A mirror by candlelight is a doorway that swings both ways. Under the full moon it hangs widest open, and whatever you set before it, it answers back in kind.
This working reaches toward exchange: the trading of a sickened reflection for a hale one. In the narrow space between glass and flame lives a shadow that will take the illness gladly, keeping it on its own side of the silver while it hands your wholeness back across.
The Working
- Set a mirror upright beneath the full moon and ring its base with an unbroken circle of salt.
- Place a lit candle between yourself and the glass so your reflection floats up in its light.
- Set a bowl of clean water before the mirror to catch and double the flame.
- Look into your own eyes in the glass and name aloud the sickness you would be rid of.
- Breathe the illness toward the mirror and watch the shadow behind your reflection take it in.
- Look again and name yourself well, drawing the whole reflection back into you with one slow inward breath.
- Cover the mirror with a dark cloth to trap what it has kept, and pour the water out upon the salt.
The Incantation
Silver, keep what I release,
shadow, hold the hurt in peace,
give me back the face I knew,
hale and clear and moon-washed new.
What the glass has taken in,
seal behind the salted skin.
The working seals under the dark cloth and the spilled salt-water, the sickness shut fast on the far side of the silver. Uncover the glass only after a full night of rain has cleansed it.