In our very first gathering, as described in my book Dreamgates, the Deer spirit became available for healing for a woman who had been told she had an incurable disease. There is a legend on this mountain of a great stag who has the power to turn of the killer in men. It is said that, three seasons in a row, hard-bitten hunters came face to face with him, eager to take his antlers for a trophy, and found that something in his huge steady eyes made them lay down their guns. A modern-day version of the story of the Roman general Placidus, a passionate hunter who had a similar encounter and – finding the Christ energy in the stag – became St. Eustace.

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Deer antlers symbolize spiritual power, because they reach above the physical head into a higher dimension. The antlers also embody the power of healing and regeneration, because they die and grow back.

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In one of the early gatherings on the mountain, after we had seen and felt the presence of the Deer in healing, I wrote a poem of invocation that I want to share here:

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Deepheart, mountain guardian
who harries the hunter
and knows what belongs to us
and what does not,
give us your speed,
your ability to read the land,
to see what is behind us and around us.

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May we grow with the seasons
into your branching wisdom
putting up antlers as taproots into the sky

to draw down the power of heaven,
reaching into the wounded places
to heal and make whole,
walking as living candelabra,
crowned with light,
crowning each other with light.