tears of The gods: Flowers, death, grief, + Shapeshifting
Aphrodite’s mourns Adonis and her tears sprout into Anemone flowers, “Awakening of Adonis” by John William Waterhouse
A 6 month creative cohort exploring folklore and myths of flowers and plants as they relate to death, grief, and shapeshifting. This class particularly focuses on Greek myth and European folklore. Participants will explore their own process of shapeshifting and story-telling in grief and relationship with plants, creating and sharing creative writing and art inspired by the plants we meet and themes we explore each month.
Upcoming Course Dates
January - June 2024
COHORT 1 -FULL
Thursdays: January 4, 18, 25, Feb 8, 15, 29, March 7, 14, 28,
April 4, 11, 25, May 2, 16, 30, June 6, 13, 27
From 6-8pm EST
COHORT 2 - FULL
Thursdays (same as above)
From 12-2pm EST
Recordings will be made available for those who can’t attend live.
course Topics
In addition to doing a deep dive of the folklore of 5 different plants (each month besides the first!), we will explore the following themes together:
Flowers and Plants as Allies for the Underworld
Plants, Spirits, Gods, and Monsters
Reconnecting with our lived experiences with plants and stories
Reconnecting with ancestral plant stories
Grieving as Shapeshifting + Being with the Unknown
Becoming Compost & Flora: Ripening into Death
Story Telling, Creative Writing, Art Making, + Myth Making
Entanglement + Collapse: staying with the trouble of love amidst collective + ecological loss
We have never done grief or death alone as a species.
Flowers and plants have played an important role in human grief and death care rituals for millennia. We have looked to flowers as we’ve tried to grasp what it means to be alive only briefly, to make beauty, and to become something else through death and loss.
Plants’ stories provide us with ways of understanding what it might mean to make beauty as we fall open and apart, ripen, rot, and plant ourselves as seeds.
An Invitation to Slow Down
Sinking into our relationships with plants teaches us so much about practicing the art of sensing, noticing, slowing down enough to give plants and our bodies and the places we live our attention. Remembering that we are already being held. Opening to nuance and not knowing. Opening to the possibilities of care and mutual aid between species, to being “stopped in our tracks in wonderment” of the ecosystems we find ourselves in and the beings we share them with (Queer Nature). And that noticing, remembering, opening, sensing, becoming re-enchanted to the world is in itself incredible medicine. This class is an invitation to embrace slowness and the possibility of enchantment as medicine, and see what doors that opens for grief support from plants, and their wisdom and stories.
Course structure
Our class will meet 3 x per month.
Aside from the first month, which we will spend opening the space, meeting one another, and setting intentions, the first class meeting of each month will dive into the stories, myth, and history of that month’s plant as they relate to grief, death, and shapeshifting. We will meet 5 different plants total.
In the second session of the month, we will have an optional, informal collective studio time. Though sometimes these spaces are silent as we each do our own thing, there is also room to collaborate, connect, and share our reflections and ideas with one another.
The last meeting of each month will be purely discussion and sharing of creative projects and reflections from working with the stories of that plant that month, allowing space for participants to share their own insight, stories, and magic as we move through our time together.
Community based learning
Coming from a background in community organizing and community based education, I see the classroom as a space made up of relationships, and relationships as the place where healing happens, as well as a place of deep learning. While there will be spaces where I am sharing in a lecture or workshop based format, much of our exploration of what is shared will be collective dialogue - rather than simply me sharing with you. While there is no requirement to share, this is a space where I hope all will feel that their insights and experiences are welcome and valued.
While each session is recorded, I think of the course as an invitation to be with each other in grief and our desire to support others in grief. All this to say, you’ll probably get more out of it and feel more connected to the course if you plan to attend most classes live- though this isn’t a requirement, and there are ways to participate via our discord for those unable to make it live.
a trauma, grief, + joy informed learning space
Every thing in our class is an invitation and optional, and choice is central. There are many ways to participate and no one right way. Listening to your body, your resistances, your excitement and interest will be encouraged throughout our course.
Grief is given a place at the table in our class discussions and check ins, but also in the design of this course, which is designed for those us who feel profoundly changed by our grief.
We will also be creating space to share about our joys, and to lean into those places in our lives where we feel nourished - to tend to the both/and of our grief/joy, and the relationship between the two.
This class is an invitation to really welcome ourselves and our grief however it arrives, emerges, and changes, and to let it be the vast, shapeshifting landscape of experience that it is.
“the stories of the flowers are the stories of joy and tears. the flower is slain and bringing its beauty to the world. they sing out in all this beautiful glory just for a moment, and then they are taken back down into the belly of winter before rising and singing again.”
-Josh shrei
"Joy is the capacity to do and feel more. As such, it is connected to creativity and the embrace of uncertainty...Joy is a process of coming alive and coming apart..."
-Carla Bergman & Nick Montgomery, Joyful Militancy
rooting your creative practice in nourishiment
Instead of rooting our creative practices in capitalist expectations of endless productivity, at the expense of ourselves and the earth, we can have creative practices that look more like ecosystems. We can root our creative practice in attunement to ourselves and others, with seasons and cycles of growth and decay.
When we allow our creative practices to be less product oriented, more process oriented, less driven by perfectionism and more driven by nourishment, we are more likely to return to that creative practice.
We are also likely to feel more resourced, especially as grievers, in not necessarily having to “make something of our grief”, but rather recognizing the need to create spaces for grief’s expression, which includes rest.
With the plants as guides and collaborators, we get to make our creative process a process of attuning to the world and ourselves.
And we get to spend time in a creative cohort of other grievers, supporting one another in returning to nourishment.
Who is this class for?
This class is for anyone looking to connect with their relationship with plants, grief, creativity, shapeshifting, and the stories and myths of plants, as well as other grievers. This is a course for those in grief looking for plant allies, however this is NOT a course for someone looking to learn how to use or make herbal remedies outside the storytelling form (see instead the herbalism for grief support course).
What students are saying
“Mara June is an incredibly gifted facilitator, herbalist, death worker, storyteller, and an exemplary example of community care. Their passion and love for the work they do, space they hold, and those they serve is immeasurable. What I value most about working with Mara, is the room for grief and joy to meander throughout the group and class, as well as happen simultaneously.
Mara has a knack for fostering connection and care with plants, grief, creativity, each other, and ourselves. I leave Mara June’s offerings completely enthralled with what I’ve gained and hungry for more. If you are curious about the work being done at Motherwort & Rose, I highly recommend jumping in – you’ll be met with such a soft and lovely landing.”
— Jillian, Tears of the Gods participant
“I am in the current cohort of this @motherwortandrose magic and I cannot recommend it enough. It is such a beautiful space to tend to your grief and learn and grow and know we are all grieving something, all of the time. We are never alone, and Mara creates that feeling in every class.”
— Abby, Tears of the Gods participant
Cost
This 6 month course is $750. Payment plans are available and can be selected on the registration page below.
Scholarships for BIPOC and low income individuals are available. The scholarship interest form for this cohort is now closed. If you submitted a form, you will be notified by December 15.