Floralia

The Feast of Flowers (Floralia): an arcane festival involving the Rite of Baptism, a purification often performed as part of or prelude to the Eleusinian Mysteries. In the ‘Limnae’ (temple lakes) the ‘Myste’ (participants) were guided towards and through the ‘slim gate’ of Dionysus, to emerge there as full Initiates. It is considered a relic inherited from the Sabines. Dionysus “In mediæval poetry and romance, the month of May was celebrated above all others as that consecrated to Love, which seemed to pervade all nature, and to invite mankind to partake in the general enjoyment. Hence, among nearly all peoples, its approach was celebrated with festivities, in which, under various forms, worship was paid to Nature's reproductiveness. The Romans welcomed the approach of May with their Floralia, a festival we have already described as remarkable for licentiousness; and there cannot be a doubt that our Teutonic forefathers had also their festival of the season long before they became acquainted with the Romans. Yet much of the mediæval celebration of May-day, especially in the South, appears to have been derived from the Floralia of the latter people. As in the Floralia, the arrival of the festival was announced”[1] “Fair Flora I fear I have no buds to give you, No amorous hare, no spray of blossoms. Only my hard and fissured heart, beating dust, and dry of life... I warm it in the sun as best I can, but without green I fear it falters still. With water from cool springs of crystal blue, it drinks, but does not seem to find its fill. I ask but one small boon of you, sweet mistress of the sacred urge to open: The roses in the market, pass by them still they're there with you! Though you have moved beyond the flower-seller's stall, you know they're there - their tender rosey souls shout out beyond their earthly, flowering confines. So pass by me this way invisible- and linger for a moment at my heart's side. For your wake of tender shoots and tendrils, Overflow of pollen with sweet bee attendants Might fill the crags and cracks of this my stony heart, That seeds of blooms find purchase once again And get them quickly to their holy work That I might be renewed and opened, With heart-flower faces smiling at the sun, That I may dance along with you and laugh again Along with all the floral folly that is spring In her sundry, heady blooming. Serica Antonius     Flora (Chloris) Flora, a licentious Goddess of springtime, was depicted as a beautiful maiden, wearing a crown of flowers. Her festival, the Floralia, was celebrated particularly by the ‘ladies of the night’ across all levels of society.  This reverence is reflected in the exotic flowers incorporated into her highly theatrical rites, expressing quite explicitly the simulacra of human sexual organs.  Female celebrants often paraded naked until authorities finally banned it during the 3rd century CE.

                    

 

---

[i] Sacred texts

paintings: wiki-commons

photo images are copyright of shani oates

THE TRAUMA GODDESS

I reshape family karma.

I am the diamond maiden, the player of games
The yogini is one of my forms
Showing that I am beyond earthly attachment
I am the shining revelation to the ascetic

The women in silk and roses
I am the harlot in black net and leather,
Who gives enjoyable punishment,

I am the glass bead master, creating universes of form
And a spark of me is in each bead, for I dwell in karma.

I am the Trauma Goddess, the Lady of Pain
In return for devotion I pull thorns from the heart
In return for obedience
I untie the knots in the belly and the head
I hold the vajra, which gives and receives
I reshape family karma

The Trauma Goddess is called for people in painful situations
Where anger and hatred block the path of the soul
I evaluate the benefits of revenge
And give better suggestions for spiritual growth.

I am not suited to polite society
To social striving, upward mobility, and making good impressions
I am radically honest, sensitive, brilliant, and blunt
I hold up a mirror to the best and worst facets of human life.

The Lady of Trauma is the mirror of pain
I reflect the disastrous ways that human beings interact
Then the reflections are stretched and distorted
With irony, and humour, and sadness
Loosening their grip on the heart
So that the person who seeks freedom
Can get a taste of being free.

“Lady of Trauma, Lady that absorbs pain
Ascetic and bhairavi and sannyasini and mistress
Pull me from the disaster that I have made of my life
Save me from the evil machinations of others.”

This is their prayer and I hear it in their hearts
As they chant my mantra.

“Saviour, Lady, Mother Goddess, Bodhisattva,
Love me as I love you
I am desperate and bound
Free me by your grace.”

I will give freedom, but not without realisation
Those who have been bound, bind others
Those who have suffered, cause suffering
I let them know how they have been affected
But also how they have affected others.

I do not wear bones because of death
I wear them because they represent what is beneath the surface
The blood that I drink is evil karma of those that I save
And the karma is then halted and does not pass to others.

I appear wrathful as I take on anger, hatred, fury, and the desire to destroy
Which are destroyed within me.
I am a dancer upon the pain of all mankind
I destroy the dark and corrupt.

My compassionate side is hidden
But for those whom I love
Who have taken on my dark grace
I open a path of shining light
With pain and sorrow left behind.