TIME
for the full moon on September 7th, 2025
Part I: Introduction
“Time is not a thing that passes, it’s a sea on which you float.”
- Margaret Atwood
Full Moon Tea for September 7th:
Marshmallow root (Althaea officinalis)
Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris)
Seaweed (any edible species)
I found myself in the midst of a wide sea, far from the distant shore. The water enveloping me was strangely shallow and gave no threat. I could see miles of silken ocean touching the coast, and though the sight of land gave me comfort, I felt stranded, standing in water that reached only to my thighs.
The current had pulled me out to that place, keeping me tethered in the shallow waters, and I did not know how to return to the land I longed for. Should I walk the daunting distance back to shore? Should I stay and gaze at the shimmering expanse surrounding me? Soft light reflected off the blue-green water, and the sky was open and clear, mirroring the placid sea. I was alone, with water and sky and the great vastness. I stayed standing where I was, like a speck of an island held within an endless sea.
If time is the sea upon which we live, then perhaps we sometimes feel — as I did in this dream — stranded in its watery, tidal expanse. We long for the comforting shores of the past, or for the undiscovered lands of the future. We yearn for escape from the inescapable currents of time. But stepping out of these temporal tides can feel impossible, even as the shores behind or before us beckon.
If time is the sea upon which we live, then perhaps it guides us to where we cannot guide ourselves — a current so strong it pulls us from what we’ve known towards the vast unknown, leaving change and transformation in its wake.