• There never was an apple, in Adam’s opinion, that wasn’t worth the trouble you got into for eating it. Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
    Good Omens

Other Blogs

  • Someday I Will Be Doing Research Again
    Until that point apparently I will just pop in once a year or so and remind people that it is the Opet season, a time when we show civic support for our broader communities here at Peaceful Awakenings’ Take On Kemetic Social Values. If anyone wants to join me, The Emboatening Crew on Kiva is […]
  • Opet Again
    Just popping in to remind everyone that with the Opet season upon us again, the Emboatening Crew is still rolling to support Kiva loans. (My office renovations are going well if slowly, so who knows if that means I’ll get more work done when they’re done.)
  • CowOfGold Moving
    An update on my previous post: Cow of Gold will have a new home here when the maintainer has a chance to put up the site again (with some revisions, apparently).
  • Hills of the Horizon: The Past is Another Country
    The problem with extrapolation from history is that nothing is testable. The evolution of a religion over time is not a predictable and easily comprehensible thing, where we can look at a point in time and say, "It was like this then, so it would be like that now." The process of deciding what needs […]

Crafting and Iron

Earth is black with secret red
Flowing with dark molten iron
A pulsing of the heartbeat’s blood;

Heaven, black with shining gems
Flower-strewn and rainbow-prismed,
Velvet depths in endless flood;

The silver-twining open road
From ferrous heart to shadow’s sun –
The partner to the kiss of worlds,
A lover’s breath, a dance begun.


Iron is the blood of the earth
The red sweat of its bones
The last explosive breath
Of dying stars
Giving their metal hearts to the universe.

Iron, holy,
Spattered droplets across heaven
Sky-metal, earth-metal:
The tree spans all worlds
From the fire in the earth
To the fires in the sky.

Your bones sweat blood
Iron-red, made of skyfire,
Life and death
Of stars and men.

This iron tooth,
Many-folded,
Whorled like a dance of cells:
Your cousin,
A drop of blood,
From star-death to earth-life
Predator-pointed,
Cuts the grape from the vine.

And look:
The fruit also bleeds.