Burning Times
Leigh Ann Hussey

The songs are sung to rouse our anger
Of martyred witches gone to the fire
But what is served by righteous singing
When all we do is stew in our ire?
More in the time simply died of disease.
Why do we dwell on long-passed dead
When we are alive in times like these?

Rise up, Witches, throw off your masks
And cease crying guilt for ancient crimes;
Earth and all her children need us,
For all face now the Buring Times.

In the face of that hostile power,
How did the old knowledge stay alive?
How do we have a Craft to practice?
Our ancestors knew how to fight and survive!
How do we honor our blessed dead?
Slavery threatens all but the few!
We must teach their cunning ways;
Everyone needs the skills they knew.

Rise up, Witches, gather your strength,
And let your power spread and climb;
Earth and all her children need us,
For all face now the Burning Times.

I'll not cast off science's works
Witches all forces to Will can bend.
I'll not accuse, for war and waste,
Some patriarchy of faceless Men.
Men do not cast the only votes;
Women alone do not demonstrate.
Rather than shut out half the race,
Who, if not we, will change that state?

Rise up, Witches, gather your strength,
And let your power spread and climb;
Earth and all her children need us,
For all face now the Burning Times.

I will not blame a Father's Church -
Blame and guilt are Their tools, not mine.
And even in the schools and churches
Allies there will I seek and find!
I will not answer hate with fear;
Nor with a smug, cheek-turning love;
I will not answer hate with rage;
By strength alone will I not be moved!

Rise up, Witches, gather your strength,
The factories and cities yet ring me about.
I will not climb my ivory tower -
The real world exists though I shut it out,
I will not work for Church nor State
Who serve themselves while they serve us lies.
Nor only for my Witchen kin
But for the family of all alive!

Rise up, Witches, gather your strength,
Ane let your power spread and climb;
Earth and all her children need us,
For all face now the Burning Times.

So if rebellion means to fight
A State lost sight of why it was built,
If hersey's to reject a Church
That rules with force or fear or guilt,
Then let us all be rebels proud,
And shameless heretics be creed!
A tyrant's hand subjects the Earth
More heretic rebels are what She needs!

Rise up, Witches, gather your strength,
And let your power spread and climb;
Earth and all her children needs us,
For all face now the Burning Times.

We must never forget, that's what I was taught by my grandmother.  Our
family history was given graved lessons of that.  Another lesson I was
taught is the scars of torture that were carried by our ancestors give us
the strengths we need today to see that it never happens again.
When I set up my memorial tree for Samhain there always many tears
but I always hear my grandmother voice and feel her hugs, she says they
are the hugs all of that suffer for us so that we can live a better day.