I finally finished my last bottle of frenzy wine-which had been steeping with some delightful herbs (including blue lotus) for over two years. We set about making the wine after our last trip North and I had been using it as sacrament and spoil in rituals over the last year- finally drinking the last drop last night. Witches of all kinds from all over the world make concoctions that include entheogenic herbs and substances, to aid in reaching that higher plateau of awareness and inner energy that comes with the abandonment of the ego of the material.
Some tribes in South America utilized plants like ayahuasca or cacti, some North American and Central American tribes utilized peyote. Old English folk tales speak of flying ointments (herbs steeped in fats and applied to the body). In Asian cultures, poppies were utilized, or the secretions of certain poison animals and it’s believed the extinct soma plant of India may have been marijuana. Every culture had their own ways of reaching that level of frenzy needed to enter the ecstatic world and become one with their Divine. As a practitioner of European style witchcraft, I’ve always favored flying ointments (and boy have some of them been unsuccessful), and as a modern American slacker, I’ve had my share of experiences with Plant Medicine (and not always respectfully in my younger years), and I, like many witches, have my preferred favorites.
Some witches prefer smoke, some prefer whole plant ingestion (the most dangerous type), some prefer steeped herbs diluted in fats, oils or water (many of the most accessible and commonly used entheogens are fat soluble)- there are many mindsets and ways of thinking when it comes to herbalism in the mind-altering sense. I’m in love with the many mentalities that exist in each culture concerning their Sacred Plants- and always have been. Flying ointments and oils are a special interest of mine, and probably because of my studies in European folk magic, but for my own reasons, I tend to lean towards frenzy wines and smokes.
I began researching frenzy or “maenad” wines about five years ago in college when I took my second anthropology course and met two other women walking alternative spiritual roads and we worked on a project about drugs in ritual. Rachel, who was studying shamanism at the time gave me some of my first tips and courses on making frenzy wine from already prepared wine (I was too young to get the tools or space necessary to make my own wine). Her experience was with mushrooms (amanita) in frenzy wine… But, because of certain allergies and age restrictions, I waited a few years before attempting them myself. It’s not an every ritual kind of thing, which is why it took so long to get through the two small bottles I made, but worth it every time, especially when that frenzy sets in.
Some witches describe it as flying, but I’ve never felt any sensation like flight, only a madness,a frenzy that sweeps over the self as I dance around the fire to the beat of drums, the howl of flutes and (sometimes) the sound of my uncontrollable laughter lol. Ecstatic dancing is a way to bring yourself into that otherworldly connection without the use of substances, and is my preferred crossing method. Hey, to each, their own.
I have half a jar left of last years frenzy balm- a mild, unnamed cream. Definitely going to have to whip out the recipe in October when the herbs it contains are in full wild bloom. I’ll make a new batch of maenad spirits around then too. I may not be much on oil crafting or incense, but I know liquor and wine outside and in, being the little lush I can be lol.
In other matters….
I collected cottonwood fluff from my yard- the trees are exploding these little poofs everywhere, yards and streets and gutters are smothered in them, like snow. My allergies have been going nuts because of it. It will make good stuffing for all sorts of things… like poppets for my new wreath. Even have a few porcupine quills left to contribute.
