Other vessels hold wine, other vessels hold oil
inside the hollowed-out vault circumscribed by their clay.
I, as a smaller measure, and as the slimmest of all,
humbly hollow myself so that just a few tears can fill me.

Wine becomes richer, oil becomes clear, in its vessel.
What happens with tears?—They made me blind in my glass, 
made me heavy and made my curve iridescent,
made me brittle, and left me empty at last.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke, “Little Tear-Vase” (Sep. 16, 1923) [trans. S. Mitchell]


About

Little Cosmic Missives is a place for my visions, my poetry, my musings, and, occasionally, my dreams. It is my hope that these ‘missives’ will offer a little spark of mystery, of joy when you come upon them. Everything published here is my attempt at faithfully transcribing what is entrusted to me, often through invisible dictation, either from within me or, seemingly, from outside me. I also include an audio recording of a recitation in each post, so you may receive them in a similar way as I do.

I do my best to attach no particular frame of interpretation or consequence to these ‘cosmic missives’, and hope that you join me in curiosity and intrigue as to what these voices from the depthheights have to share with us at this time.

About Cybele

Cybele Brandow is a third-gender writer, poet, and divinatory counsel of Magyar, Celtic, and Germanic (et. al.) ancestry. They live in the Dawnland just south of Portland, Maine; a short walk from the rocky Avalonian coast they grew up with and so love. They hold a degree in Religion from Reed College, where Cybele studied late-antique Christian mysticism, Sahidic Coptic, pre-imperial Chinese idea systems, and presented a thesis titled “The Fool’s Hermeneutic: Toward a Trialogic Understanding of Authority within the Confines of the Tarot Divination Event”.

For as long as they can remember Cybele has received richly colorful, narrative visions. Similar in character to waking dreams, these visions regularly come with accompanying poetic dictations. While it has been their practice to record as many of them as they can, they never transcribe that which must be passed over in silence. At times, these powerful imaginations occur daily or even more frequently, and can only be experienced. Many of the longer-form visions, dreams, and emergent characters have been woven into a novel of mid-grade ‘nonsense’ literature which is almost ready for publication.

Through years of being in intimate learning community with Jungians via the Maine Jung Center, Cybele received many keys that aid them invaluably in more gracefully and sustainably navigating unconscious imaginal currents. These tools and techniques are much treasured by their psyche, and you will undoubtedly see regular allusion to them in their writings.


I hope you will enjoy your time here, and I look forward to the way your own contributions will help to unfurl more richly the meaningful potentials of these little cosmic missives.

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Mystical poetry for times in transition~

People

writer | poet | divinatory counsel