A Prayer to Hecate

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Hecate, keeper of the crossroads, 
help me shake off this too virtuous light 
and travel with me into unholy darkness 
to prowl feral and free 
with those who are dark as forests. 

Hecate, Goddess of the moon in all her aspects,
tune my heart to the mythic music
that flows through the earth 
like an underground river
and rises up in the night 
to join with the endless torrent of stars. 

Hecate, friend of the wild and wayward, 
be with me and other untamed ones
as we forget our age and dance fierce 
and contrary through our years 
like parentless children. 

Hecate, protector of liminal spaces, 
lead me to find shelter in twilight places 
and comfort in caves with 
    mother bears 
         and bones 
  and fires burning.

Blessed Hecate, Queen of the Darkest Night
teach me to mark my dreams in times like these
and open my heart 
to the madness of my soul’s undoing. 

Hecate is an ancient Greek Goddess, the daughter of the Titan Perses and the Nymph Asteria. She is still widely honoured among modern witches who associate her with magic, witchcraft, the night, crossroads and the Moon. She is also often depicted as having three bodies or three faces, and looking in all directions.

I don’t often call upon Hecate, and when I do, I so thoughtfully; for she is dark, she is totally unapologetic and she probably won’t make things easier. She asks us to face the darkness in our hearts and teaches us to honour and work with it.

She, of all the Goddesses can show us how to run through the underbrush with wolves, swim upstream with salmon and fly with the crows on a moonlit Samhain night.

Music pairing: A Dagger and a Poem by Ayla Nereo

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Image: Photo by Stephanie Piercy, adapted with Prisma Oil.