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Alchemical rebirth of serpentine motion

By: Marjory Mejia

Drawing by Theodoros Pelecanos  (1478)

Mother Serpent, the great devourer

Slithering, undulating, weaving her naked body on the dark earth

embracing her cycles of death and rebirth, Serpent sheds her skin to renew herself

bending her body into a circle that spells infinity, Ouroboros She is called

a mandala of life biting her own tail, eternal, visionary, sensual

poison becomes medicine and her body sets in motion

waves of kundalini DNA scriptures

intimately clearing the way and nourishing the soil

with the sacred flow of life-giving rivers.

Happy New Chinese Year of the Water Snake dear ones!

For all of you feeling like rebirth is in order, you have a brand new day marking the beginning of a new cycle in the Chinese calendar. Nothing spells rebirth in my nature book more than snake/serpent, a great teacher this beautiful and mythical animal/spirit, often misunderstood and reviled for her sensuality in most religions. She was, however, worshiped as the representation of the underworld, the realm of the feminine, a sacred symbol of the Goddess in pre-patriarchal times, which still survives in some indigenous traditions until today. Who else could teach us that:

“You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” Mary Oliver from ‘Wild Geese’

Some of my favorite moments in life have been healing moments of grace and communion in sacred serpentine contact with nature, landscape, earth. I’ve been most alive when I have given in to what the soft animal of my body loves: getting lost in the wild and finding my way crawling and swimming upstream in the body of a river; floating like a some marine mammal belly up in the ocean gazing into the sky; lying on the earth letting her pull ground me with her gravity; shaking to the rhythm of some ancient song awakening the fibers of my being deep within..

Painting by P.C.Turczyn

In the words of Carl Jung:

In the age-old image of the Ouroboros lies the thought of devouring oneself and turning oneself into a circulatory process, for it was clear to the more astute alchemists that the prima materia of the art was [woman herself]. The Ouroboros is a dramatic symbol for the integration and assimilation of the opposite, i.e. of the shadow. This ‘feed-back’ process is at the same time a symbol of immortality, since it is said of the Ouroboros that [she] slays [herself] and brings [herself] to life, fertilizes [herself] and gives birth to [herself].

 ~ ♥ ~