A few years ago I encountered a Norwegian folktale titled “Prince Lindworm.” This tale was completely new to me and aspects of it have lingered as I contemplate the future of my country.
In “Prince Lindworm,” a childless Queen wants an heir and follows the advice of the Wise Woman she meets in her garden. The Wise Woman tells the Queen where to find two magical roses, instructs her to eat only one, and warns that she “will be sorry” if she eats both. The Queen, of course, eats both and gives birth to twin boys. The elder child emerges as a serpent or lindworm and immediately disappears into the forest. Only the Queen witnesses this birth and, as this is not the child she wants to parent, she remains silent. The second boy is beautiful and healthy and grows into a fine young man. When he is of age to seek a wife, his path is blocked by his unknown exiled brother, Prince Lindworm, who has grown into a massive, repulsive serpent and claims his right to have a bride first. The Queen admits her failure to follow the Wise Woman’s advice and the kingdom must cope with the knowledge that the heir to the throne is an exile.
Dear FAR readers – please find photos from a celebration of the 101 anniversary of women’s suffrage, the 19th Amendment, that I attended August 26, 2021. That day marks the end of the 100th year of women having the right to vote.
One of the 18 characteristics of Africana Womanism is being a self-definer. This piece is a sliver of my process to do and be exactly that.
I am striving to be a whole Black woman. I have an awareness that I am a whole person and transcend the role that Amerikkkan* society has given black women. Wholeness is justice and justice/liberation is wholeness. We are unaware of the full extent that racism has impacted Black women psychologically and emotionally. I’m saying racism constricts us in exhausting ways- the results have been wearing on our mental and sexual health, senses, nerves, physical health for years. And it still is.
When I was invited to create this post, a number of topics came to mind. But I decided to start our conversation with my response to the question: why do I write?
I am a Colombian woman designer who promotes venture projects in a region in which it is difficult to grow a business. In my daily work life, I ask entrepreneurs why they do what they do; why do they take the risk of possible failure? Usually, once we know the why, finding the how is much easier.
Note: If you’ve been reading Athena’s story for the past two days (link to Part 2 here), you know what’s happened to her before her third birth. You’ve read her version as I heard it in my mind and wrote it down. Part 3, here, is mostly speculative, based on hints in books I’ve read during the past twenty-plus years. If you’ve read The Greek Myths by Robert Graves (who is said to be The Authority), you’ve met Medea in the context of the yarn about the Golden Fleece, but I’m leaving Jason out of this story. I’m also leaving Theseus (also associated with Medea) out. These boys have no role in Athena’s story of her meeting and her shamanic rebirth at the hands of the great Medea, who is sometimes called a sorceress. Read on.
Athena
And so with the help of the great Hera, who remembered how I had once loved her (and she still loved me), I left Zeus’ stony kingdom. Hera helped me depart, though I soon forgot her help. I suppose she is still there. After all, her own lands had been taken long before, her own throne stolen long ago, her temples and altars supplanted. I suppose she has nowhere to go now. For all I know, great Hera remains at the declining god-king’s side, where poets still deprecate her and laugh at her and call her a nagging wife. A god-king as impotent as he is now needs such a strong wife, does he not? I regret that I no longer know her.
But I could find no other kingdom that would give me charity or honor, found no other king or god who would wed me or let me speak for him, and so I become disillusioned with kings and gods and epic tales. I put down my spear and shield and abandoned my armor and helmet, though I always kept my owl (who often flew above me) and my ragged plume.
And so, twice homeless, twice born and twice dead, friendless and scorned by the men I had so harshly judged, I wandered through the world, and all anyone saw was a woman, a gray, anonymous woman carrying a stick and a drooping feather. I walked up and down in the world and had no home. I had neither friends nor sisters nor protégées to honor me, neither priestesses nor queens to love me. I had no one at all. I had nothing at all. I wandered alone through all the lands around the wine-dark sea, alone in the lands around the central sea, alone in the lands along the ocean sea and the northern sea. For uncounted years I wandered alone, stopping here and there, but never staying anywhere, searching for what I never found and no longer remembered. I went in a plain gray cloak with my stick in my hand, my sad plume in a pouch at my belt. Sometimes I ate, but more often I went hungry. Up and down upon the earth I walked, and so my pride and anger began to be worn away.
The Roman authorities executed Jesus for sedition because he posed a threat to their hegemony: their wealth and their oppressive, imperial domination system of exploiting others for profit. Jesus spoke out against their injustice, and his message resonated with the 99%. People were beginning to listen; momentum was growing. So the Empire snuffed out that “Rebel Scum” in their most excruciating, punishing, degrading form of execution. According to the logic of imperial domination, Jesus’ death should have been a humiliating, final defeat.
Instead, his movement lived on and on, grew and grew. The symbol of Imperial execution — the cross — should have symbolized the wrongness, the lack of Divine sanction, the complete Divine rejection of Jesus’ ideas, according to Empire. Instead, the Jesus Movement reclaimed the cross from an Imperial symbol of shame and turned it into a symbol of victory. Paul, the feminist liberationist prophet most responsible for the survival and spread of the Jesus Movement, repeatedly wrote that the Jesus Movement follows Christ Crucified. Paul’s message seemed scandalous and confusing— lifting up a symbol of horror, death, and defeat as proof of victory? Why? How?
Dedication: I dedicate this writing to all animals, women, children who have been violated, brutalized or murdered by men.
I will never forget
the look in her eyes
when he kicked her
the ugly brown shoe
smashing the domed
brown skull –
the daze – vacant
uncomprehending
falling to the floor
her eyes glazed
still find mine
“What did I do?”
As we strive to create a better future, we can look to our rich heritage of global goddess and heroine tales for insight into peaceful, creative, and effective means to achieve our goals. Let me introduce you to the delightful ancient story of two young Chinese heroines, Gum Lin and Loy Yi Lung.
Summarized from Merlin Stone’s Ancient Mirrors of Womanhood: Gum Lin’s village was starving due to a drought. Even the bamboo she needed to make objects to sell had disappeared. Searching for bamboo on a nearby mountain, she found a lake, but a locked gate stopped its abundant waters from flowing down to the village. A dragon living in an underwater cave held the key. Gum Lin sang sweetly until the dragon’s daughter, Loy Yi Lung, arose from the depths and together they hatched a plan. They sang in unison to draw the dragon to the surface. While Loy Yi Lung continued her song and the dragon listened, Gum Lin swam to the cave where she encountered treasures she could easily steal for herself. She ignored them and found the key. She unlocked the gate and the waters gently flowed down the mountain in a newly-made river, nourishing the rice and bamboo. In time, Loy Yi Lung moved to the village where she and Gum Lin happily sang at the edge of the water.
A year or so before the November 2020 U.S. presidential election, a private Facebook group now titled “Wives of the Deplorables! Go Vote!” came together because many women were distraught about the political ideological rift between them and their husbands—a rift that became more evident as Election Day 2020 drew nigh. Women, stunned and disappointed by the Trump-like behavior (angry, petty, and argumentative) of their Trump-supporting husbands or partners, encouraged each other virtually as Biden (now President-elect) moved closer and closer to winning the White House.
From the group’s private Facebook page: “This is a group created after a CNN report about the wives of Trump Supporters. This is not a politically affiliated group….This females only group is created to support each other and help women share their thoughts.” Continue reading “They Really Do Hate Us* by Esther Nelson”
In this most challenging time, women are showing the world what women’s spiritual power can do. They are guiding nations, states, and communities through the pandemic and towards environmental sanity; feeding the hungry bodies and spirits of their neighbors by organizing community assistance projects; offering hope and care to vulnerable family members; and leading and healing in so many other ways. They are calling on their inherent, profound belief in their own sacredness and that of others to gain access to the strength and clarity that leads to wisdom and effective action.
Yet, finding and using your spiritual power is easier when it is affirmed by the people and subtle messages you experience every day. In our society, too often girls and women may struggle to find encouragement to identify and use their spiritual power, whether because of present or past experiences or the sheer overwhelming nature of our individual and societal challenges. Yet, symbols of women’s spiritual power are all around us, everyday, and can help guide us to that deep well within we have all carried since birth.
Dedication: I dedicate this writing to all animals, women, children who have been violated, brutalized or murdered by men.
Feminism and Religion 