James Turner and the Borley Ghost

James Turner and the Borley Ghost
by
Barry Van-Asten

'The record of a man's gardening is the autobiography

if not of his soul, certainly of his body'.

(James Turner)

We, children of death, acclaim the Spring,

unconsummated flowers, the livening seed

brother and benches, and stench

of work, boredom of long hours

is haloed by the single thrush;

primrose, violet and the plane tree

caracole even in the din.

Jonquil breathes into the air

and Lydian chords lift the soul

over death, over Jordan, over

Crucifixion.

We, children of death, acclaim life.

(Pastoral. James Turner. Seven Gardens For Catherine. p.181.)

James Ernest Turner 1909-1975

There is a wealth of non-existent material available, related to the green-fingered poet James Turner and his connection to the notorious Borley Rectory haunting, that I felt the need to collect some of the facts together for the purpose of some future reference.

James Ernest Turner was born on 16th January 1909 in the village of Foots Cray, at the bottom of Sidcup Hill. He was educated at Wykeham House School and after he left Lancing College in 1925, he went up to Oxford to read English at Queens College. His early aspiration to become a parson was quickly dashed when he felt the calling to become a writer. Following from Oxford, James found himself in search of some direction and felt himself being steered towards training as a nurseryman, in Sussex.

It would prove to be a disaster for Turner and the difficulties he faced while growing mushrooms eventually led him to bankruptcy!

He married Lucie Alice Porter (known as Catherine) on 4th March 1936 at Eltham and it was her sense of humour and support throughout their hardship and comic mishaps which was a great strength to James.

James filed his petition for bankruptcy on 7th November 1938 and was declared bankrupt on 8th February 1939. The period ended on 15th August 1940.

The Turners lived for a while in London when James became a chauffer/secretary to an eccentric woman who owned a magazine.

James found himself in a spiritual sense in East Anglia when the two themes of his life merged together - poetry and gardening.

At Borley

On Wednesday 22nd January 1947 the Turners went to Borley in Suffolk to view the remains of a property that had been known as 'the most haunted house in England'. James saw the potential of the garden which could be developed into his own nursery, where he could grow his mushrooms in sheds. They bought the site of the old Borley Rectory (which included four acres of orchard) from a Mr Russell, and on Tuesday 29th April they moved into the red-brick cottage that was attached to the stables in the grounds of the former Rectory.

The cottage consisted of a sitting room which in the past served as the coach-house. A brick wall turned it into two rooms: a small sitting room and a dining room. The kitchen used to be the saddle room and the first floor has three small bedrooms and a bathroom.

'The cottage itself has been the centre of reported inexplicable phenomena for almost sixty years - as early as the occupancy by Mr Edward Cooper and his wife which lasted from April 1916 until March 1920'. (The Ghosts Of Borley. p.184.)

The Rectory

The legend of Borley Rectory is well documented and therefore I find no reason to give an in depth explanation of events at the house. But I will mention briefly that the Rectory became known as 'the most haunted house in England' due to the various manifestations that were seen and heard there. The infamous 'ghost-hunter' Harry Price visited the Rectory in 1929 and returned on many subsequent investigations. His finding are recorded and published in his two books: 'The Most Haunted House In England' and 'The End Of Borley Rectory'.

Among the many phenomena experienced at the Rectory is the apparition of a nun which appeared to the Misses Bull in 1900 and seen on numerous occasions. Mysterious writing has also been seen on the inner walls of the house during the Price investigation which appealed for 'help'. And legend has it that a phantom coach and horses along with a headless driver tears down the road towards the Rectory from the direction of Rodbridge.

The Rev. A.C. Henning

On Whit Monday 26th May 1947, James Turner assisted the Rev. A.C. Henning along with Mrs Henning and Mr J. Durrant in removing some of the floor boards in the Sanctuary of Borley Church. Directly below, they found a marble slabbed tomb. The tomb, that of the Reverend Humphrey Burrough, Rector of Borley from 1722-1757, was in good condition and many bones were found and later re-buried in Borley churchyard.

'Mr. Turner suddenly broke through into a cavity which proved to be a brick-lined vault, presumably that of Humphrey Burrough. The strange thing about this vault was that the brickwork looked new and there was no foul air from it. Below, as we lowered a torch at the end of a pole, could be seen some three feet of water. In the water were clearly visible three skeletons. The hole was closed again and now, of course, the new floor covers the place, leaving the black tomb slab'. (Haunted Borley. A.C. Henning. p.29.)

The new floor was laid over the tomb the following day and Mr Turner took the old wooden altar in his car to Liston Church.

Here is Mr Turner's account taken from his diary entry for that day - Monday 26th May 1947:

'Whit Monday. Began to raise the boards in the sanctuary. Present, at first, were myself, Clifford Henning and a Mr Durrant. Began work at 10.45. Soon after we arrived pressmen from the Evening News and the Daily Telegraph. On the removal of the first board D and I were, at once, confronted by the black marble tomb slab of Humphrey Burroughs, Gainsborough's uncle, who was once rector here - a very good and exciting find. It was in perfect condition having been protected by the wooden floor. We had to rip up most of the boards (only deal and about twenty years old). Not important. Strangely no one knew that the tomb was under the altar, the usual place to bury a priest. Durrant began, then to dig in the earth, mortar, sand and lime, forming the bed of the church floor at this spot. Immediately he started to dig up leg bones and perfectly formed, very yellow, ankle and foot bones. Catherine came across and verified these as none of us could be certain. Broke off for coffee. Afterwards I began to dig with Eva Henning taking notes. Very many more bones came up, even down to a depth of three feet. As yet no clay.

In the afternoon I began to dig before the others came back. The church was cold and still. I began to find more bones and talked with an R.C. priest who arrived. When Durrant and the Hennings came back I had already begun to dig under the black marble stone of Humphrey Burrough's tomb. Quite quickly I found a skull and clavicle which, I suppose, went with the legs and ankles. (Note. No one explained these finds, was it another clergyman? Next morning I dug a hole in the churchyard for the Rector to re-bury them).

Durrant suggested breaking into the vault as it would be our only chance to do so. Tomorrow all this would be concreted over and the stone slabs laid. I drove the crowbar into the 'modern' brickwork of the top and within a quarter of an hour, the bar went through without any warning, bringing my arm down hard on the edge of the memorial stone. I enlarged the hole until we could dimly see the level of water in what we then thought was a tunnel from the old rectory. The rector's lamp was lowered on string which Cathy fetched and, before a crowd of people who arrived to see what we were doing, we discovered it to be the vault with the bones of two bodies, no traces of coffins, three feet of water and built, 7ft. x 5ft. of modern bricks and mortar, just as if it had been finished yesterday. One of the sets of bones was, of course, that of Humphrey Burroughs'. (Sometimes Into England. p.12.)

'Mr. Turner lived at the Rectory cottage from May 1947 to June 1950 and during this time carried out extensive explorations in the vicinity of the wells. Before he completely filled in the rubble-crammed cellars of the Rectory and laid out a sunken rose-garden, he and his friends spent considerable time in clearing the rubbish from the cellars and at length reached the round well where the cream jug had been discovered. As they uncovered the well, there was much escape of gas. Next day the well was broken into and dug out. There was nothing below but solid clay and though this, too, was excavated thoroughly, nothing interesting came to light'. (The Ghosts Of Borley. p.141.)

Some Accounts Of Mr Turner's Occurrences At Borley

On Saturday 17th May Peter Underwood met the Turners for the first time at Borley. The Turners had been living at the cottage for three weeks. And it should also be noted that this date (according to messages received by the planchette) is the 280th anniversary of the death of the Borley nun, whose name was given as Marie Lairre. Mr Underwood stayed over night investigating the church and the cottage.

On Tuesday 27th May the Turners were at breakfast in the cottage and they heard a loud noise from the rooms above, but on inspection the noises stopped and nothing seemed to be out of place.

Between May and June James worked hard at clearing the overgrown brambles from the area known as the 'nun's walk'. He mostly worked during the evenings using a sickle. But he found his attempts to clear the tangled growth, met with laughter; in fact throughout his hacking at the undergrowth he heard the sound of laughter and voices talking, but not distinct enough to make out the words. The sounds seemed to come from the location of the old Rectory. On stopping work to listen to the voices, they appeared silent and on picking up the sickle to begin again, the voices and laughter would start up again. His wife Cathy also witnessed this occurrence.

In June 1947 the BBC produced a broadcast on the Rectory and after it was aired numerous 'ghost-hunters' and 'sensation seekers' rushed upon the site of the old Rectory which was of the greatest annoyance to those who lived there, especially the Turners who were quite happy to have the odd ghost or two, but to be invaded by people in search of a thrill and not caring or being respectful of property was something they could do without!

'Mr Turner tells me he even arrived home one night to find two men in the garden with guns, though what they imagined their bullets could effect upon a ghost, they did not explain'. (Haunted Borley. p.31.)

On Saturday 2nd August 1947, James Turner walked to the church just after midnight and sat on the steps of the priest's door for around 45 minutes. He heard the Sudbury clock strike one when he suddenly became aware of a presence moving up the main path to the church. Nothing was visible but there were definite footsteps heard and the sound of a swishing skirt. It motioned towards the porch away from Mr Turner, to his relief. There was a full moon that night and the air was still. This phenomena has also been witnessed by others visiting the church. The Rev Henning writes about Mr Turner's occurrence in his Haunted Borley: 'Mr Turner had a strange experience. One beautiful night in August 1947, he thought he would cross to the church for a stroll. He sat down on the step - but I will tell the story in his own words.

The night of the full moon and my brother, Philip, and his wife are staying with us. Went to Long Melford to meet John and Elizabeth and home again about 10.30 Elizabeth wished to spend the night in the church, but this was not possible because both doors were locked. At 12.15 I went across alone to the church where I sat, in the light of the full moon, for three quarters of an hour or more, for I heard the clock in Sudbury strike one o'clock. All the time, out in the road, a young man was saying goodbye to his sweetheart. I could hear their voices dimly along the moonlit paths and between the great yew trees. There was absolutely no wind at all and I sat huddled up upon the step of the priest's door with a jacket over my shoulders. I stood up and looked out across the fields and realised, as one does sometimes, that I was utterly happy. In a few moments, I slumped back into my former position for I was quite tired after the day's work, tired but not in the least sleepy. It was then that it happened.

Something was going up the main path of the churchyard, something which had one footstep more marked than the other, and something in a gown or skirt which swished as it went. Perhaps the whole affair lasted no more than ten seconds, but my attention was held for, it seemed, much longer. All the time, the man and the girl were talking by the gate, some two hundred feet away from me.

Whatever came up the path to the porch must have passed them if it came from the direction of the rectory. But they had not been disturbed. The actual happening, which occurred as I have stated while I was neither thinking of such things or perhaps of anything in particular, left little visible impression upon me.

I left the churchyard soon after as my brother came to call for a cup of tea. Had I heard the steps coming up the little path to the priest's door, I should have been terrified. As it was, whatever manifested itself then seemed intent upon its own errand and to have nothing to do with me. I do not believe I would have gone back alone into the churchyard after that, however!' (Haunted Borley. p.35-36.)

A Séance

It was on the evening of Tuesday 8th June 1948 that a seance took place at the cottage. Those present were: the Turners, Rev. John C. Dening, Mrs G. Taylor of Chelsea, and Mr T.S. Frankland of Trinity College, Cambridge. During the seance an entity wishing to be known as 'Harry Bull' came through and declared that he would haunt Borley for '4004 years'. When asked whose footsteps are heard in the churchyard, the spirit replied that it was the Rev. Lionel Foyster and he suggested that the Rev. Foyster's death occurred under strange circumstances!

Around 2.30 a.m. Mr Frankland asked the so called Harry Bull if he would make an appearance, it being the 21st anniversary of his death, and the entity replied: 'Go to church now!'

The sitters marched over to the church porch where they sat expecting some manifestation. After some time, Mr Turner broke the silence by saying 'I don't think we ought to be here!' Mr Frankland went over to the cottage with Mrs Turner and they talked and had tea while the remaining party still waited in the churchyard. The sceptical Frankland said jokingly: 'You know, nothing will happen if I put my finger on the glass...like this...' Suddenly the glass was seized and made three wide circles - Mr Frankland, quite startled by this, asked 'Why were we sent to the church?' and the answer came back - 'Pray'. Then he asked who was in the church now and these letters were slowly spelt out: 'C-H-R-I-S-T. He ended the questioning then and there!

On another occasion in July 1948, Mrs Turner was sitting on a deck chair, near the location of the old Rectory when she became aware of footsteps approaching towards her, and then dying away. She described them as sounding like a man walking upon floorboards, along a passage. She experienced the same phenomenon two weeks later in the same location.

And again in September 1948, the Turners rushed from the dining-room to the kitchen on hearing a loud noise of smashing crockery, but nothing appeared to have been moved when they investigated. This phenomenon - the sound of breaking crockery had been reported on several occassions by the previous occupants of the cottage, Mr and Mrs Cooper, in 1919, and also in the Rectory itself. Several weeks later, a loud pistol shot was heard by the Turners from in the kitchen - it sounded as if it had been fired in the kitchen, it was that loud!

Phantom Cats

On Thursday 28th July 1949, Mrs Turner was awoken by scratching at the bed clothes. A thorough search by Mr Turner found nothing to be in the room that should not have been there. The door was closed. They also noticed a hollow in the bed where it appeared a cat had been sitting. But no cat was in the room!

Again on Sunday 28th August 1949, Mr Turner was looking out of the kitchen doorway when he saw a mysterious shape, a furry form playing with their own cat Fred. The 'mysterious cat' was grey and white and it disappeared under Mr Turner's car and did not appear again. If it had come out it would have been seen as there was open space all around the car.

There has been a long history of 'spectral cat' sightings at Borley cottage and at the Rectory. Cats were prevalent during the time of the Rev. Harry Bull's incumbency. In fact, he had up to 34 cats on the premises and there is a cat's cemetery in the grounds of the old Rectory. Mr Ronald Blythe, the writer, has also witnessed the so called spectral cat in the bathroom at the cottage during October 1949.

On Sunday 5th March 1950, the Turners were visited by Mr Dening, who stayed the night. Mr Dening went to bed at 12.30 a.m. Mr Turner was in the sitting-room with Fred the cat next to him on the sofa. Mrs Turner was in the kitchen and Holly, their other cat had been let out. Suddenly there was a loud feline scream which seemed to come from inside the cottage, from the landing. After a search they confirmed that Holly was still outside and Fred was still on the sofa - no other cat was present to have made the noise.

On the weekend of 4th and 5th March 1950 Laurence C. Gafford and Peter Underwood spent a night in Turner's lounge at the cottage, below the Turner's bedroom. Controls were placed around the church and within to attempt to capture some of the reported phenomena. Beginning at 1 a.m. on Sunday 5th March after the Turners retired to bed, the controls were checked at regular intervals. At 2.15 a.m. footsteps and voices were heard overhead by both Gafford and Underwood. This occurred on different occassions. The Turners confirmed that they had not woken during the night and that they slept soundly. They were not surprised to hear reports of whisperings and footsteps as it had been an ever-present phenomena in that room. Mr Dening was sleeping in the front room of the cottage on the first floor. He also confirmed that he had not risen in the night and that his sleep was undisturbed.

While living at Borley cottage, Mr Turner wrote his novel - 'My Life With Borley Rectory', published November 1950. The Turners moved out on Saturday 1st July 1950 and went to live at the Mill House, in Belchamp Walter, 3 miles away. Borley was put up for sale for £4000. The site was sold in March 1951 to Mr Robert Bacon and his wife for £3,250 and they lived there until 1972.

Letter from Peter Underwood to James Turner, Saturday 18th January 1969:

'I remember that first visit when Tom Brown and I spent a night in the grounds; you said we were the first ghost-hunters during your occupancy (you had only been there a very short time). Unfortunately we were not the last! You very kindly asked us into the cottage for coffee, saying 'we won't do this every time but as you are the first to spend a night on the site while we're here...' and very acceptable it was, too! We talked about the ghost nun and you said that if you saw her, you'd like to position yourself in her path and see whether she'd walk through you. Perhaps like me you're too sceptical. I've spent scores of nights in haunted houses and I've yet to see my first ghost...

I hope you will not feel it necessary to disparage the Borley hauntings. (Alas, I have a little, I think). There is fact behind the 'legend' of Borley. As I think you know I have contacted and personally interviewed practically every person who had anything to do with the Borley 'case' and I have a great deal of good first-hand evidence from the Coopers, Marianne Foyster, Mr A. H. Foyster, Marianne's husband's brother, Mary Pearsons, the Bulls, Norah Walrond, the Hennings, Edith Whitehouse, Guy L'Estrange, J.P., a doctor who knew Harry Bull, a pupil to who Harry Bull taught Latin, Mrs Goldney (who told me she would be the last person to suggest that nothing of a paranormal nature happened at Borley), Dr Peter Rowe, who saw the 'nun' a few years ago, a Bank of England official, the Rev. John Dening, Mrs Ellie Howe, the Rev. Stanley C. Kipling, Canon Phythian-Adams (who passed to me all his papers pertaining to Borley) - the list is endless - right up to the present day and to the Williamses and the Bacons (who now own the Borley cottage and site). And Harry Price. You know there is no real evidence that he played false at Borley...'

(Sometimes Into England. James Turner. Appendix.)

Leaving my love is binding freedom

In chains, and the burden of spring

Into the overheated summer ovens.

The journeys were into freedom

And the faith of love. Of spring

The freedom. Where can I go,

Up here into the hills above the river,

Or here in the woods or again

Along the tessellated street,

And stare and stare without love?

Leaving my love is the closing of hatches,

And to be lost. This was an investment

Of love, this noble building.

This, too, because of our freedom,

This avenue of ilex was an embodiment

Of the straight road of the free.

Who has betrayed? Or must it come

Always to this, a flower grasped

Slowly dying, each minute slowly,

Dying even with soft water.

Where is the meaning of such freedom

And the heart of happiness?

The meaning comes to a betrayal,

Comes to the loss and to iron gyves,

Because her voice sped the hours,

Her laugh was a shield to humour,

And her body bought off weariness

Leaving my love is an open wound

Handwide in my breast, and a heart

Of blood sucked dry and of throat

Burning with unslaked thirst.

Leaving my love is a life spent.

(The Alien Wood:Twenty Elegies. James Turner. Seven Gardens For Catherine. p.219.)

 

Bibliography Of James Turner

Novels:

 

Murder at Landred Hall. Cassell. 1954.

A death by the sea. Cassell. 1955.

The strange little snakes. Cassell. 1956.

The frontiers of death. Cassell. 1957.

The crystal wave. Cassell. 1957.

The dark index. Cassell. 1959.

The deeper malady. Cassell. 1959.

Condell. Cassell. 1961.

The glass interval. Cassell. 1961.

The crimson moth. Cassell. 1962.

The nettle shade. Cassell. 1963.

The slate landscape. Cassell. 1964.

The long avenues. Cassell. 1964.

The blue mirror. Cassell. 1964.

Anna Chevron. Cassell. 1966.

Requiem for two sisters. Cassell. 1968.

Stone dormitory. Littlehampton Book Services. 1971.

 

History:

 

The dolphin's skin: six studies in eccentricity. Cassell. 1956.

The shrouds of glory: six studies in martyrdom. Cassell. 1956.

 

Poetry:

 

Pastoral. Cambridge University Press. 1940.

The alien wood:twenty elegies. Cambridge University Press. 1945.

The hollow vale: a poem. Cambridge University Press. 1947.

The interior diagram and other poems. Cassell. 1960.

The accident and other poems. Cassell. 1966.

 

General:

 

 

My life with Borley Rectory. The Bodley Head. 1950.

Rivers of East Anglia. Cassell. 1954.

A book of gardens: a collection of original essays on some aspects of gardens and gardening. Editor. Cassell. 1963.

Thy neighbours wife: twelve original variations on a theme of adultery, by Denys Val Baker (and others). Editor. Cassell. 1964.

The fourth ghost book. Barrie & Rockliffe. 1965.

A coin has two sides: a collection of double stories on a theme of love. Cassell. 1967.

Seven gardens for Catherine: an autobiography. Cassell. 1968.

The unlikely ghosts. Mayflower. 1969.

Sometimes into England: a second volume of autobiography. Cassell. 1970.

Love letters: an anthology from the British Isles, 975-1944. Littlehampton Book Services Ltd. 1970.

Ghosts in the South West. David & Charles PLC. 1973.

Stella C. - an account of some original experiments in psychical research. Harry Price. intro by James Turner. Souvenir Press Ltd. 1973.

Staircase to the sea: fourteen ghost stories. Kimber. 1974

The way shadows fall. Kimber. 1975.

Stone peninsula: scenes from a Cornish landscape. Kimber. 1975.

The countryside of Britain [with Edwin Smith and intro by Ronald Blythe]. Book Club Associates. 1977.

Sceptred Isle. [photos by Edwin Smith]. Methuen. 1977.

 

Stories contributed to The Ghost Book series:

 

The guardian. The ghost book vol 4. Editor. 1965

Double take. The ghost book vol 5. 1969.

No one ever comes here in winter. The ghost book vol 6. 1970.

Fly away home. The ghost book vol 7. 1971.

An ordered sequence of events. The ghost book vol 8. 1972.

Love me, love my car. The ghost book vol 9. 1973.

Selected Poetry of Barry Van-Asten

Selected Poems from the collection 'Ghost Blooms':

Wych Elms

Beneath the stones, shallow hearts press
The hours into their starry margins,
And the irregular tide of time turns
The years that are passing away.


The shadows in the swept gardens shake and cease,
Winding a heart in as it repeats.
And beyond the boughs, those remembered things,
Where childhood's ghost is interposing


Its secret world: bones of Roman loneliness
Root with slow life and remain;
Signposts in the green hush, where magnolia's
Lose their language and waste away


In dumb reserve... storm's electric menace,
Winding along the lanes again,
Under the cross-hum of pylons
As the steel-ribbed sun is setting.


Wrists of ancestors make a wilderness
Under the pale beam where we wander,
And in the dark woods something dreadful sleeps,
As love careers into view and slips away.

[also from 'Body and Soul'. United Press. 2005]


Against Us


What strange apostle of wisdom comes
From the hermitage, filled with fear?
He of old pagan enchantment, drawn,
To wear the wild ways beneath his skin;
With history hidden in fingertips:
A seasoned man, forever touching
Love's last seduction...brain-stepping...


And what appalling strength is this
Glut of desire upon us bringing?
The blood-air about us ringed: we kissed
To the cycle of ceremonial sighing!


Yet there was a time once, when song
Was glad in our souls...we listened;
We heard love's language linger long,
As we mouthed the words, not comprehending
The sorrow in the songs we sung.


And beneath the West wind, the end was falling;
We sipped at moon poison and passed into nothing.
My deeds, still dark with worshipping:
I knew, in those degrees of intimacy,
With my blood-lips on your scented skin;
The death-flowers of your craft, in me,
Shall remain, monstrous and stupidly human!

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]



Blue Interlude


Frail, iridescent star
In the cosmic green of man:
She has fled our bournes and brooks now,
Too cruel to understand.


But imagine a time of not knowing;
Of seasons measured in fingernails,
Where a theatre of mistakes, unwinding,
Still dowses after death, and fails.


Where someone keeps the hours, someone
Still listens for womanhood's corrosive call,
Into a silence that leaves its listener cold,
Longing for birth tracks, and that is all.


But here, the glass tower's dreaming
Under time's hooded flow,
Where the innocense of love falls, is falling
Into a world we do not want to know.


And there, waiting at the gates of the lodge
According to her habit,
A woman wept to see us still
Defying time and not changed by it.


For my heart reflects your sadness,
And changeless - sings, but sees
No love of life, nor love for us,
Nor love of mortal things.


Yet something animal in its nature;
Something cold and magical
Is born in us, and programmed to lure
The tide of man's sorrow to worship still.


But will time beat out this tragedy
Between our souls that sigh?
Two unshaken blossoms, that
Each side of a woodland lie.


Frail, iridescent star
In the cosmic green of man:
She has fled our bournes and brooks now,
Too cruel to understand.


Dracula's Cousin


Dracula's cousin
Lives in a suburb of Birmingham,
Lisping after the severity of flesh:
His only weakness and his sole outlet.


A bachelor of modest needs
With divination roots that thread
The immemorial sleep of day
Like dancing sea-shore feet,


As faces collapse like dropped buds
Between the sunrise and the dead.
His fingers black with printer's ink
Leaves yesterday's headlines on drained necks.


But no stranger to enchantment, no,
He courses as some satellite,
Steering his blue-shadowed skin that shakes
And sinks into beauty without regret.


And in his most brilliant of moments, one finds
No hesitation, no awkward talk, none,
Just spontaneous in thought and outspoken
On things he's not seen and not done.


But it matters to him, this world of nothing,
This 'creating symbolic magic' by hand.
Yet he was nothing but dead apologies
For a world he could not understand.

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


Something Will Be Done


I live by the power of the amulet;
Of stones and consecrated objects.
Kept in an iron place, I no longer hear
The oracle of sickness: love's undoing.


Between elbows - signs of conjuration
Performed in my anatomy.
A talisman holds you in my sphere;
A goddess in flames: love's ruin.


Let me breathe in your existence
And define the perimeters of love;
To feel the workings of your skin
And the softness of its touch.


But the plague of youthful adoration
Drifts like ribbons on the sea,
Fearful of the ocean guardian
Between the ceremonial waves again.


And I destroy myself by constellations
Where memory's a museum of my love.
We are guided by astronomical phantoms
To intermingle, blood with blood.


But my body is an almanac
Bruised by the morning sun,
And for all these crafted calculations
Something will be done.

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


Finding Orpheus


Under love's not sleeping,
We turned our backs upon the wind
And made a picture book of symbols
From dry leaves and feathers and things that
We'd found.


And we whispered softly into bird madness
Which gave less dread of volume.



Herded like cattle over ley lines;
All night we sang sorrow's tempest is done,
Spun of the fairest years, now flown;
Flung back to a braver and radient realm
To give the death's-head force of nature form.


But a memory of love persisted
Where meanings in broader mysteries cling,
Through this simplicity, drawn
Like a dark veil over everything:


A watery voice; an echo of time's arrows
That murmurs softly from afar,
Blowing its visceral night ballads that roll
Through easeless age and what we are.


But now, a Macbeth in the heart
And a Caesar in the brain
Have given meanings to symbols, and thoughts
Are the beginnings of speech - silent again...



With the spirit's core, we erode our past
And find its obscure language dead;
As dead as the Latin word that seems
A thumping Caliban of things once said.



Still with eyes closed, we feared to look
Upon the eve of another day
Where evolution leaves us sick again.

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


Lost Hearts


But for a shared moment, long ago...
Your voice is painful to me now;
There has been too much said and done between us
And I have shrunk from the world I used to know.


And there are no simple words, just stupid
Things that we said in the past;
Now an impossible cosmos of hurt feelings
Where two hearts had won and lost.


But it's awful how we dream, somehow,
Of sorrow's wickedness in the heart,
For I made a Pompeii of my love
And buried the whole damn lot.


And you will pass as in some dream
Where echoes of those far off days
Shall murmur, winter-thick and constantly:
Love and us remain always.


But my mammoth love was cooled by Severn
Since long before your birth, I said.
Yet still the soft voice whispered near:
Give our unbroken love delight.


And I am obsessed with dead time
And other things shall follow soon.
I do not know of love or its ways
Because of unnatural reserve, nothing evolves.


But like ancient stones we'll stand,
Labouring under some misplaced spell
That will tick us to the end of time,
Into its blue-lipped oblivion.


Something Supernatural


At twilight, I imagine her as before,
Assembled from posted fragments, gathered
Into an alphabet of her ways and more,
Until the female form is covered -


Girlhood's expanse, recurring somehow...
But her eyes only show the reach of dreams
Cutting through the hallway's glow,
Concealed by something more than she seems.


And yes, it's terrible, how she will never say
Those words I need to hear the most.
And when the feminine part inside falls away
To the flood of grim September's ghost,


I won't leave the room, instead I'll wait;
Time won't tell but time will pass,
With my lens fixed to the iron gate
To see its shadow fall across the grass.


For something supernatural keeps her near,
Where desire, dying under dream's wing
Is something sealed that our hearts' won't hear:
Too involved in ourselves to love, and ending.



Telescope Dreaming


This eye-glass on Byzantine worlds
Of our own mythological fate,
Locked upon some distant star
Like Gullivers' gulping on dead space.
A penetrating lens that strays
Beyond those satellites that sing,
To pause on the past and make
A flash in the sky our everything.
As if looking on the microscopic
Where seasons are big things unknown
To single-cell abominations
Content to let big things alone.
A distant supernova detector
Viewed by voyeurs of light years,
Where we are but an eyelash in the soup
Straining at things too far away.
But our little world of telescopes dreaming
Of space...infinite space,
Can't tell us that we're not alone
In a universe of illusion that remains
Content to let big things unknown.

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


Spoon Bending


The house is empty and seems so cold;
Rooms are dying, winding down, all through,
Where childhood thumbled long ago.



And in seclusion, I dummy death,
With fingers touching, still content
To draw stars and circles in the air.



Here, lion-crouching or war dancing;
Test-monkey sitting and laboratory squatting,
Waiting, expectantly, as if you would come in.



Round and round, without touching
Floors and walls or appliances:
These interiors have become your Himalaya's, you said.



And in my hunchbacked morality - I hypnotise...
Corners are head-shaped and I fit in.
Both as giant and insect, table-drowning,



Wanting to hear your voice, but then
Electric socket dreaming and spoon bending
Have taken you from me once again.


There's Something There



I'm an elegant sod, a chemical savant:
We're killers in flared jeans.
We are beautiful
When we're cutting worlds in half.



We pissed through glass canons
At the moon that night.
Love was cremated in the hollows -
We're never safe to be around.



Drowning our Northern sorrows,
Stalking through the bars...
Below the surface we are far
From thinking kind things. We laugh,



And together we shuffle through our thoughts -
What has suddenly come between us?
Why this change in you and me?
But speechless, we sat and smoked in sequence.



Now, our dreams have come to nothing,
And my strategy, in its flawed process
Has collapsed by the stone steps
Where we are beautiful, once again.



Selected Poems from the collection 'Night Flowers':


Birthlines



It is in my mind to be
Rested, in this dark urgency...



Gnarled god of infinite beauty,
With ancient tongue, the hills awake
To nature's call and the season's duty;
To the magic and menace that you make!



And in these things we love the most,
Great beasts of boughs are lost to us.
They wear the darkness like some ghost
That rattles around the rooms of a house.



With their bulged limbs of lump and grot
Deep-twisted through the roll of land;
Green-skirted in your rooted rot:
Horror and history, grooved and grand!



Gorged on darkness, this heart finds
A terrific sadness, deep, that clings...
Death strikes where the river winds
Through a changed landscape that sings



Of experience and gnosis, of hedgerows lost;
Of pathways and barrows and Saxon slain...
To wake the sleeping sylvan ghost
And thunder over mound and hill again!

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


This Ulysses


This angry fellowship of the heart;
This dark seasoned spell that dams
The flow of love's beauty, and fades
Beyond the enchanted reach of the stars...
And the touch of long ago, still haunts,
Like a kiss in darkness, to remain,
An echo of this constant growth
That cannot truly live or die.
O lover, my demon sigh of despair;
My noble god of limitless soul
Who sings and slumbers in the mortal brain -
Strong in spirit and arm, gentle of mind...
But in me there is some whispering dread
That keeps me at its side, always
To watch in the hollows, and handsome, hide
A memory of love on these dead lips of mine;
Dead as the passion that bloomed in youth
To look, Calypso-eyed upon love, and grow...
A love unmoved in every mood -
I go into a dream that I cannot change!


[also from 'Fact and Fantasy'. United Press. 2010]



Natasha


I gazed through the half-open window
In the dimmed afternoon;
And sombre, my heart set me dreaming
As I paced from room to room.



I saw the sun-scorched lawn,
And thought: the rain will come soon.
The frogs lay screaming in a dry pond
And the cat was securing their doom!



But I'll soon send words to Natasha -
Ballads to a baleful moon...
But this house, still gripped by ghosts
Keeps my love from its first bloom!


White Nettle


I looked upon a rose, and saw
The gothic-lipped mist of evening,
Kiss each petal beneath a summer moon
In the dark time brush of the woods.


And ghosts and magic filled the air
Like cinnamon to the nose, and
Those I used to know came by
To see me standing all alone
Between moon dew and black boughs,
Tracing my shadow's outline
Amongst dogweed and wild garlic.


Yes, the woods in June were fragrant,
The oaks and the birches all stood,
Breeze-born and stupendous,
Weathered by elements and time.


But my love is a mythical witch,
Typhooning from the north;
Bound for the cruel starry gloom
And the endless abodes of night.


[also from 'Reflections'. United Press. 2010]



The Birth Of Pan



This earth calamity;
This new-born man:
Short on form, long on reason...
At the coming of the Golden Dawn
Wood whisperings reveal:
Great Pan is born!
Born into a world absorbed by war
Where darkness is thy maiden whore!
And at the fount of our man-god, take
This treacherous rot of globe and make
A Kingdom, wonderful with gold
And goat-god lust both brave and bold:
Awake! Masturbating man of old!



This piss of life;
This earthward bowel:
This token charmed from midnight foul!
Here, vomit up your history
To see the scum of Sodom pouring forth,
From the night to light this mystery;
Where loathsome is the flesh within
The sanctity of salvation's throne,
To reveal a great god, shook from dust;
His thighs thick with honey lust:
Mad, for the passion-bashed clitoris of fire
Where his seed shall flow and never tire
In the endless gash of mortal desire!


The Alien Brook


Dark continent of reeds
Where a mythical world unwinds,
Sunrise stirruped to its mystery, broad,
And the jasmine heart in decline.


An echo of time, repeats and runs
Through meadow's dwindled pulse, and blood
Booms in veins, where hornbeam and ash
Reclaim, a dead fox with its hunting claw.


Stood, as stranger, though always touched
Veiled glamour of long ago - I'll retain
A memory of this evening, between us,
Immersed in magic, sleep shall flow,


Through Tudor brain, moon-milled by woods
Beneath a bat-black oppressive sky;
Purposeless over pebbles now, its course
Meanders with antique weariness,


To sigh, where owl-haunted beauty persists
Between star and steeple - a steady pace
In blankets of twilight - the heart beats
To an ancient song, sung far away.


[also from 'Poetry in Motion'. United Press. 2010]


The Totem Elect


Under the steed breath and warlock eyes,
His granite stare lifts a Canterbury miracle
And a death... Lips like a drained lake, reveals
A winding path amidst the sunken graves...



The thump, thump of hideous thought
In gloomy gardens... violated remains
Castrated to the crack of horse hooves,
To jab like wax-work, and become
Insane at some vile ache of time.



And at the summit of imagination -
Black angry marks; a widow's tongue
Cuts like some cancer through the heart,
Snorting at pantry fever and kitchen dust.



While above the tree-tops, from a steeple
Swooped a raven, thrashing low
Over columns and pillars, to the waterside
Where it earthed with ineffable joy,
And placed itself upon a pendant.



Here it wove for a thousand years:
Dreams and domes and all things lost;
All things smothered in their prime
By twilights charging at dawns...



Some dead foetus tumbled down
From out of the summer lightning;
Performing staggering etudes
In its unsteady playing.



An idea came to me:
Why not show it life?
I'll take it to the idol room
And breathe into it, intellect!


Spring Equinox


You have looked into the dawn, my love,
To see a string of black bound pearls -
Fragments from the darkened tide
To muse upon the world!
From the windows shifting menace
A storm has come to pass...
Sometimes a terrible guardian
In the shape of Briareus;
Sometimes a sleepless wanderer
In the pallor of Saint Alastor...
Yet, the park, fresh with snowdrops
Is also as dead as you are!
And your lips, red and eager,
Spun of gossamer glass -
Do you feel the sea wind's salty
Corrosive whispers pass
Beyond the darkness, sleep of death,
Over sea-world's gleaming?
A rich meadow of love is upon us
Where stars are born of dreaming!


[also from 'Spring Vision'. United Press. 2010]


Troubled By Time


To the memory of A. E. Housman.


Born, in the year of Darwin's 'Origin',
Where secret worlds of unrest grow;
His inward lips were tenderly pressed
Over the lines of Juvenal.



His passion: silent - humanity's ache
Under the touch, lies far away...
And in the night, there is no sleep
To stamp over the angles of each day.



Words lived, yet he was dead,
Caught in a season's oblivion.
His sombre thoughts were all but lost
On boys to which the war had won!



Ballad-whistling, yet still no-one,
For he would not stay...
His spy-hole on the liturgy,
Kept like photos locked away!



Now, he is going into rooms
Where his heart lies with the dead;
His romance found in Latin graves, and
All that need be known - was said!



Not wanting to remain, no,
Our poet-scholar built a tomb -
A small wound bleeds his sex away,
To flow like wine in printing bloom.



But how could a passing flower give
Life to old bones and dust,
When sorrow thought it fit to stay
And cauterize his lust?

[also from 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]



On Hampstead Heath


Man of earth - titans and wraith stones;
Dwarfed by hornbeam, alder and ash...
Acorn jewelled moss paths, bluebells and nettles;
Dark places of anemone and dead man's rot.


Songs of grass: the honey-haunt of weeds,
Shaken in shafts as shadows darken and sink
Beneath a bridge. The lakeside strangeness
Had disappeared and seemed less strange, somehow...


The chalk bricks, white as maiden bones,
Stood weary, turned on time...
Green pools, poppy-bruised, where
The corpse of years remains...


And here, the dead where pathways cross,
Reach from roots and ground elder stems;
Hoof-thuds vanish down a winding track and
Ale exulted blood still courses through the wood.


The oaken brain, like a steel box, contains
The dream of history, grown dim and flowing
To the magic and menace of reeds by night,
And lips of twilight found me there.


[also from 'Poetry by Moonlight'. United Press. 2009]

Niseag


In bygone squid-lust, it slays
Centuries; shift from eye to eye;
Slumped in the bottomless sludge,
Uncaring of the world above
Where mankind, like mayflies, die!


Devil-curst fame: its fathomed kiss
Lies like love notes on the wake;
Measureless, in its humped myth
Where its bulk of heart can evoke
A dark and ancient emptiness.


Yet, we intrude upon its sleep
To wish upon it: 'museum-death',
The prey of monster eyes, always...
Guardian of your dark reach, deep,
May the mystery of our worlds,
Never meet!

[from the collection 'Hexham Heads' 2011
and 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


The Butterfly


O secret or symphony -
I know its heart too well;
Sweet sovereign of life's mystery,
Your silence cannot tell
What difference this is, parts you and I
Or what spirit takes you far away.

Will this love immense, never fade;
Could my heart but love you less?
I have seen your fiery wings displayed
To summer's silver light caress;
Serene, unfolds, and flits away
And blessed to live another day.


I'll say I'll seek its beauty,
To hear its sealed heart sigh
Through the long, lone summer,
Wherever its soft wings lie.
And passions fleeting in vain, will chase,
Though never mar nor seize its grace.


Since then in my remembering
Its sad and sable flush,
Fate, in its surrendering,
Steals by a pale moon's crush
Where the frailness of the butterfly
Unknowing strength - must die!

[From the collection 'From the Hermit's House' 2011.]

Ode To Satan


His bones are black like dragons’ teeth
And he’ll make merry with your soul.
Beyond concept, form and time, to dwell
In the regions of your own imagined Hell.
Like mind-fire, he rises,
Silk instigator, his bulk shall sway,
Song-like, in timeless rhythms, to emerge
Urgent at his supper of souls, again.
No purity too high; no weakness too low;
He is mistrust in the heart of every lover
And anger wrestling in the down-trodden.

A name swift to lips – he’ll come
In sleep or silence, seducing:
‘S’ words – serpent, scratch, sugar, sun;
Slumber, sweet, shout, sex, sing,
Smoke, scream, sinister, snake, sin...
Of them all, Satan, upon the tongue,
Licked with a rush of air...
Shushed and shaped into Sss-a-tan:
Satan, I call thee to me, Satan,
Sensual flame and saviour, strong:
Satan, Satan, Satan, come!

[From the collection 'Under Wind and Over Sun' 2011
and 'Ten of the Best'. United Press. 2013]


THE KILLING OF ERATO

Muse, thy fair and busty presence
Brought moonlight, madness and song;
Conjurations inspired wise words to mind
And invoked beauty, but you belong

In your world of mythology, not mine;
Come no more and trouble me not!
I do not care for your enchantment;
I do not want your alluring rot!

I am sick of your flowery love-words;
Sorceress, do not trouble me!
Go back to your sisters: Melpomene,
Urania, Thalia and Calliope,

Polyhymnia, Clio, Euterpe and
That haunting devil of dance – Terpsichore!
The old blush of youth has gone
And so has your hideous hold on me!

Still she came, she did not listen;
I pushed my pen firm in her eye;
I cut her heart out with my scissors
But still Erato did not die!

The brain slipped easy from the skull;
I tore her lungs out with my fingers!
The tongue was simple to remove
But still the muse of love-words lingers!

I cut her up into nine pieces;
Wiped my finger prints from the pen;
I left her body parts in bags:
She will not trouble me again!

[from the collection 'A Toe in the Queen' 2016]


A EULOGY UPON THE DEATH OF ROMANCE

They said falling in love would be painless –

Some numb beast in the brain,

Distorting dimensions of dreaming

To dull the senses of pain!

A whirlwind romance, they called it,

But the heart is deplorable now;

Love sought a serenade of perfection,

More than the heart would allow!

They said love’s just pure emotion;

A tissue of tournament tears,

Devoid of intellect – love is

A carousel of shameful fears;

A torturous sadness of longing –

The heart hangs heavy with time;

An enchantment of song was left muted

To whither away in its prime!

A dreadful departure of passion;

A vacuum void of cold kisses;

The perfumed pretence of not knowing

Why this arena of soft caresses

Remained flowerless, diminished,

With sweet words blunt and dull;

The dim rush of longing sensation

Was heart-breakingly beautiful!

Sunlight was always my cradle

And moonlight was always my bed;

Romance went out with the old year –

Romance is decidedly dead!

 

[from the collection 'A Modern Antinous' 2018]

Gallery - A Small Selection Of My Illustrations

 

ILLUSTRATIONS BY BARRY VAN-ASTEN

Aleister Crowley

Ink. 1992.

Book Of The Law I

Ink. 8 April 1992.

Book Of The Law II

Ink. 7 April 1993.

Book Of The Law III

Ink. 8 April 1994.

Schizophrenia Carnival

Oil. 1990.

Sisters In Morphine

Ink. 1993.

Fuck Absolute

Acrylic. 1995.

Behind The Scenes

Ink. 1993.

Hendrix

Ink. 1991.

W. B. Yeats

Ink. 1995.

Mountain Scene

water colour. 1996.

Night Flowers

Ink. 2008.

Wych Elms

Ink. 2008.

Ghost Blooms

Ink. 2008.

all works Copyright Barry Van-Asten

Unquiet Ghosts - Part II

UNQUIET GHOSTS
PART TWO
By Barry Van-Asten


SWORD AND SALT

The next sitting took place on Friday 5th March from 11.45 P.M.-1.15 A.M. and the medium used automatic writing. The entity contacted who called himself ‘Anthony Myers’ was a particularly nasty spirit. He gives his age as 90 and that his years upon earth were from 1890-1980. He then goes on to say ‘I want your life! Your voice – select, your choice… You are chosen – you’re fucked!’ Then the spirit turns quite nasty and is abusive towards the medium, when she asks ‘why me?’ he replies: ‘For opening your legs’, and he then goes on to say ‘only you can decide’. There is then a lot of talk about having ‘sex magic’ which he is very enthusiastic about and he is reluctant to leave and the sitting is terminated at 1.15 A.M. but there is a sense that he has not left. On this occasion Barry had to resort to a Banishing Ritual using his magical sword and a good dose of ‘consecrated’ salt!
Sitting number seven took place on Thursday 1st April at 11.50 P.M. and was an Ouija Board session.

Are there any spirits present? Yes.
Do you know one of us? Yes.
Are you family? Yes.
Is it Barry’s family? (No answer).
Is it Aimee’s family? S.
(Question repeated) Yes.
What is your name? PAVATJL. (Yes then indicated).
Please re- spell your name. (No answer).
Are you still here and do you want to communicate? Yes.
(The medium senses a male spirit but he is reluctant to speak).
Did you send us a smell? JASJ.
I do not understand. (Yes then indicated).
Do you have a connection to the J....... family? Yes.
Was it during the nineteenth century? 1. Yes.
What year were you born? 1754.
What year did you die? 182_ (Yes then indicated when the medium mentioned Parish records) 1. [1821].
Are you John’s father? Yes.
Will I find your birth and death in C............. Parish records? (No answer).
Are you John’s Grandfather? Yes.
Are you a J.......? Yes.
Are there records of you in C............? Yes.
What is your first name? J(3)ALTAJ (Yes then indicated).
Are you not very good at English? Is this phonetic spelling? Yes.
Is your name John? Yes.
Did you have a shortening for your name? Yes.
Please spell it. JCK (Yes then indicated).
How many children did you have? 5.
Which order was John? 2.
How many boys were there? 3.
How many girls were there? 2.
Was the first child a boy or a girl? B. [Boy].
Who came after John – number three? G. [Girl].
Who was number four? B. [Boy].
Who was number five? G. [Girl].
Were they all alive before you died? Yes.
When did you get married? 175_
Marriage not birth – did you get married? Yes.
At what age did you get married? 21. [1775]. Yes.
(The spirit lingered on the number seven previously when giving the date of his marriage but the number seven was not taken as definite by Barry and medium which it should have been – The date of the wedding is therefore 1775).
What are the initials of your wife? BS……J.
Is ‘J’ part of the initials? Yes.
Was her name Beatrice? Yes.
How many more generations of the J........ family can I find? 2.
1700-1710? Yes.
What is the earliest date of birth for the J....... family I can find? 1714.
Are you tapping? Yes.
Were they in C..............? Can the records be found there? Yes.
What was your job? BOJOJNV.
Do you know how to spell this? Yes.
Did you work on the land? No.
Did you work in town? Yes.
Did you provide a service? Yes.
Were you a blacksmith? No.
Were you a bootmaker/cobbler? No.
Did you work in the brewery? No.
Were you a cooper? No.
Were you a builder? Yes.
Were you a bricklayer? Yes.
Were you a ‘bodger’? Yes.
Did you send us a smell earlier? Yes.
Is your wife here? Yes.
Is she very pretty? Yes. (The medium sensed the spirit laughing at this). Yes.
When did your wife die? 1829.
How old was she when she got married? 20.
Was she born in 1755? Yes.
Did they all stay in C............. (except John)? Yes.
Thank you for coming… etc
Goodbye.
(The sitting ended at 1.40 A.M.)

The next sitting (number eight) occurred on Friday 9th April at 10 P.M. after Barry did a ‘Banishing Ritual’ to cleanse the working area. The Ouija Board was used.

Are there any spirits present? (The indicator pointed towards a piece of human bone Barry had collected from St Mary’s Cemetery where the couple had been that day, and which was deliberately placed on the table). The indicator then pointed to the Angel Raphael.
NF(4). Yes. BSOV. (N.O.).
Is Raphael moving this? No. 4.
Is this an Angel? GUI (pause) DE U (The indicator points to the Guardian Angel).
Is this for Barry? Yes. (The indicator pauses over the number one).
Do you have a name? D(P).
Are these your initials? No.
Is your name a riddle? Yes.
Have you finished? No.
How many more letters are there? 5.
Next letter please. FVVA.
Can you help us to make it easier? 3.
Next letter please. I.
Are you here to help? No.
We need to understand. Q4.
Are you here in any magical capacity? Yes.
Are you my Guardian Angel? (Meaning the medium's Guardian Angel). (Raphael is indicated).
Have you pointed to Raphael? Yes.
Are you Raphael? (Gabriel is indicated).
Please answer the question with either ‘yes’ or ‘no’. No.
Is this Barry’s Guardian Angel? (Michael is indicated).
Please continue. (Raphael is indicated).
Please continue. EGPUIYTFU.
How many letters are left? 9.
Is it one word? No.
How many words are there? 4.
Please continue. PWHIJALMT….M.
Have you finished? Yes.
Is there any meaning to the letter ‘M’ final? No.
Is there any more? Yes.
Do we need to work out the words before continuing? Yes.
Do we need to use all the letters you have given to make four words? (Guardian Angel indicated).
Is ‘Egypt’ one of the four words? (Guardian Angel indicated).
Are you wasting our time? No.
(The question is repeated). 5.
Yes or No? Yes.
Is it the first, second, third or fourth word? (Raphael indicated followed by Guardian Angel, then the number ‘four’).
Is Egypt the fourth word? Yes.
Are all the letters to be used? No.
Do any of the other words have a name in them? Yes. (Michael indicated).
Does the name come first, second or third? 2.
Is the name Philip? Yes.
Can letters be used more than once? Yes.
Do we have any other relevant words written down? Yes.
Is the word ‘Law’? Yes.
Is it first or third? 1.
Is ‘wilt’ the other word? Yes.
Is what we have then correct: Law Philip Wilt Egypt? Yes.
Do I have to take the ‘Law’ to Egypt? (Asked by Barry). No.
Does Barry have to learn something from the Law then go to Egypt? (Guardian Angel indicated).
Are you Barry’s Guardian Angel, to guide and protect and find something in the ‘Law’ that will help him go to Egypt? Yes.
What chapter of the Law? 3.
Can we know your name? JENDY FIRAD.
Is this your full name? Yes.
Is there two names there? Yes.
Is Jendy your first name? Yes.
Is Firad your second name? Yes.
Are you male? Yes.
Are you/were you Egyptian? Yes.
Is anything going to happen tomorrow? Yes.
Is it going to happen to Barry? Yes.
Was I meant to meet P.........? (Asked by Barry in reference to a meeting with a certain Adept named P........ in Northampton). Yes.
Is it a good thing that will happen? Yes.
Is Horus happy with the Law of Thelema as it is? Yes.
Is its following to grow soon? Yes.
Within the next fifty years? (Hesitant).
More than the next fifty years? Yes.
At what Thelemic date in years? 148. (2052).
Is there any more to say to us tonight? Yes.
In how many years is Barry to go to Egypt? 2.
Is this all for tonight? Yes.
When Barry/Philip calls your name will you come if needed? Yes.
How old are you? 97.
Did you ever meet Aleister Crowley? Yes.
Was it while you were both alive? Yes.
In what year did you meet him? 08. (1908).
How old were you at the time? 24.
When were you born? 1885.
Were you born in the spring of 1885? Yes.
Did you meet Crowley in the spring of 1908? Yes.
Was it in Cairo? No.
Were you in China? No.
Where was it? ENGLAND.
Thank you and go in peace… etc. Yes.
Goodbye.
(The sitting ended at 12.05 A.M.)

Sitting number nine took place on Saturday 17th April and began at 11.15 P.M. Present with Barry and the medium was also Mr D....... P...... Previous to the Ouija Board session the medium sensed a ‘female’ spirit present.
Do you wish to speak to someone here? Yes.
What is the initial of the person you wish to speak to? A.
Are you a relative? Yes.
What is your name? (A) BGXEB.
Is this your name? E. (Guardian Angel indicated).
Please give us your name in full. IWAHNS.
How old are you? 40.
Are you a relative of my present life? No.
How many lifetimes ago? 6.
Was this in another country? Yes.
Are you from the Americas? No.
Are you from Asia? Yes.
Are you from the Middle East? No.
Are you from China? No.
Are you from Japan? No.
Are you from India? Yes.
Are you from Northern India? Yes.
Do you have a message for me? I (D) NIHNIDI.
Is this correct? Yes. (Referring to ‘Hindi’). KYJCRNUCMD.
Is ‘M............’ part of the message? (A person known to the medium who is Indian and lives in India) Yes. HTO.
Is this the word ‘Hot’? Yes.
How many more words are there? 9.
Is this words? Yes. GOD.
Is this the next word? Yes. I ARNOM.
Are there more letters? Yes. UETG.
Is the word ‘Get’? Yes. 2.
Do you wish to write it? No. AIMEE PMT WILL OHTEL.
Is this the word ‘Hotel’? Yes. QUEUE U QUITE ILL BESIESD 1 RITGISITHELP.
Is the word ‘Right’? Yes. HE KILLING SID VISVIIWDS.
Is this a word? Yes.
Is it finished? No. BGO(A)IMOEU.
Is this the last word? Yes.
Is there any more to add? Yes. OOIBHNCH.
Is there more than one word here? Yes. BYBE.
Are you finished? Yes.
(The sitting ended at 12.30 A.M.)

The next sitting (number ten) was on Wednesday 28th April and began at 12.15 A.M. Incense and music was used and the first method was the pendulum.

Is a spirit present in the room? Yes.
Is it of a friendly nature? Yes.
Does it want to talk to someone present here? Yes.
Were you here yesterday and the previous day? Yes.
Did you knock the magnet off the fridge? No.
Did a spirit knock the magnet off the fridge? Yes.
Do you know who this spirit is? Yes.
Was the spirit who knocked the magnet of a good nature? Yes.
Have you come to see Barry? No.
Have you come to see Aimee? Yes.
Are you my Guardian Angel? Yes.
Is there a reason why you have come? Yes.
Is there another way you would like to communicate? (Other than the pendulum) Yes.
Do you want me to hold an Angel card? Yes.
Do you want me to write? Yes.
(The medium then used the pendulum over the Angel cards: Guardian Angel and Zedkiel are chosen).
Are you the same Guardian Angel that came before? Yes.
Is your name Iwahns? Yes.
Are you here to help me? Yes.
Is there a reason I chose the Zedkiel card? Yes.
Is Zedkiel watching over me? Yes.
Do you want me to pick up the Guardian Angel card? No.
Do you want me to pick up the Zedkiel card? Yes.
Is Zedkiel present now? Yes.
(The room becomes very cold and the heater has to be turned on at 12.35 A.M.)
What shall I do? – Do you want me to meditate on the Zedkiel card? Yes.
Do you want me to read the prayer on the card? Yes.
How often and how many times: Once? Yes. Twice? No. Thrice? No.
By reading the prayer will it bring the Angel forward? Yes.
Is he here for a reason? Yes.
Will you (directed to the Guardian Angel) be present when the prayer is read? Yes.
Will he (Zedkiel) speak to me? Yes.
(The medium read the prayer aloud at 12.40 A.M.)
Is Zedkiel here now? Yes.
Does he want me to meditate on the card? Yes.
Is the Guardian Angel still here? Yes (in the background).
(Zedkiel comes forward – the medium meditates upon the card and there is a change of temperature on the medium’s right hand side. It becomes very cold, like a strong breeze blown upon her).
The medium then falls into a trance and a series of automatic writing begins, what is written at the end of the sitting at 1.22 A.M. is what follows:

Do as you will, not as others. Keep strong and you will grow in strength. Tell the truth as it is and not as you(‘ve) seen it. The truth you will have forever. Believe on what you wish no(t) as others. (The writing then becomes a little undecipherable). Be … I will guide you. I will guard you and you will be still within.
Time will change and you will see… I, our, we and thee... You are not a spirit, an soul, an entity. I am close by; I am always close by till the end of time.
Goodbye, goodbye, until next time.
Just call my name and read my prayer… read my prayer.
Sitting number eleven was held on Monday 3rd May after a spirit was sensed in the rooms at 9.45 P.M. After Barry read aloud Crowley’s ‘Hymn to Pan’ and then read the Enochian 19th Key from ‘Liber XXX Aerum vel Saeculi being the angels of the thirty aethyrs The Vision and the Voice’ as preliminary invocations, the couple went for a walk and returned at 10.25 P.M. During the sitting which took place at 10.25 P.M. the medium used a pendulum and at 10.55 P.M. the medium fell into a trance and Barry took notes on her vision which she described to him:

I am situated in a pyramid and Barry is also present. There are separate rooms in the pyramid which is entered at ground level. In the middle of a stone floored and stone walled room is a table which is a tomb-like oblong stone box. The room is dimly lit with a candle. There is writing on the wall (hieroglyphics) and Barry is by himself looking at the wall. I am present but he cannot see me, I am not visible. In one corner appears the God Anubis, black headed with a human body; part God and part human; a God of mystical powers. He appears more human-like and masked. He knows information (?). Barry is wearing ordinary everyday clothes then at intervals he is seen in a white, sort of toga-like costume of Egyptian origin. Anubis is guiding Barry into another room. The floor of this room is of sand and it is smaller than the previous room. Barry appears aghast, not at Anubis but at the room and the difference from the previous room; the light and atmosphere are completely different and incense is burning. Barry is standing at one end and at the other end are three persons, seated on a dais with candles around them at the sides (one is seated in the centre on the highest step with the two others at each side on the same step at the same level). The people look different but the same i.e. like a family. One is female in traditional dress with fur and a man is amongst them, possibly related, but there is a connection between the male and the female; they are of equal standing. There are two guards on either side holding spears and facing each other (both can see Barry):


O O O
Male Female Male
(3 persons on dais, one possibly a young boy)

O O
Guard Guard


O
Barry
(kneeling)


I entered by curiosity and now there is a sudden importance upon me. The woman in the middle of the dais says or gestures to Barry that he should come forward. Barry is hesitant but wants to go forward. The woman is not all she appears to be (she can change her form although she is now in human/female form). Her face changes from a young and beautiful woman and she assumes the shape of a bird of prey. She is speaking and Anubis stands by the doorway as a guard. I am now seeing through Barry’s eyes and Barry is speaking and listening to the female figure. Barry knows her, she is familiar to him. I free myself from Barry’s body and fly into the air to view Barry from the female’s angle. I am behind her chair (in the space between the wall and the chair) and I stand behind her stone throne. There is a symbol carved into the back of her stone chair, a circle with a line from the centre of the circle drawn down past the circumference, like a tilted letter ‘Q’.
Barry realises who the female is. They are family; the woman has more importance/authority, even though the male and female are equal; she has more to say. I am unable to see the faces of the men; I only see the female face which is clear. Her partner is on her right as she faces Barry and on her left is a young boy. I am still unobserved behind the woman.
On the young boy’s chair there is a symbol: a circle with a triangle inside and overlapping this is a pentagram. There may be something in the centre of the triangle. On the other chair where the man is seated there is a triangle with a circle inside it. There is possibly ‘an eye’ in the centre of the circle, but this symbol is not as strong as the others.
Barry has now moved closer to the female and climbed up five steps of the dais (there are six steps in total). The female hands Barry a short crook. He is unable to touch her; his hands/palms are upwards as he receives the gold and blue striped crook. It is metallic and quite heavy; not precious to look at but it is an important symbol. I then hear the words: ‘You must come back!’ spoken by the female.
The man and the young boy are equal, yet different. The boy is her son. The males speak through the females. Barry has to ‘protect’ something [protect the boy while still young]. Above the female is a circle or disc which represents the sun, carved into the wall.
I then hear the words: ‘Go now!’ spoken by the female.
Anubis is by the door, beckoning Barry towards him. He goes over and Anubis leads him out to the other room (ante chamber). Barry looked at one of the guards before returning to Anubis and the guard (situated on my right) disintegrated into dust. Then all was changed and the figures were no longer there. I felt that Barry had to anoint/bathe himself in the River Nile, five times and drink five mouthfuls. Barry has a large pot and is pouring it over himself. But Barry must be careful of what he cannot see as crocodiles dwell in the Nile. Barry has the crook still which he holds in his hands. He stands at a crossroads and there is a left and right turn and a road forwards – he must choose!
(The vision ends at 11.40 P.M.)
Later that night as the couple are in bed the medium feels the presence of Crowley in the room from 1.10-1.50 A.M.

Sitting number twelve took place on Wednesday 22nd June at 10.40 P.M. and like the previous sitting involved the medium entering into a trance and vision:

Your scarlet woman is before you.
You have done well.
The secrets will be unveiled.
While the sun sets in the west,
It will always rise in the east.

Take the name and add by numbers [Winchester, possibly in Latin; there is a connection with Merlin and the round table].
Ancient City; ancient grounds…
There is no such thing as chance but chance.
There are many scribes available to you that are working in your favour.
Question – Have you read your dreams?
The sun won’t rise in the east until you have.
The medium then goes down a tunnel, led by a light and appears in a stone room. She is surprised to see on her right hand side a doorway. She sees a figure, his bottom half is male and his upper parts are that of the hawk. He is alive, yet unreal, as if he is made of gold. There is also some blue upon the front of the head (face). He blinks and looks directly at the medium. No words are spoken but it feels as if he expected her to be there and he is welcoming her. The medium felt as if she were being watched and that she had done wrong and was being judged, and if found guilty he would eat her. There is a stone tomb or corridor with torches burning and the smell of frankincense. The medium feels as if she is to find something and explore. He continues watching her and she must go forward.
He wields a staff and she gives the sign of the enterer. He then appears less threatening.
He touches the medium on the left shoulder with his staff and he points with the staff straight ahead, down an archway along a corridor.
The medium feels a little afraid and has to look behind her. He watches her as she walks. (At this point the medium physically cry’s during the sitting). She feels alone and something is preventing her from going too far forward. The Hawk is angry at the medium for not going further forwards. The sign of the enterer is given by the medium. There are doorways and an arch which is not an arch but a corridor with something behind it… Perhaps Anubis is on the medium’s left hand side behind an arch! There are seats on either side of the corridor, like a theatre – [Hall of Judgement – Maat]. A meeting place… Anubis has a black jackal head; just the head as his body is human and male. Anubis points the medium in the right direction forward. There is a series of arches along the corridor to pass through. There are two doorways on the left and right between each arch. The medium draws the pentagram to help her pass by an arch.
She sees a man, wizard-like and innocent in appearance, take off his hat and reveal his bald head. He seems to be in disguise and not what he appears to be. He is mischievous and hiding something; there is an eerie feeling and he offers the medium a cup; a red cup or chalice (large goblet) gold and ruby in colour with large jewels upon it. It appears to be wine and he is eager for the medium to drink it but she doesn’t want to. He is tempting her but it may be blood; he drinks it to prove himself – drink to give clarity!
If the medium does not drink it then the adept PAAA does not progress forward.
Horus/Anubis there is a choice – birth/death; choose to live or die! It is the medium’s decision! (Both are watching from afar). The man seems to have more authority than even Horus and Anubis!
The man says: ‘which way is it to be – darkness or light?’
The man is actually Aleister Crowley in disguise.
The medium then says: ‘Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law’.
The man appears surprised but did not reply. He then said: ‘Do you know who I am?’ And the medium replies: ‘Yes, I believe so’.
The man (Crowley) says: ‘Why did you say these words when you are not a believer?’ He then becomes more aggressive: ‘You are not his, he is mine!’
The medium then says: ‘Why are you dressed like that?’ (Like a wizard)
Crowley: ‘Isn’t it how you would think a magician would appear?’ (Crowley’s appearance is that of old age). There are two doorways behind Crowley and he is in the middle. The medium must decide which way to go if she refuses to drink from the cup. Crowley tries to draw her towards him and the medium avoids eye contact. But why is he putting her through this test? The cup is not full of wine but blood! The medium is the key! She is PAAA’s skryer and without her he (PAAA) cannot see. [Horus can either be your protector or your avenger!]. The medium must physically drink from PAAA's Magickal Cup which has consecrated water within it and was used in this actual Ritual previous to the vision beginning. This she does. Crowley is smiling and it is not a nice smile, it is secretive.
The medium chooses the doorway on the left after Crowley said choose the right! Crowley looked at her before and raised an eyebrow. The medium had the cup in her hand and she felt she must give the rest of the water to PAAA. The corridor is dark and the medium came to a cliff face and can’t return – skeletons were beyond the door that she entered, hanging by their necks.
The cup she holds in the vision is like a doorway and it is full of protective red liquid. The medium sees PAAA in the cup in a black robe. In the robe PAAA makes the gesture of the enterer and ‘Osiris slain’ in the liquid. PAAA physically drinks of the water in the Magickal Cup. Anubis and Horus point to the sun as the medium stands on the cliff, before PAAA drank the water. The medium jumped and plunged into a river; on surfacing she saw PAAA on the bank and he drank from the cup. Now the surroundings change to green fields and the vision ends!
(The vision ended at midnight).

Sitting number thirteen took place on Saturday 31st July at 1. A.M. and was an Ouija Board sitting. There is little remarkable about the sitting until the medium switches to automatic writing:
Is there a spirit present? Yes.
Are you someone we know? (The indicator does not move from the ‘yes’).
Are you here to talk to one of us? (Again the indicator does not move from the ‘yes’).
Are you here to talk to Barry? (No answer).
Is there anyone still here? No.
Is there anyone wishing to contact us tonight? Yes.
What is your name? EVOP. Yes. T.
Have you finished spelling your name? Yes.
Are you a spirit? Yes.
How old are you? 94.
Is that 94 years as a spirit? No.
Is this the age when you died? Yes.
Are you an old soul? Yes.
Are you here to tell us anything? Yes.
Is it directed to me (the medium)? No.
Is it for Barry? (No answer).
Barry asks: Have you come to give me information? Yes.
Barry then asks: What is the information? TVLJGDMT(Y)KUZ4RJZAYWBWSWJMX.
Will you answer to Barry? Yes.
The sitting ends at 1.45 A.M. and then the medium uses a different method, that of automatic writing; the message that appears reads:

Is there anybody there? Yes.
What is your name? Barry.
Are you here to talk to Barry? Yes.
And the message continues: Please be good. Help her. Life is not worth much to her. You have powers, use magick, you’re greater than you are. Wiser than your words: a great man to be. Strength and honesty are your guides. I am your helper.
Are you a magician? Yes. I am of the highest order. You w… ….. You are better than you know you are.
What grade am I? You have much work to complete. Zelator is obu. You are a wing. I’m here to call.
(The message ends at 2.45 A.M.)

Sitting number fourteen took place on Monday 11th October and is described in the previous chapter ‘The Great Beast’.
The next sitting (number fifteen) occurred on Monday 25th October at 11.45 P.M. First the incense was lit (sandalwood, frankincense and myrrh) then the medium used a ‘grounding ceremony’ by stimulating the chakkras and ‘earthing’ herself. Previous to beginning the medium senses the presence of between four and five spirits. At midnight the sitting began proper when the medium entered her vision state:

A male presence to the medium’s right side is pointing towards Barry who is on the medium’s left side. He is old and has grey short hair. He seems fragile and is balding on top of his head. Another male presence that is older and well dressed is also with us. He is well spoken and may be related (perhaps a Grandparent on a maternal side); he smells dusty like an ‘antique’. A younger male points towards the physical door (it may be Barry’s father as possibly Barry’s mother is present). Barry and the medium hold hands in the physical to create a link. Barry’s mother is asking why Barry is so ill. There is an elderly woman also present. Barry’s mother says: ‘You knew I was there!’
She feels frustrated with Barry and wants to talk to him at a ‘Spiritualist Church’. She can’t believe he went into a church! ‘Why now?’ she says. ‘I don’t like you doing that ‘’devil worshipping’’’. Here the medium asks about finances – it appears she needs to wait longer and Barry’s mother seems to think the medium has led him astray. The medium gets the image of a baby, dark haired and new born. Barry asks: ‘What time was I born? – 11.20 P.M. She wants the ring to get a stronger link and Barry says he will use it next time! Time of birth is then given as 12.20 A.M. (not 11.20) and she says he was a ‘bastard to deliver!’ She misses Barry and says he shouldn’t remember her how she was at the end. The medium saw Barry wearing his mother’s ring and she held it too. Barry’s mother feels sad that she can’t take care of him like she used to and be affectionate. She says he looked lovely at the wedding and Aimee was lovely too. She says they both look right together! She was glad that Barry’s brother D........ turned up too but why wasn’t there an extra space at the top table for him? She wants D.......... to know about her, that she is in communication etc. Barry’s father seems puzzled that D........ keeps changing his address. He is shaking his head and Barry’s mother seems to think she needs to take D........ in hand – will he ever grow up? She doesn’t like Crowley; she doesn’t like it affecting Aimee. She mentioned the medium Gordon Smith and that Aimee is meant to meet him!
(The sitting ended at 1.20 A.M.)

Sitting number sixteen, the final sitting for the year 2004, took place on Wednesday 8th December. Sandalwood incense was burnt and candles and so began a sitting using the pendulum at 11.55 P.M.

There is a female present. She is elderly with long grey hair (half her hair is tied up and the rest is down).
Is there a spirit present? Yes.
Is it a woman? Yes.
Are any other spirits here? Yes.
Do I know you (meaning the medium)? No.
Is there a family connection? Yes.
Are you connected to my family (the mediums)? No.
Have any of my Grandmothers been here in the past week (the mediums)? Yes.
Is it on my mother’s side? Yes. (The medium’s Grandmother visited during the week).
Did she sit on my bed? Yes.
Are you English? No.
Are you Irish? No.
Are you Scottish? No. (Small ‘no’).
Do you have anything to do with Barry? Yes.
(The medium sensed her standing near to Barry dressed in nightwear).
She seemed hesitant on the Scottish link – perhaps she is a Grandmother on Barry’s father’s side).
Are you Clara Beatrice? Yes.
Are you here to help? Yes.
In what year did you get married? Towards end of the year 1918.
What month? December, Christmas time, aged 21.
Were you married in England? No. (This is incorrect).
Were you born in 1897? Yes.
Were you born in England? Yes.
Did you get married in France? No.
Did you meet my Grandfather in Holland? Yes. (Unlikely).
Were you there on a trip? Yes.
Was he attached to the War? Yes.
Was he a fighting soldier? No.
Was he behind the trenches doing clerical work? Yes.
Was he literary, reading and writing? Yes. (Strong yes).
Did you get married in Scotland? Yes. (Incorrect).
Did your parents know? Yes.
Were they happy? No.
Were you pregnant? No.
Where in Holland was J....... from – North west.
Is it Amsterdam? Yes.
Did J...... die in 1966? Yes. (Incorrect).
Did you meet the same year that you got married in 1918? Yes.
(They met early in the year before the War finished; John was in uniform, on leave).
Were you doing research in Holland? Yes.
Was it art? Yes.
Van Gogh? Yes.
Were you a commissioned artist? Yes.
(She was there a few weeks or a month and kept in touch).
Did John come over to England? Yes.
Was it after the war? Yes.
Is anything incorrect? Yes.
25th as a date in November, John came over and they were married a month later.
Does Barry have a photograph of you? Yes.
Towards the end of your life were you in a wheelchair? No.
Grandfather present now and photographs are produced. J........ says that his father was stern, (a photo is held by the medium – taken in Holland supposedly as J......’s father never came to England).
He felt distant to his father; G......... was the same, distant to him.
Clara was independent.
Was Clara born in Birmingham? Yes.
In Edgbaston? Yes.
She was from a middle class, smallish family. J....... was more working class thus the conflict. She broke links with her family; they disowned her!
Was Clara religious? Yes.
Was she a Christian? Yes.
Her Parents were more religious.
Were her parents English? Great Grandfather S......... was Irish and Mother was English – Northern Ireland – Protestant. Mother was quiet.
(The sitting ends at 1.35 A.M. and Barry is very sceptical about the information gained during this sitting. It is also the last sitting for the year 2004).