Latest / Laura and Lauren Podcast / Mystic Spiral Episode 21: Sirens of the Deep part 1
Transcript
- 0:00[music]
- 0:11SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Mystic Spiral, the podcast where earth-rooted magic, animal wisdom,
- 0:17SPEAKER_01: and ancient enchantment twist together like a serpent and a snail in the moss.
- 0:23SPEAKER_01: Join us as we explore the unseen, the intuitive, and the beautifully strange.
- 0:31SPEAKER_00: Each episode invites you deeper into the spiral, into the myth,
- 0:35SPEAKER_00: and into the wild magic that lives within and around all of us.
- 0:41SPEAKER_01: Hi, I'm Lauren, Crystal Healer, Earth-Rooted Mystic,
- 0:45SPEAKER_01: and Friend of Snails and Mossy Fae Folk Magic.
- 0:49SPEAKER_00: And I'm Laura, Animal Communicator, Serpent Kinponowich, and Solitary Social Practitioner.
- 0:55[music]
- 1:06SPEAKER_01: Welcome back, mythlings, to Season 2 of the Mystic Spiral, where myth, magic,
- 1:11SPEAKER_01: and unseen currents of the world braid together.
- 1:14SPEAKER_01: We've missed you.
- 1:16SPEAKER_01: We've missed the space.
- 1:18SPEAKER_01: We've missed the way stories shimmer when we speak them out loud.
- 1:22SPEAKER_00: Season 2 feels like a return tide, familiar shores, deeper waters.
- 1:26SPEAKER_00: And today we're diving into one of the oldest,
- 1:28SPEAKER_00: most shape-shifting archetypes in folklore, Sirens.
- 1:31SPEAKER_00: Sirens.
- 1:33SPEAKER_01: Not just the Greek ones, not just the mermaids,
- 1:35SPEAKER_01: but the whole constellation of water spirits who call, warn, guide, and transform.
- 1:42SPEAKER_00: And we're starting with four of them today, each with their own tale, each with their own voice.
- 1:47SPEAKER_00: As a reminder, if any questions should arise during this episode,
- 1:51SPEAKER_00: you can email them to us at mysticspiralpodcast at gmail.com
- 1:56SPEAKER_00: and we will address them in a future Q&A episode.
- 1:58[music]
- 2:10SPEAKER_01: Let's begin where most people think the story starts, Greece.
- 2:14SPEAKER_01: But the Greek sirens weren't mermaids.
- 2:17SPEAKER_01: They were bird women, perched on jagged rocks,
- 2:20SPEAKER_01: singing truths so powerful it could unravel a person.
- 2:23SPEAKER_00: And I know you've been carrying a story about them all week.
- 2:26SPEAKER_00: I could feel it humming.
- 2:28SPEAKER_00: It came in like a tide.
- 2:30SPEAKER_01: There's a tale, not from Homer, but from fishermen, about a young sailor named Theros.
- 2:37SPEAKER_01: He wasn't brave or foolish, just curious in a soft way that makes someone lean towards mystery.
- 2:44SPEAKER_01: One dawn, he heard a single trembling note drifting across the water, not beautiful,
- 2:51SPEAKER_01: not yet, but full of promise, a question, a pull.
- 2:56SPEAKER_01: He rode towards it.
- 2:58SPEAKER_01: On a jagged rock sat a siren with storm-colored feathers.
- 3:04SPEAKER_01: She didn't beckon.
- 3:05SPEAKER_01: She didn't smile.
- 3:07SPEAKER_01: She simply sang.
- 3:09SPEAKER_01: In the moment Theros heard the full song, the sky opened inside him.
- 3:14SPEAKER_01: He saw the truth of his life, the choices he had feared, the longing he carried.
- 3:20SPEAKER_01: The song didn't kill him.
- 3:22SPEAKER_01: It changed him.
- 3:24SPEAKER_01: He left the sea and became a storyteller.
- 3:27SPEAKER_01: And every tale he told carried a faint echo of that siren's note.
- 3:34SPEAKER_00: That's what I love about Greek sirens.
- 3:36SPEAKER_00: They're dangerous because they're honest.
- 3:38SPEAKER_00: They don't seduce you.
- 3:39SPEAKER_00: They reveal you.
- 3:41SPEAKER_01: Truth has tidal force.
- 3:44SPEAKER_00: Let's swim north to Ireland where the Murrah wear red capes that let them walk
- 3:48SPEAKER_00: on land and fall in love with humans in that bittersweet salty way.
- 3:53SPEAKER_01: There's a story of the Murrow woman named Nula.
- 3:56SPEAKER_01: She adored a human world, its fires, its laughter, its clumsy tenderness.
- 4:02SPEAKER_01: She warned her beloved Eamon, if you ever hide my red cap, I will be trapped here,
- 4:08SPEAKER_01: and love should never be a cage.
- 4:12SPEAKER_01: He promised, but one winter, fearing the sea would steal her, he did it.
- 4:18SPEAKER_01: She didn't rage.
- 4:20SPEAKER_01: She didn't cry.
- 4:22SPEAKER_01: She simply looked at him with sorrow deeper than the Atlantic.
- 4:27SPEAKER_01: Love without freedom is not love.
- 4:31SPEAKER_01: She found the cap, kissed him once, a kissed tasting of salt and forgiveness,
- 4:38SPEAKER_01: and returned to the waves.
- 4:41SPEAKER_01: Fishermen say that she still rises on calm nights,
- 4:45SPEAKER_01: leaving a single red strand of hair on the shore.
- 4:50SPEAKER_00: That's Murrow energy, tenderness with a backbone,
- 4:53SPEAKER_00: love that breathes and refuses to be held too tightly.
- 4:57SPEAKER_01: Now let's wander inland, rivers, lakes, marshes, to meet the Rusalka.
- 5:04SPEAKER_01: They're grief spirits, guardians, echoes of unresolved stories.
- 5:09SPEAKER_00: And they always feel like moonlight on water to me.
- 5:12SPEAKER_00: There's a tale of a girl named Mila who loved singing beneath the old willow tree.
- 5:16SPEAKER_00: When the river flooded one spring, it took her.
- 5:19SPEAKER_00: Weeks later, fishermen heard a voice at dusk, thin, stretched, shimmering.
- 5:25SPEAKER_00: They saw a figure in the willow's branches, pale skin, river-green hair, eyes full of longing.
- 5:32SPEAKER_00: Her grandmother visited the riverbank, sat beneath the willow, and hummed Mila's old tune.
- 5:37SPEAKER_00: The river stilled.
- 5:38SPEAKER_00: The Rusalka softened.
- 5:40SPEAKER_00: Since then, she guides wandering children back to shore, humming that same willow song.
- 5:46SPEAKER_01: A grief spirit who became a guardian.
- 5:49SPEAKER_00: Water remembers and protects.
- 5:52SPEAKER_01: Well, now let's travel to the Philippines, where the Sirena are storm-tied, fierce,
- 5:58SPEAKER_01: and protective.
- 6:00SPEAKER_00: And deeply relational with the sea.
- 6:02SPEAKER_00: There's a story of a fisherman named Jory caught in a sudden typhoon.
- 6:06SPEAKER_00: Lightning split the sky, waves towered, and through the chaos he heard a voice, follow my song.
- 6:13SPEAKER_00: A Sirena named Lyra guided him to a sheltered cove, then vanished beneath the waves.
- 6:18SPEAKER_00: He left offerings for her every year.
- 6:20SPEAKER_00: Flowers, shells, carved flute.
- 6:23SPEAKER_00: When foreign sailors tried to capture her, the sea rose in fury,
- 6:27SPEAKER_00: but spared the fishermen who honored her.
- 6:29SPEAKER_00: If you hear singing during a storm, they say Lyra is guiding someone home.
- 6:34SPEAKER_01: A siren who protects those who respected her waters.
- 6:38SPEAKER_01: A merling after my own heart.
- 6:40[music]
- 6:51SPEAKER_00: Before we leave today, we're going to pull a card.
- 6:53SPEAKER_00: Today we were called to use the Sea Melodies deck, of course, by Jessica Lay.
- 6:59SPEAKER_00: Remember to take what resonates with you and leave the rest.
- 7:02SPEAKER_00: Okay, Mifflings, time for a little Shuffy Shuffy.
- 7:14SPEAKER_00: These cards have a mind of their own. Sousi.
- 7:16SPEAKER_00: They're real sassy! Ooh, you pulled two.
- 7:21SPEAKER_00: I pulled two.
- 7:23SPEAKER_01: So the first one is change.
- 7:26SPEAKER_01: Know when to move to a new shell, especially if yours no longer fits.
- 7:33SPEAKER_01: That's a good message. I think we all need that sometimes. Exactly.
- 7:36SPEAKER_01: And the second one was take the helm.
- 7:40SPEAKER_01: Be in control of your own ship.
- 7:44SPEAKER_00: We also need that one.
- 7:46SPEAKER_01: I really feel like these two go together very nicely.
- 7:49SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and they are a pretty universal message.
- 7:52SPEAKER_00: We all need that, I think, right now.
- 7:54SPEAKER_01: I think so, too.
- 7:55SPEAKER_01: Pull your shit together.
- 7:57SPEAKER_01: You got this.
- 7:58SPEAKER_00: I feel like you're talking to me directly.
- 8:03SPEAKER_01: You know, I think I'm giving myself a pep talk, too.
- 8:05SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, the two of us, we both need it.
- 8:08SPEAKER_01: It's true. It's very true.
- 8:10SPEAKER_01: I'll be popping these up on our socials.
- 8:13SPEAKER_01: So keep an eye out on our Facebook, Instagram.
- 8:16SPEAKER_01: And also you can check us out on YouTube and subscribe to our Substack.
- 8:21SPEAKER_01: It's true. You can. You can stalk us everywhere.
- 8:24SPEAKER_00: Please do. It'd be fun.
- 8:25SPEAKER_00: Send us messages.
- 8:27SPEAKER_00: Tell us what your favorite episodes are and stuff.
- 8:29SPEAKER_01: Oh, yes. And we love a good stalker, you know.
- 8:32SPEAKER_01: A good stalker, not a bad stalker.
- 8:34SPEAKER_01: Not a bad one.
- 8:36SPEAKER_01: These sirens, Greek, Irish, Slavic, Philippine.
- 8:40SPEAKER_01: Their thresholds, their mirrors, their teachers.
- 8:44SPEAKER_00: And next week, we'll continue our journey with even stranger, more liminal siren spirits.
- 8:49SPEAKER_00: The Melusine, the Limia, the Havemayer, the Haldese, and Cornish Seamaids.
- 8:55SPEAKER_00: The tide is still rising.
- 8:57SPEAKER_01: Until then, mythlings, keep listening and keep your magic soft and steady.
- 9:02SPEAKER_01: Bye for now!
- 9:04[music]