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This Issue 10/20/2005

Also in this issue

• Doomed to suck
• Sunday Luxe
• Hold me closer, famous director

An overgrown tree obscures the full moon. Lightning flickers in the dark sky. Thunder growls in the distance. Midway through the ritual, the wind kicks up. Dirt and sand sting eyes, and the warm night air turns chilly.

"Isn't this wonderful?" Morgan asks. "We have all the elements here: air, fire, earth and I think pretty soon we'll have water." The group chuckles.

Morgan begins by casting a circle around the motley group of Wiccans assembled on the old baseball field across from her shop. Using her fingers rather than a wand, she creates a protective invisible bubble around them. She warns the group that if people need to leave the circle, they must raise their hands and wait for one of her assistants to cut a door in the bubble.

"Hail and welcome," the 20 or so Wiccans say to the deities, and then also to the four quarters -- air, fire, water and earth. The group forms a five-point star with their outstretched hands after each. Morgan pours colored liquids into a bowl, merging the God and Goddess into one supreme being. She lights this mixture on fire, creating a blue flame to awaken "the ancient ones," and calls the Goddess down from the moon. The blue flames flutter dangerously close to the tablecloth on which the bowl rests, but Morgan remains unruffled.

The goal tonight is to harness the Goddess' energy, which Morgan brings into the circle and shares with the other Wiccans so they can prepare themselves for the Fall Equinox next week. After each request to the Goddess, the group repeats in unison:

"So mote it be" -- Make it so.

***

Back inside Morgan's Cauldron, a tiny shop just south of South Street, the Wiccans unwind with some cake -- an important part of the ritual. Without this time to relax (or as Morgan calls it, "ground"), Wiccans often develop headaches or suffer from insomnia. By eating and socializing, the group feeds the energy it raised during the ritual back to the earth.

In addition to leading rituals, Morgan -- whose real name is Fran Toscani -- sells crystal balls, incense and other Wiccan paraphernalia. She is middle-aged with a shrill voice and a soft face and has been practicing Wicca since the '80s. In 1998, she opened Morgan's Cauldron, named for the alias she goes by during rituals. Now, she leads about 32 open rituals annually.

"It just came to me while I was doing some meditation," Fran says of her magical name. "It was a personal journey that I made. I don't believe in using my magical name outside of the circle, it's something special."