimpse of the gorgeous white horse ahead, who took my breath away, and my heart skipped a beat. I knew the path I must follow to catch up with this otherworldly horse, but first I must mark where I came through in my time travels, so I could return again to my own time. I walked back to find the broken window where I had fallen into this time in the 1800’s. There in the street looking up at the broken window was a couple, who I knew to be connected to the good folk. They said, “Yep, this is the place!” I looked carefully at the window and felt something was off about it, and decided to walk a bit further up the street, and found that the blue ornate building I had entered through was there but the window was no longer broken. Some faery mischief was afoot, the couple was trying to trick me to entering another timeline beyond the one I had travelled. I called them on their trick, and said they would need to make an offering for a dumb supper at the crossroads in order to make amends to the spirits of the otherworld.

The couple agreed, and came to the crossroads prepared to make an offering with a plate of meat and potatoes. The woman was pregnant and wore a beautiful, blue slate, silk dress, and when she went to set the plate down at the crossroads, she had a look of distress as her water had broken, and her beautiful silk gown had water all over it. Her labor was about to start. I felt the intensity of the moment, as she made offerings to the spirits her birthing had begun. I looked closely at the offering and noticed there were three pieces of coal on the plate, and asked them to be removed, the faeries won’t like that as an offering., and I certainly didn’t want to offend the faeries.

The husband removed the coal as requested and the offering was completed. Now I was free to go about my journey of tracking the wild white horse. I returned to the deer path along the train tracks and went about setting my sights on the White Horse leading me deeper inside the otherworld.

While a dumb Supper is usually held during Samhain as a silent way of communing with the spirits by offering a meal when the veil between the world thins, this ritual supper at the crossroads of Imbolc (a term meaning “in the belly” when sheep are pregnant and begin to lactate) is a halfway point between Winter and Spring, and a portal when the doors between the otherworld are open to bring through birth and new beginnings.

The story unfolds of the dumb Supper offering as that of making amends, in this world and the otherworld, and remove anything blocking that connection. It is said that coal was often left in barns to keep fairies from steeling milk. In this way, the coal must be removed so that the fairies may receive the offerings, while being respectful and honoring of this liminal sacred space and what is brought into it. The very act of making this offering at the crossroads, is a watershed moment, when the water breaks, and birth begins. This encounter frees me to carry on my journey in search of the White Horse of the Otherworld.

Enbarr is a magic white horse of Celtic lore who could travel between worlds, and the otherworld. The horse could travel across water or land and is associated with going on a mystical journey. Enbarr is connected with Niamh, the Queen of Tir na nOg (Land of the Young) an island of the Celtic Otherworld, which is a parallel universe that exists alongside this one. It is home to the Tuatha De Danann also known as the Faery Folk, Good People, Shining Ones, or Sidhe. Niamh means bright or radiant and she herself is a Faery Queen. What follows is a Gaelic lullaby, “Sleeping in Tir na Nog” by Liz Knowles inspired by the painting by Jack B. Yeats In Tir na nOg.