Altar to The Myth of the Goddess Holla and Yggdrasil Lost Apple
Retold by Celeste Joy Greer-Walker
Trees have been venerated throughout the world as a mystical symbol whose fruits, nuts, blossoms, bark, roots, branches and leaves grant wisdom health and healing. World Trees are often found near a mystical source of water, which imbue the tree with further magic.
In contemporary world biology, trees are likened to the world’s lungs, breathing new life into the world’s ecosystem. The decline of the world’s trees is aggravating an already fragile and abused world ecology.
The myth is that one fall day Iounn was harvesting apples from the World Trees Yggdrasi. One of the apples fell into the well of wells. The loss of this apple would be felt, someone would have to go without! A great sorrow came over Iounn and she wept. The goddess Holla (grandmother of the dead) saw Iounns grief and said, “Not to worry child all is not lost!” With that Holla nodded her old face and winked her eye. And she shed her human skin and became her true self a great toad and dove into the well disappearing beneath its marquee surface. Sometime later Holla emerged from the well of wells with not only Yggdrasi lost apple but many apples, gifts from the mortal plane sent to the dearly departed.