Tonight the firebird will rise from the ashes, spring will come again and the son be reborn. Funky stuff. Although, as folk tales go, the execution of Christ seems rather unimpressive. And illogical too, I mean, how on earth is that supposed to save us? And lets see, Jesus gets one day of torment and one day of death and then he’s up to heaven and then it’s wine and virgins all day again. On the other hand, Judas who acts out Gods divine plan, gets to take his life in remorse and then spend eternity in hell. And I’m supposed to pity Jesus and revile Judas? Yeah, right.Doesn’t seem very profound does it?Even Frankensteins monster managed to rise from the dead. Certainly gods have been doing it all the time. And will mot likely continue to do so for a while yet. Here, for example, is what Mr Wednesday learnt, swinging from the tree:

“I know a charm that can cure pain and sickness, and lift the grief from the heart of the grieving.”I know a charm that will heal with a touch.”I know a charm turn aside the weapon of any enemy.”I know another charm to free myself from all bonds and locks.”A fifth charm: I can catch an arrow in flight and take no harm from it.”A sixth: spells sent to hurt me will only hurt the sender.”A seventh charm I know: I can quench a fire simply by looking at it.”An eight: if any man hates me, I can win his frindship.”A ninth: I can sing the wind to sleep and calm a storm for long enough to bring a ship to shore.”These were the first nine charms I learned. Nine night I hung on the base tree, my side pierced with a spear’s point. I swayed and blew in the cold winds and the hot winds, without food, without water, a sacrifice of myself to myself, and the worlds opened before me.”For a tenth charm, I learned to dispel witches. to spin them around in the skies so that they will never find their way back to their own door again.”An eleventh: if I sing it when a battle rages it can take the warriors through the tumult unscathed and unhurt, and bring them safely back to their hearths and their homes.”A twelfth charm I know: if I see a hanged man I can bring him down from the gallows to whisper to us all he remembers.”A thirteenth: if I sprinkle water on a childs head, that child will not fall in battle.”A fourteenth. I know the names of all the gods. Every damned one of them.”A fifteenth: I have a dream of power, of glory, and of wisdom, and I can make people believe my dreams.”A sixteenth charm I know: if I need love I can turn the mind and heart of any woman.”A seventeenth, that no woman I want will ever want another.”And I know an eighteenth charm, and that charm is the greatest of all, and that charm I can tell to no man, for a secret that no one knows but you is the most powerful secret there can ever be.”