ayaad
Newbie
Posts: 24 
Pronouns: she/her
Religion: Mormon pagan
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Post by ayaad on Mar 3, 2015 15:22:54 GMT -6
I've been considering making some prayer beads lately. Unfortunately, many of the resources I find out there aren't really all that helpful (a lot of them focus on picking out pretty bead colors and completely ignore actually writing the prayer to go with them) or else use the phrase "pagan rosary", which causes me to immediately back out.
I've kind of figured out the basic structure I want the prayer to have, but I've never actually written out a structured prayer before. Even the concept of formalized, pre-written prayers is pretty new to me, since I was always taught they were a bad thing when I was growing up. Does anyone have experience with this sort of thing? Can you offer some tips? I read a lot of beautiful, poetic prayers that others have written, but I've never been any good with poetry. Any advice would be appreciated.
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aondeug
Full Member
Posts: 141
Pronouns: She/Her/Hers, He/Him/His
Religion: Thai Theravada, Irish polytheism
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Post by aondeug on Mar 3, 2015 15:37:10 GMT -6
I am entirely awful at poetry though I've made attempts at creating structured prayers. Which I then tend to use during all my more proper formal offerings. Though even the less formal have things that get said usually? The ones that are specific to certain beings tend to follow a simple format of "O, -enter a bunch of epithets and qualities and acts here, usually in duos or trios if I can manage it-. I honor you -enter name here, possibly in conjunction with an epithet not mentioned in the main body of the prayer- and offer you x in thanks/as I ask for y/please y." Y is often specific to the deity in question and may or may not be regular. It's very simple. It probably doesn't sound like some sort of amazing poetic thing. But it works. Sometimes the o gets cut off because I don't feel like saying it or feel it is too clunky.
Simpler things instead are more just "I honor -enter name-", "I honor -enter name-, for -enter reasons-", or "Honor to -enter name-".
When picking qualities and what not I tend to mention them either as a single word or some two-word phrase. So Lugh is spear-wielder and stone-flinger though I could conceivably present that in some other way. Like "you who wields spears MORE STUFF DESCRIBING SAID WIELDING". So very simple things.
Now by duos and trios I mean that I group certain kinds of acts or qualities based on some sort of related theme. So spear-wielder and stone-flinger are a duo that get mentioned one after the other. They're both related to war and how he is known to fight. He has legendary spears and is known to have beaten his grandfather Balor by hitting his one eye with a stone and sling.
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Post by Allec on Mar 3, 2015 19:53:47 GMT -6
When writing a prayer, unless your tradition has specific rules, there aren't any! I like Aondeug's suggestions of epithets. I think the first thing to consider is...What type of prayer do you want this to be? A prayer to honor a specific deity? A prayer to say in the morning? A prayer for a specific ritual? Etc. Think of how the process of the prayer will go. Will each bead represent something? Will it only represent a stanza? Will some represent actions, not words? I have outlined what I want to do for prayer beads to Brighid. I adopted this prayer from the Carmina Gadelica. Each bead will be for a line, with separate beads for pauses between the stanzas. It'll loop back to the first stanza, where I'll reverse the genealogy. Once I have made the beads, I'll post them  |
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ayaad
Newbie
Posts: 24
Pronouns: she/her
Religion: Mormon pagan
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Post by ayaad on Mar 7, 2015 14:03:04 GMT -6
Sorry it took so long to respond. Family obligations have kept me busy for the past few days.
Anyway, thanks! Y'all have been helpful. Aondeug, that helps me get some ideas for how to phrase things. It also helps to know that I'm not the only one who sucks at poetry.
Allec, I would definitely like to see your beads when you're done with them. I can't follow that link right now because the library's web filter is overly-sensitive, but I'll check it when I get home. I hadn't considered having some of the beads represent actions, but I really like that. It would need to be something simple, so that I can use them in public without drawing too much attention. One of my hopes is that I can use these beads subtly while I'm in church, to help keep me calm and still focused on my deities. To everyone around me, it'll look like I've just taken off my necklace and started playing with it.
I might post the prayer and pictures of the beads when I'm done. It might take a while for me to gather the supplies, since money is tight right now, but at least that gives me plenty of time to plan.
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eiridescent
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Posts: 4
Pronouns: She/her
Religion: Åsatro
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Post by eiridescent on Mar 8, 2015 19:41:24 GMT -6
I have a set of beads coming soon from an artist on Etsy. I find it difficult to write the prayers for it, mainly because I'm a perfectionist. But the general motif is that each bead is for a different deity, and their prayer incorporates one or two simple things about them and what they mean to me. I'm keeping it short because there's a lot of them to do! For example: "Hail Eir, merciful one, most skilled of healers."
I do also want to get devotional jewelry or beads of some sort for a specific deity eventually, but I'm not ready yet to know which one it'll be. I'm terrible at poetry but I think that's just because I know very little about it & haven't written poems ever. I think it just takes doing it a lot until you start to suck less, like most things. Nothing says you can't start out with a prayer you know you're not 100% satisfied with, and replace it later as your skill grows (writing more to practice in the meantime, getting constructive criticism, etc). As your relationship with who/what the beads are for grows, I think that should make it easier as well.
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Post by Mari Opal on Mar 16, 2015 15:52:44 GMT -6
I've never worked on prayer beads, but writing prayers is a big part of what I do -- if you want to look through some examples, I post my poems/prayers on tumblr at opalborn.tumblr.com/tagged/rough drafts
Most of the actual suggestions I'd give have already been covered, but if you have any questions or get stuck on phrasing, I'm happy to help if I can ^^
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ayaad
Newbie
Posts: 24
Pronouns: she/her
Religion: Mormon pagan
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Post by ayaad on Mar 17, 2015 12:39:51 GMT -6
I'm suddenly realizing that I'm not actually following you on Tumblr, for some reason. I'm fixing that right now. I always love it when one of your poems crosses my dash. I'll definitely be looking through some of your work for inspiration (though I really don't need an excuse to read your poems and prayers, since they're just generally fantastic).
I was planning on sitting down and attempting to solidify the prayer today, so I'll post here if I run into any snags or need advice. Thanks, everyone!
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Post by Mari Opal on Mar 18, 2015 17:56:14 GMT -6
Awww, thank you so much! I hope the prayer goes well ^^
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