30 April 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Arcturus is the brightest star high in the east these evenings. Spica shines lower right of it by about three fists. To the right of Spica by half that distance is the distinctive four-star constellation of Corvus, the Crow of Spring.
As Mars marches eastward across Taurus this week, it approaches the two stars that represent the Bull’s horns: Beta & Zeta Tauri. This evening, the Red Planet forms an isosceles triangle with the pair.
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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
Walpurgis Night, In Germanic folklore Walpurgisnacht, also called Hexennacht, literally “Witches’ Night” – the eve of the feast day of Saint Walpurga, an 8th-century abbess in Francia. In Goethe’s Faust we see 2 scenes: ‘Romantic Walpurgis Night’ the night of a witches’ meeting on the Brocken, the highest peak in the Harz Mountains, a range of wooded hills in central Germany; and later in Part 2 a ‘Classical Walpurgis Night’ is featured.
65 – Seneca, teacher of Nero, murdered
1789 – On the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York City, George Washington takes the oath of office to become the first elected President of the United States.
1812 – Birthday of the enigmatic Kaspar Hauser
1877 – Birthday of Alice B. Toklas, an American-born member of the Parisian avant-garde of the early 20th century. Life partner of American writer Gertrude Stein
1885 – The Niagara Reservation becomes New York’s first state park, ensuring that Niagara Falls will not be devoted solely to industrial & commercial use
1939 – The 1939-40 New York World’s Fair opens
1945 – Adolf Hitler commits suicide
1963 – The Bristol Bus Boycott is held to protest the Company’s refusal to employ Black or Asian bus crews, drawing national attention to racial discrimination in the United Kingdom
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POD (Poem Of
the Day) for Flora on Beltane:
May Day Maya
Pleiadian Goddess
Bright light of the 7 Sisters
Mountain Nymph transformed,
We ascend your beacon mound
& kindle there
The oakwood of the Bel-Fire
To rival the Sun
& call the Summer heat.
Zeus’s lover
Hermes Mother
Inspire processions
Of chimney sweeps & milkmaids
To leap the healing flames
& sky-clad singing:
“Ride a cock horse to Banburry Cross
To see a fine lady on a white horse”
Walk the circuit
& beat the bounds
With the young Summer King
& the Queen of the May
For the feast of flowers
Is calling forth the consort
Come, come, come unto me
& celebrate with the orders of Elementals.
Bold maidens bathing in the dew of May morn
Sword dancing & singing
In deep forest frivolity
Striking open ancient ley lines in bulls-eye archery
Marking the unrestrained tryst,
A Maypole in Holy-Rood-Mass
Wrapped & weaved in ribbons & ivy
For the May-Eve rites.
Robin Hood makes ready the hunt,
Maid Marian has gone-a-Maying.
~Lady Hazel
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This is the Eve of Beltane or May Day. Beltane, the old Celtic name for May Day, means bright fire or fire of Bel, the name of the Solar force, whose feast marks the beginning of the 2nd half of the year.
Wood from 9 sacred trees is gathered, & the great Bel-fire is built & ritualistically ignited by the High priestess or Arch-Druid. People would jump these ‘need-fires’ for fertility, healing & protection.
Torches lit from it were carried home to re-light the hearth fires. The folk would walk their animals in-between them to ensure a productive season – this is the mating season after all for man & beast.
There were other May Day customs, like walking the circuit of one’s property, repairing fences & boundary markers, processions of all kinds, archery tournaments, Morris dances, sword play, & of course making merry with music & drinking.
May morning is a time when the veil between the worlds can easily be pushed aside; but instead of the spirits coming into our realm from the other side, which is the case with Halloween, the polar opposite of Mayday on the wheel of the year -the fairies can enchant us over into their mystical realms.
This is a magical time, perfect for gathering ‘wild’ water, especially the May morning dew, or water from hidden wells & springs. These wild waters were collected & used to bath in for beauty, or to drink for health.
May Day is considered the start of summer – the time of milk & honey. This sensuous fertile energy is totally universal, & can be applied on many different levels. When we acknowledge these creative forces in the dance of our lives, it takes us to our own personal, modern-day version of dancing around the maypole, where we weave & combine the opposing energies within ourselves, blending them into one balanced source.
So yes, whether you know it or not, there will be at least one song that plays in your sub-conscious head on this eve of the 1st day of May, when you become perhaps, the Queen of the May, or Jack-in the Green. Our body like the body of the earth instinctively knows its Beltane, the time of vitality & passion & new growth. And the wisdom of our spirit seeks the natural union of polarities that occur at this time, giving us the opportunity for integration, in the alchemical dance of our souls…
Because under all the sexual innuendo & frivolity, it’s really all about the inner mystic marriage, the union of fire & water -opposites complimenting each other, to become one, bringing all the elements into balance.
You’ll just have to go dancing naked in the forest preserve on your own time…
For now, let’s work to unify the polarities of our being, by sparking the new fire of creative fertility & passion, & marrying it with the beautiful, healing waters of compassion & pure love. So we can truly celebrate the marriage feast of our lives, with a grounded, mindful joy.
So if it is your will – light your Bel-fire, marry it to the water, by floating it in the chalice of your choice. Take the time you need there…To do or not, what you will…Whisper your marriage vows into the water…or dance the 1st dance…or smash the glass…whatever your ceremony calls for…short simple or silent…it doesn’t matter…a 3 day bacchanal, with dancing puppets…it’s all good…cause it’s all about what’s inside…
Peace & Love
~Lady Hazel
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Tuesday 7 May 2019 in Ann Arbor Michigan
& also
Sat. 25 May 2019 – 7 pm – 9 pm in Chicago
Climbing Jacobs Ladder: Celebrating the Feast of Ascension
Leading Thoughts & original art-collage projections with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
Eurythmy with Mary Ruud
Social Art with Nancy Melvin
$10 Donation & Snacks to Share Encouraged
Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019
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Sunday 19 May 2019, 2 pm – 4 pm- Social Sculpture Workshop around the ‘URPFLANZE’ with Victoria Martin. More details to follow
$20 for art supplies + Snacks to Share Encouraged
for more info. contact Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
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Whitsun: A Festival of United Soul Endeavor with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
Sunday 2 June 2019 at the Branch 2 pm – 4 pm
also
10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com
also
12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com
also
7 pm – 10 pm 11 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller
Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life
Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.
Leading Thoughts with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*
What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?
Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.
Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?
*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.
Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019
May 1st is also the day that the Sun moves from Aries into Taurus for 45 days. This is the time where a kind of purifying fire can occur in all three realms: Thinking, Feeling, and Willing. As the midpoint between Spring and Summer, this event denotes the strongest indication of personal resolve in achieving a step forward in conscious awareness.
I like the fact that you, Hazel, see all these indications even in the days leading up to the event. Indeed, the Day of Purification accords to Saint Walpurgis, is one of leading the fire pan into the fire. Steiner often referred to it as the so-called ‘sambo’ of the Kalevala rites of the Finnish mystery . In our time, it acquaints with Longfellow’s “village smithy”,
who forges the pure instrument of the future human in a rite that accords so well with the Finnish Kalevala as well as with Emerson’s transcendentalism, which Longfellow was a part of.
Let us make the first day of May into a kind of rite of passage, at least for 45 days. Then, it leads into its own resolve, which is the Logos of Saint John at the Summer Solstice. The first 18 verses of John let us leave until then, c. 24 June, and then they will lead to a kind of sublime summer thought. You see, Thomas, long before summer was purified in his thinking and willing. He was made to realize the Christ through Jesus himself.
interesting!
To me Aries is the spark that sets the blaze & Taurus helps it burn steady & strong, the purification doesn’t come until we meet Uriel & St. John.
Ahh yes, The Sambo. For us it is the Handfasting for a year & a day.
Thanks for the Longfellow reference:
Under a spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a might man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawney arms
Are strong as iron bands.
His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
His face is like the tan;
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns what’er he can,
And looks the whole word in the face,
For he owes not any man.
Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear the bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his might sledge,
With measure beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low.
And children coming home from school
Look in the open door;
They love to see the flaming forge,
And hear the bellows roar.
And catch the flaming sparks that fly
Like chaff from a threshing floor.
He goes on Sunday to the church,
And sits among his boys;
He hears the parson pray and preach,
He hears his daughter’s voice,
Singing in the choir,
And it makes his heart rejoice.
It sounds to him like his mother’s voice,
Singing in Paradise!
He needs must think of her once more,
How in the grave she lies;
And with his hard, rough hands he wipes
A tear out of his eyes.
Toiing, — rejoicing, — sorrowing,
Onward in life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned his night’s repose.
Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,
For the lesson thou has taught!
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
May the fires of enthusiasm set your will into action with Joy & de-light!