Looking for the Goddess in Greece

By Diana Rivers

Mother, we have come seeking some trace of You here in this dry, boney, beautiful land surrounded on all sides by sea, this land where You were worshipped for so long and by so many names. We have come hopeful and open-hearted but You are elusive, not easily found, hiding always just out of reach, a secret, a hint, a whisper, the echo of an echo, a locked gate, a closed museum, a shadow, a shadow behind the shadow, some words in a guide book but no directions, some directions but no sign, a sign, but the path much too long or steep for these old mortal feet to carry the body, or the road years gone in rain and rock-fall, the bus that doesn’t come, the boat that leaves too soon.

Sometimes it seems as if You are lost to us, perhaps even gone from this land, and we feel like crying, or we turn our anger and frustration on each other. Just as we despair of ever finding You, You whisper, You call, You beckon, always around the next corner, the next turn in the road, up the next hill. We follow and keep following and are finally rewarded by this cave, supposed to be Zeus’ birth-place, but for eons before that a center of worship to You as Goddess of childbirth.

This place is a womb, its dark opening guarded by a fig tree that both conceals and marks the entrance, hiding it from those who have no business here. We enter, bowing low under the rock ceiling, and are met by a metal fence and closed gate. No matter, the gate swings open at a touch, doorway to the under-world. Hushed and awed, we step into the silence and You are there. Your large, dark, ancient presence permeates this chamber and enfolds us. Our feeble lights barely open a tiny path in the darkness but we can see just enough. Your form is there before us, huge stone head and shoulders rising out of the earth, reflecting, echoing the shape of the cave around it. A flat altar-like rock is on the ground before You and we sink down beside it. Others have been here before us. We find flowers, sage, shells, feathers left as offerings. We add our own small offerings, light our little candle, pour water over You as a libation, sing our few chants and suddenly we are connected to circles going back and back and back through time, seeking guidance and comfort here at the Source. Sitting in this cool dark stillness, we have found our way home to You.