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Today I thought I’d share what my daily devotional practice to Inanna looks like, and how my altar is currently arranged. I just switched the table I use for my altar to a slightly taller one with slightly more surface space a couple days ago.

This is what my altar currently looks like. On a riser in the center is a statue of the goddess Inanna. In the riser in front of her is a small offering bowl where I burn incense. She is surrounded by a few small stones which are symbolic offerings to Her. I eventually want to make a new riser to look like a whole ass ziggurat to put Inanna’s image on, but I don’t know what materials to use to make such a thing yet. I want the statue to sit a bit higher up compared to the plants, but I still want plants on there, and they need to be in large enough pots to account for their roots.

On either side of Inanna I have two potted plants. The pink pot to the left contains a crepe myrtle and a hibiscus. There’s no specific symbolic reason for these particular plants. I wanted something that flowers to represent a “spring/beginnings” and feminine sort of energy, and I had plenty of seedlings of these outside (Crepe myrtles from my Arbor Day society membership and hibiscus just pop up everywhere in my yard and garden). The cypress to the left was a gift. I feel it represents more of a masculine energy, as well as fall/winter as an evergreen. It’s not doing too well indoors, so this one will probably be planted outside around November and replaced with something else. I’m thinking a spider plant or something else that does well indoors and is safe for cats. The other two from the pink pot will eventually go outside too.

I have three candles. The center one represent Inanna. I light this one first during my daily devotionals and rituals. I use a large circular clear multifaceted candle holder, which I feel nicely represents the pure yet multifaceted energy of Inanna. Using a utility candle, I light the left one that is in the pink skull candle holder from the center candle’s flame. I think of that one as representing myself, and Inanna’s light shining through me. The third candle holder is where I put candle used in spells or specific rituals if I have one I’m doing that day. Otherwise I light it at the beginning as representing sharing my light with the world at large. I use tea light candles typically, as they burn out quicker if I forget to put them out when I’m done. I’m currently using Hanukah candle as my utility candle because I found some that share a portion of the profits with Sharsheret, an organization that helps women with hereditary breast cancer from the BRCA1/2 mutations that are commonly found in women with Jewish heritage. It feels like a nice way to honor my ancestors too, even if I don’t worship the same deity they did in recent generations.

I light incense offerings from the left candle that sort of represents myself to represent giving of myself to Inanna or any other deities I’m giving offerings to at that time.

After the candles and incense are lit, I do a short prayer/meditation using the wrist prayer beads I keep on my altar. I got the prayer beads from etsy seller HearthfireHandworks and I use the prayer that she included with the beads, with slight modifications, though one of these days I’ll probably rewrite the entire thing to better reflect my personal relationship with Inanna.

All of the classical elements are represented throughout my altar, but they are more “concentrated” in certain designated spots. On the left side of the altar, I have the tools related to the feminine elements of water and earth. I have a container for holy water and a sprinkler tool (made from a miswick stick, rope, and a quartz crystal) for water and earth. I also have a coaster to designate the spot for my chalice, a selenite pentacle altar tile (for charging and cleansing small items), a wood altar tile with an ankh symbol (where I set spell components until I need them. There is goldenrod freshly harvested from my pollinator garden on it in the picture.) The cup is in the way in the picture, but I also have a trilobite on the riser next to the skull candle holder for water and earth, also to represent the past (Earth’s past, obviously, and mine. I got it from the Seneca Cavern’s gift shop as a child). There is a painted shell that says “love” on top of the soil of the left potted plant. I found it while cleaning up trash in the Metroparks. I meant to re-hide it, but it found it’s home on my altar for now. I also have an peat turf sculpture of a cat from Ireland, which I feel gives my Irish ancestors representation, again, even if I haven’t been called by their particular deities.

On the right side, of course, I have greater concentrations of the air and fire elements, commonly considered more masculine in energy. The cauldron I use as an incense holder brings back a bit of feminine energy to the air/fire of the incense being burned. I have my little bell that I got from the Buckland Witchcraft Museum gift shop (I really like museum gift shops, if you haven’t noticed), which also represents air. Its not really visible, but there’s a lava rock I illegally brought back from the beach of Hawaii’s Big Island for fire (and also earth!). The skull-shaped speaker I use to play ritual music through is kinda hidden behind the big candle holder. I usually keep it on the floor, but I had extra space when I rearranged everything. I might swap it out for a garden gnome though, and put the speaker back on the ground. I guess I don’t really have the masculine elements represented as much as the feminine ones, but I’m also completely okay with it. This is my personal practice. I do what I want!

For music, lately I’ve been using the album “Inanna” by Neurotree. I don’t know anything about the artist, I just found it on Amazon while looking for books about Inanna (I bought the album from iTunes though). I found literally nothing about the artist other than that one album when I tried to look them up. It seems kinda sus, since usually there would be at least some info about the actual humans behind the music somewhere on the interwebs, but whatever. I like it.

In the center, right in front of the riser for Inanna’s image, I have a big chunk of quartz. I got it at some witchy/Halloween event last year in Lakewood in a scoop of “witch confetti.” The lady I bought it from picked it out of her mixture of odds and ends special for me, which was so nice! It reminds me of a mountain top, so I like to keep in down in front of Inanna, like she’s rising up above the underworld. (“Kur” can mean both “underworld” or “mountain” in Sumerian. It can also refer to foreign/eastern lands).

The tablet behind the quartz translates to “The strength of my god completes my own. Inanna is praised!” Idr if I posted the tablet as a blog post yet.

The yoga cat statue is kind of like a stand-in worshipper sort of thing. I read something before that back in the day figurines of worshipers would be left at the shrines of deities to continue “worshiping” the deity in the person’s absence. Idk how true that interpretation of the artifacts is, but I liked the idea, so I’m using the yoga cat statue in that way. It even has an 8-point star on its tummy!

This is all my own personal practice and what is meaningful to me. If I were ever called upon to put together something for the community at large for whatever reason, it would obviously stick more to traditional kinds of imagery and associations (i.e. less just making things up as I go along).