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Miscellaneous

Global gathering 2017

August 8-17th, 2017 – Saw the second Global Radical Faerie Gathering which took place at Featherstone Castle.

 120 faeries from more than 20 countries gathered to build and strengthen our global network. Albion, Euro, American and Canaan tribes were all well represented, and were joined by faerie pioneers from around the world, including delegates from China, Nigeria, Russia, Benin, Cameroon and Singapore.

In August 2017, thirty-eight years after its founding [of Rad Fae community], a sold-out, international Radical Faerie gathering was held in Great Britain with the stated goal of creating a global Radical Faerie community. Its aim is to have “queer people step up and claim our freedom and security and human rights, our meaningful and valuable place in society,” echoing the Gay Essentialist intent that originally motivated Hay and Kilhefner to call the Radical Faeries into being.   Don Kilhefner  https://www.laprogressive.com/gay-identity/

Here are words from some of those that attended:

Thanks to the Albion Faeries for hosting the Global Gathering and welcoming us into your world and culture. It was magical to make connections with people from around the world and hear their stories and political and cultural challenges and difficulties. It is an honour to be part of this ongoing multicultural dialogue. Bobby

As the sun sets on the first day back in muggle non faerie space, I think of the first thing said to me upon arrival at Featherstone, “Welcome home”. It took me aback a little, but within several hours I understood why we’d called it such. I have never felt so apart of a family, a tribe, a community as I have this week so thank you all for being apart of this experience. This is the start of a beautiful journey that I look forward to sharing with each and everyone of you.   Red

Really missing my time in the castle with all you beautiful faeries. Words can’t really describe how beautiful it was too be welcomed and witnessed with such lovingly open arms (and other body parts). Spirit gifted me a song at the gathering. A song that she’s only shared with me once before. A gift that resonates with me right now as powerful as the gift of getting to witness all you lovely beings. Thank you, yes you, for welcoming me into the sacred space that is the gathering we created and the cauldron we continue to stir our love and support in to.   Dirty D Extraordinaire

Exceptional and unique. Every individual, every shared moment, every bonded cluster… so many profound experiences shared at the Castle. Deep affection, pure love. I know no one who’s heart was not touched by the pink pulsing energy of all of us beautiful souls together. Waving the Faerie flag, knickers, dresses in the air.    Blue

Thank you all for your magic and presence. As I placed the final stones in this ‘circle’, I thought of us all, different shapes and sizes and colours, not made to fit any one way, but coming together harmoniously to make a thing of beauty. Sorry to the farmer that asked me to put them all back; it was too rainy on the last day to do so… Much love for all the comfort, challenges, support, and familiarity with you all. Many thanks to John for sharing his giant home with us, and to the land for holding us in it’s beautiful way.

‘Faerie Castle’
Castle strong,
You hold us tight!
Castle wise,
You know our might!
Castle old,
You’ve seen us grow!
Castle stay,
We’ve far to go!
Every moment in you
Is a moment of Truth!
Every movement in you
Is a dance of youth!
Every secret we’ve shared
Is a promise we’ve made!
Every touch, kiss and cuddle,
An emotional parade!
We’re bonded in story!
We’re bonded in song!
Sing out, sing proud,
Sing loud, hard, and long!
The castle is in us;
The castle is our hearts!
We build it together;
We make up its parts!
We hold one another
By our warm fire light!
We walk our own halls,
By day and by night!
We share what is in us;
We are sheltered in our love!
We keep coming together,
And see our castle
Rising
Above!                ~Earthflame

What a brilliant and amazing Gathering. Back in my own home again, tired and immensely happy, and proud of everyone at Global for what we created and achieved there and what will come of it in the years and decades ahead.

Thank you for receiving what I gave
Thank you for giving what I received
Thank you for the hugs and the compliments
Thank you for the laughter, the dancing and the drumming
Thank you for noticing when I was sad
Thank you for comforting me in my sadness
Thank you for the community and connection
Thank you for your love
Thank you for being who you are    Taz Spirit Warrior

When I first came out in the late 60s, I had no word for what I was. After Stonewall, many of us homosexuals flocked to the great urban settings and found anonymity and freedom to be more open as to who we were. I found my first tribe there and it was a time to explore, to come out, to figure out what it meant to be gay in the neighbourhoods we lived in, the workplace, the street, the underground, the world. I can still remember the unfamiliar heady feeling of freedom from just being gay. The community hadn’t evolved enuf yet to begin identifying into further distinctions (other than what what I would call the Top 5: Western, Leather, Military, Preppy, Drag.) For me, it was the onset of the AIDS epidemic that began to help me discern that we were a . . . “people” . . . and that we were about something. We know now that some of the support models for People with AIDS that were created in the early 80s have become the norm, as well as how medications are accessed, etc. At some point I began to consider and appreciate the power of what it means to be an ‘outsider’ in the larger mainstream world which increasingly included other homosexuals. My sense is that the outsiders/outlaws/edgewalkers need to be able to see each other and bind together (ala the castle) and, if the larger mainstream has enough insight, they should finds ways to appreciate and support (or at least live and let live) the outsider/other as well. The truth is that there are no insiders without the outsiders; their survival is directly linked to ours.   Ed Wolf

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Drawn as a response to the Global Gathering, this began as a visual representation of our spiral dance at the closing circle. Our collective creation, initiated by W’Fang, was a beautiful highlight of my magical faerie experience.  Moss  {PICTURE}

Restored. Connected. Overflowing… Such a fat and gorgeous week with you all and such an important personal milestone and mirror for me in community. Global tribe alive. See you all in a discrete corner of the world somewhere soon.    Octopus

I’ve been reflecting on why I feel so exhausted AND ecstatic after our gathering. Late last night I realised, the gathering was and is a personal and collective re-birth. A calling forth of ecstasy in a manner traditionally reserved for mystics who experienced the divine as lover. And so it is, when we meet one another from soul-love, we meet the divine. What a gift, and what a challenge when we can’t meet others in this way! I think this challenge is exhausting me – and I don’t think I’m alone in this experience….

“Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away”
For what is here now, but the pieces of a shattered vessel
Too burdened to carry further, released, fragrant again
Eager with spring’s sharp waters
Abounding with winter’s fertile song
Let us a sing a new song, and be glad   Qweaver, 28aug17

Positivity and energy abound. I truly, really have a Faemily who help me understand, be and flourish. I see in my mind”s eye and hear again the conversations, experiment, intimacy, challenge at The Global Gathering. Revelation, envy, laughter, fun. Powering through discomfort, a new confidence is developing in me. When there are cloudy days in the future, I will think about the GG, odd days when there were heavy clouds in the sky but know that the sun is hidden behind them and it will make an appearance when it is and I am ready.   Blue

Hi, some have asked for the words to the song we sang at closing…
“With each change we make
let it begin
With each step we take
let it begin
With each chain we break
let it begin
Every time we awake
let it begin”
Thanks to WFang for the memory, song and leading.  Kwai

My usual way of processing after a gathering includes making a play-list of tunes that resonate personally during and since.
I have made this one collaborative so that others with easy access to Spotify can add in too.
There are stories behind my choices, but I name no names !
https://open.spotify.com/user/miqhey/playlist/0saGn3BVJ8TdsVVndKnaTj   Miqxture

…had coffee with friends this morning and they asked me what did i enjoy most?
Impossible question… the answer took ten minutes and included morning coffee, sunshine in the car park, organised chaos and spontaneous choral works in the kitchen, the warm cosy chat friendly fires and the walks in the country with only the sheep and cows bearing witness to the explosions of colour and fashion, drums, laughter and late nights.
i talked about washing up pots and pans for 100 people, while singing and laughing like a small furry animal from snow white… flitting around the kitchen performing magic and feeding the faeries.
i talked about the workshops and the conversations, the leaning and the teaching and i talked about the strangers – who were just friends we hadn’t met yet.        Pink Dalek

Thank you to everyone for an amazing gathering. It renewed my faith in the radical faeries and in myself.   Astro

I ride the waves
Floating towards my home shore
Waves of calm
Waves roughly shaking me
Waves of love
Waves of tears
Waves of song
Waves of laughter
Waves of memories
Waves from the distance
Like Omar Sharif appearing in the desert mirage
You wave to me and I long for you
I ride the waves
Knowing you are always around
Riding your own waves
But always there for me
I’ll soon reach the soft sands of home
And sleep upon the sunny shore
The waves softly caressing the beach
Comforting me as I settle   Moss

It was my first time in a Castle! I felt so much welcomed these ten days … I made a new family I got so much love without any Greed or benefit just unconditional love ❤️ just got back in London seeing the concrete world through the coach window… Featherstone Castle and the tribe I feel like it was a dream.  Dark Angel

Thank you global faemily, and especially Albion faeries, for this healing empowering experience. We go forth with great visions into the future! Blessed be!   EZ

At the global faerie gathering it was delightful and refreshing to observe how the Euro, American and Israeli brothers happily refer to each other as She. I think the machismo of Anglo Saxon Britannia has affected Gay culture and produced a situation where many gay men have masked their femininity and so are perceived and perceive themselves as different to trans and non-binary folk. But living as a Radical Faerie I am living my whole Self, the She, He and also That.

By That I mean the divine spark of consciousness. The thing we all have in common. The awareness of I AM. In Faerie space we can explore who we are, female and male.. and also That something non-binary, mysterious and holy. That. My faerie mind describes That as the presence of Nature… a serene, wise yet wild, raw, vulnerable and utter powerful. From Nature we come to Nature we return. In Nature we heal and become Whole. Our whole holy Nature.

From all over the world we Faeries gathered at Featherstone.  Each tribe unique, each faerie unique, together we found our shared spirit in the meeting of passionate hearts, of lovers of life and liberation. Our nature affirmed, our global community strengthened, it happened at Featherstone.   Shokti

There is no beginning
There is no end
There is only the infinite passion of life. — Fellini

Events, Family, Miscellaneous, Paddington Farm, Personal Stories, Recollections, Vulnerability

Loss reminds us of what we have

Solstice was fast approaching and again, I found myself looking forward to Glastonbury, the gathering and our solstice bonfire. That said: arriving at Paddington Farm was bittersweet this time round as someone special wasn’t going to be with us any more.

On April 8th, our Faerie Tribe lost a unique friend who took us to heart and delighted in our magic and sense of community. As many of you already know, I’m talking of Suki Key who passed unexpectedly from an acute kidney infection. She was an all too youthful 65.

I first met Suki in the camping kitchen at last year’s Solstice Gathering. Having both retired and divorced she had sold her house, somewhere in Lincolnshire I think, and begun a quite remarkable odyssey. She was living in a large bell tent on the Farm’s second camping field (complete with sofas and log burner). At some stage, she was planning to ship out to India, fulfilling her own spiritual quest whilst travelling and doing some charity work.

We initially crossed paths when Suki saw me doing a tarot reading but she became doubly fascinated when she realised I’d designed my own cards. This was our first common ground for Suki’s son was an amazing artist with his own successful design studio. I also discovered the best way to make her face light up with pride was to get her onto the subject of her children.

My experience wasn’t unique. Suki had connected with lots of us during the course of the gathering and I think she loved every minute of our mischief and our colourful sense of fun. She was a tiny, willow like woman who reminded me of children blowing bubbles. Bubbles themselves shimmer and sparkle with an astonishing spectrum of colour yet they are delicate and fragile, vanishing in an instant. They encapsulate all the innocent joy of childhood and that’s why they remind me of her. Suki was that rare combination of age earned wisdom and childlike wonder. God knows how she’d done it but she’d managed to retain her youthful sparkle in a way that most of us can only marvel at, even though we were younger.

She re-appeared at our September gathering. Now lodging in Glastonbury for the winter months, she’d checked our dates and made sure she was back up at the Farm to come and visit us. It was a joy to see her and I still smile when I think back to our long conversation in the Farmhouse living room. Better still, I remember her moving around from person to person, watching their faces light up as she sprinkled her own particular brand of faerie dust around the room.

For all of this, my fondest memories will be of our last meeting at January’s Imbolc gathering. Once again she visited but this time she came laden with foil wrapped packages of gluten free chocolate brownies. She’d known we were coming and had set to baking. India was now looming on the horizon and she wondered if any of us had contacts with aid workers or volunteers heading for Calais. Her bell tent had served its purpose and she wanted it to go to the refugee camp where it would give someone in need a good home. She said she’d return to the farm later that evening, to join us around the fire for some drumming.

Sure enough, as dusk was falling she drove back to the Farm and that small red car, cluttered to overflowing with all things useful (rather like Moominmamma’s handbag) pulled onto the car park and a slightly breathless Suki came looking for volunteers to help her empty the boot. To my incredulity, the boot was stacked high with drums, apparently gifted to her some months previously.

“I’ve always wanted to try these!” she told me with a beaming smile.

Suki’s drum collection was temporarily added to the Faerie drum collection and I sat next to her for the rest of the evening while we let the fire and the rhythm hypnotise us. I was aware of the circle, of friends, of music and of the joy of being alive. I think Suki was too.

She came to say goodbye the following morning, giving many of us sticks of her favourite incense as a parting gift. I still have mine, as something inside wouldn’t let me burn it straight away. I didn’t know it would be the last time I would see her and the incense stick remains on my bookshelf. Sometimes I’ll breathe its fragrance to remind me of her. I may even bring it to a gathering and offer it to the fire as an act of remembrance when I’m ready to let go of it. For now it remains as a reminder of a special spirit who flew briefly into my life and left a trail of sparkle behind her for a short while.

The loss of Suki has reminded me just how important our Faerie friends are. There are many of them, Tanya, Michael, Robert, Leila, Tiffany and Holly at Paddington Farm for instance, who think of us as their favourite visitors. There’s also John Clarke at Featherstone who makes us feel that his home is our home whenever we stay there. These are but to name a few. They may not be directly part of the tribe but they enable us, celebrate us and even love us. We also love them and the loss of one friend has reminded me once more to cherish the others.

Fly away joyfully dear Suki; for I know you’ll light up wherever it is you journey on to. For us, we’ll celebrate you but we also missed seeing you at the Farm this summer.

Brighteyes.