As a child, I both feared and loved witches. She was the menacing presence in my Granny's attic that would devour me if I misbehaved and the wonderous entity that lived in the forest, only venturing out at night to sing to the moon and conjure spells. In my mind, she spoke to animals and kept company with all manner of devils and fae folk. Shunning society and all things ordinary, she could be mysterious, terrifying, seductive, and otherworldly, or just an awkward misfit like me. Her stories always resonated with me, and I wanted nothing more than to be my own kind of witch.
As I grew up, I realized there really was a witch in me; she was everything I feared and loved most about myself. I came to see that she's the part of me that loves too fiercely and dreams too wildly. She's the most genuine part of my soul, the wonderous child, the passionate woman, that blazing fire I'm forever trying to control. She's untamed and unapologetic, wild and unburdened by fear. Music, forests, flickering flames, and thunderstorms awake her. I feel her when I'm in love. I feel her when I'm enraged. She is the most violent of storms but also a healer finding light in the darkest of places.
As I've grown, I've learned to dull her presence. I now know her as a boat rocker, and I tend to prefer smoother seas these days, but I miss her madness. Sometimes I worry that there's less and less room for her in my adult world, but she is always there, sleeping soundly in the woods, ready to be awoken by a song.
She led me to write this album as a reminder that we have never really lost that mad and magical part of us. The sleeping witch is only ever just sleeping and maybe today is the day you light the fire.