Elyse Welles is a practicing witch for over ten years on 3 continents and is initiated in an eclectic Faery Tradition coven. Selected by Free Verse Revolution as a ‘Best Poet of 2022’, Welles is a nomadic poet, novelist, and non-fiction writer, based between Athens, Greece and Pennsylvania. She is a regular contributor for The Wild Hunt News, Witch Way Magazine, and Sunflower Journal, among others. Her debut novel, Witch on the Juniata River, is forthcoming from Running Wild Press, and her essay on Tolkien and neo-paganism is forthcoming in an anthology by Luna Press Publishing. She is the creator of Seeking Numina, bringing you to sacred sites and practices through online workshops and meditations, and in Greece through tours and retreats. She also co-hosts Nature’s Wrath: Putting Nature First on the Magick Kitchen Podcast. Read her works and sign up for her newsletter at seekingnumina.com and follow her on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube @seekingnumina.
As a wildfire approached less than a kilometer from my home, something changed.
I realized the anxiety won’t help. The fear doesn’t end the flames. But grieving with the land, consulting the weather spirits, and participating in the moment will. The fire stopped that day, and the protections I leave on the land, I like to believe, keep the fires from harming my home when I am away.
Although the period of Lammas/Lughnasadh and the first harvest is a time of fire, it is not literal— it is a time of literal heat, when cicada wings beat faster each year, reminding us to stop and remember. Remember that these fires are not normal; neither are the floods on the East Coast of the US that I will be seeing soon as I prepare for the autumn festivals in the US.
A red sun during a wildfire in Miami [Photo Credit: MJTM
These extremes are not acceptable, and if we are practitioners of Earth-based spiritual paths, we cannot look away or go on as we had.
In the age of Aquarius, we must come together in community with love and find new ways of honoring the flame as it seeks to consume the illness our species is causing on her body.
It is normal to feel grief and loss at this suggestion of not lighting a fire in Leo season. To not have a live fire at a fire festival can feel wrong, especially if you’ve practiced for a long time. At the least, one might feel wistful and sad as this reality of our changing landscape is settling in. But we are Pagans, Druids, Witches, and earth-loving people. We must listen to her needs beyond what our desires or traditions have been.
The Hierophant of the Tarot is the card of upholding tradition. But it is also a card that reminds us to follow our values. This is the energy I am bringing to my personal journey as a young high priestess founding an earth temple in dark times for our planet. Not grief or sorrow, but productive, positive, open arms of inclusivity.
In my time in the UK, extreme heat caused the rubber on the doors of our train cars to melt. When we were forced to disembark, we saw signage saying the soil is too dry to run. This sign was printed on a thick, plasticized banner — they aren’t expecting this problem to end any time soon. I felt a dryness in my throat that had nothing to do with the intense heat or stuffy air in the crowded train station. As I read this sign, small children read books and looked to their parents for snacks and water. Children who may never remember cool summer evenings or green hills in August.
A fire burning [Pixabay
Fire heats attitudes. It makes us prickly if we aren’t prepared to channel it. We’ve all fallen prey to our emotions in hard times. But we cannot allow hope to fade and bitterness to set in. The children deserve better. We deserve better.
These fires are a fever. We can be the medicine.
Here are three ways to celebrate Lammas without live fire, while still working with the fire spirits:
1. Call in the rain (if that is part of your climate). If rain was called into Greece right now, in any real quantity, it would get in the way of efforts to lift waters from the sea and evacuations from affected fire zones and more importantly, cause flooding as we saw last year. Please know your climate when doing weather magic.
2. Ask the winds to calm, as this is what spreads the fires.
3. Ask the fire spirits to quell and release.
This can be done with drumming — as a native Greek priestess reviving the lost earth temple arts on the very land that burns each summer, this is my main way of connecting to land. Being the oracle my ancestors were: grounding, anchoring into the earth and communicating through and towards it.
It can also be done with visualization, walking meditations, and silent prayer. Pour out a water blessing on the land, symbolizing the rain you’re calling in. Send gratitude to the rains when they come, and go outside to welcome them with open arms.
Instead of a fire, let’s let the flames of resistance be fed this year. Pick one thing and make the change. Here are some solutions:
1. Go on your township’s website and verify what you can recycle and how it’s done.
2. Sign up for a farm co-op for your veggies.
3. Stop using paper towels as the default for drying your hands when washable towels are much more responsible.
4. Replace toilet paper with bamboo toilet paper or use a bidet when possible to minimize use.
5. Replace plastic bags or wash the ones you have instead of buying new ones.
6. Get wax coverings or silicon ones instead of cling wrap. But use what you have, as it already exists in your home and “eco-friendly solution” consumption is a problem too.
7. Don’t use disposable cutlery or plates, and if you do, on special occasions you can’t avoid, aim for bamboo and compostable solutions. Many are burnable, save the used ones for rainy months when fires are safe.
8. Start composting, diminishing methane release in landfills.
9. Shop less, it minimizes mileage of fossil fuel usage every time we don’t buy something because it tells companies to order less and less of that item, among other benefits including minimizing plastic waste.
10. Carry a reusable water bottle and don’t buy plastic water bottles.
11. Do NOT make AI images, they are the biggest consumer of water in AI, and avoid AI altogether if it is possible (I know some employers require it now… we do live in dark times).
12. And most importantly, speak up when you see someone you love doing something you can help them find a better solution for.
Just pick one and stick to it. Maybe a month later, add another. In a year, you’ll be doing more for the earth.
If you are on a spiritual path grounded in loving the earth, especially if it is your foundational spiritual belief, please be conscious. Pause before acting. Make space in your life to do the things the earth needs. And make your rituals to the earth conscious and with her health, in the grounded moments we live in, at the top of your priorities. To donate to a good cause, there are many. The one I donate to for wildfire relief in Greece is the Hellenic Initiative.
We are one with the earth, and no act of resistance is too small. The only embers I want to see spreading this month are the sparks of motivation to do better for the earth.
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