Lichen Oracle
November 5, 2007
These are glyphs that I selected from photos of Graphis scripta, the Writing Lichen, one of a large group that grows on smooth bark of subtropical hardwoods. Several Graphis and related species are common on American holly at Nags Head Woods and Buxton Woods, and last month I took photos as reference material for a lichen oracle (part of my Moon Oracle project). The “glyphs” are the spore-bearing structures (apothecia), which are round in most lichens but in this group they are narrow and are called lirellae. Depending on the species, the lirellae may be linear, branched, star-shaped, or labyrinth-like.
Graphis scripta is one of the first lichens that I learned as a child. I was fascinated with the rune-like designs, and wondered how to “read” them and what they would tell me. But the idea of creating an oracle came much later.
A few years ago, I dreamed of a giant fossil tortoise shell with designs carved on the dome of the carapace. I remembered and sketched some of them, and ultimately found them in a book on the I Ching - they were characters of the ancient script that is assigned to the 64 hexagrams. I hadn’t studied the I Ching before, but I began to work with it a bit, and found that I was most fascinated with the characters and hexagrams - the commentary didn’t interest me as much. I wanted a simpler, more intuitive oracle, and some of the characters reminded me of Graphis lichen figures…so the idea of a Lichen Oracle was born, and now I am beginning to develop it. When choosing glyphs from lichen photos, I’ve found that symbols stand out in natural groups, and my mind assigns a preferred orientation - some of them don’t look right if they are “upside down”. The panel above is a rough draft, one of several from which I’ll choose the final symbols and re-draw them in ink with more realistic detail.
November 10, 2007 at 8:24 am
Fascinating! Isn’t it wonderful to live in a world of such diverse expression. Thank you for sharing your fresh perspectives and explorations!
November 10, 2007 at 12:28 pm
Could you use snowflakes too?
November 11, 2007 at 3:19 pm
Most interesting, Lorena. I’ve noticed lichen patterns on trees and stones before, but never thought to read them like the I-Ching. Am looking forward to reading more about your ideas.
November 11, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Here’s a site where you can see views of the Moon at any time and more several POVs:
http://www.fourmilab.ch/cgi-bin/Earth/action?opt=-m&img=MoonTopo.evif
November 14, 2007 at 10:29 am
In reply to Karin about using snowflakes as an oracle:
I assume you’re referring to W.A. Bentley’s famous photos of snow crystals. They can be seen on this site:
http://www.bentley.sciencebuff.org/
Higher quality versions of the photos were published in a lovely book, SNOW CRYSTALS by W.A Bentley and W. J. Humphreys. This is a large Dover Publications paperback and is OOP but you can probably find it on ebay.
Both the website and the book arrange the photos by shape, beginning with simple hexagonal plates and ending with complex crystals that have multiple hexagonal plates with many needle-like extensions. I have the book and can see that selecting a pre-determined number of crystals (possibly a multiple of six) and developing an oracle would be a lot of fun.
November 15, 2007 at 11:36 am
Yeah…. each crystal could be a word.
But the link above was about moon phases, not snowflakes… It’s great to see a closeup of the the moon everyday, at any time and even as it can be seen from the Sun.
January 1, 2008 at 9:37 pm
What I love about this oracle is that again, what Lorena has discovered is that the Earth Mother will find the most subtle and seemingly hidden way of communicating with us. I am not familiar with this lichen, but will be looking for it now that I have seen it here. It is like some secret tree script, and seems odd that the Druids didn’t use it in divination rather than Ogham! What a beautiful and powerful use of nature. Thank you Lorena. You continue to astound me.