The Corn-Wolf at Harvest

This is an invocation of the Corn-Wolf as protector of the seeds that hold the promise of crops and life to come. We are indebted to our far-flung colleague, Zafar, who created the outline for the ritual as a student project before moving to Australia. He told us at the time he was inspired by a women’s group house here in Washington DC that he passed each day on his way to work. Someone was always cooking or preparing food there, and residents of his block soon came to call it the house of the women who cook.

But without grain and other fruits of the Earth, there would be no food and no cooking. And indeed, the crop harvest in much of the world is declining, partly because of soil nutrient exhaustion and other soil-fertility problems. But an often-overlooked cause of crop loss is gene exhaustion: the dramatic decline in crop genetic diversity.

This problem was brought home especially dramatically for the United States in the early 1970’s, when blight devastated much of the corn crop. Since almost all the commercial corn in the U.S. derived from the same basic genetic stock and had been heavily hybridized for a few choice genetic traits the entire corn crop was jeopardized. Scientists have since gone back to wild varieties of maize to recover some of the biological diversity that had previously protected corn from disease threats of that magnitude. Unfortunately, because of habitat loss, corporate monopolies on seed stocks, and the introduction of modern agricultural techniques, thousands of unique and potentially valuable corn varieties are extinct.

The world over, people are struggling to preserve what remains of that genetic diversity. In America, many individual gardeners have joined this fight in a big way, returning to heirloom varieties of crops grown by their grandparents or native peoples. The situation is similar in other countries.

So we invoke the European archetype of the Corn-wolf to help us preserve the genetic pool of our plant resources. The Corn-wolf is a typical vegetation deity; it is the embodiment of the spirit of the grain residing in the last sheaf harvested from the field. Often, that sheaf was preserved and used for the next year’s seed grain. When the wind passed over the fields of barley, causing the grain to ripple and sway, it was the custom in some European communities to say: It is the breath of the Corn-Wolf, or The Corn-Wolves are in the field.

We hope you will take the opportunity of the upcoming Harvest Moon to collect and preserve your own heirloom plant seeds, making a personal contribution to preservation of genetic diversity.

Ritual: The Seeds of the Future

The focus of this ritual is the blessing and eating of a sacred harvest meal. Prepare a sacred space, preferably out-of-doors. On an altar in that space, rest a platter of seed cakes (cornbread or oatcakes or other grain-baked goods), a goblet or decanter of wine or fruit juice, and a bowl of corn, wheat, or barley seeds.

As the full Harvest Moon rises, close your eyes and feel the power of the Moon flood through your body as the light of the Moon floods the landscape. Feel the pull of the Moon in the tides of your blood; match your breathing to the rise and fall of these tides. When you are relaxed and centered, proceed with the ritual. If it is your practice to do so, cast and consecrate a formal Circle now. Invoke such Powers as is your custom, or use the following invocations for Wind, Sea, and Stone.

We invoke you, Wind,
Powerful force of clarity and choice,
Of decisions, of culling and cutting and saving,
Of what will live and what will die this season.
Welcome, Wind.

We invoke you, Sea,
Powerful force of love and longing,
Of the sorrow of choice,
Of mourning for the lost and the soon to die.
Welcome, Sea.

We invoke you, Stone,
Powerful force of strength and necessity,
Of the long darkness, gravid with light,
Of the fear and joy of birth and death.
Welcome, Stone.

Return to the Altar, and take up the bowl of corn. Plunge your hands into the bowl, feeling the life force in the heart of the kernels. Let the grains cascade over and through your fingers, a rich golden river of life pulsing with the heat of the past summer’s sun. Trace a circle on the ground around you with the corn; scatter any remaining kernels to the four winds. Visualize the circle glowing with golden light.

Into the circle invoke the spirit of the Corn-Wolf, the vegetation god of the harvest who lies in wait for the coming of the Spring and guards the life of the corn through the harsh Winter. Use these words or a rune of your own devising:

We invoke you Corn-Wolf
brother, lover, sower of seed
bread
sustenance
that which dies for life.
Be with us.

As you speak the invocation, let your mind conjure up images of wind passing over great fields of grain, the hot breath of the Wolf caressing the meadows. Hear his footfalls in the rustling of the grain.

Take up the goblet of wine for blessing. Trace whatever symbols of power you wish over the liquid, feeling the sap of the harvest welling up within the chalice. Use these or words of your choosing (At Cithaeron, we plunge a dagger into the wine and use it to trace a pentagram over the top of the goblet):

As the blade reflects the Power-of-the-Gods,
So the cup represents their Compassion.
Combined, they bring blessedness,
For they are One in True.

Take up the platter of seed cakes. Trace your symbols of power over them, recognizing as you do that as the wine is the blood of harvest the cakes are the flesh of earth. Consecrate the cakes by sprinkling them with wine from the chalice.

Before anyone drinks of the wine or eats of the cakes, the Corn-wolf should be given the first portions of each. Each person in the ritual speaks a toast to the Corn-Wolf, takes a sip and passes the wine to the next person. Each participant breaks off a piece of bread and crumbles it at the circle’s perimeter. All share the cakes and wine. Other foodstuffs could also be shared at this time, and any additional magical workings could be incorporated here. The Pathwork (below), if used, should be done now.

When all have finished and are ready to finish the ritual, end the sacred meal with these or other words of your choosing:

I have eaten, and am sated this season.
The Corn-Wolf sleeps within me.
I bless the life within.
Let it die and sleep, to wake again.

Thank the powers of wind and sea and stone for their presence and participation. The corn can be left on the ground for creatures of the wood and field; if the circle is an indoor ritual, collect the grain and scatter it outside. Pour out any remaining wine, and crumble the last of the seed cakes on the ground.

Close the Circle, if cast, according to your tradition.

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We are indebted to our colleagues at New Moon Rising, in which we published an early version of this ritual  in Issue 44 as a Moonweb ritual. Just as the Corn-Wolf guards our crops, so NMR has been a faithful custodian over the years of many of our early rituals.

Pathwork: Meeting the Corn-Wolf

With your eyes closed, breathe deeply and thoroughly, feeling the tension drain from your body with each exhalation. Ground and center using your personal techniques for meditation.

Into your mind’s eye comes the image of a golden field of barley, ripe and ready for the autumn harvest. In your hands rests a scythe; its sharp, curved blade cuts effortlessly in great swathes as you walk slowly through the field, cutting the grain. It is late in the year and approaching sunset; still the sun beats down hotly on the golden stalks; you feel the hot breath of the sun on your back and shoulders. Sweat beads on your forehead and drips from your arms, it pools across your chest and soaks the clothing you wear. Your arms and legs itch where the chaff clings to sweaty skin. This is the last field of the last of the harvest; you are bone-weary from weeks of harvesting.

The scythe has a rhythm. Raise the blade on the count of one, swing it through the grain to the count of two and three, the return to center is the count of four. You inhale and exhale to the four-count rhythm of the harvest, lulled by the exertion of your muscles and the soft swishing of the curved blade through the grain. Around you others are scything the field, as well.

You are mesmerized by the harvest rhythm; you forget your aching shoulders and back, the stinging of the sweat, your thirst. You lose track of time, and when you next are aware of your surroundings, the sun has set and the twilight is falling around you. The other harvesters are indistinct in the gloom; you yourself have only a few more passes of the scythe before the field is laid completely bare. A few crickets begin to sing, then fall suddenly silent. You straighten your back for a moment, wiping the sweat from your eyes, and notice that although the dusk around you is eerily quiet the last few sheaves of standing grain are thrashing wildly and violently. Startled, you take a step back.

The thrashing ceases as a large amber wolf with blazing yellow eyes materializes between you and the remaining stand. In the tense moments that follow, you are locked into the lambent gaze of the Corn-Wolf. You sense his fierceness, his wildness: you feel how vulnerable you are, how easily the wolf could kill you. Even the great blade in your hand offers little protection against this spirit wolf.

And yet you sense something else, as well; a bond, a tendril of communication, of shared responsibility. Images flood your mind of seeds rotting in the granary, of mice and rats eating the seed grains for next year’s crop, of fields blighted by disease. The wolf is calling to you to help it protect the young life in the kernels of grain. Take a few moments to mentally explore with the wolf what would be required of you as a protector of the grain.

When you feel you fully understand, silently pledge your aid in protecting these seeds through the harsh winter to come. The harvest moon has risen behind the wolf; its golden pelt glows against the dark stubble of the harvested field. A cloud passes over the face of the moon, and when the shadow departs the field, the wolf has disappeared as well. The grain waves violently for a moment, then is still. Crickets sing from the stubble; their calls echo in your mind as you return to waking reality.

FoxFire

For some reason, foxes have come to occupy my mind a great deal of late. At least two frequent my suburban back yard — at least when the dog is indoors! — and snack on a little dry dog food I put out for the crows. During a recent moon ritual in the back yard, the following fox summons flowed into my mind, although I have yet to figure out how to use it (and am frankly puzzled by the odd word “lochses”) –

“Come foxes from lochses
Through frost and through fire
Through heath and through heather
Through bog and through briar
Come stealthy, come silent,
Come fierce and come free,
Come tracing the pathways
Of wind, stone, and sea.”

We learn in our work at EarthStar never to ignore lays like this that come unbidden to mind during Circle; they always make their meaning known eventually.

Wake-Robin

“Mounting toward the upland again, I pause reverently as the hush and stillness of twilight come upon the woods. It is the sweetest, ripest hour of the day. And as the hermit’s evening hymn goes up from the deep solitude below me, I experience that serene exaltation of sentiment of which music, literature, and religion are but the faint types and symbols.”

John Burroughs wrote these words in the late 1800’s, in a seminal US nature writing book, Wake-Robin. He’s speaking of the hermit thrush, of course, not hermits of the human variety. He’s walking at dusk in the woods of New England, having spent the day roaming the wood lots and wild forest near his home.

Here at EarthStar, we take these words literally — our religion and ritual are based directly on our experience of the wild. Ritual, for us, replicates what we observe in nature — in the seasons, the life cycles of plants and animals, the ebb and flow of the earth’s power tides. And yet, these rituals can only be reflections of those grand cycles — powerful symbols, yes, and work in which we learn ever more about the Earth and its creatures.