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Southern Folk Magic

I’ve already posted about how you should paint your mailbox yellow and your porch haint blue, but I wanted to share some Southern folk beliefs that I’ve heard throughout my life. By no means exhaustive, will hopefully add more later.

Speak your sorrows to a weeping willow. The breeze in the branches will make it whisper them away.

Willow bark is also good for inflammation remedies.

Never gift someone a knife or scissors lest it cause a deep cut between the two of you.

Plant your garden on Good Friday.

Plant lavender by the front door.

For remembered dreams, put a mugwort leaf in your pillowcase

To tell the gender of a baby, use a needle and thread pendulum over the pregnant woman’s stomach. Up and down is a boy. Side to side is a girl.

Only fertilize watermelon on the side where the dirt is highest.

Keep reading

notyourmothersspellbook

Southern Black Candle Curse

Write the offending person’s name on a piece of paper to place underneath the candle. Dampen the candle and roll it in saltpeter, pepper, salt, and cayenne. Call out the person’s name and the desired effect as you place nine pins into the candle and burn at nine o’ clock at night or at any uneven hour.

southerncunning

5 years ago I started writing a journal as I went a new direction in my magic. I read through as many books on folklore as I possibly could. I wrote down every story I remembered from my childhood. I went through every superstition, urban legend, and ghost story to find the magic hidden there. Today I get to hold a completely different book in my hands that is the culmination of this journey- at least up till now. Everyday something new comes forward and gives a different facet to what I do and how I understand the stories we tell. I hope this book helps people do the same, I hope it helps people find power in their stories.

notyourmothersspellbook

Southern Folklore and the Trouble of Passing Down

This post may not be of much interest to many, but I wanted to make something to point out the difficulty of taking passed down stories and folklore and translating it to usable practice and show why taking notes and conducting experiments with your practice is so necessary. As my example, here’s how to conjure the devil to you (according to Southern folklore):

1. Go to a crossroads of four roads for nine consecutive mornings and on the ninth morning the devil will appear and you must physically fight him and, assuming that he let’s you go, he’ll ask your terms - what you want and for how many years you want on Earth before he comes for you.

2. Go to a crossroads of nine roads for nine Sunday mornings and on the ninth the devil will appear and play music (with you? against you?) and ask what kind of earthly pleasures you want.

3. Go to any public crossroads for nine consecutive mornings with a live black chicken and on the ninth the devil will meet you and teach you anything you want to know.

Now while I have no interest in conjuring the devil at a crossroads I’d have a hard time of it if I was. Although there are some consistent elements - the nine mornings spent at a crossroads - there’s a lot of variation here, and this is a mild example of the kinds of wild variation in folk stories and magic practices. Ask five different individuals and you’ll likely end up with five slightly consistent but quite varied stories. In some instances it can be easy to see the main patterns and pull out the core elements from there, but in many cases it can be impossible to note any kind of consistency when it comes to what you’re actually supposed to do, not to mention all of the details that might be left out intentionally or unintentionally - are there words to speak while at the crossroads? is there a trick to besting the devil physically? is there a better time of morning to conduct this? etc.

These kinds of unanswerable questions mark the moment where the individual practitioner must become a scientist willing to conduct multiple and varied experiments over time, documenting findings until they discover what works. And this is part of what makes witchcraft a practice, an ongoing constant search and series of experiments to locate results and effective methods and means through layers of misinformation and misunderstandings. So, if something isn’t working make note of it and turn to the experiment again.

southerncunning

I can finally start sharing some sneak peeks for this beauty! This process has been wonderful and I’m so glad to be working with Moon Books who has shown such amazing respect for the vision I have for this book. The cover was designed by me and the woodcut was made by an amazing artist Nick Vuimin. It hits to the core of the book as soon as you look at it. More sneak peaks to come! 2019 here we go!

hauntedwine

Tag Yourself - Types of Witches

Green witch - the perfect rain jacket, high-maintenance plants, travels to see natural wonders, hiking boots, composting, environmental protests, lemon-scented candles, great with computers, the perfect sports bra, home remedies, knows which phase the moon is in, always has sunscreen, natural light, soft flannels with holes in the armpits or the elbows, weekends at the botanical gardens, collects rocks, eclectic tattoos, only shares nice stories and animal videos on Facebook, paint-stained fingers, ebooks, wind chimes

Swamp witch - practical jokes, claw-foot bathtub, the perfect vegetable garden, candlelight, altars to the dead, glass bottles, carries a switch blade and knows how to use it, frizzy hair, quick laughter, never sugarcoats it, sandalwood-scented candles, Twitter fights, short nails, three partners, dark lipstick, sleeps with the windows open, night mode, notes in the margins of every book, long walks, “that’s why her hair is so big, it’s full of secrets”

Kitchen witch - the first person you call after a bad day, moonlight, lavender-scented candles, bookshelf just for cookbooks, fresh flowers in every room, women’s studies major, quilts, sturdy sunglasses, bright nail polish, crystals on every windowsill, herb garden, Pinterest boards, good jeans, fresh produce, family photos, nose ring, creaky floorboards, always smells good, best cup of coffee, knows the best bookstore in town, lots of partners but never talks about it

Hedge witch - secret stashes of candy, moss terrariums, a full medicine cabinet, bakes cookies constantly, oversized sweaters, one reading lamp, deleted all social media, comfortable couch for friends to sleep on, steel-toed boots, bergamot-scented candles, stacks of books everywhere, copies of goddess art on the walls, a well-worn library card, standing donations to Planned Parenthood, the perfect leggings, three cats, two dogs, and a hedgehog

Crystal witch - “what’s your birth date and time?”, bullet journals, eucalyptus-scented candles, will hold anyone’s hand, bright lights, minimalism, curated Instagram, snake plants and pathos, smoking weed out of crystal pipes, color-coded books and sex toys, knitted her own pink pussy hat, best meme collection, the perfect lingerie for any occasion

catcrumb

please donate to the palestinian children’s relief fund or any of these other organizations doing work in palestine! any little bit, even just $10, can help relieve some of the suffering under the settler-colonial occupation!

catcrumb

the pcrf’s offices in gaza got bombed today (link) (link), two days after i posted this. i have no adequate words for how horrified and disgusted i am.

the pcrf has an excellent charity score. you can donate to their urgent gaza relief fundraiser by clicking this link. if you can’t, spreading information about the crisis is valued by the palestinians living in conditions that the human rights watch describes as an apartheid state.

if you would like to do some easy and very clear reading on palestine, i highly recommend decolonizepalestine.org.

stormwaterwitch

How I want Tarot to work:

How Tarot actually works:

mississippicryptid

Swamp Witchcraft: Honoring your surroundings.

(This is Cypress Swamp, MS.)

Swamp Water Protection Spell:

Supplies:

Swamp water

A Jar, bottle, or some kind of container with a lid

Something to represent you and/or you and family this can be:

String of different colors

A picture

Strands of hair from each family member

or a symbol that represents your family

A candle of Black, white, or red color

a Mirror

Chant:

Swamp, old and strong

Let your energy and waters wash us clean

Protect me and mine from what is to come.

Swamp water is the barrier around your family and home. Any one whose seen a swamp knows the water is thick, murky, and hard to see through. This energy surrounds you and your family keeping bad intentions away.

Combine all your supplies into your container, everything but the candle and mirror. Once you’ve got your bottle ready seal it tight and set up your candle and mirror with either the candle on or beside the mirror.

This is to absorb the negative energy that is around you while you are working the spell.

Next, softly sing or speak the chant. For folks that don’t like to talk while doing spells or rituals you can write the chant down and burn it in the candle, releasing the energy.

Before you are blow out your candle, you can always ask the Deities or God/Goddess you work with to also help keep the protection bottle strong.

thebrokeasscoven

Any refs for a southern/swamp witch?

Sure!!

Uses for pennywort/dollarweed (a common plant in the south/marsh areas)

Swamp witchcraft - general information

Candle alternative for hurricane season

Swamp water protection spell

Tadpole spell (involves tadpoles but tadpoles are treated humanely; the spell doesn’t involve doing anything to them but catching/holding them in a bowl briefly)

Anger and grief relieving spell (ingredients particular to southern witches)

Swamps and magical correspondences

Marsh salt recipe

Tip for witches that work with lots of plants

Top ten magical herbs

Herbs associated with wishes (you can wish for more swamp witch resources lmao)

Uses for running water

Let me know if you need anything else!

~mod Kai

burninginthebiblebelt

Southern Witchcraft

Putting a moon pie on a jar of water to make moon water.

notyourmothersspellbook

More Southern Folk Magic

A follow-up to my post on Southern Folk Magic. Many of these are known, but I want to put all the ones that I’ve heard in my life in one place.

To find a lost thing: Trap an insect under glass and recite Luke 8:17. The insect will point you in the direction of what you’ve lost.

Never accept a gift from one who practices magic, not even through someone else’s delivery. Give nothing to them and take nothing from them lest they be able to work magic on you.

For a fertile harvest season, make love on the freshly turned fields.

If you wake up exhausted, dirty, or with your hair tangled it’s because you’ve been ridden by a hag. Make a dummy to lie in your place the next night and go off to salt the hag’s skin.

Visitors must leave your house through the same door they came in.

Never tell a dream before breakfast.

Keep reading

notyourmothersspellbook

Rural Witch Tip

Paint your mailbox yellow to encourage the delivery of only good news.

witchsaidwhat-deactivated202012

southern witchcraft is

watching flour fall like lazy snowflakes in your grandmother’s kitchen. her weathered hands are kneading dough and your aunts are telling stories about weddings from twenty years ago. it smells like cinnamon and wine. their cackles could ignite a fire.

hiding under honeysuckle and trying to stay out of the noontime sun. the grass is burnt to a crisp and you are sucking sugar from the petals. the air is so hot that it suffocates you. it tastes like the salt of your skin.

digging through trunks in the attic and finding delicate lace from a time long gone. old records that wail the voices of our past–church hymns and stories of the devil. your shirt wears the perfume of history when you descend with old, sepia-stained pictures in hand. it’s you asking your papaw to tell you about the war.

barefoot walks down to the water, mud clinging to your clothes for dear life. mosquito bites and their scabs are worn as proudly as dirt on your nose. it’s lifting palmfuls of water to the sky; it’s the freedom of a thunderstorm.

trips to crumbling cemeteries where even the gravestones don’t remember their names. heat lightning blooms above you in rolling clouds. distant brontide, carrying the voices of the past and making the little hairs stand up at the back of your neck. it’s picking the weeds and saying hello to your ancestors.

mom and dad dancing to some old song. her smile turns her into a young girl again, and he spins her ‘round and ‘round. it’s “I knew from the moment I saw her.” bands of gold tarnished by a hard day’s work times ten thousand. dinner on the table and “give me some sugar.”

funeral casseroles and “she looks so good.” black garb adorned with pearls and a handkerchief waiting to catch tears. stories you’ve heard at least a hundred times. cigarettes on the back porch. lies laced in last wills and testaments. preachers calling out to the lord almighty. it’s the way the flowers already smell like rot.

dumping more sugar into the pitcher of fresh-brewed tea and carrying glasses onto the porch as night falls. lightning bugs become your companions as you run amuck with your cousins. it’s secrets told over the hum of cicadas. it’s that “well, i guess so” when a mason jar of liquid abandon is passed around a bonfire.