Yes, there are witches among us, or so they say. Not "pointy black hat, pointy green nose" witches, but the modern kind, the urban sophisticated witches, and this is their time of year. They seem to enjoy their moment in the sun, or the darkness, as the case may be.
Here is Stacy Rapp, 30, of Brooklyn, slender, with many tattoos and a shock of red hair. Not a mole in sight.
She sets a plate with bread and fruit to honor deceased loved ones, places orange candles around the room, cuts a pomegranate to invoke the spirit of the mythical figure Persephone, and begins divvying up exact portions of the wormwood, mullein (also called graveyard dirt), mugwort and other herbs. All are ingredients in the incenses burned during this week's rituals.
O.K., it seems a little hokey — but this is a hokey week. For witches like Ms. Rapp, it is a sacred week, too.
Samhain (a Gaelic word pronounced SOW-wen), as Halloween is called by the male and female followers of the Wicca religion, represents the close of the harvest season and the beginning of a new year. Most Wiccans, or witches, spend some part of the evening of Oct. 31 reflecting on loved ones who have died.
But this is New York City, so there is actually a diversity of ways that witches spend this holiday.
"In the past I've thrown huge parties," said Kimberly Smith, 30, of Washington Heights, and a board member at Pagan Pride, a group that helps explain pagan traditions.
"It's a festive time of remembrance," she said, "so I've had altars stacked six or so feet high with photos and mementos of all sorts."
Michelle Nelson, 24, a witch from Ridgewood in Queens, prefers to escape the city to spend time at her father's house in the countryside near Lititz, Pa.
Some go to the Greenwich Village Halloween Day Parade. Others meet in small groups. "I'm a kitchen-sink witch, so that means I make up the rituals from stuff I have around the kitchen," said Sarah Razner, 28, of Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
But Carol Bulzone, 52, a high priestess from Queens, said there was one thing that witches shouldn't do. "You need to be careful not to surround yourself with the wrong people," she cautioned. "We made that mistake one year," she said, explaining that several years ago she invited Geraldo Rivera to televise a séance. "He sent the place haywire," she recounted. "It was terrible, he drew so much power that he completely blew the fuse in the building," she said, leaving ambiguous whether this was a spiritual or electrical fuse.
Although counting Wiccans in the United States is difficult, the American Religious Identification Survey estimates that the community grew to more than 134,000 in 2001 from 8,000 in 1990.
As for New York City, "Honestly, I think the Lower East Side has the highest concentration of witches," said Joe Zuchowski, a high priest of Wicca and an employee at Enchantments Book Store in the neighborhood.
Some crave a more suburban existence. Morgana SidheRaven, 44, who owns Morgana's Chamber, a Wicca store on West 10th Street in the Village, lives in Westchester with her husband and daughter. "My husband is not within Wicca, but he is very accepting of my beliefs," she said. They were wed on Samhain. "Everyone has their own way to celebrate the day, but for us it's a wedding anniversary and a religious new year."