Guest Column: Thinking in New Directions

TWH welcomes Christian Cooper, Pagan, author of the new memoir “Better Living Through Birding,” and host of the new National Geographic TV series “Extraordinary Birder,” to consider new directions for magical practices beyond the classical elements.

Column: The Owner of Fire

“No matter how hard they tried, the other animals did not know how to use fire like the king, but man did. Since then the hummingbird, the partridge, and the booby bird have become guardians of humanity for their gift.”

Column: “Death, She Speaks Through the Birds”

I. The Other

“I don’t practice what I preach because I’m not the kind of person I’m preaching to.” – Rev. Ivan Stang

Sitting on my patio, I looked up from the clay in my hands and was suddenly and immediately awestruck by the silence. For a moment, the entire street symphony was quiet: the birds, the cars, the workers on the Broadway Bridge, the pedestrians, it was though the volume had been suddenly turned down for dramatic effect. I looked around and down towards the street, surprised by the silence, and it was at that moment a truck came roaring by out of nowhere, hit the loose pothole right outside my building, and set off the car alarm for the fourth time that day. I looked down towards the car from my third-floor balcony, enraged.