The Rites of Spring in the High Rocky Mountains.

The sunny birds have stirred me from my winter hibernation to embrace the fertility of Spring. Immediately my eyes lift heavenward to the Rocky Mountains towering above. My heart is like a magnet, as it yearns to be reunited with the wilds of my youth. As soon as I could walk on my own, I was introduced to the near-by mountains and have gone back again and again for the rest of my life. I feel such a strong and peaceful bond with all of nature. It ignited a life-long passion for nature that burns brighter with each passing year. Soon, it will be time to perform my "Consecration of Spring" ritual.

It involves finding a secluded woods far away from camp sites to strip naked. Nudity is our natural form--it is what Mother Nature intended us to wear in our natural habitat. But, since we can't walk around naked all the time, I like to incorporate it into many of my Neo-Pagan rituals. In those hidden woods, I dig a small hole with my hands. I don't use a man-made object because it lacks the personal connection to the fertile dirt that feeds us and gives us resources for shelter and fuel.

I like to raise a scoop of dirt in my hands to my nose and smell of its richness. It is a gesture of respect to the soil's power. At the same time, it's soft yet rich scent relaxes my body and mind, allowing the chaotic stress of modernity to melt away quicker. It's a ritual that shakes the grime of city life off my mind so I can get into spiritual state worthy of Mother Nature's beauty. It's a ritual that reminds me I don't have to carry the baggage of my daily life out in nature. It disintegrates the knots of stress, so that I can fully embrace the experience of nature. I don't believe in rituals without preparing your spirit first because otherwise you rush through it and miss the messages Mother Nature has for you because you weren't in the right frame of mind.

This is where I will be adding some new rituals to my "Consecration of Spring" ceremony. I like to bath in mountain streams when I go backpacking far away from human contact. So, I was thinking that before I strip naked in a secluded grove, and dig the hole that I'll bath in a mountain stream to ritualistically cleanse the grime of materialism from my body. Then when I'm naked I am pure for the rituals to come. Finally, upon completion of the bathing and digging, I drop some wildflower seeds in the hole. Then, I begin to masturbate.

I really loose myself in it, without drawing too much attention. I thank Mother Nature for giving me such a beautiful tool, as my aroused phallus to spread fertility. I thank her for making me a man and with it the enjoyment a sexually horny male can enjoy. I dedicate myself to supporting all ideas that further the birth of revolutionary changes that improve life for humans and animals. Then, when I've extended my masturbating for as long as I can, I unload my streaming man seed (cum) into the hole (womb) as a symbolic ritual of rebirth.

A dedication to a Springtime of renewal and stewardship of nature. It is a ritual where I symbolically impregnate nature and thus feel a deeper bond to the land--and to protect it like I would my own family. It represents a renewed hope and dedication to give birth to new and positive changes in my life. It helps me feel like I am re-connecting with my "natural man" instincts, too. Then I fill in the hole with the soil dug out and cover the sacrificial area with leaves, in a nod to the environmentalists creed, "Leave nature as pristine as you found it." Leave no trace of human activity behind. Feel free to adopt anything that calls to from my "Consecration of Spring" ritual...I believe in communal co-operation and sharing of spiritual expression. That's all for now...

~The Green Man Has Spoken~

The Sacred Pines.

Having been raised in the alpine region of Colorado, USA and spending countless hours camping or backpacking within the vast pine forests here, I have grown very fond of those trees. In European nature based spirituality, the pine trees are symbols of immortality. This makes sense given they survive year round. They never experience the mass loss of leaves like deciduous tree leaves that shrivel up and blow away, which is otherwise quite the visual portrayal of death.

Years of backpacking have taught me how to live as close to nature as possible living my the principle of "Leave the land how you found it." The sacred pine tree offers the initiate an infinite number of useful tools in the wilderness. The most essential thing to accomplish when first backpacking in the deep wilderness is to get your shelter up. You might be hungry but the weather can turn from 78 degrees to 45 degrees really quick at high altitude. Or you can easily be enjoying the blissful rays of the sun god before minutes later the rain gods empty the sky as though someone tore a gash in the sky. Besides, most tent shelters these days come with a small vestibule to cook under with a backpacking stove when Mother Nature decides to storm about in unpredictable turmoil. The last thing you want up in the alpine is to caught out in a chilling storm without shelter.

In preparing my shelter I often sweep the ground area to be used with a pine branch--the bunches of needles splitting off from the branch are great for using as a broom. Then I discover in my researching of old, dusty, websites online that pine was often used to sanctify outdoor ritual areas by sweeping the ground clean. Interesting. Yeah, I always had a feeling when I swept the ground clear for a camp site that I was making a grounding, spiritual gesture with the Earth. Especially with the strong, fresh, cold, cleansing smell it emits, like an incense offering wafting through a contemplative spiritual gathering. I'm going to remember this the next time I go backpacking. It will mean even more after learning additional information about the sacred connections.Whole, dense, forest of pine trees sway in patterns at times like waves. An ocean of eternal green. At other times the vast stands of trees seem like a city of green skyscrapers. Yet always, a stoic and often silent army of the animal and plant communities of the labyrinth style forest floor. Haunted by the grey ghost that is the mysterious and elusive lynx--my favorite species of cat with whom I feel a strong connection to. If I could morph into cat form it would be the lynx. The pine forest is a netherworld of secrets, wisdom and mystery--and the lynx is the recluse of that world.May the scared pines remain dense and strong, so that they will reveal their secrets of life to the next generation, and further still down the rabbit hole of the future. Hail the great pines!! Respect.

Sacred Groves.

Trees are the great repositories of time, guardians of animals and walls to house sacred spaces. They are natural sanctuaries, which block out much of the wind and cold of the open lands. Trees reach into the heavens as if to remind us of the greater universe that we are apart of. They are wonderful examples of patience and going with the flow of nature and life rather than against it--They bend but rarely break. The quietude that they provide obviously makes them ideal for spiritual and secular contemplation. They speak in hushed, rustling of leaves to scatter their secrets to the four corners of Earth. It is the sound of air being cleansed for the trees are the lungs of this miraculous, blue, planet. And seeing how our first ancestors lived in trees, Is it any wonder that we like to climb trees as children?I climbed a lot of trees as a kid and found them to be the closest things to floating in air as I sat amongst the blue skies and swayed about in the wind. I would put my books in a small canvas ball, hang it around my neck and ascend into the leafy heights of our giant cottonwoods that were anchored in our backyard. The trees branches always held me strong and tight as I lost myself in the pages of my books. They cradled me and inspired lofty day dreams, which were carried into the heaves with the breeze.Now those big cottonwoods are dying -- they are rotting from the inside out. They have to be cut down or my parents risk them falling on the house. Yet even in death those trees gives one last gift -- wood to carry warmth through out the long, cold, Colorado winters. Nature can be rough and the falling of a great tree is a thing to mourn yet it teaches us that even the big, giants of this world must die. However, even with the most violent crash to the ground of a forest god, new life will be given a chance to reach for the sun to fill the hole left behind. Just like the picture above with the new growth growing on the fallen tree. It's the beautiful, cruel yet fair and eternal cycle of life.

TOP PHOTO CREDIT: Druids in a sacred grove by Nocturntable

MIDDLE PHOTO CREDIT: Reading up in a tree

BOTTOM PHOTO CREDIT: Fallen giant

I Went to the Woods.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

~Henry David Thoreau

Green Man: We have tamed our earthy ancestral roots with the rope of a neck tie and the apron ties of a house wife. Our inner connection with nature has been buried by layer after layer of materialistic pursuits. We have traded the protective, giving and sacred labyrinth of nature for the cold, gray, polluted concrete jungle, which are our cities. We have destroyed much of nature including the recent guardians of them -- the First Nation Americans. Still, there are some of us who heed the call of the wild, pick up the tradition from the First Nation people and seek out the untamed pockets of the natural world so that we might always remember our true source of life. I was lucky to have been born and raised not a few miles from the great, untamed Rocky Mountains and spent just as much time wandering through the great pine forests as I did the barren concrete side walks of "progress." I know the sounds, smells and instincts of the wilderness like I know my own neighborhood.



I am a child of the woods and thus guardian of these sacred spaces. Especially a spot so remote into the high mountains and dense pine stands that in 14 years of backpacking to it I can count on one hand the amount of other people I've seen up there. It is a hallowed place, which has become a place that our family cherishes deeply. It is an oasis of untamed land where moose and large herds of elk and deer roam freely. They have been under protective status in this area for so long they seem right at home sharing the land with us. I have had the humbling honor of moose walking by our camp within 10 yards or so. We come to an understanding especially with the moose who are the animals that most frequent our divine alpine lake. When they look at me I avert my eyes slightly so as not to be confrontational but in that shared moment an understanding is reached to respect each other's space and right to enjoy the land. For all are but guests when visiting the wilderness.



It saddens me that many people including children have not even seen a cow let alone some of the most raw, natural wonders of this divine planet we share with all expressions of existence be it animal, plant or rock. It is with that knowledge that I recognize my fortuitous circumstances to be able to live in such an area like Colorado, which is one of the last truly untamed places left in America. As I've said the woods have been my companion and guide since I was a child and even still after all these years of visiting I learn knew lessons each time I enter their inner sanctuaries.



There is an immediate change that occurs when you take that first step to engulf yourself in a forest. Things get instantly much quieter as if in reverence to the natural temple that is a forest. So that when something does sound like a bird call it becomes much more than a simple bird call that we might not even be aware of down in the city. Yet in the holy places of nature these sounds might as well be trumpets from the descent onto Earth of an almighty god. It is because of this palpable feeling of reverance that inspires me to ask permission every time we enter these places and upon leaving offer up gratitude for the gifts, lessons and protection granted us.



So indeed Thoreau touched on something powerful about nature, which gives meaning and a sense of being alive. Thus, a person who has not fully experienced nature in all it's glory has not truly lived. It is therefore my hope that all men and women can respond to the call from Mother Nature to return home again and be healed. Embrace her with open arms and feel whole once more. If I had money I would set up a program to enable kids and young adults from inner cities to come and experience the awesomeness of pure nature. I want them to see that there is a world that is ten times more amazing than any video game.

PHOTO CREDIT: Stunning, mysterious and beautiful picture by D L Ennis. I highly recommend looking at the rest of his pictures because he is an amazing photographer. Click here to view this picture and many others.

-Not All Who Wander Are Lost-