Cerridwen Fallingstar (born Cheri A. Lesh, November 15, 1952), is an American Wiccan priestess, shamanic witch, and author. Since the late 1970s she has written, taught, and lectured about magic, ritual, and metaphysics, and is considered a leading authority on pagan witchcraft.. The Pagan Alliance. May 8, 2010. p. 10. MoreMarin. September 10, 2009.
She is the author of three historical novels, which she refers to as "posthumous autobiographies" – memories from previous lives.Fallingstar, Cerridwen. "Exploring Other Lives: Healing the Ones We Live Now". Anthologized in: The Creative Woman, Volumes 7-14. Governors State University, 1984. p. 37. In 2020, she published a memoir, Broth from the Cauldron.
Early life and education Cerridwen Fallingstar was born Cheri A. Lesh, in 1952 in Southern California. Her father was an aerospace engineer for Aerospace Corporation,Boverie, Richard. "Atlas ICBM and PERT". Air Power History. Fall, 2007. (Re: Michael Lesh, Fallingstar's father per Acknowledgements in The Heart of the Fire.) and her mother was a librarian. According to Fallingstar, "As a tiny kid, I was always remembering adventures from other lives, trying to remind my parents of various other places we had lived. ... I also spoke constantly, as soon as I could talk, about Witches, herbs and spells, a development which made my agnostic parents slightly uneasy."Cerridwen Fallingstar – Guest Editor: A Books.com Special Feature . Books.com.
She attended Beloit College from 1970 to 1974, receiving a degree in English literature and English composition. She obtained a master's degree in English literature from UCLA in 1976.University of California, Los Angeles – English Literature alumni
Career
Journalism and early Wiccanism In the mid to late 1970s, Fallingstar pursued a career as a journalist in Los Angeles, writing mainly for the alternative press. Still using her birth name, she wrote often on feminism,Lesh, Cheri. "Women of Wander". Lesbian Tide. January/February 1980. pp. 16–17. Noted in: Shugar, Dana R. Separatism and Women's Community. University of Nebraska Press, 1995. p. 204.Lesh, Cheri. "The New Conformism?" Lesbian Tide. January 1977. p. 14. Noted in: Boone, Joseph Allen. Queer Frontiers: Millennial Geographies, Genders, and Generations. University of Wisconsin Press, 2000. p. 218. feminist sexuality,Lesh, Cheri. "Hunger and Thirst in the House of Distorted Mirrors". Anthologized in: R. Linden et al., eds. Against Sadomasochism: A Radical Feminist Analysis. Frog in the Well, 1982. p. 203. Quoted also here: . and related matters.
In early 1975, she was writing for a feminist newsletter at the time Wiccan pioneer Zsuzsanna Budapest was arrested in Los Angeles for fortune-telling from reading tarot cards.Beck, John. "Fallingstar's One Witchy Woman". Marin Independent Journal. October 16, 2009. Budapest asserted that this was an arrest for witchcraft, and that it violated her right to freedom of religion. Fallingstar did a lengthy interview with Budapest,Drury, Nevill. Stealing Fire from Heaven: The Rise of Modern Western Magic. Oxford University Press US, 2011. p. 200.Lesh, Cheri. "Goddess Worship: The Subversive Religion". Twelve Together. Los Angeles, May 1975. (Interview with Zsuzsanna Budapest)Drury, Nevill. The History of Magic in the Modern Age: A Quest for Personal Transformation. Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2000. pp. 159–160. and subsequently studied extensively with her, joining Budapest's all-women Susan B. Anthony coven.Lewis, James R. Witchcraft Today: An Encyclopedia of Wiccan and Neopagan Traditions. ABC-CLIO, 1999. p. 279. Fallingstar founded her own first coven, Kallisti, in 1975;Holzer, Hans. Witches: True Encounters with Wicca, Wizards, Covens, Cults, and Magick. Black Dog Publishing, 2005. p. 85. and she began publishing poetry and literature under her Craft name, Cerridwen Fallingstar – from Cerridwen, the Celtic goddess of rebirth and transformation.These include: Fallingstar, Cerridwen. "Invocation to the Moon Goddess". WomanSpirit. Fall 1976, p. 30; Fallingstar, Cerridwen. "Persephone Returns". Lesbian Tide. Spring 1978. Reprinted in: Roberts, W. Hunter. The Ravaged Goddess. March 1999. pp. 2, 10; Fallingstar, Cerridwen. At Bridget's Forge. Anthologized in: O'Brien, Aline. Womanblood: Portraits of Women in Poetry & Prose. Continuing SAGA Press, 1981. p. 205; Fallingstar, Cerridwen. "Persephone Rising". Circa 1980. Anthologized in: Roberts, Wendy Hunter. Celebrating Her: Feminist Ritualizing Comes of Age. Pilgrim Press, 1998. p. 152. Her journalism also began reflecting her involvement in feminist spirituality and paganism.Lesh, Cheri. "Holydays of the Goddess". Lesbian Tide. 7(5):5, March 1978. Noted in: Feminist Spirituality and the Feminine Divine: An Annotated Bibliography. Crossing Press, 1986. p. 74."As The Tide Turns". Lesbian Tide. July/August 1979. p. 20. "Cheri Lesh covers 'the witch beat' with supernatural skill and daring."
She studied also with noted Wiccan teacher and author Starhawk, and in 1980 was a founding member of a coven called the Holy Terrors, along with fellow Starhawk students Bone Blossom, Sophia Sparks, and M. Macha NightMare."Witchcraft and the Web: TWPT Talks to M Macha NightMare" . The Wiccan / Pagan Times. 2001. She worked closely with Starhawk on the Reclaiming Collective, a ritual and teaching organization in the San Francisco Bay Area, from 1980 to 1986. She was also an early member, Minister, and Elder of the Wiccan fellowship Covenant of the Goddess.
In an academic paper in the early 1980s, she wrote:
Women within this religion [Wicca] have a positive feminine principle to relate to, a mirror in which to find validation, self-worth and self-love. The Goddess possesses all the best aspects and attributes of femaleness. ... Wicca is the most Goddess-oriented of the pagan faiths, and places the most emphasis on developing the intuitional psychic side of the personality – the side that has to do with the craft of magic. Wicca emphasizes the power of the individual, and in a society where women have been denied access to power, this is a crucial concept indeed.Lesh, Cheri. Feminist Spiritual Alternatives. Circa early 1980s; unpublished paper in American Religions Collections, Davidson Library, University of California, Santa Barbara. Quoted in: Hutchinson, Dawn L. Antiquity and Social Reform: Religious Experience in the Unification Church, Feminist Wicca and the Nation of Yahweh. PhD. dissertation, Florida State University, 2007. p. 95.
In the 1980s, living in Marin County in Northern California, Fallingstar continued her professional work in the areas of shamanism, witchcraft, trancework, healing, and psychic work. She also studied with spiritual teachers from various other traditions, including Native American, West African, Tantra, Reiki, Zen, Kundalini Yoga, and New Age teachings.
First book Following the publication of her 1990 book, The Heart of the Fire, seen as an authentic look at 16th-century Celtic paganism, Fallingstar became an established voice for Wicca, witchcraft, and paganism. In 1991 she founded an organization called EarthRite, which offered public rituals in Northern California for 12 years,Fagan, Kevin and Tyra Lucile Mead. "Judge Brings Pagan Flap To a Civilized Ending". San Francisco Chronicle. September 19, 1998. and that year she also founded her third coven, Eye of the Crescent. She was interviewed for the 1995 compendium book, People of the Earth: The New Pagans Speak Out.
In 2009, she was interviewed in the documentary film, Dancing with Gaia.Trailer for the 2009 documentary Dancing with Gaia featuring Cerridwen Fallingstar She has also been interviewed for media outlets including Time magazineStein, Joel. "Joel Stein: Stop the War on Halloween: Why protecting our pagan holidays is at least as important as free lollipops". Time. November 4, 2013. Full text: CNN, the Oxygen Channel, Pacific Sun, and FoxNews.com.Block, Jenny. "East Meets West in the Bedroom". FoxNews.com. January 13, 2011.
She lectures and teaches classes and workshops, including a year-long apprenticeship program, and has also led spiritual journeys to sacred sites in Scotland. Additionally, she works as a professional psychic. She also provides past-life hypnotic regressions, and trance journeys, which she describes as hypnotherapy in a shamanic context.
Books Fallingstar has written three historical novels. According to her, these books are descriptions of her own past lives, accessed via a form of hypnotic regression, which she combines with historical research.
The Heart of the Fire In 1990, she published her first book, The Heart of the Fire – about a young witch named Fiona McNair and her coven, in rural 16th-century Scotland, during the time of the witch trials. The book was well received by many alternative press journals, including Yoga JournalDevi, Nischala Joy. "Armchair Yogi". Yoga Journal. November 2003. p. 20. and Green Egg.Reviews of The Heart of the Fire. Witches' Voice. New Directions for Women wrote:
The Heart of the Fire became a staple of Wiccan literature, and Merlin Stone wrote of it, "Cerridwen Fallingstar is a brilliant writer. The power of the Goddess shines through all that she does." Insight Metaphysical Bookstore. Portions of it have also been anthologized in other books.Fallingstar, Cerridwen. The Heart of the Fire (excerpt). Anthologized in: Oscar Wilde, et al. Going Down: Great Writing on Oral Sex. Chronicle Books, 1998. pp. 134–137.Fallingstar, Cerridwen. "Fiona McNair". Anthologized in: Pond, Lily and Richard Anthony Russo. Yellow Silk: Erotic Arts and Letters. Harmony Books, 1990. pp. 20ff.Fallingstar, Cerridwen. "The Heart of the Fire". Anthologized in: Thornton, Louise et al., eds. Touching Fire: Erotic Writings by Women. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1990.
White as Bone, Red as Blood Fallingstar's second historical novel, about a Shinto priestess, poet, and imperial companion in classical 12th-century Japan, was published in 2009 as White as Bone, Red as Blood: The Fox Sorceress. It was followed in 2011 by White as Bone, Red as Blood: The Storm God. Together, these two books chronicle the transition of Japanese culture from the refined and poetic Heian period to the warlike Shogunate period, as seen through the eyes of the protagonist, Seiko Fujiwara. Seiko's father is an erudite court poet, and her mother is an Inari priestess.Interview with Cerridwen Fallingstar. Historical Novel Review. November 25, 2009.