YOU WILL NEED
White candle
Corn dolly
Fireproof receptacle
Either the sticky burrs from a cleavers plant
(which has a cleansing effect) or several pieces of
paper on which you have written your irritations
METHOD
✤ Light the candle.
✤ Cup the corn dolly in your hands and review
the previous year, particularly winter.
✤ Attach as many of the sticky burrs as you can
to the corn dolly, making each one represent
something that has irritated you.
✤ Alternatively, tuck the pieces of paper into the
corn dolly.
✤ Carefully set the dolly alight and place it in
the receptacle.
✤ As the dolly burns say these words or similar:
Begone dull and nasty times
Welcome moments fine
I greet the new times with joy and laughter
✤ When the corn dolly has burnt out, bury the
ashes as an offering to the earth or dispose of
them in running water.
Nature-based religions gave way to the Christian in
other ways as well. For example, the four-leaved
clover has long been associated with the sun, good
fortune and luck. To pagans it also represented the
Goddess form, the quaternity – the fourfold aspects
of deity
In Ireland, St Patrick is thought to have used
the trefoil (three-leaved clover) to demonstrate
the principle of the Holy Trinity – Father, Son
and Holy Spirit – to his followers. He would
have used material that was readily available to
him rather than the rarer and more magical
four-leaved plant, and would thus have
signified the move away from intrinsic magical
knowledge associated with Mother Earth.
Incidentally, the clover plant is thought to give
the wearer the ability to see the fairy form.
