Singing the Tor

Friday November 9, 2007:


It was a beautiful late autumn day. The sun was bright in a blue sky with scudding wispy clouds, the wind a brisk but not despotic Northerly, cold rather than icy. We sat on the bench in front of the rocks that was the entrance to the Tor labyrinth (which we were not going to walk today) whilst my companion described the landscape.

In the sacred landscape of Glastonbury, the Tor is described as the goddess’s left breast. As we sat this day, ahead and to our left, lay Wearyall Hill the swans’ neck or leg of the goddess, ahead and to our right rose the rounded mound of Challis Hill, the goddess’s pregnant belly. Nearer on our left, a stand of trees stood shaking in the wind. WE turned and climbed upwards.

Here at the beginning of the first level, the place of earth, the ground called me and I sat down. Here on the earth chakra, the energy is about grounding, money, physical security, being rooted on the earth. If we stay too long in this place we may get stuck in the mud. But before we moved, we sang to the earth, the first part of four songs by Jaana Runnalls

“Mother earth we feel you in our bones,
Walk in beauty on the land
Mother earth we sing to your stones,
Voice of power and healing hands.”

I lay back and let the earth hold me as though I was held on the palm of her hand whilst my companion sang to me a very long love song to the goddess.

Inelegantly, I clambered to my feet and climbed up more steps. Here at the second level, the place of water, the belly chakra, the womb I sat on the earth as it gurgled beneath me. This is the place of the flow of the waters of emotion, the waters of creativity. Not enough water and you get dried up but too much water and all boundaries are washed away. I sat and heard my blood flow in my veins and felt happy as our voices flowed into Yaana Runnalls water song:

”One drop of love, flows like a stream,
Flows like a stream to the ocean.”


The path got a bit steeper as we climbed up to the third level, the level of the solar plexus chakra, the place of fire and of energy. Here was the place of vitality and the place of will. Too much fire leads to obsession and burn-out, too little, apathy, inertia, lack of courage. Knackered, I flopped down on the earth. We sang Jaana Runnalls song for fire. ”

Light the spark and kindle the flame
Watch the fire and release the pain.
Light a spark and kindle the flame
Watch the fire and release the pain.”

Feeling a bit perkier after singing through our entire repertoire of fire songs, I staggered to my feet again and we climbed on. At the next level, the heart chakra and in the landscape of the four elements, the place of air, the wind was certainly apparent. WE sat low down on the ground, lest we fly off the steeply sloping earth. Here is the place of higher emotions, of pure unconditional love. This is the clarity of the wisdom and truth that comes from the heart rather than just from the clever mind. This too was the wind of freshness. We tossed Jaana Runnalls words defiantly back to the wind.

“Breath sky, soul fly
Send our breath to purify.”


The wind danced about gleefully, thrusting itself hard against our bodies. WE could stand no more and clambering upwards and onwards, found the fifth level, the place of the throat chakra, and the place of speaking our truth. At this level is the place of Clair sentience, the place of intuition. But the wind roared and sang at us and, after flinging songs into its face only to have our words swallowed, we gave up and headed up and round the Tor to the sixth level.

Still the wind whooed and hooed at us as we stood, braced against it. Here we were at the brow chakra, the place of the third eye, the place to see things visible and invisible and sang to each other in the space, songs of intuition.

But it was no good; the sun’s warmth was masked behind the fierce northern wind. WE turned and walked the last stage to the seventh level, where I ducked beneath the winds arm and sat down in a bottom-shaped dip on the earth. This place, the crown chakra, is the level of her will, and aligning our will to hers. Here was the place of surrender to her will, connection with spirit and higher self.

Comfy in my bottom-shaped hollow, I surrendered to her will in the dream.

I was walking downwards, down into a ditch then down underground as though going into a Fogou, but never coming to its’ end. I was swimming in thick black water, like oil, the kind that coated me as I moved through it and I was not human. I sensed my big ugly head and gills and a small tail thrashing away through the thick goo.

The lake was black and shiny. I drove a way through it to the dancing light I saw in the middle which glittered on the black oiliness. It was a fire, on a rock rising sheer from the lake that left no room for anything else. But I had to get out of the lake; I could feel it eating me up.

I climbed into the fire, I danced with the fire as it burned me up and I became vapour rising in swirls and spirals from the greedy flames.

Up and up right up to the ceiling I went and the ceiling became strata’s of rocks and I, the smoke rising as though through a natural earth chimney. UP past the tall trees I went, rising to the top of a white mountain, landing on the snow at the top, light as a bird. I became a bird and soared down from its height. I circled the earth below me, spread out and spinning like a map, before diving down low and landing in another sunken path. I walked on and came to a gnarled and dead-looking ancient beech tree, its wooden skirts falling elegantly down to its roots. Tired now, I sat down to rest and felt at peace.

But we were only a little way from the very top. I got up from my comfortable seat and trekked up the last path to the tower. Here we called to the quarters, sang to the land laid out below us and then returned to the town, slowly picking our way down the steep stairs, heading eagerly for tea and crumpets.