The Pearl Pentacle and its predecessor (and twin) the Iron Pentacle are tools and magics that originate within the Anderson Feri Tradition. Feri (as it is often called) is an American-born form of witchcraft that arises from a syncretism of various cultural influences in the so-called USA. These influences include Hoodoo and Southern Conjure, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh folklore and magic, Hawaiian cultural understandings, Gnostic Christianity, folkloric witchery, and the modern witchcraft revival. Feri initiates are unsure of the exact provenance of the Iron or the Pearl Pentacles, with some of us noting that the Iron Pentacle exists in all Feri lineages, while the Pearl does not appear in at least one line. My best assumption and intuition (and it's not a conclusion) is that the points of the Iron Pentacle—Sex, Self, Passion, Pride, and Power, in the original order as given by the Andersons—derive from magical and mystical teachings from a 1930s coven that existed in Oregon, of which Victor Anderson (1917-2001) was a member. The Pearl Pentacle seems to be Victor Anderson's own evolution of the Iron points.

The Pearl Pentacle points in the original order—around the circle—are Love, Wisdom, Knowledge, Law, and Power. In Magic of the Pearl Pentacle, Jane Meredith and I decided to order the progression of the points through the "body" of the pentagram to keep the book consistent with the progression of the Iron points in Magic of the Iron Pentacle. This innovation of moving from the head to the foot to the hand to the hand to the foot and back to the head—to cast a pentagram through the human body—likely originates with Gabriel Carillo (1948-2007), who was initiated in the early 1970s by Cora and Victor Anderson and originated the BloodRose School of Feri in the Bay Area of California in the 1980s. Reclaiming was simultaneously emerging in the Bay Area and though Starhawk and the early teachers of Reclaiming taught the Pentacles around the circle in the original order (as shown in The Spiral Dance, 1979), eventually the influence of "running the pentacle current" through the body became more centralized in Reclaiming classes through teachers such as Beverly Frederick and M. Macha Nightmare. At some stage in the 1990s, T. Thorn Coyle, an initiate of both Reclaiming and Feri, learnt the alternative name of Liberty from Victor for the Pearl Pentacle point of Power, and this has been disseminated widely within Reclaiming.

If we run the current of the pentacle through the body, we may discover Love in our head, Law in our right foot, Wisdom in our left hand, Liberty in our right hand, and Knowledge in our left foot. It is important to not get stuck in these notions of these regions of the body as the points; they are certainly not the points, but this can be a useful way to engage the Pearl Pentacle as a living, pulsating presence in our lives. Love, law, wisdom, liberty, and knowledge are endless wells of learning and meaning. To begin to understand the Pearl Pentacle we must first remember that the Iron Pentacle is often an embodiment of the rigorous shadow-stalking work of self-possession. I have heard it said by various witches in Reclaiming and Feri that Iron Pentacle can help us with our relationship to self and Pearl Pentacle is a turning outward of that to connection with others and the world.

So the point that we call Sex in the Iron Pentacle is therefore Love in the Pearl Pentacle. If we are delving into our own connection to the life-force, to the intimacy of eros as it shapes consciousness and reality, to the pulsating power of creativity in our lives (Sex in the Iron Pentacle) we will naturally arrive at Love. Or rather, it will be revealed that Love was there within Sex the whole time; that they are one and the same. This is the inherent magic of these two Pentacles, which are really one Pentacle, one Mystery, experienced from different angles. The work of these Pentacles also helps to unravel our over-cultural notions of what these words may even mean and unbind them—and ourselves—into a clearer and deeper intimacy with the forces of the universe.

When I consider the place of the Pearl Pentacle in my life I remember that I am intrinsically related and connected at all times, in all places, to many and varied rivers and threads of existence and experience. In these times of distress and devastation—when many of us reading these English words will be doing so from within the relative safety of imperialist "super-powers" or colonial nations that have wrested that safety and comfort from pillaging the global south—I believe that the Pearl Pentacle has a lot teach us. The radical provocation of taking five virtues, principles, challenges and placing them within the ancient icon of the pentagram is a magical invitation to transformative work. More than this it is calling us powerfully into our connections, into the vibrant and rigorous magic of community and collaboration. When I am "running the Pearl Pentacle," I notice I am more likely to be moving the Iron Pentacle current through my being and then witnessing and sensing where and how those Iron points of Sex, Pride, Self, Power, and Passion, open or reveal themselves to be Love, Law, Wisdom, Liberty, and Knowledge.

I meditate on these points a lot. I might do this as I shower, exercise, walk down the street, sing, and drum in front of my working altar or shrines. I consider how these pentacles are ways of understanding the nature of the Goddess, or God Herself (as she is often poetically spoken of in Anderson Feri). She is Sex, which is Love; She is Pride, which is Law; She is Self, which is Wisdom; She is Power, which is also Liberty; She is Passion, which is Knowledge. And I am within Her Body, I am also Herself, and Her Beloved. I am formed of all of these mysteries myself. They describe Her and thus also me, my potential, what is possible.

Jane Meredith and I wrote and edited Magic of the Pearl Pentacle, inviting rich perspective from experienced Reclaiming teachers, with an idea in mind. This idea could be summed up as: what would it be like to live in a world in which Love is the Law? How would it be if our many communities and networks valued Wisdom and Liberty and Knowledge as commonly-held ideals, foundation stones, and seeds that nourish us all? These five points might come across as ephemeral or even absolute, but they are not outside of us, they are within us, waiting to be revealed and acted upon. It us up to each—and all—of us, in the end, in the beginning…

In the Reclaiming and Feri Traditions we tell each other a story about a pregnant darkness or a void filled with mystery and presence. We whisper and sing to each other devotionally, poetically, rapturously about God Herself who awakens from within Herself—Her Starry Black Void—and beholds Her reflection in the curved, dark mirror of space. She falls in lust-love, this quickens Her mighty desire, and She-They-All drew each other towards one another, fucking, making love, until and through orgasm. Through this pleasure, this orgasm, all worlds, spirits, mysteries come into being. This is a remarkably distinctive and empowering cosmology and creation story. Instead of an omnipotent detached, perfect father deity who orders and commands all things into existence and knows and directs everything, here we have a living, sensual, mysterious cosmos of which we are a part that eternally transforms through interaction and the power of connection. Through Sex and Love all things come into being; we come into Self and touch Wisdom all around us; we become impassioned by our relationships with each other and grow in Knowledge; we deepen into Pride, our right relationship and truth in the web of things and remember Law; we gather our Power to affect and to change ourselves and realise that together we may create Liberation.

The thing is: none of this is able to be accomplished without interaction, without that initial catalyst of connection conjured through witnessing one another and desiring to be in relationship. The Pearl Pentacle may reveal to us something of the nature of the Divine Mystery and therefore something of the nature of our own selves. It may reveal that in the eternally-unfolding, unfinished co-creation of existence, there are options, there are possibilities, there are roads. If we can begin with connection and curiosity and honor all beings as worthy of that, we may begin to work the magic of these pentacles, we may join in the great work of love that I believe binds all things together.

Magic is a very real practice and force in our lives, one that requires our attention, presence, and engagement. If we begin to meditate on these Iron and Pearl points, dancing through them, awakening them within ourselves and our lives, things change, we change, and a potent lucidity and depth opens to us. And ultimately the magic of the Pearl Pearl is a magic that says, You are part of this, you are able to transform the way things are, you and I are beloveds of the Great Ones, we are mysteries, we may commune with the wisdom intrinsic in the world, and through dedication become knowing and powerful. And this is just the beginning. What will you do from here? How will we live our lives? As Victor Anderson said, "When you are confused about power, remember love. X"