The Guardian’s breath makes the Horn resound
To the very depths of the Valley
As you advance toward the Bridge
That leads to Heaven
The Divine Cloud comes to you.
Penetrating and renewing you.
The Rainbow seals within your Being
the Divine Emanation.
Enthusiastic, you resume your journey.
The Sound of the Horn signifies inner awakening. We advance toward the bridge that leads to the higher states of consciousness represented by the Cloud, an emanation of the Divine Form.
As we open ourselves to this Cloud, it penetrates us and deeply regenerates us.
In a botanical vision, we see here a plant, a reed open toward the sky, with the three upper parts forming a receptacle. Receptivity is thus optimal, and we are dealing here with an Antenna.
We also find this posture in the gesture of invocation and opening to the forces of the heavens in many religions and spiritual disciplines. Like the reed, the officiant calls upon and channels the supernatural forces within and through himself. There is thus both active invocation and passive reception.
This motif is engraved on the back of the priest’s chasuble, signifying that once clothed in this garment, he steps aside to become a channel, a mediator between the celestial forces and the congregation.
If Eihwaz showed us how life and death intertwine within us and Perthro allowed us to glimpse a new hidden purpose, Elhaz describes the weaving of this purpose in , through a new form of participation in the underground currents that nourish our destiny. In Eihwaz, the Yew was firmly rooted in the earth, and its strength lay in that slow, continuous growth that ensured its balance; here, the reed is an aquatic and flexible plant: the mystery of Perthro’s cavern has become nourishing and assimilable water.
The horizontal opening of Perthro, signifying listening and participation in the currents that influence our future, is answered here by a skyward-oriented openness. Our personal destiny has been fertilized, and the three vertical lines indicate active participation: we are now a channel. In Perthro, we understood that a part of our destiny remained mysterious and beyond the control of our will. Here we accept and open ourselves to consciously participate in these forces that transcend us.
Ice, the form opens like a corolla to welcome fire, light, and Force. The reed draws its substance from the marsh, the liquid form of ice, and draws it up to the sky. There are two complementary dynamics at work here: that of ice, ascending in the form of water drawing up the nutrients that will form the plant’s fibers, and that of Fire, descending, solar energy drawing up and energizing the flow of sap by creating a strong polarity.
An antenna must be wide open to receive waves, but also properly tuned and oriented to select and focus on the right frequencies. The reed must know how to use the sun, water, and wind to ensure its growth, constantly adapting. After the encounter with Perthro, which briefly reveals the underlying currents that determine our destiny, we must now integrate these currents within ourselves so that they enable us to reach a new milestone.
If this lesson has been properly learned, there is a conjunction between our personal destiny and the inner call, creating a powerful dynamic. Thus the reed becomes a bridge, a path to a new world symbolized by Bifröst.
Simultaneously, we acknowledge our dependence on an external force that determines our destiny, yet we offer ourselves to it, asking for its protection. The more powerful the invoked force, the more indispensable humility and flexibility become. The more we become aware that this previously sensed force flows through us but does not belong to us, the more we gain flexibility and resilience. Thus, paradoxically, we realize that this force and what it instills within us is Reality in the making.
There is an ambivalence in this rune that conceals a notion of danger: these dangers are emanations of water, our emotionality. But the rustling of the reed is a signal warning us of any overflow; it is up to us to listen to it.
By not seeking to hold back or manipulate these energies that flow through us, and by applying the transparency learned in Isa, an inner weaving takes place within us: as the two energies condense and combine, they generate a fabric of a new nature—a cocoon for the inner child, the gestation of Tir Nan Nog