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Halo Quin

~ Author, storyteller, witch

Category Archives: Stories

My short stories…

Pwyll’s Descent – Welsh Mythology and some Faeosophy

19 Thursday May 2016

Posted by Haloquin in Enchanted, Faery, Magic, Philosophy, Stories, Storytelling

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Tags

Annwn, Arawn, Faery, fairies, Feyhearted path, Mabinogian, Magic, musings, paganism, Philosophy, Pwyll, Rhiannon, Stories, Story

My work has risen from my experiences with spirits and magic, my theories have come from exploring the stories and putting the tales and my experiences together… So something I’m working on is weaving the theory back into context of the stories for the talks and workshops I have coming up this summer and I thought my lovely readers here would enjoy a taster!

On 5th June I’ll be co-teaching a workshop on working with the spirits of the land and this little video introduces the first part of the story and some of the ideas behind this work.

Pwyll is the “Prince of Dyfed” and, whilst out hunting, he finds himself on a strange adventure to the Welsh Otherworld, Annwn. Later he will meet Rhiannon, but first he had to prove himself worthy of honour from Annwn and its denizens… 

 

This story is from the first branch of The Mabinogian, a cycle of stories written down in 12th-13th Centuries and compiled together (and translated into English) by Lady Charlotte Guest. Because of the time they were written they are couched in terms of medieval society and social structures, but the magic shines through, carrying with it evidence of the oral culture and understanding of the world in which these tales were born. Tracing the patterns of the myths and stories can teach us a lot about the relationship we humans have had with the land and its spirits, and what we had learnt (and have recently mostly forgotten) about how to navigate those relationships for the benefit of both worlds.

I believe this is so important I wrote a book on how to get in touch with your own connection to the otherworlds, and you can see more about that here, and I’m constantly exploring new ways to share that understanding and the skills that worked for me with others. Bringing it back to where I began, rooted in the stories, where we learn best, feels like and important thing to do now.

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

The Power of Story – WIP

03 Monday Sep 2012

Posted by Haloquin in Faery, Stories

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Tags

Beginnings, Faery, Imperfection, Philosophy, process, story, Strangeness of Life

This is a section of the first draft of something I’m working on currently…

***

Stories have power. We tell ourselves stories that allow us to do things and stories that hold us back. We listen to the stories of others and some part of the story influences us. A story of failure encourages us not to try. A story of success pushes us towards our dreams.

Let go of the stories that say you are not enough. Let go of the stories that hold you back from pursuing your dreams. Let go of the stories that you carry from childhood which make you feel small.

 

You are bigger than your stories, greater, more.

You are the storyteller of your life and you get to choose to be the hero at every moment.

 

As I sat crying under a tree one night a Jack-in-the-Green sat beside me, pointing to constellations of streetlights in the town stretched below us:

“Look how the humans have tried to copy the stars.” He smiled.

I think I argued, as though I didn’t find it strange to be greeted by a jack, that the lights were there to see by, not to copy the stars.

“What do you think stars are for?” He replied, leaving with the sound of church-bells.

 

The lights in our hearts are there to guide us, the stars of our soul show us the path to our dreams. Seek the stars in your soul. Seek the bigger story that carries you to the moon and leave behind the ones that weight you down.

Fey Cards Challenge step 1 – The Story

18 Monday May 2009

Posted by Haloquin in Art Craft and Beauty, Faery, Magic, Stories

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Art Craft and Beauty, challenge, Devotional, Faery, Feyhearted path, Magic, musings, oracle cards, project, Stories

Today I jumped the gun and rewrote my story.

The ideas themselves are not new, but the telling, I hope, is fresh 🙂

My plan is to use the story for the first suit of the deck of Faery oracle cards I’m making (see here for information, and here for the bigger project).

And then the deck will expand…

Enjoy…

Continue reading →

Story Charmer

22 Sunday Feb 2009

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

muse, story, writing

In the back of my mind, through the forest of thoughts, I catch glimpses of the story. Its shy, but longing to be shared, and though I can’t quite make out its shape occasionally, just for a moment, I catch sight of its colour.

Warm markings full of depth and glowing orange-red flash between the deep green leaves, like a goldfish in the ocean, dark and murky.

The story sneaks closer and I sit patiently, my pen flying across the paper while every other part of me is still. Waiting. Waiting for the story to lay itself down in the movement of ink, the flow of words across the crisp paper transforming potential into reality.

Flying, Soaring, Falling

29 Tuesday Apr 2008

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

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Tags

desire, divine, dragon, flight, Love, serpent, stars

Serpent coiling round sensous curves
The egg breaks, releases, scales form.
Dancing deva, devil, god
Her wings spread, she flies above.

Toes touching starlight, leaping far.
Round wrist, cross shoulders,
Whispering in her ear.
Spiralling divine, she hears his song.

Coiling in her belly a serpent stirs.
Stretching from her heart, wings soar.
Serpent rises, wings connect,
A dragon with stars for eyes is born…

When love meets desire,
And understanding blossoms,
The most beautiful flower
Begins to grow.

A new sheet

13 Tuesday Feb 2007

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

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moment, story

Bottles of colour in hand, running down the stairs into the cold, cold snow, white like a clean sheet, a blank slate, a tabula rasa. What will these colours give rise to, give life to?

Confronted with the freshness, momentarilly stunned. Possibilities endless. Total freedom.

Clunk.

The first bottle loses its lid, and with it drops the hesitation…

Swoosh!

Swish!

Shooosh!

Colours fly through the air like liquid joy, staining the snow.

Arcs of rainbow inks pattern my world.

Later I watch from the window as snowballers scoop pink snow to throw, balling it up tight and puzzling over the green and blue and orange.

The snow melts slowly, dissolving deeper in the footprints.

As night falls the rain follows and washes my colours away.

And with the dawn a new sheet of snow sleets down to shower with rainbows again.

An Angel Wept

05 Thursday Oct 2006

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

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moment, story

On a crystalline world not far from here an angel wept. Perched atop a small hill as tears flowed freely into her palms, sobs wrenched from her heart in great gasps that steamed in the crisp autumn air.

I watched my little girl from the window of our stable, she was the youngest of our children and the light of my older years. Now she seemed so far from my reach. I knew this would be a hard time for all of us, and dashed away the tears that fell from my own eyes and blurred the world into a quartz-like muddle.

At dinner we were strangely superficial. Topics bore no relevance to the pain lying in the next room. We avoided mention of the blossoming blood that would not go away no matter how many bandages were applied. We tried not to think of life once the nurses had finished their job, once there was no more reason for them to be here. The boys talked of their day at work, Angelica barely touched her food. And for once no-one complained.

I was with her at the end. I closed her eyes.

The world was becoming colder. Winter came closer and the house was quiet. My little angel, withdrawn from the day, refused to go to school. And I hadn’t the heart to make her. Mathew and Peter spoke to me about it once or twice, as I recall, but I didn’t really pay attention. After that, they took her each day, and I sat, waiting for her to come home safe, never quite believing that she wasn’t also gone for always, and never quite believing her mother wouldn’t bring her home anymore.

My whole being was empty, or perhaps filled with the waters of the Styx, dark and dreary and full of sorrow. Every day was an effort to rise and food, food no longer had any taste. I ate out of rote, but nothing more. Mathew, the eldest, eventually went back to his wife, I’m not sure when. And the house became quieter.

Angelica took to spending much of her time wandering on the hills, by the lake.

One stormy evening dusk fell and she hadn’t returned. This was the first moment I felt anything other than empty sorrow. Peter and I spent half the night searching for her, on the hills, through the forest. We combed the caves nearby, we swept the fields, now bereft of corn, and found no sign of her. As the moon rode high, the storm cleared and the stars turned in the sky, I circled the lake, and there, curled beneath a willow tree wrapped in her coat, my angel slept safely.

I carried her home.

The winter was hard for me. But it was harder on my little ones. I tried to fight for them, to stay, but the cold and damp had gotten into my lungs, my blood, and eventually the water and the winter claimed me.

And out on the frosty, crystalline hill, an angel wept.

The Truth

11 Monday Sep 2006

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

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Tags

moment, story

Can you use logic to reveal the Truth?

We have a history of analytical thinking over half the world.
Are we any closer to The Truth?

We have many things that could logically be called true.
Does that make them Truth?

And, would finding The Truth really help us?
Would it make us happy? Would it guide us in how to live good lives?

How could it do that?

Why should it do that?

Would it matter if we found The Truth and it didn’t help us?

What would be the point in finding The Truth if it doesn’t help us practically?

Are all acts of logics simply solving logic puzzles… no more than games?

What is The Truth anyway?

Music written just for Me

11 Monday Sep 2006

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

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Tags

moment, story

Music… Why is it we hear some music and it feels like it was written just for us? Like it speaks to us in a special way…
How can this songwriter from hundreds of miles away, that we’ve never met, capture our thoughts and feelings so perfectly?
It feels as though no-one else should feel this way, like a personal interchange between two like minds…
And slowly we remember that we have felt this way before… How is it that they can reach into our heart of hearts so often?
And the realisation dawns… Because these feelings aren’t new to us, they are felt by many people many times, and that’s how music touches us, it reminds us of what we all share, that we aren’t, as it feels, alone in our feelings…
Isn’t it nice to know we’re not unique in our unending attempts at emotional experiences.

What is Philosophy; a Theory.

11 Monday Sep 2006

Posted by Haloquin in Stories

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

moment, story

The point of philosophy is not to find out what happens in the world, but what it means to us, what affect the events that occur have on us. Philosophy is looking for the truth, not the truth of what is, but the truth of what “what is” means. Leave science to look for what is, we shall look at what is behind the veneer of reality.

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Meet Halo

Snow Pixie

Welcome to my world!

Halo Quin is an author, a storyteller, and a practicing witch with a lifelong relationship with the spirit realm (faeries, deities, and the primal powers of land, sea, and sky, specifically) who aims to share magic through experience. Halo lives in wild West Wales, right by the roiling sea, and loves to sing, dance, and otherwise enchant through performance. She also runs the local storytelling circle, and an ADHD resource centre, and ultimately encourages self-knowledge, self-acceptance, self-healing, and self-enchantment through everything she does... leading to:

Beauty ~ Magic ~ Delight

Re-enchanting the world, one story, one song, one spell, at a time.

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And for the over 18s… My alter-ego, Ms Quin, writes erotica, kinky poetry, on sacred sexuality and the like. You can explore some of Her writings and poetry readings, and find her sexy book of poetry via links at Twisted Ms Quin.

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