Yet again, I have received asks about my devotion to Morana – and general questions about Her, her nature and role in the Old Faith, and Her relation to us. This post is I think similar to the previous one I made about my connection to Veles. This is not informational, not academic. It’s what I feel about Her.
Why Morana? Morana – or in my native Polish Marzanna – is the slavic Goddess of Death and Winter. Such a strange Goddess she is, so different from others worshipped in the Old Faith. Not a sweet girl in a flower crown that brings happiness and love, not a dear mother that watches over successful crops. And she’s the patron of witchcraft, and nightmares as they say, and sickness – and yet she’s worshipped. And by some loved and appreciated above others.
What is necessary to understand to even begin thinking about Her, is that Death isn’t evil. In any form. It’s a natural cycle, a necessity, a release. A sad one, as we mortals feel so deeply and we love so strongly – but it’s not evil.
She is the one who brings the cold, the howling freezing wind that catches up to you when you hurry through the frozen field to get to the fire. She’s the one that dresses the hills and the mountains in coats of snow, and lets rivers and streams rest under an embrace of ice. She’s the one whispering in the night, and in those dead gray hours of morning when everything is still.
She’s the one listening to your silence when you think about dying. She’s the aching in your soul when you think of times long gone, and people long lost.
She’s the one who watches with unyielding gaze as crops wither and die, as trees wither and die, as animals wither and die. As humans wither, and die, and her hands do not tremble.
She is the one we worship.
She is the one we fear.
She is the one we drown.
Her beauty is stubborn, and her love is harsh. Her burden is a heavy one to carry, and her strikes are often cruel. But there is no one – no other Old God or Goddess here – who understands better. She is the one who knows that there is no Life without Death, as all things must die so they can live anew. She is the one who knows there is no Spring without Winter, as all lands must be stilled and frozen, and hidden under whiteness, so they could later welcome sweet Jarilo and blossom and burst with green, and flowers, and life.
And She is the one who knows that there is no Death without Life, and no Winter without Spring. She knows the time comes when she has to step back, to stop the wind, to cease the breathtaking freezing lullaby. She smiles upon the Gods that sit around the fire, and dance under the summer sky, who laugh and take offerings where for her there are none. And she smiles upon the people, as they carry her effigy and sing of her, tired of winter and death and hard times, and she looks at them with understanding as they throw her into the water, as they set her on fire, as they exclaim and shout in great joy.
Every Winter has to pass so the Spring could come.
But also every Life has to pass. And the Death will come.
żmija