Medicine Grove

Book excerpt: Medicine Grove is a comprehensive herbal, with listings for every common herb and many wild plants of North America. It includes descriptions of the part of the plant used, notes on preparation, lists of symptoms alleviated by the herb, and common effects. But Medicine Grove goes further, with chapters on gathering and growing wild herbs, using herbs in shamanic ceremonies or as plant allies in the wilderness, and birth, death, and dreaming herbs. Cruden combines her own first-hand experiences with a profound knowledge of indigenous traditions, enabling the reader to bring herbal lore into his or her own practice. She explains which herbs are best for seasonal ceremonies, smudging, and making offerings, and tells how to purify a sacred space. She covers topics such as vision quests, consciousness-altering, and the special connections between certain herbs and totem animals. Medicine Grove brings the concept of an herbal into sacred territory, offering guidelines for incorporating herbs into one's spiritual life, based on the author's lifetime of work with Native American practices.