The old wives kept hyssop by the door and rue in the hedge, herbs the ancients trusted to scour a body of more than dust. Under a waning moon, their bitterness turns kind.
This bath does not soothe; it strips. It reaches for the residue of a hard season — the arguments, the sickroom air, the weight you carried without ever naming it — and coaxes it loose from the skin like tarnish lifting from silver. What the water takes, the drain carries past the threshold and away.
The Working
- Draw the bath as the moon wanes, the water no hotter than blood.
- Cast three fistfuls of salt across the surface and let them dissolve.
- Bruise hyssop and rue between your palms until they weep green, then scatter them upon the water.
- Add three drops of oil and stir the bath widdershins with your left hand.
- Lie back until the herbs cling to you, and breathe the bitter steam.
- When the water begins to cool, pull the plug and stay in place until the last of it has gone.
- Rise without rinsing, and let yourself dry in the dark air.
The Incantation
Bitter green and blessed brine,
take the season, it is thine.
What was heavy, what was worn,
loose it now and leave me shorn.
Down the drain and past the door,
this that clung shall cling no more.
The spell is sealed the moment the water is wholly gone, and released as you dry unrinsed, wearing nothing of what you shed.