Thursday, June 16, 2016

A Writer's Spell for Summoning Genius

I was trying to write and I was staring at the white screen trying to make words appear.  I was getting depressed and felt particularly uninspired until I recalled the words of Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of "Eat, Pray, Love" where she talks about the difference between being a genius and having genius.  It's also possible some stray notions about writing being a spiritual practice were floating around in my head, too.

As I grumpily stared at the white space on the screen underneath the false starts, I thought, "I have no genius today."   Visions of various djinni and accompanying lamps flashed through my head, and dim echos of Scheherazade's Tales of the Arabian Nights--and I thought, "If I have no genius, the magickal thing to do would be to summon a genius of writing with ritual words."  

This is what I came up with:  


Genius of the air, powers of choosing words, be here in the writing.  Be floating bubbles, iridescent; be falling snow, crystaline; be the song of a thousand leaves in the wind.  By the sign of the quill, send questions and mysteries.

Genius of the fire, powers of burning words, be here in the writing.  Be burning beasts hovering over our brow; be tongues of flame; eyes of flame.  By the sign of lightning, send events that scorch old structures.  

Genius of the water, powers of dissolving words, be here in the writing.  Be water poured from the grail; be deep currents; be the wave without a shore.  By the sign of the shell, send characters unsatisfied with themselves.

Genius of the earth, powers of grounding words, be here in the writing.   Be memories covered and discovered; be textures for our skins, aromas that incite, sounds which beguile.  By the sign of  the compass, send a stranger who rides into town.  

Genius of the story, where we meet in the writing as one:  The closed eye sees darkness before dreams; the blank page is whiteness before words.   Before experience, mystery.   Whisper words into my ears.  Guide my hands to manifest.  Let my my eyes witness.

So let it be written, so let it be done.

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