Berkano

These Pagan Portals are all current works in progress, serialised here on the Pagan Collective blog with each chapter being open for comment. In due course the entire script will be published as a Pagan Portal book.

Check out the weekly lessons on this blog.

Follow along and learn the runes!

Berkano:

ᛒ

Before reading about the meanings and qualities associated with Berkano, take time to contemplate this rune.

In Your Journal 

1. In your journal or on a separate piece of paper, trace, draw or doodle Berkano. While drawing, say its name out loud: how does it feel? Where does it resonate within your body?
2. Imagine what color(s) best match(es) Berkano and apply them to the image you have drawn.
3. What texture do you think goes with Berkano? Can you represent the texture in your drawing?
4. Look around. From your surroundings, what objects and shapes, if any, would you connect with Berkano? What natural, man-caused phenomena or activities come to mind when you look at your representation of Berkano? Write those down.

Now read the lines describing Berkano in the rune poems.

•  Icelandic: “Birch leafy twig/and little tree/and fresh young shrub.”
• Anglo-Saxon: “The poplar bears no fruit; yet without seed it brings forth suckers,/for it is generated from its leaves./Splendid are its branches and gloriously adorned/its lofty crown which reaches to the skies”
• Norwegian: “Birch has the greenest leaves of any shrub;/Loki was fortunate in his deceit.”

In Your Journal 

5. Can you relate the description in the poems with your own experience of the rune? You may be able to find correlations with the description given in just one poem. Or you may not see any correlations yet. Journal your findings, whatever they are.

Here are some of the meanings commonly attributed to Berkano in readings:

•  translated as birch or poplar
• cleansing, purification
• together with Perthro could mean pregnancy 
• regeneration
• Successful start with promise of future growth

In Your Journal 

6. Journal about how these meanings fit with your own experiences so far. Be open to the fact that the way you perceive this rune may change over time, with some meanings fading and others emerging. At the end of the course, revisit your journal entry and make updates (if necessary).

  

For more details on Daniela: https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com/moon-books/authors/daniela-simina