July 9, 2002
The Pagan Cluster in Calgary:
A Short Report on the G8 Protests
By Starhawk
Photo by Yuill Herbert,
Indy Media
We arrived from multiple different directions, at different times. We came from Seattle, California, Texas, Vermont, Ottawa, Colorado, Kansas, British Columbia, Alberta, and other parts of Canada. Our first challenge was crossing the threshold, the border. All of us were challenged, questioned, searched. Some of us had to try twice or even three times. But all of us got in.
We brought with us a variety of practical and magical skills: from the knowledge of how to design an ecological garden to the skills of organizing a street action, from knowing how to convert a diesel engine to run on veggie oil to knowing how to facilitate a meeting. We were welcomed, supported and taken in by the wonderful Witches of Calgary, the organizers of the action, and by Kelly and Marie, the practicing permaculturists who opened their home to hordes of us staying and making magic.
We arrived into a city drenched in fear and hostility, with everyone from the media to the school board portraying the protestors as dangerous, malevolent, and violent. Teachers and students were ordered not to talk to us. An 'expert' lectured the judges and magistrates of the city, telling them we were coming to kill cops, among other warped fantasies. People who might have rented spaces to us were warned we would bomb them or burn down their homes.
The organizers of the action were working nonstop, trying to combat the propaganda and arrange for spaces and infrastructure in an extremely hostile environment. They welcomed us and we tried to see what we could do to support them. And as the cluster gathered, we wove our magic, trancing together, reading tarot cards asking for guidance and information. We clarified our intention: "Our intention is to consciously use the energy and actions of this week to shift the ground beneath the fortress of power-over and undermine its foundations so that it crumbles, opening space to seed loving cultures of beauty, balance and delight.."
We were told to go on the Summer Solstice to the statues of the Famous Five in Olympic Plaza. The Five were the women who brought a court case that established that women in Canada were legally 'persons'. The statues stand around an inscribed circle which was just big enough for the group that gathered. We created a magical drain, a vortex to suck away the fear that clouded the city, and a positive pole, a tree of life to draw in positive forces.
Over the next two nights, we tranced to the Reclaiming Clanhouse to build our magical group mind, and decided to use the proximity of the G8 summit as an opportunity to enter the Fortress itself. We could enter the Fortress, we found, through the Fortress within, because each of us has a Fortress inside of us. The path we took started as a passage through the clanhouse. Many of our friends around the world joined us in this working, as did a number of the action organizers and legal team. We found the Fortress full of prisoners that needed to be released before we could bring it down. A green haze, green twining vines, tunneling rabbits and prairie dogs were some of our allies in bringing it down, but mostly we understood that it will fall when the ground beneath it shifts and the spell of compliance that knits its stones and concrete together is broken.
Throughout all the following, various members of us were offering Permaculture workshops, direct action trainings, trainings for the unions, making art and props, attending spokescouncil meetings, doing uncountable interviews with the media, and generally carrying out all the usual organizing activities associated with an action.
The next day, the actions began with a permitted, family march sponsored by the Unions. The Cluster participated, but we felt somewhat scattered. Some of us were part of the Bread and Puppets pageant, others were simply walking and marching.
On the Full Moon, the Witches of Edmonton led us in a ritual, with support from the Calgary Witches who found a beautiful, safe space with a full Chartres labyrinth. Many, many people from the action attended. Out of the labyrinth, a chant emerged:
We are the rising of the moon,We are the shifting of the ground.
We are the seed that takes root,
When we bring the fortress down.
We released our fears and grief, charged moonstones and seedballs made in permaculture workshops, and danced the spiral under the Full Moon.
The following day, we were part of the action at the GAP, and marched off and had an impromptu spiral dance back at the Famous Five when it was over. By the evening, during the Showdown at the Hoedown -- the unpermitted march to protest the huge party the city of Calgary was throwing for press and delegates to the G8 -- we had better cluster banners and were able to march together and start a spontaneous and very powerful spiral dance outside the stadium grounds at the end. After the circle was opened, a young man was heard to exclaim, "What was that?"
Photo by Yuill Herbert, Alberta Indy Media
We rose very early the next morning to participate in the snake march, the most confrontational action of the day, which moved through the streets of downtown Calgary during rush hour with the goal of creating economic disruption. As people gathered, the cluster led a spiral dance. The march was peaceful: the police simply stood back, blocked traffic ahead of us, and let us take the space. People on the march made an effort to apologize to drivers, to leaflet and open discussion with passersby. The Unions supported the march, and came out with their flags and banners. The cluster planted the seed balls and led another spiral at City Hall. At 10 AM, after hours of marching, we all stopped and at that point the march split into 'green' and 'red' groups -- green to do leafletting or go on to the planned die-in, 'red' to continue with confrontational actions. We were asked by the Anti-Capitalist Convergence if we would come on the 'red' march as support for their plan to block intersections with anarchist soccer. Those of us who still had some energy had short careers either as players, rooters, or Anarchist Soccer Moms, but we were eventually all exhausted after hours of marching in the hot sun and went on to the Carlos Giuliani memorial performed by Bread and Puppets, and the die-in. Then we went to the picnic organized by the Labour Council and Council of Canadians, where the Calgary Witches had created a beautiful healing space, with massage (definitely needed by then!) and Reiki and food and water.
Afterwards, a contingent of the cluster joined a caravan of over a hundred cars that drove out to Kananaskis, and after some tense negotiations (and some lengthy meeting process that was, depending on your take, either an empowering impromptu blockade or a disempowering, painfully long meeting) we had yet another spiral dance, third cone of the day.
On Thursday, we had organized our own ritual action, Earth People, which began with a circle near our favorite Famous Five. After casting a circle and calling directions, about sixty people covered themselves with mud, losing their powers of speech and normal locomotion. The following prophecy was read:
When eight kings in a fortress meetTrading greed and lies
Out of asphalt and concrete
Beings of earth arise
Grunting, dancing through the street
Ancient powers awake
In everyone they touch or meet
Hidden chains now break
The kings trade lies and costly gifts
Protected by their walls
But when the ground beneath them shifts
The mighty fortress falls
Fertile compost out of blight
Living seeds take root
Of beauty, balance and delight
Trees bear living fruit
No army can keep back a thought
No fence can chain the sea
The earth cannot be sold or bought
All life shall be free!
The army of Earth People stalked, danced and slithered through downtown Calgary, followed by winged Beings of Liberation and beautiful banners proclaiming "Resist!" and "Insurrection!" Alarming and delighting the public, they stopped at the GAP and at major oil companies to perform a dance ritual of awakening, rising, uprooting the anchors of corporate power, and planting seeds. Drumming and chanting built the energy to a peak again and again, and the Earth People succeeded in completely taking the streets. Mesmerized members of the public followed and the action became an impromptu snake march, with amazing energy. It ended at Eau Claire market with a spiral dance, and then a procession down to the river and a ritual bathing. At the moment the circle was opened, raindrops fell and thunder and lightning filled the sky.
After returning to what passes for our normal state of consciousness, eating and showering, we went back to the convergence center for the debrief and led a closing circle and spiral dance.
The following night, after a last permaculture workshop for around twenty people and a last set of media interviews, we went back to the Fortress in trance with much of the cluster and many of the organizers. The trance was long and complex and maybe we'll try to write up the notes later -- but the essence was that the Fortress is huge, with many chambers and aspects, but that we have begun shifting some of its energies. One yearling bear was killed up at Kananaskis by the military this week, and the bear's spirit came with us as an ally. We tried to go up the stairs into the higher levels of the Fortress, but found ourselves drifting in confusion and decided the time was not yet right. We found a crack in the walls that let us enter the structure of the fortress itself. We entered a tunnel that was very old, that existed in multiple times, especially the Roman Empire. In one chamber, we were stirring a cauldron of black stuff, like oil or like the dark lava flowing under the earth, until the vortex became a spindle revolving. The Ancestors from the Burning Times were with us. And then many of us took hands, jumped into the cauldron, and fell through into another world in which we were birds circling around the towers of the fortress, weaving a cocoon of binding and transformation.
We're thinking that in the next action we might need to work with air. We've held the energy of water, of the living river, since Quebec. In January, at the World Economic Forum, we brought in Brigid's flame and the energy of fire. In this action, we held earth. So air seems to be next.
The actions were small this time, never more than 5000 people, but for Calgary, everyone says they were big. And this one was never called as a major international mobilization -- in fact, there was a conscious call put out for people to focus on their home communities instead of using huge resources to converge on Calgary. Some very positive things came out of the actions. Ties and connections with the labour movement (at least in Canada) were strengthened, and the unions gained valuable experience in direct action they may put to use in their own struggles. The global justice movement in Calgary was strengthened and organizers here will have a stronger base to build on. The actions were extremely peaceful, in fact, some of us would have liked more of an edge of confrontation (which is not at all the same thing as violence.) However, the utter politeness and calm of the protests may have done more than anything else could have to delegitimize the G8 and point out the obscenity of their militarization and the $300 million dollars they spent on security.
And for the Pagan Cluster, we were able to deepen our magic, our ability to create a magical group mind, to openly share our work with the whole action in a transparent way, and to create an action of our own that turned out to be one of the most exciting moments of the week.
Many thanks to all who participated and who gave us such great support, especially to Tarra who found housing for many of us, found the space for the Full Moon ritual, and did countless other acts of organizing and kindness, to the Edmonton Witches who created the Full Moon ritual, to Kelly and Marie who let their home be taken over for weeks, helped organize, plan and teach the permaculture workshops, and supported us in our border trials and everything else: to the organizers and legal collective who helped us with everything from Immigration to traffic tickets, and to all who gave us magical, practical, financial and moral support!
Keep your eye on the ball
photo by Shane Nelson, Alberta Indy media
Solstice in Calgary
By Starhawk
In Calgary's Olympic Plaza, across from City Hall, stands a grouping of statues honoring the Famous Five: Five women who in the early '20s brought the landmark court case which officially established that women in Canada are legally, persons.
They sit, somewhat larger than life, caught in bronze, drinking tea. One lifts a glass, one peers forth earnestly, one stands and looks on and another points as one lifts high a scroll proclaiming "Women are persons!" They are older women, white, affluently dressed in a bronze rendition of the clothing of the twenties, sitting in oversized chairs and drinking from giants' teacups. Within their grouping, a circle is inscribed bearing their names.
It is here we decided to do our impromptu Summer solstice ritual, our affinity group that has just grown to eleven with Rusty's safe arrival, joined by a few of our organizer friends, mostly from the legal collective. We gather late, after the meetings and trainings are over, spend time chatting among the statues who seem alive. I am tired, I admit to myself.
Finally we make a circle, do a short grounding, cast a circle from within the statues who seem to be alive, observing us, raising a their cups in a silent toast. We call in the directions, the moon and the sun. I make an offering of Waters of the World to the spirits of the land, ask for permission to do our ritual there. The opera house is letting out across the street, and a few people stop and stare. A few homeless people wander by, and a couple of teenage boys who stand and laugh. A bearded homeless man who looks like a worn-out version of an ancient prophet wanders to the edge of the circle. As I ask the spirits for help and support in the action, the prophet beams at us, raising a hand in benediction. I am thinking about fairy tales where the gods appear as beggars. I know that our prayer has been answered.
We have decided to work two pieces of linked magic: to create a vortex, a drain for fear, here in the center of Calgary, to siphon off the fear that is being dumped on the city daily, the warnings about protestors being terrorists, the warnings by the police to people who would rent to us that their houses will be bombed if they do, the instructions to all teachers and school personnel not to talk to us, the whole usual boring campaign of criminalization. And the larger fears perpetrated on all of us to justify the crackdown on all of our rights and freedoms.
As a counterforce to the drain, we need to create a wand or opposite pole, something which can draw in and ground positive forces, hope, vision, courage, justice, love of liberty, truth.
We begin chanting, the wordless A O O A chant which opens the gates between the worlds. Charles steps out of the circle to walk the edge, guard us and our possessions as we slip quickly into trance.
The vortex opens up immediately. It's like a giant whirlpool, flowing both clockwise, like water down a drain, and counterclockwise, the direction of releasing. It's sucking fear out of us, out of the city, out of the rest of the world. I suddenly become aware of how much fear we walk through every day, how it clouds our vision and slows our steps, like walking through a heavy, gray, toxic snowfall. And what it would be like to be fearless, weightless, dancing in a world of clarity, doing what we needed and wanted to do without the clutching sense of dread. Earlier in the night, during our direct action training, we were discussing tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, tasers, cattle prods, and all the other weapons that might be used against us. "Remember, they are all weapons of fear," Charles had said. If we truly drain the fear, if we don't respond out of fear, all the weapons are disarmed.
"If you are fearless, you are invincible," I hear. I am thinking of the ride to Nablus a few weeks back when I was in Palestine with a group making our way into Balata, a beseiged refugee camp. We were talking about what level of risk we were willing to take. "I'm willing to die," Neta had said. We'd had a long talk the night before, about her month in Arafat's besieged compound in Ramallah, with little food or water, together with other internationals committed to peace and with Arafat's own security forces armed with Kalashnikovs and prepared to fight a war. She had been telling me about one of her friends, how much he loved and enjoyed life, and how completely he was ready to die. They all were: they faced the daily, moment to moment reality of their imminent death, and her face is glowing and her eyes are shining as she describes how they fed the wounded first and shared the food they had and the love they felt for each other. "And after enough time expecting to die," she says, "you start to want to run out and meet it. To grab a rifle and go out under fire and just say, 'Okay, kill me."
Caoimhe, who was also there, hated it, felt trapped in the place she was not supposed to be, unable to get out and be with her own close friends who were being massacred in Jenin. She is far, far more cynical about what was going on, insists that Arafat and his close guard were eating well upstairs. The others in our group in the van to Nablus agree that we are willing to risk our lives, that we have accepted the possibility that we could die in this work. "But I'd be really, really pissed!" I say. "I am willing to give my life for the cause, but I would take a lot, lot, lot of convincing that my death would be anywhere near as valuable as my life. Or yours, Neta, or yours or yours…" All of this is swirling in my mind as the vortex grows, and I think about the suicide bombers, who are also fearless because they seek death, and so become unstoppable. And how much trickier it is to become fearless while seeking life. And yet that is what I believe we are called to do. I am still in a state of awe and gratitude and wonder just from the kids in the training -- some of them totally new to any form of protest, and scared, and some of them veterans of Quebec City or even Genoa who are back, again and again, as if some cosmic hand has tapped them and said, "You! I want you as one of my agents of transformation."
The chant swells and ebbs and I think about the pole, the wand of the ancient wizard I saw in a dream. He was teaching a group of us how to use a wizard's staff. It had to be thick, wide, he warned us, not a skinny little branch that would break under pressure. "If you think this is powerful when it's not activated," he'd said, "when it's awakened it can move mountains!" We need some mountains moved, desperately. "Where I'm going, I can't take a staff," I had said to him in the dream, thinking about actions and jails. "You can use mine, as an inner image," he said. I picture it rising out of the vortex. It becomes a pillar of fire, that becomes the trunk of tree, its roots a web of fire in the core of the earth, its branches reaching up beyond the highest heavens, alive to draw down sunlight and moonlight, alive with squirrels and birds and animals. I look around the circle. We are all having the same visions. I sense movement behind me. Two homeless people are standing there, an aboriginal man and a slight, old woman with short gray hair who is holding Charles' hand and dancing to the music. Suddenly I feel that she should come into the center and dance. She starts to come into the circle and Charles starts to gently guide her away but I shake my head and he lets her go. She begins to dance.
She is completely, utterly drunk but her dance is clear and graceful and beautiful, an uncensored movement of the energies we are raising, a spontaneous ballet. Her face is still, enraptured, her hands and arms become precise, expressive; her feet keep the rhythm as her hips sway. I am thinking of a ritual long ago when I took on the aspect of the Baba Yaga, the ugly old hag witch of Russian Fairy tales, who told us, "Once I had a beautiful face!" I think that it has been a long time since anyone has seen this woman's beauty, and I am silently cheering for her, because she has become the hag who when embraced becomes the beautiful goddess of the land, the crone, the ancient unloved broken hurting drunk and battered Earth herself, taking visible form for us, drinking in our attention and admiration and love.
When the chant ends, and the dance is over, she throws herself into Laura's arms. "It's been so long," she sighs. "So long since I've been loved." She tells us she is going to change her life. I am old enough and wise enough to know this may or may not last, that the woman in her finite, human life may or may not take this love and go the tremendous distance she would need to go to heal. "This looks bad," her husband is murmuring as he leads her away. But she has become, for a moment, the Goddess in visible form for us. That is the promise, after all, of the Pagan gods, that they will actually manifest if we have eyes to see them. We have witnessed a true miracle.
We ground the energy. I look up, and catch the eye of the statue of one of the Famous five who was a pillar of the Women's Christian Temperance Union. I tell the others and we all laugh.
So here we are, in staid, conservative Calgary, with a vortex established, the gates between the worlds propped open, the military massing, the action gathering, on the longest day of the year.
www.starhawk.org