moon listening: the dark moon letters

when an invitation from mystery arrives in the mail

Dear curious listeners of the world’s humming heart,

For the past three moons, I have been holding space for a group of fourteen women, journeying through an underworld descent with the dark moon as our guide. The inspiration for this circle came from a dream vision I had in the depths of January, of a subterranean grandmother cave. I listened to the dream, and sent out a call for the dark moon sessions. One by one, the women came forward with a heartfelt yes. The circle was complete within a day.

I was astounded by the wellspring of truth, tenderness, and ferocity of heart each woman brought with her to the circle. We shared wild longings, poetry, art and dream images, spoke with mystery and the muse, conversed with animals and other life forms. It felt like a dream. Each woman shared things that altered my own heart forever.

But I shouldn’t have been surprised, really, because when women circle together to honor mystery, darkness, and the phasing moon, gleaming new worlds are born. This is the way it has always been.

love letters from Earth

Three nights before the final dark moon circle, I had a dream that I was opening a very old letter. There was an antique letter opener in my hand, with a mother of pearl handle and a tarnished silver blade. The envelope was frayed and yellowed, and inky words had been scrawled by quill. There was no stamp or return address. The letter was a door to a mystery world.

I never got to read the letter, but its magic was conveyed through the tactile eros of simply holding it. The soft worn paper, the blotted ink, the weight of the letter opener in my hand. This sensorial feeling seemed far more alive, far more alluring, than any written content would have been. Holding that dream letter was, without exaggeration, a mystical, mouthwatering delight.

What I knew upon waking was that I wanted to share something that might evoke such a feeling. Here was the container of the dark moon sessions closing, and an unopened letter now arriving. I felt an unmistakable nudge to send letters in the mail, ones that might offer a similar glimmer of the curiosity I felt when holding that letter. To open up a space for something to happen.

I want to offer you something slow and real, and mysterious, glinting with beauty, because those are the things that feed me. I want to offer you something you can hold in your hands. This is a soulful experiment in channeling beauty and mystery into form, and sharing it with you, so that it might inspire and feed you in unexpected ways.

Starting in just a few weeks from now, as we blaze across the threshold of summer solstice, I will be sending paid supporters of this newsletter real mystery letters in the mail. For now, these will be sent quarterly (every third month), at the portals to each new season. And, brilliantly, the seasonal thresholds this year happen to fall in rhythm with the dark moons. So I am calling this series the dark moon letters, because they are a continuance of my love story with Earth’s chthonic and cyclical mysteries.

The moon is my dearest muse in all matters of creative inquiry, and particularly the dark moon. Would you believe me if I told you that she is the one who sent me the letter in the dream? The dark moon is the unopened letter, the inky void, the mythic wellspring, the starry womb, the impossible imagination. The great mystery herself.

These letters will be written by candlelight, or from hidden wild places, or in the dusk tangles of my garden, and my suggestion is that you also read them by candlelight, or in wild places, or in your garden. The contents might be some combination of love letters, stories, poetry, inquiries, practices, recipes, and other things that will surely surprise even me. The letters may also occasionally contain small gifts, such as blank poetry postcards I’ve designed, for you to send real mystery mail to your own friends and loves.

At the end of this writing you will find logistical details for the dark moon letters. But mainly, current and new paid subscribers just need to send me a current mailing address (by the 15th, please). Receiving these letters in the mail is entirely optional. I have other offerings brewing in the cauldron.

I am so excited for this slow mystery mail experiment, to see what strange beauty is born from my sending, and your receiving. This is the dance of co-creative dreaming. It is a dance that I love.

pages from a booklet "of soil & stars" I made by hand a few years ago, which I printed in a single edition microbatch and gave as a gift to my apprentices.

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Whether you choose to receive these letters, whether you are a free or paid supporter of my work, I cherish your presence, your readership and your willingness to receive what I share. I will continue to share writings here that are free to everyone, mostly on a monthly basis, and always with great tenderness when I hit that tremulous send button.

I have been thinking so much recently about how human attention has become nearly an endangered species. We live in an age of distraction, endlessly lured toward the next shiny thing. We are flooded with more input than we can possibly integrate in a lifetime.

Doesn’t this make our attention the most precious gift we can offer one another? Your presence here with my newsletters is a gift, in all forms, in all ways, in whatever measure of care and attention you offer. Thank you so much for being here with me.

Mostly I hope my recent dream of the mystery letter might inspire you to send someone a real letter in the mail. Maybe your letter just contains a haiku you wrote over coffee one morning, or a single pressed flower with a tiny love note, or a printed photo of something curious you saw on a forest wander. Maybe it’s just a strange open-ended question scrawled onto fallen birch paper or a dried leaf.

Here is an inquiry for all of us to wander with: In what ways can we feed the dream of the Earth, through our own slowing down, through our listening, through creating something strange and mysterious, through using our hands to turn dreams into form? Something within me trusts this is the path forward, in this aching world, to listen to our innermost longings and accept their strange invitations. To be guided forth by feeling, and the ever-phasing moon.

One of my own deepest longings is that we allow ourselves to make no sense at all— to loosen our grip on rational thinking, in order to become the wild visionaries humans truly are. To live for and from the boundless, mysterious heart, because we know that all life, and all beauty, is born there... effortlessly welling up to the surface, each night in our dreams.

with feral, holographic love letters delivered to you on hummingbird wings,

Kate

moon listening — logistics for receiving the dark moon letters:

• If you are a paid supporter of this newsletter, or you become one, all you need to do is make sure I have your current mailing address on file. You can simply reply to this email with your mailing address, or email it to me directly: kategardinerclearlight@gmail.com

• The dark moon letters are sent quarterly, around each Solstice and each Equinox. For both existing and new paid subscribers: Please make sure I have your current mailing address by the 15th of those months (if your address has stayed the same, you don’t need to worry about this.)

• Each edition of these letters will be mailed only once, in one single printing.

• Before each printing, I will update the list of active subscriptions. You can, as always, discontinue your paid subscription whenever you want, just make sure that as long as it is active, I have an updated mailing address for you!

• These letters are printed with as much care for the trees and our waters as possible, using acid-free, chlorine-free recycled paper, from manufacturers who prioritize ecological stewardship.

• Please rest assured, I will never share your mailing address with anyone. Or show up at your house uninvited…

Please reach out to me with any questions or reflections, dear moon listeners.