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Shove Your Brunch Where the Sun Don’t Shine: The M...

Shove Your Brunch Where the Sun Don’t Shine: The Madness of the Witch-Mothers

Yes, happy Mother’s Day to you, too. Now, kindly shove your brunch where the sun don’t shine. We are the Witch-Mothers, and don’t think we can’t hear every cowardly, cornered whisper about our vulgarity and viciousness. Your quiet condescension is not lost on us, rest assured, and we’re asking you nicely to stop praying for our children’s souls. We’re doing just fine, thank you very much, and your 24 karat crucifixes are hardly a divinely mandated right to think yourself spiritually and maternally superior.

Wear your wildness any way you like or not at all, but roll up and stuff your judgment inside those fancy bags of yours. You have your family crests on your doors, sure, but our homes are blessed by our ancestors. You take your vacations, and we’ll take ours. Call us mad all you like. Your feigned perfection isn’t fooling anyone anyway, and I’ll bet your basements are scarier than mine. I’m not hiding anything, wives from Stepford. My dark is out there for all to see, and my cookies still taste better than yours.

My babes are hardly the devil’s spawn, though they can speak in hell’s mother tongue with the best of the winged minions. I did not conjure my little beasts out of a cauldron; I grunted and howled just like you did. My friends and I, the ones at whom you fling your jagged pity and pink-dick politics, were not granted a reprieve from the pain of childbirth by any dark lord, though I’ll admit I tried. Our pentagram tattoos stretched across our swollen bellies, and our babes suckled at our once-pierced and still-hard nipples. They bit us when they were teething, too, and our curses echoed so loudly our dead grandmothers heard them and blessed us. We rocked our little loves to sleep crooning blues lyrics and chanting Pagan rhymes, and, like you, we wept on the lonely nights when the fatigue blurred our vision and our whole village was fast asleep . We cast our circles while our brew bubbled on the stove, and we carved protection sigils into the floor under our children’s cribs while they crawled about the drying herbs with our black, furry familiars.

We are the Witch-Mothers, and we are a living contradiction. Sometimes we are stretch-marked, soft-bellied beauty and stained clothes. Sometimes we are leaking breasts and feminine ire. Sometimes we kiss our young sweetly on the forehead, smooth their hair back, then bid them to sleep so we may ride our lovers late past the Witching Hour. Sometimes we warm bottles between our legs and drift to sleep communing with the ancients and dreaming of horned gods and cloaked crones.

Don’t mock us, fickle one. We are the Witch-Mothers, and we will go to battle for the future of the innocence we are raising. I hate to break it to you, old man in the red hat, but my little ones are far wiser than you. Go ahead and fake your feminism, fascist. We’re on to you. My wee ones know the definitions of privilege and oppression, do you? I’m afraid they have more hopeful sentiment in the ends of their wild hair and grass-stained knees than you have in your whole bloodline.

Enjoy your carnations and your mimosas. I’ll be sipping stinky tea and snuggling with my brave-hearted babes beneath warm blankets. We’re not that different, you and I, and I hope your day is brimming with enlightening compassion and intriguing wonder. After you’re full and fed, stumble over to my haunted house, leaving your fire and brimstone at home of course, and we can swap birth stories and filthy jokes over some honey mead. You’ll ask me if my friendship makes you a sinner, and I’ll tell you yes, then we’ll laugh like raucous old crones who’ve set aside all care for social convention. Such unlikely friends we’ll be, my straight-laced Sister! You have some madness in you, I know it. Happy Mother’s Day, you closeted Witch. I won’t be waiting for you, but do come over when you’re ready to get dirty. The days grow warmer, and I’ve some bones to bury in my garden.

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Danielle is a heathen visionary, Aquarian mischief-maker, and word-witch. The author of Woman Most Wild and The Holy Wild., she teaches internationally and has facilitated circles, embodiment trainings, communal spell-work, and seasonal rituals since 2007. She is the founder of The Hag School, the lead teacher for the Flame-Tender Teacher Training, and believes in the emerging power of wild collectives and sudden circles of curious dreamers, cunning witches, and rebellious artists in healing our ailing world. As an Irish-American, Danielle’s witchcraft is deeply rooted in Celtic philosophy and Irish mythology. She believes fervently in the role of ancestral healing, embodiment, and animism in fracturing the longstanding systems supporting white-body supremacy and environmental unconsciousness, is committed to centering the voices and teachings of POC and LGBTQIA+ folks in her work as founder of Living Mandala, LLC and The Hag School and supports organizations and initiatives that do the same. Parent to two beloved wildlings and partner to a potter, Danielle fills her world with nature, family, and intentional awe. Find her praying under pine trees, wandering through the haunted places, and whispering to her grandmothers’ ghosts.
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Danielle is a heathen visionary, Aquarian mischief-maker, and word-witch. The author of Woman Most Wild and The Holy Wild., she teaches internationally and has facilitated circles, embodiment trainings, communal spell-work, and seasonal rituals since 2007. She is the founder of The Hag School, the lead teacher for the Flame-Tender Teacher Training, and believes in the emerging power of wild collectives and sudden circles of curious dreamers, cunning witches, and rebellious artists in healing our ailing world. As an Irish-American, Danielle’s witchcraft is deeply rooted in Celtic philosophy and Irish mythology. She believes fervently in the role of ancestral healing, embodiment, and animism in fracturing the longstanding systems supporting white-body supremacy and environmental unconsciousness, is committed to centering the voices and teachings of POC and LGBTQIA+ folks in her work as founder of Living Mandala, LLC and The Hag School and supports organizations and initiatives that do the same. Parent to two beloved wildlings and partner to a potter, Danielle fills her world with nature, family, and intentional awe. Find her praying under pine trees, wandering through the haunted places, and whispering to her grandmothers’ ghosts.

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