Baby Crone's Tarot Playbook

 Now available in hardcover!

Baby Crone's Tarot Playbook

or Laphrodite's Mini Mindfulness Meditations

Baby Crone's Tarot Playbook offers seventy-eight short practices for that tarot on-the-go feeling. Rich, full-color images accompany the guided meditations to create a synthesis of right-brain and left-brain activity by combining potent imagery with meaningful words. Whether you flip to a random page for a quick hit, spend an hour using an image as a writing prompt in your journal, or dedicate yourself to delving deep into the meaning and symbolism of each piece, this is a treasure trove of accessible wisdom.

Cosmic Giggles

 

Cosmic Giggles

Chuckling at the traffic light

Engagement ring in the sunlight

Catches it just so

I'm in my own private disco

     Opening my eyes

      To the morning surprise

     Throat throbbing with delight

      Hummingbirds ruby red flight

Best part of when I owned a cafe

Was spinning that mirror ball every day

Prisms scattered across the ceiling 

Espresso-ing a glittery feeling

     And by the way,

      Did you know

     Broken crystals 

      Cast the most rainbows

So put your violet fairy wings

Hover, sip and sway

And when the light is right

Just slip away

Chime

 

If I had known back then - Ada Limon

The bell rings three times. Notice

How long until the last note 

Declines

Would I have got that tattoo

Or the other

Bruises, stretch marks

Still have been a mom

Or just a housemate, Tia, aunt

Friend from long ago

Felt this close to you

Dying among your books

A few of mine

I would have said yes sooner,

As in, get it over with

Yank off the Band-Aid

Take off the blindfold

Disillusioned

Once

The bell rings

Two times

Follow the chime

Follow the 

Chime

The Word Whisperer

 The Word Whisperer

Once upon a time, in a jewel box by the sea,

Lived a Word Whisperer named Lisa, and her magnificent cat, Rumi.

She spent her days writing, teaching, reading and seeking,

Believer in the power of words: transforming, listening, and speaking.

Then one day, a bleak plague came across the land,

Trumpet tears, Covid fears, all went hand in hand.

She lost her direction, taste, even her sense of smell,

How to gather up those pieces, what story now to tell.

It was a time of stupor, a time of feeling of stuck,

Bogged down in all of the rhetorical guck,

But wait, her daughter Colette was pregnant,

How to bless and gift the expectant?

Lisa thumped her chest, set off on a quest, Rumi at her side,

And she met these particular muses, on the by and by,

Invited to a quilting bee for the softest lullaby,

Woven from yet unspoken gossamer sighs.

Sitting for a spell, these spelling bees,

Notebooks on their laps, pen caps between their knees,

Doubled and further multiplied,

Zoom in, zoom out, perspectives diversified.

The Word Whisperer moved her hands, harvesting silk,

Invoking the muses, aware of her ilk,

Chanting under the big dipper, creating her circles,

Resources, Sorceresses, composting rose petals.

There at the threshold, slowly she began to build power,

Delicious minutes, savoring every hour,

Mindful of the moments, creating her altar.

Ensuring her words would never falter.

Lighting a match to inspire the stubborn candle,

Eagle feather to let go of what one can no longer handle,

Taking the time for name tags, a basket of release,

A ritual writing of kumquats, hope, and soft grief.

Lisa listened as her muses sang of a heart shaped stones,

Embroidered cat tails and daiquiri ice cream cones,

Collected cat whiskers and a lost earring or two,

A Peace Angel mended with heart, tears, and gorilla glue.

Five stones in clear reflecting bowls,

Helping the Word Whisperer to reach her goals,

Thanking each of her muses with a sigh,

Now she had the unmasked gold for her lullaby.

She had the threads, she knew what to do,

Just how to breathe and weave them through,

Though the years go by too fast, the winter night is too long,

She knew her magic is good, her magic is strong.

 Knocking her wrists together three times,

Hearing the last of the second chime,

Holding the lotus, fingers blossoming true,

Now go write your story, We have sung to you…

The Word Whisperer let her lullaby sail,

Rumi said, this is the end of my magnificent tail…

So bid adieu, thank you for the tears and laughter,

And they all wrote,

Happily Ever After.

The End

Kayla Garnet Rose, Crow Moon 2023

Morgue

Morgue*

lightening up my

morgue, pounds of associations, cut

mined, succinct

* In reference to a collection of images, magazines, papergoods, etc used in collage art, just saying

Laphrodite's Guide to Mindful Menopause

Laphrodite's Guide to Mindful Menopause 

or the Adventures of a Baby Crone

An enchanting collection of midlife musings, moon magic, and meditations for mindful menopause.Over the last three years menopause has brought me to my knees. In this humbled position, I offer anecdotes, potential antidotes, and some not so common advice.

According to the Mayo Clinic, menopause is experienced by over 3 million women a year in the United States alone. What makes this book different is viewing menopause as a time of incredible spiritual growth and creativity, rather than just a physical experience that needs a special diet or more exercise.

The book offers concrete tools such as guided visualizations, meditations, and rituals to honor this significant passage in a woman's life. Rather than a dry reference book, it includes humorous stories, inspiring poetry, and juicy practices to experience mindful menopause. 

My Journey Through the Tarot

Back in November, I went to the Salvador Dali museum in Monterey, California. There were several lithographs of Tarot cards that he had designed for the James Bond movie, Live and Let Die. My husband and I talked about the movie, which I did not remember seeing. I know I read the book as a child, since I read all of Ian Fleming's work, the few available books in English available at the Luxembourg airport, along with Agatha Christie.

I didn't really remember the story or that there was a tarot reader in it, but I do remember being about twelve years old and going to London for the first time. We went to the large department store Harrods, which I had heard had an amazing toy section. I searched and searched for Tarot cards. They had many different playing cards and card games but no oracle decks. In the twelfth grade, I wrote an essay on the tarot, even though I had not yet seen, let alone touched a deck, cobbled from some information in the Random House Encyclopedia.

It was only in my early twenties, the summer I came to Santa Cruz, that I encountered the tarot for the first time. I was at a LBQ-BBQ up at UCSC, and one of the women had brought the Motherpeace Tarot by Vickie Noble. I was enchanted. I went down to Gateway's Bookstore the next day for my own set. About a year later, in 1988, I came across the Daughters of the Moon Deck by Fiona Morgan, which was then just a black and white deck. I spent about a year living in Idaho and during that healing time hand painted the deck with watercolors.

After I returned from the Global Walk for a Livable World, I worked at a metaphysical bookstore called Aries Arts for three years. We carried around seventy different tarot decks. I loved bringing them out from the glass counter showing people the cards, talking about the cards, learning about the cards. Then I owned my own bookstore, the Herland women's book-Cafe, we carried at least three dozen different decks by female artists. When the store across the street, 13 Real Magik, closed, they consigned all their decks to me so now we had around a hundred different oracle card sets. After I closed the bookstore, I began doing reviews for US Game Systems. They would send me decks and I would post on my blog. By now I had a lot of decks, so a few I sold, a few gifted to clients and quite a few given to local metaphysical bookstores.

I moved from retail therapy to hypnotherapy. I finished my PhD in Holistic Health. My thesis was entitled Journey Through the Tarot: An Integrated System for Holistic Healing. A comparison of the traditional Rider Waite Tarot cards to four modern-day decks (Daughter's of the Moon, Tarot of Transformation, Osho Zen Tarot and The Tarot of Transformation) demonstrates how the Tarot is an integrated tool for holistic health that offers insights for personal growth and transcendance through the use of symbols, archetypes, and allegories. It's a sweet little primer, check it out.

Then I took a class in Soul Collage at Cabrillo College. I set the intention to make my own deck of 78 cards which I call the Baby Crone's Tarot. About a year later, I wrote poems for each of the images which are now published as a meditation set.

I have been working on two other decks, one called the Tarot of the Banal which is photographs of everyday objects. The other is the Holistic Tarot which is a combination of colored pencils and watercolor focused on universal symbols. I also have a series of portraits. I've only done the Major Arcana but I think the Tarot of Kayla could be a totally fun project. I continue to take classes, most recently with Afefe of Touched By Tarot. It has been a long romance, yet I still feel like I've just begun courting the cards.

Blessed be.