Working with Cimeies: words, memory, and finding what is lost

Cimeies, and three offices that belong together

Cimeies is listed in the Grimoire Companion as a Marquis, and his offices at first look like three separate things: he teaches grammar, logic, and rhetoric; he discovers lost and hidden things; and he makes men valiant. Spend a little time with that list, and it stops looking scattered. Grammar is the craft of saying a thing rightly. Logic is the craft of thinking a thing through rightly. Rhetoric is the craft of saying it so that it lands. Finding what is lost is often a matter of the same skills: retracing your steps in words, thinking clearly about where a thing could be, and having the steadiness to keep looking when the first search fails. Valiance, courage, is what carries all three past the point where most people give up.

That is why this article is not about spirit work in general. It is about Cimeies work in particular, and about words, memory, and lost things as serious, specific matters. If you are preparing to speak, to argue a case, to teach, to write something that must be exact, or to recover something that has gone missing, that is Cimeies' ground. If your matter is really about something else, another spirit may be the honest choice, and saying so is part of doing the work properly.

Be specific before you begin. A petition to "be better with words" is hard to read afterwards. A petition to speak clearly at a particular meeting, to untangle a particular argument, or to find a particular thing, is a petition you can actually judge. Cimeies teaches the liberal arts of language, and language rewards exactness. Bring him an exact matter.

Incense is not background scent

Incense is not background scent for this work. It is part of the working itself. We are used to scent in ordinary life being pleasant, or atmospheric, or something that makes a room feel nicer. In ritual work, incense does a different job. It marks the time as set apart, it fills the space you are working in, and it stays with you through the working, in a way a spoken word does not. When you light incense for spirit work and spellwork with Cimeies, you are changing the room and changing your own attention along with it.

Treat the lighting as a step in the work, not as preparation for it. Do it deliberately, name the purpose in your own words if that is part of your practice, and give the room a moment to settle before you go on. A working with no clear beginning often has no clear end either, and it drifts. For work that depends on clear speech and clear thought, that drift is the very thing to guard against. Begin cleanly, and the rest of the working has a shape to hold.

The Cimeies incense offered here is hand made in the same way as the other incenses on this site. Each batch is hand made when you order it, unless a batch has just recently been made. The incenses made here are of a quality that Athena uses herself for magical work, for spirit work, work for clients, as well as her own spellwork.

Words first: grammar, logic, and rhetoric in practice

Grammar, in the old sense Cimeies teaches, is not schoolroom pedantry. It is knowing what your words actually say, as opposed to what you meant them to say. Before a working for speech or writing, read your own words back aloud, slowly, and listen for the places where they blur, hedge, or say two things at once. Those are the places a listener will stumble too. Fix them in ordinary daylight, with a pen, before you bring them into the ritual room. The working will not fix a sentence you have not bothered to write clearly.

Logic is the next discipline, and it is quieter. It asks whether your argument holds together, whether your conclusion follows from what you actually know, and whether you are leaning on a step you have not checked. Sit with the argument on paper. Mark the step you are least sure of. That step is often the real subject of the working, even if it is not the step you first named. A working that names the weak step honestly is a stronger working than one that dresses the whole matter up in confident language.

Rhetoric is the third, and it is about the listener as much as the speaker. Who will hear these words, what do they already believe, what do they need to hear first? A speech that is true but badly ordered will fail where a well-ordered speech succeeds, and that ordering is a craft, not a trick. Think it through before the working, so that what you ask for in the room is a real piece of work, not a vague hope of being persuasive in general.

Finding what is lost

Cimeies also discovers lost and hidden things, and that office deserves its own attention, because lost things are found by method as much as by magic. Before the working, retrace in writing: when did you last have the thing, where were you, what were you doing, what else was in your hands? Write it as a short timeline, not as a feeling. Most lost things are found by this kind of retracing, and a working done after it is a working aimed at a real gap in the timeline, not at a general hope.

Hidden things are a wider category. A hidden thing can be a document, a fact, a motive, or a piece of your own memory that you cannot quite reach. The same discipline applies: write down what you know, write down what you do not know, and mark the boundary between them clearly. A petition that names the boundary is easier to work with, and easier to judge afterwards, than a petition that asks vaguely for the truth to come out.

And then there is valiance, the third office, which is the one people forget. Finding a lost thing, or saying a difficult thing clearly, often requires going back to a place, a person, or a conversation you would rather avoid. Courage here is not grand. It is the ordinary steadiness to make the phone call, open the drawer, ask the question, or admit the mistake. If your working is really asking for that steadiness, name it. It is a legitimate petition in its own right.

Preparing the room and yourself

Clear the space you will use, physically, and set it aside for this purpose. Put away the things that pull your attention elsewhere. If you have a regular working space, use it. If you do not, choose one place and use it consistently for this working, so the place itself starts to carry the association. Set out what you will need before you light anything: the incense, a safe burner you have used before, the oil if you are using oil as well, and any seal or tool your practice calls for.

Ventilation matters in a practical sense. A room that is completely sealed will fill with smoke quickly, and a room that is wide open will lose the scent before the working is done. Find a balance that works for your space: enough air to breathe comfortably, enough containment that the scent remains present through the working. Test this before the night of the working, not during it.

Then prepare yourself. Bathe, or at least wash your hands and face, and change into clothes you do not wear for ordinary errands. This is about marking, for yourself, that this time is set apart. Eat simply beforehand if you can, and avoid starting a working when you are exhausted, drunk, or already agitated. A clear head is a working tool, just as much as incense or oil is. Know what you are going to say, in your own words, and keep it direct and honest, to the matter at hand.

Oil to go with the incense, and a simple working order

Oil and incense are often used together in Goetia work, and Cimeies work is no exception. They do different jobs in the room. The oil marks and anoints. The incense fills the space and sets the atmosphere for the working itself. If you are doing a full working, rather than simply burning incense on its own, use both. Anoint first, with a clear purpose in mind, then light the incense and let the room settle before you speak your petition. Do not rush from lighting to speaking. Give the room a moment to change, and give yourself a moment to notice that change.

The following is a general order, not a fixed script. Adapt it to the system you already work in. First, prepare the room and yourself, as above. Second, set out the incense, the burner, and the oil and any seal or tool you will use. Third, anoint, if you are using oil, deliberately, naming the purpose in your own words. Fourth, light the incense and let the space settle. Fifth, speak your petition, clearly and once, rather than repeating it until it loses its shape. Sixth, sit quietly for a time and listen, rather than filling every moment with more words. Seventh, close the working properly, in whatever way your practice requires, and put the tools away in their proper place.

Work from the instructions and teaching you already follow in the Goetia system. A general article like this one is not a substitute for proper teaching, and it should not be used to invent a purpose for a spirit you have not studied. If you are working in the Goetia system, follow its forms.

What not to do, and keeping a record

Do not burn incense in a room where it is unsafe to do so, and do not leave a burner unattended. Use a safe burner, on a heat-proof surface, away from curtains, papers, and anything that could catch, and stay with it for the whole working. Do not use incense as a substitute for the rest of the working. Lighting incense and then doing nothing else, with no petition, no attention, and no closing, is not spirit work. It is just a room that smells different. The incense supports the work, it does not replace it.

If you have sensitivities to smoke or to particular incense ingredients, test carefully, ventilate well, or choose a different form of working. If the incense makes you cough, or gives you a headache, that is information, not a test of dedication. Stop, ventilate, and reconsider how, and how much, you use.

Afterwards, write down what you did, when you did it, and what you noticed. Not what you hoped would happen, but what actually happened, in plain language. Note the petition in one sentence, the incense and oil used, how the room behaved, and what changed in the days afterwards, whether a word came more cleanly, a search turned up something, or a difficult conversation went better than expected. That record is what lets you tell, weeks later, whether anything changed, and whether that change had anything to do with the work. Do not repeat the same working endlessly in the hope that repetition alone will force a result. Do the work properly, once, observe, and then decide, calmly, whether a second working, a different approach, or no further working is the right next step.

Cimeies incense, and Cimeies oil to go with it

Incense is not background scent for this work. It is part of the working itself.

I hand make Cimeies incense myself, in small batches, when you order, and I bless it myself before it is sent out. It is incense I use myself for spirit work and spellwork with Cimeies, not a bulk incense relabelled for the purpose. I make no promise about what it will do for you, only that it is made by hand, for this work.

If you want the incense for that work, this is the one I offer: Cimeies Goetia incense, $44 CAD. View the product

I also make the oil to go with it, for the same work: Cimeies Goetia grimoire demon evocation oil, $44 CAD. View the product

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