Aradia and I rolled into Dead Horse Point State Park in the late in the afternoon, mid-June of 2019. The winds were high and the sun was setting fast as we unloaded the car. It was full dark by the time we finished setting up the tent. The moon was full and bright. The winds were high and loud. The RVs in the neighboring camp sites did not really respect the quiet hours when it came to running their air conditioners.
I lay awake in my tent, listening to the wind. I stared out the window, and I could see the Great Bear hanging low in the sky.
In the morning, I realized three things: there is no window in that corner of the tent; even if there had been a window, the juniper trees between my camp site and the next would have obscured any view of the sky; even if there had been a view to see, I had not been wearing my glasses.
It was not the first time the Bear had caught my attention: it had also featured prominently in our skywalk at Beltane. Nor was it the last: it seemed to hover over every camp site after. So, for that matter, did the ravens. If there had been any doubt that the vision of the Bear was Not Just A Dream, the omnipresent raven omens would have put that to bed.
I stewed on that vision for weeks. I consulted what lore I could find, little though it was. I couldn’t figure out what to do with that experience.
Then, in the preparation for one of our Lunar Shenanigans esbats, Aradia and Alvianna and I got to talking. The Great Bear includes the fixed star Polaris, and would be a powerful engine for fate-changing magic. The Sun would only be a few degrees past Polaris, so that full moon would be as good a time as any to do work with that constellation. Alvianna took that inspiration and ran; all credit for the ritual I am about to describe belongs to her.
We began by calling upon the four nearest constellations as our quarters: Bootes, Leo, Auriga, Draco. We called upon the Great Bear, herself, to watch over the rite. We called upon the stars within ourselves, as above so below, to mirror the stars in the sky.
In the presence of the stars, we gathered around our altar and meditated. What did we desire? What would we call upon the Great Bear to manifest for us? How could we rectify our fates?
We crushed beries and mixed honey and earth to make crude ink, which we used to paint our desires on our bodies.
Then we called down the Great Bear again, one star at a time: Dubhe, Merak, Phad, Megrez, Alioth, Mizar, Alcor, Alkaid. Her power filled us, spilled out over us. It changed us, changed our relationships, changed our kingdoms, changed our fates.