The Dark Mountain and the Big Black Cat

Tales from Hedgespoken

Lying in my tent with gentle rainfall filling my sound-world I mused on the first evening of my weekend at Embercombe, down in the woody depths of Devon. Hedgespoken story tellers had held the stage for the past couple of hours, filling the darkening night with tales of magic and mystery, conjuring yarns that pulled at deep things in my soul.

I’d sat into the wee small hours on the dew-gathering grass, gazing into a campfire as aberrant rhythms of accordion, whistle, fiddle and guitar entranced the words from gypsy clad story-carriers.

The tangle of permaculture plots, wild edges and laughing woodpeckers had welcomed me heart and spirit into their midst and I felt a homecoming of like minded lovely-folk. Little did I know the turn of events that were to take me as the weekend flowed through the drizzle soaked land.

Despite the place of it’s birth the Dark Mountain held an unexpected release from judgement and aloneness in a changing world. Here was a group of people who knew. Earth lovers who felt the depth and horror of the incoming changes and yet could rise above this and work on resilience and personal growth, exploring ways for humanity to survive, no… thrive through the chaos of world evolution. This is what I came to explore, this is what I wanted to put in my pocket and bring home to our folk, yet the land had other plans.

Beast

Paul Kingsnorth spoke of his new book on the Saturday afternoon, reading the magic from a handful of pages. Beast. A shocking, deep, short, piercing read. He spoke passionately about the big black dogs that wandered our wild places, our moorlands and forest edges since memory began. How lone walkers met their smouldering red eyes when vulnerable and weather-worn. He mentioned how this all changed fifty years ago as the big black dogs stopped appearing to wilderness wanderers.

Now was the time of the big black cat. Slinking over the wild places, muscles rippling, green-gold eyes burning, owning the land, sightings multiplied. Reputable scholars saw them, respected naturalists witnessed their walkings, and thousands of everyday solitude seekers met with their hair-raising gaze. Yet no one found proof. No one found their homes, their scat, their prey remains, their dead… nothing.

Sharing wildness

Kingsnorth then brought into the room the otherworldly big black cat. The beast that came to share wildness from the other realms. To remind us of the edge of life, that we need more than this tame existence, that we aren’t alone. Black Panther was a messenger, a reminder, a memory. This possibility sank deep within me and lit a flame of knowing which burned with clarity and eloquence.

From that point I could no longer attend any of the lectures, the room acoustics messed with my already messed up hearing, stole my balance and fed my tinnitus. So I retired to the solitude and solace of outdoors. On Saturday night my world flipped. I couldn’t stand. Vertigo flew around my head with such rapidity that the whole planet whirled around me.

Helplessly I crawled into a nearby woodland and dug a hole to take my vomit as I curled up on Mother Earth. Her cold, wet breath soothed my sweat soaked body.

By Sunday noon I could stand again so I wobbled back to the community circles to say my goodbyes. Casting my gaze to the wooded horizon to steady myself, I saw him. Stalking along the fence-line between forest and moor-edge Black Panther surveyed his kingdom, long tail twitching above the wet grasses. He graced the land with unspeakable elegance, his lines fluid on the land. He belonged there and knew that.

I hurried to the lunch tables and called out to a couple of folks. “There… See… Big Black Cat!” Story-telling friend Judy followed my finger and failed to see him. I willed her to witness this moment as I watched panther sleek between the silvering birches. The guy next to us shouted ‘yes – I see him’, then Judy too picked up his shadowy form and stood aghast as he melted back into his own realm, leaving open mouths and wildened hearts in his wake.

Wild Freedom

Four days later I woke in my bed, knowing old things, new things that would seep through the rest of my life. My otherworldly time took me to a ruin on Anglezarke Moor, the one time homestead of Old Rachel. Black Panther came to meet me. Tales of future work, of bringing wild freedom to folk and of a new animal spirit guide washed through me as another adventure began to unfold.

Last night Nicola and I hosted an experiential journey night for a group of enquiring Preston people. During the interval a lady spoke to me of her previous night’s dream.

She recounted how since childhood she had never had a single dream but “last night I dreamt deeply. Four Black Panthers stood around my bed, green-gold eyes gazing into mine. What could this mean?”

The page has turned, a new chapter has begun. Will you walk to wild freedom with us?