Cow Goddess and Me

[kiya]

I sometimes think about gender.

In part, I do so because I'm not very good at it. I don't understand how it gets constructed in other people's heads. I don't even understand the forms well enough to try them on, to play with them, like I see some other people doing with gender. Most of the gender roles I've met have been like . . . like those knitting projects in cartoons, where the sweater comes out with three arms, or the sock goes on for miles and miles. Like that. They don't fit. I'm not that shape.

Someone once said to me that I'm not butch because I'm trying to conform to the image of what 'butch' means, it's just the way it comes out. To which my response was, "But am I butch?" Okay, I don't do makeup, really, but. I don't know that preferring long skirts is terribly butch as a trait. You pays your money, you takes your chance.

Do it yourself gender. Build your own box.

Ht-Hrw is, I think, one of the most feminine of the ntjrw, one of the most classically female. Gold, She is called, the gold of the gods. The beautiful daughter of Ra. She governs many things comfortably within the feminine realm as commonly conceived: motherhood, beauty, love. I suspect that this is some of why people have a hard time seeing Her in me.

Because I don't bend my manifestation of female to fit the genderings.

But what else is Hathor?

Partner to Horus of Edfu, Herw-Wr, with all the strength and majesty that that must indicate. House of Horus -- the home of He who is so large that His eyes are the sun and the moon. Mistress of Heaven. One who knows how to utilise Her possession of the feminine with potency and who will do so -- who will flash Ra when He has withdrawn from the proceedings of the ntjrw -- whether one interprets that as whimsy or as the revitalising presence of Her sexuality or perhaps both. To be the Eye of Ra, His protector, is more than Her potential for purging cleansing, Her inner Sekhmet; it is to have that potency of rebirth and rejuvenation, for the living and for the dead. Mistress of the West. She is the life-sustaining shade of trees and with their healing wisdom. Lady of the Sycamore. It is to know how to cast aside the forms and follow the summing law of ecstasy and abandon. Lady of Intoxication. She gives birth to Ihy, of the joy of music. Mistress of Music. Precious stones and substances are Hers, as guardian of beauty and wealth. Lady of Turquoise, Lady of Malachite, Lady of Lapis, She Who Reigns in Punt. She is woman, cow, falcon, uraeus, lioness. She is mother to Ihy, of musical joy, nourisher of many, bringer of beer.

When She is well and within her community, She is bounteous, passionate, uninhibited, glorious. ("She got legs and knows how to use 'em.") When She is slighted or affronted, She will pursue solitude, withdraw, become dangerous to be near. The Distant Goddess. It takes wisdom and cleverness to bring Her back.

(A wisdom and cleverness which I at the moment lack, but I am a shadow of myself these days.)

And what is She to me?

She laughs often, and mightily. Her hand turns things, just slightly, just so, to reflect their beauties. Her colours are jewel-tones, returning to malachite and lapis. She loves milk and rum, and prods me to offer them to Her. She gives me the strength to heal and protect those who are in my care. She is there for me, supporting me, in my slow progress towards being ready for motherhood, and I see Her in my need to prepare for it. She is there in my love of music, bearing the joy that it inspires, the transcendence of it. She lurks within my tendency to whimsy and delight, and She laughs there too. Elegant things, beautiful things, with rich colours. She is there in the deep expanses of the sky that I have watched, in its mysteries, in its glories, and in the elegant circlings of the hawks.

And She is there in my strength to say, "Yes, this is what a woman does. I am a woman, and I do it." I don't have to fit someone else's notion of womanliness; Her strength is in my hands already.