...today's edition of The Moar You Know presents a roster of the main Slavic spiritual beings, listed generally in order from most harmless to most dangerous.

Image source is [url]http://myfhology.narod.ru/[/url] unless otherwise specified

The House Spirit

One of the most positive spirits in Slavic mythhology. Keeps the house safe, maintains it and talks to the cats; generally a well-meaning praknster, does not like mirrors, goats or anyone who sleeps by the doorstep. Possesses magical powers, like the other spirits, and can seriously hurt house invaders. If there is a plague or a similar calamity, he leaves the house, sits in the yard and howls with the dogs.

http://i035.radikal.ru/0802/10/176df473f499.jpg
[url]http://i035.radikal.ru/0802/10/176df473f499.jpg[/url]

http://dic.academic.ru/pictures/wiki/files/100/domovoi.jpg

The Forest Spirit - the keeper of the woods, can take form of a bear, an old man or a tree. Loves to confuse visitors and can get you lost if you get carried away. Tends after the animals. Misleads visitors with blood-chilling screams, and if you want to appease him, you should make him laugh by turning your clothes inside out or making jokes like "Please come back yesterday" Not a mean spirit overall, but it's better to not meet him

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters/leshiy1.jpg

http://i.focus.ua/img/a/9/0/5609.jpg

The Water Spirit (who the Swamp Thing and the Man-Thing bit)

http://slavyans.narod.ru/nechist/vodyanik.jpg
[url]http://slavyans.narod.ru/nechist/vodyanik.jpg[/url]

http://img-fotki.yandex.ru/get/3/maranda2007.0/0_230a_e1e81fd5_L

The Barn Spirit - rather hostile to humans, must not be aggravated, but does his job well if left alone; can kill a man or burn down the barn if angry

http://new.bestiary.us/files/images/ovinnik0.thumbnail.jpg

The Sauna Spirit - a mean spirit that causes ruckus in the sauna house and scares the bathers. He throws rocks, burns people with boiling water and can rip off skin of those who break sauna rules, or pull them into an oven; there are different sacrifices to appease him, the most sure is cutting the head off a black hen

http://mifolog.ru/mythology/item/f00/s00/e0000993/pic/000000.jpg

Shishiga - a female version of the Sauna Spirit, even meaner and can set up death traps for bathers just for the fun of it

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters/shishiga.jpg

Baba Yaga - a powerful withc, lives in the forest in a house that stands on giant chicken legs, flies using various means, friends with the Forest Spirit. A complex character - can help out a great deal if she likes you, but if not - she messes with you/curses you, or cooks you in the oven and eats you. Eats young children for the lulz

http://bibliotekar.ru/kBilibin/1.files/image001.jpg

http://www.eblog.ru/uploads/posts/1176113909_4349853ecc.jpg

Mara - an evil spirit that can be found in the house at times, brings bad luck and can torture children; the name shares the "-mare" root with "nightmare"

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters2/images/mara.jpg

Kikimora - an evil spirit, lives in the swamp, female, steals infants and tortures them to death. Retreat at the break of daqwn, with the first rooster calls

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters/kikimorabolotn.jpg

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters/bolotnicy.jpg

Can be found in the house too; you have to burn a doll on a bonfire to get rid of her

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters/kikimora.jpg

Yrka - evil spirit, especially dangerous during the summer solstice - a significant holiday for ancient Slavs. This is what a suicide becomes after death. A nighttime spirit with a dark face and glowing eyes, operates in the field as the Forest Spirit won't let him into the woods (and the Forest Spirit is one of the baddest motherfuckers on this roster). Attacks lone travelers and drinks their blood, also kidnaps and drinks blood of children, especially the ill-behaved ones. They can even call you out with a familiar voice. If you hear something at night, do not turn around, keep walking, and pray.

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters/image/yirka.gif

Pokoynik - restless evil dead that can rise from the grave and haunt relativers, try to pull a loved one into the afterlife. They are usually either those who recently died or spirits of those who died a difficult death. Should be buried in lowlands, empty sites or outside of the cemetery (not in the cemetery itself)

Vurdulak - a dead vampire/werewolf. Yep. If he's after you, you're fucked. Turns into different animals and drinks his victims' blood

http://myfhology.narod.ru/monsters2/images/vurdalak.jpg

Chernobog - The Dark Lord - enough said, can also be known as Koshei the Immortal, etc

http://zhurnal.lib.ru/img/d/deathwisher/pics/chernobog_by_deathwisher88.jpg
[url]http://zhurnal.lib.ru/img/d/deathwisher/pics/chernobog_by_deathwisher88.jpg[/url]

Disney adaptation

http://www.soundonsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/chernobog-287x300.jpg
Disney

Zmei Gorynych (The Fiery Snake) - mythological three-headed fire-breathing dragon

http://image009.mylivepage.ru/chunk9/270362/792/%D0%97%D0%BC%D0%B5%D0%B9-%D0%B3%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%8B%D0%BD%D1%8B%D1%87.jpg
mylivepage.ru

Untitled

By V. O.

We spend countless hours and days and weeks building our lives
settling into zones of comfort, piling and hoarding whatever we deem worthy of keeping around
we keep searching for new ways to commemorate ourselves
what we believe in, who we meet and who we revere -
put em all on a shelf, trophy friends, trophy connections
monuments in our own petty realms that we think are mighty empires

Empires of dirt, that's all they are as we sit in our cozy rooms with pictures and trinkets and tapestries and you name it
our anchors that make us feel as if we've accomplished something
"look at all of this! Aren't I great? I did this and that and that and i have all this worthless SHIT to back it up
now let me sit back and reminisce about how great I am
let me get comfortable and attempt to fulfill my innermost yearnings and desires through these photographs and souvenirs of faraway places I've never been to
leave me in peace as I rot away in this sarcophagus, buried forever with treasures that are valuable to me and no one else"

Enough! Put me back in motion! Unground me, raise the anchors - don't throw them away, but just get them off the ground
If only for a night or for an eternity, set me free, allow me to break from this tomb of mundanity that kills even the most wondrous magic if you allow it to settle in long enough
cut the ties, break the ropes, allow me to burst out of this confinement so I can make speed my new essence

relentless motion, that of Hermes, it doesn't matter where I'm going as my right hand is on the steering wheel, my foot on the gas pedal, my left hand is sticking out of the window as it plays with the cool breeze of the city night
my eyes are looking forward, past the hurricane of lights and signs and all sorts of flashing and blinking and moving contraptions that roam the streets
my mind is on anything but the destination

I spent way too much time trying to organize this world into one unified pattern
trying to rationalize and institutionalize and assign meaning to every little thing that's happening
but as I look around, free from my grave of meticulous reason, I understand what a fool I've been as chaos is king tonight

when chaos assaulted my fortress of reason for the first time, I was shaken to the foundations
I had no idea where to place myself as my structured plans failed when my schemes and connections and motives twisted themselves into a tight knot that, to my horror, was tied around my own neck
and strangled me as a vicious being that took on its own life
and as I speed down this road I'm hacking at this treacherous snake with a sword
a battle axe, a pocket blade and a butter knife
any sharp object that will get this noose off my neck
so it does not hold me back as I allow chaos to point the direction\this primary essence, the stuff that gives birth to everything structured and, in the end, claims it back

Jamie Madrox was right - many do think that it's better to die than to grow old in this world that's grown too cold
no, I don't intend to die, this is no blaze of glory since I intend to wake up tomorrow with a new direction that I fished out of this chaos
and if I fall, it will only be a possible consequence of my action, not a desired one but one that I must not disregard
It's a gamble, my chips are on the table and a loss could take me out of the game but a win may return my bet tenfold
Fort Hamilton Parkway, Brooklyn
graffiti on 57th street, six feet above the roof of an Indian grocery store
proclaims, "take mad risks"

I am not reckless, I'm often held back by my own anxiety and fears but I must take mad risks if I am to proceed on my path
so if my car rolls over and falls into a grimy factory ditch, I will climb right out and rise like the phoenix
a different man, a product of my destruction, an altered being that will crawl right back out of the ditch
and run headfirst into any new endeavor as if I didn't learn a thing
but I know better than disregarding my lessons because experience is the best tutor
though nobody charges higher rates than he

and if I don't crawl out of that ditch, a twisted and bloody mess brought down by my own carelessness
then at least I died right there and then, my neck snapped my protruding metal
but not by the noose that I weaved from my fears, insecurities and anxieties
the snake didn't get me, that bastard coils and hisses, spitting venom in my direction
but missing me as I lay there, bloody and mangled and laughing because I died in a flash
died from a rouge Russian Roulette bullet and not from the slow and painful cancer
that withers me away as I lock myself in that coffin of inaction and reminiscence
I'm prepared for it, I took the highway and I'm ready to pay the goddamn toll
but I intend to succeed, come out as a victor or whatever entity I emerge as from this madness
you can come in for the ride, and if not, step out of my way as I speed into the night
bring it on

Cosmic Hyme

by T.M.

O pure radiant power cosmos!
I lie in bed awake December 30th 2008
awaiting the reaping of your golden great harvest
envisioning the world of pure peace politic
love land love man woman in blissful unity
Alive and awake speaking the language of the infinite
stone-dream consciousness

O great creator and creation!
How long have we waited? How long has it been
since we last touched hopes in this muddy bubbling
castle earth, kingdom of life and night and day
And waved a banner not for America not for Europe or Israel
or king of China or crazy excess manufacture profit and consume,
but for kingdom Earth and its myriad borrowed life forms
passing through time and space to eternity
pausing but briefly on this here piece of land and sky that I watch,
and which watches me, through my bedroom window

I know why we wait for the heralding of your golden dawn
We have run World none too well and must continue
until we complete our tasks and duties in respect of the cosmos
and creation I will no longer skirt my responsibilities
My first cosmic duty, I must clean my turtle’s tank
the water has grown old and filled with grime and feces,
though feeding the golden life form bacteria growing in its rocks
which in turn feeds the creature life plant I placed growing,
it has become overbearing for the turtle as she lies on a log
under the lamp I placed to keep her warm

Grimy, shit filled water
How like my thought you are!
I will empty you out like I empty my mind with this paper and pen
You are full of potential, overbearing and useless trapped behind your glass walls
like my mind is, or your mind too, behind our walls of America and money and fear
O how badly are we beginning to stink from all of our own useless and worthless shit?
Plastic giant screen tvs cars and trucks and jealousy
paranoia mad rage in blinding darkness plane tickets and air conditioners plastic bottles poison pesticide nuclear reactors mercury coal fire fear of sudden death apocalypse
and so forth
Can I shatter your hundred glass walls?
Like Allen Ginsberg or Jack Kerouac or the dread Tim Leary acid guru crazy bums before me
who left a million Americans dazed and confused
crawling on hands and knees on the floor to things incomprehensible
helpless and hopeless gasping for a familiar air
while the rest of the joneses upper-middle square America grew fat
and putrid from crazy excess behind glass walls, voted for Bush and died!
O life ! Forget your money forget your fear forget your America

forget your crazy misconceived ranting grimy shit brained filth water

I am done with it! all of it throw it all down the drain! gone!
to public services
and Pennsylvania’s rivers
to you hearer and drinker of poetry

O life calm yourself down
We are free

alive and awake in the yard
of the infinite consciousness together with the cosmos
love woman man land unity radiating and growing
into golden great oak tree mental construct of life
and pear bearing bliss
and fields of amber grain endless in sight and mind
no more paranoid pesticide thought
no more profit-mad petroleum fertilizing
into world poverty and oil war
no more Monsanto lost GMO identity
none but ourselves and creation
in connection with cosmos
free naked thought your harvest is near
O World lift up your long face!
lift up your battered bandaged and beautiful head!
O World take a look around you
the World is yours!