I use a lot of different chants. The one I've used most this last week as I focused on a major healing for my friend's blunt force trauma head injury:
Sure as the wind,
My sisters, and
Sure as the land
Sure as the sun doth shine
We will raise our sound again.
I chose that one to represent my desire for her to be whole and healthy enough to be able to raise energy and work with it in circle again.
For group unity:
There's a river of birds in migration
A nation of women [people] with wings.
or
We are the flow and we are the ebb;
We are the weavers, we are the web.
I use the classic Ancient Mother or the Kore chant for connecting with Goddess, and sometimes the classic We All Come from the Goddess:
Ancient Mother, I hear you calling
Ancient Mother; I hear your song;
Ancient Mother, I hear your laughter;
Ancient Mother, I taste your tears.
Isis, Astarte, Diana, Hecate
Demeter, Kali, Inanna
We all come from the Goddess
And to Her we shall return
Like a drop of rain
Flowing to the ocean.
For invoking the God, I tend to use two, depending on which Goddess chant I used, more commonly:
Horned One! Lover! Son!
Leaper in the Corn!
Deep in the Mother
Die and be reborn!
Or if I used We All Come from the Goddess:
We all come from the Sun God
And to Him we shall return
Like a spark of flame
Floating to the heavens.
If I'm trying to change something, especially within my own personality or abilities, I often use:
She changes everything she touches
And everything she touches changes
For invoking/balancing the elements, I like to use:
Fire and Air,
Fire and Air,
Earth, Water
Earth, Water
or
The earth, the air, the fire, the water
Returns, returns, returns, returns.
or
Air I am;
Fire I am;
Water, Earth, and Spirit I am.
If I'm outside and it's bitter cold and windy, I often invoke Stribog's cloak with the following chant (Stribog is my patron deity and the Russian lord of the winds):
Stribog, the wind is strong today, my father;
Wrap thy cloak around me so it will be no bother.
That one's important because if I get too cold, my fibromyalgia flares up significantly and I end up in pain for 2-3 days. It's nice to avoid as much of that as I can, because it's never good when every muscle in your body tries to get a cramp at the same time... ;)
And if I just want to focus on how we are all interconnected with the earth and what affects one thing affects us all, I like a translated Iroquois [Native American] song:
The earth is our Mother;
we must take care of her
The earth is our Mother;
we must take care of her
(chorus, repeated after every verse)
Hey yana ho yana hey yan yan
Hey yana ho yana hey yan yan
Her sacred ground we walk upon
with every step we take
Her sacred ground we walk upon/
with every step we take
The sky is our Father;
we must take care of him
The sky is our Father;
we must take care of him
His sacred air we breathe in
with every breath we take
His sacred air we breathe in
with every breath we take
The lakes are our sisters
we must take care of them
The lakes are our sisters
we must take care of them
The trees are our brothers;
we must take care of them
The trees are our brothers;
we must take care of them
The earth is our Mother
We must take care of her
The earth is our Mother
We must take care of her
The earth is our Mother
She will take care of us
The earth is our Mother
She will take care of us
And, most of the time when I need something specific, I write one on the spot.
