Once upon a time
or was it just yesterday,
Those who sought power and dominion over
what they could not understand,
could not control,
could not see beyond their own
buffed up, bloated, blah! blah! blah! image
concocted a scorn,
a ridicule,
a banishment,
for the “others” they could not understand
could not control
could not recognize in their own
puffed up, pompous, portentous image.

They unwittingly named us …
Witch.

Ha!
Listen, this is not just
the Night of the Witches …
this is the
Season of the Witches. 

It is our time …
yay, nigh time
for women and men
to step up and forward and reclaim
the legacy of the witch
who is by definition
the wise one
the holy one
the seeing one
the anointing one.

This is a call forth to all witches
to be the wild voice in the town square
that beckons us out of the
fractured, wounded, small and deafening places of
our personal and collective fear.

Go into your garden of healing potions.
Find the wise words to tell another story.
Lead us into the holy places of one another.
Envision the possibilities of peace.
Anoint our dying to power and security and answers
and nations and gods made in our own image.
Stand at the portal of your own courage
with open arms wide open
to midwife
the unexpected
the unimagined
the stranger in you
who may just light the way.

Practice magic.
Restore wonder.
Bewitch.
Be Witch.

And when they call you
“Witch!”
bow and say

“Thank you.”

******

Mary Byrne Hoffmann
October 31