The stars shine bright and the salt air is crisp, with a touch of damp. In Golden Gate Park we gather for the women's mysteries. Entering her gates, we travel a tunnel to the womb. Here hundred of women have gathered here the to learn her wisdom. In the hours that follow we will sing, dance and chant, and finally we will all lie in the dark and follow the voice into the other world. One voice but many visions, we each go to meet the Crone.

Afterwards, the women share their visions -- many have met their grandmother, great-grandmother. Others tell of Hecate and Grandmother Spider. I am strangely quiet. Unwilling to speak my vision, I search for pen and paper to write it down least I loose it. And so it reads:

I walked the spiral path through the woods, round and round. With me I carry the tool I thrust into my hands -- the labyris. The labyris is my tool of control, anger, precision, solitary strength and determination -- of cussedness and a refusal to be destroyed. As I walk the path, I look for tool I have worked for -- the cauldron. The tool of healing, creativity, compassion and communication. The ability to make my life more than survival.

The light of the fire draws me into the circle, where the cauldron sits on a bed of coals. The long, delicate hands of an old woman stirs the pot and dropped the salt into the brew. As I approach, the cowl falls back from her head revealing the brown-blond curls, with silver-gray swirling in their waves. She looks up at me and her pale bright blue eyes meet mine. She has my mother's eyes. My eyes.
"Your eyes," she says and smiles. "Your eyes and your hands."

She is calm and amused to see me. And as he speaks I am filled with the visions and sensations of her words. "These hands are the hands that have reached into the cauldron. With these hands I have sculpted women's bodies, made clothes for them, wrote words that reached their hearts, and reached within their wombs for their desire.

"The power in these hands is yours. Each wrinkle is a testament to all they have done."

"How do I become you?" I ask.

Her laugh is deep and mischievous, "You have a choice? You already are and you will be. You have me within you. You have the ability to reach within yourself as you have reached within others. But to reach this point on the spiral you will have to move beyond the Maid to the Mother. You must accept the cord will be cut with your mother. You must take her within yourself and learn to mother yourself.

"All your life nothing has been real to you until shared with Momma. Momma makes the world real. Your mother has been your mirror in which you find yourself. You must find the capacity within yourself to make reality. You must take yourself into your own arms and become mother to yourself. You must allow your mother to complete the spiral and it must be real."

And as she speaks I cry. I weep because she has spoken my deepest fear. I know she is right. I think of my mother and I want to be with her forever."

"In some ways you will," she tells me.

I turn to her, "You have spoken the truth to me. What can I do for you honored one?"

She smiles sadly, "Kiss my mother for me. Because even though I have taken her within myself, I am no longer able to kiss her cheek. Hold her in your arms, because now that she is within my body, I can not hold her in my arms anymore. Love her now so that you can love yourself in her stead."

She points to the fire, "Reach into the cauldron and draw forth yourself."