Virgo Season
the shift has begun
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She arrives bearing a single stalk of golden ripe wheat. She holds it like a scepter and raises it for everyone to see. The ear of grain is an ancient and potent symbol. The one who bears it is both mysterious and powerful.
We suspect that revealing an ear of grain was the final ritual of the Eleusinian mysteries, though that secret has been so well guarded over the millennia that we can’t be sure.
Jesus used the grain of wheat to illustrate the principle of death preceding abundant rebirth.
Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.
Other examples of this symbolism can be found, reminding us that it is ancient and cross-cultural.
This season of abundant grain and seeds planted in the ground to “die” only to resurrect in the spring with new life permeates this part of the year.
It’s Virgo Season
Virgo season begins when the sun enters the constellation of Virgo, The Virgin.
This is the lynchpin of the year for me. This is when the balance tips. The summer solstice saw the sun stand still at its pinnacle and begin its slow but steady decline. Yet summer still held sway, and the golden exuberance of Leo season marked the following weeks with firey energy. The rising of the star Sirius, the dog star, ushers in the dog days of August. The meteor shower named after the hero Perseus passes overhead in the night sky, and then there is a subtle change in energy. Everyone can sense this, not just the energetically sensitive.
While we may think that autumn begins with the autumn equinox, I think it starts with Virgo season. At the very least, the arrival of The Virgin signals a preparatory period for autumn. (This is an excellent reason to begin sipping Pumpkin Spice lattes now without waiting for fall's “official” arrival.)
The Virgin is a complex symbol. In recent times, she has undoubtedly been Mary in her cosmic aspects. In the lead-up to Virgo season, her feast days during August and September echo a perennial pattern of death and rebirth.
August 15th is her “death,” and she is taken up to heaven. On August 18th, she is crowned Queen of Heaven; on August 22nd (the beginning of Virgo season), her pure heart and nearly divine nature are honored. On September 12, her most holy name is celebrated, and on September 15, her Seven Sorrows are honored.
This cycle of feast days feels like the cycle of the death, rising, divinizing, and sorrows of earth mothers across thousands of years of human history. To be sure, there is an entirely more spiritual and particularly Christian layer to these feast days, but the basic pattern is recognizable as something perennial and very ancient.
Get a lovely graphic of Our Lady’s Days, as outlined above HERE
Persephone, Demeter, and Hecate, aka Proserpina, Ceres, and Hekate
It’s impossible to talk about Virgo season without touching on the correspondence of Virgo and the triple goddess Persephone-Demeter-Hecate (Greek) or Proserpina, Ceres, and Hekate (Roman).
It’s sometimes difficult to wrap our understanding around the concept that Persephone, Demeter, and Hecate are all the same. They are aspects of the Universal Feminine. They are seasons of the earth and seasons of a woman’s life cycle. Demeter, the mother of the harvest, is also the young maiden of spring who brings new life, and they are both Hecate, the crone who keeps the mysteries of winter, the dead time, the secret time when all is hidden from sight. The daughter is the mother and both are the grandmother. You can shuffle those around in any order to get a sense of the interwoven wholeness that constitutes the Feminine.
If that idea resonates, you will enjoy reading (or re-reading) I’m Still a Maiden Even When I’m a Crone, Virgo Meets Crone, Hecate, Venus, and the Virgin Mary. These three articles from past years of Hedge Mystic explore this complex reality in a variety of ways related to the season, mythology, and spirituality that seek to restore the feminine to our understanding of reality.
At this moment of the year, Persephone, Virgo, the Virgin, nearly merges with her mother, Demeter. Months ago, in the mythic seasonal cycle, Kore (the maiden) became Dread Persephone, Queen of the Dead and wife of Hades, Lord of the Dead. The earth swallows up her maiden-self, and through the rigors of initiation, she acquires the awe-inspiring power of bringing both life and death. While she is Dread Persephone, she is also Demeter, the nurturing, giving mother who provides food for the earth’s children. She is, at this moment of the year, a duality. The Life Giving Spring Maiden-turned-Nurturing Grain Mother, who is about to become Hecate, The Crone, Bringer-of-Winter, and Death. This is why she is both loved and feared. This is the mystery of fullness and completion, and we find it in depictions of the Feminine, the Anima, the Soul, and Sophia, the Wisdom of God. But without Hecate, the cycle is incomplete, and there is no wholeness. There must be planting and reaping, sickness and healing, weeping and rejoicing, silence and shouting, gathering and releasing, building and destroying, being born and dying.
In Virgo season, the Maiden takes on the aspects of Mother, and very soon, she will wear the cloak of Crone, leading us into Death.
The pattern of this cyclical reality can even be seen in the Hail Mary, a prayer familiar to many of you. It is a three-part prayer, which is the first clue.
The first part has the Angel addressing Mary, the maiden. The second part addresses her as Mother, pronouncing her child “blessed,” and the third pleads to her as psychopomp, asking for the safekeeping of our souls and her guidance at the moment of death.
The Divine Feminine shepherds us through the cycles of life and death.
Virgo The Hermit
In the Tarot, the card corresponding to Virgo is The Hermit. This fits on so many levels that we can immediately see something profound in this linking of two potent archetypal figures.
The Virgin and the Hermit are singular; they exist apart from everyday societal interactions. On the ordinary level, the Virgin is uncoupled from marriage and motherhood, and the Hermit is uncoupled from intimate relationships (wife, children, etc.). They both have chosen separateness and singularity in the service of spiritual pursuits.
Yet that is only the beginning, the entryway into the fullness of what a spiritual awakening will provide: a profound understanding of connectedness. Paradoxically, in singleness, we find communion.
For now, we will limit ourselves and explore the turning inward and singleness that Persephone-soon-to-be-Hecate leads us to as the seasons move toward winter.
Harvest is a beautiful, comforting, and joyous season, but it is always tinged with bitterness. Winter snaps at its heels. Winter weather, often in reality depending on your locale and metaphorically for anyone willing to risk the inner journey, forces us inward.
Virgo season is the time to prepare to become The Hermit. To brave the inner winter, walk with the Crone, and allow Hecate to guide you at the crossroads in the darkness of the season.
A Look Ahead to the Celestial Energies of Autumn and Early Winter
Keeping in mind the invitation to prepare for a time when The Hermit is rising into your awareness, we can look ahead to the coming seasonal shifts.
Virgo season is about taking time to enjoy the harvest and begin preparations for the transition to winter and turning inward. In this regard, Virgo is organized, attentive to details, systematic, calm, and her plans well thought out. Clearing out closets and your pantry is a practical activity during this season. Compiling your winter reading list or registering for courses or classes that will enrich you over the winter is also appropriate. Preparing yourself for inner work over the winter months may include starting or reviving a prayer or meditation practice.
Autumn Equinox, approximately September 21-23, opens Libra season, whose Tarot correspondence is Justice. This is a time to recalibrate, reorder, and restore balance to any area that has become excessive or leaned a little too far. It is also an opportunity to set things right in relationships and regain your integrity and wholeness.
Scorpio season arrives on October 23rd and encompasses Samhain, All Hallows, and All Saints. Many view this season as the end and the beginning of the Celtic seasonal cycle. It is a season of fixed feminine water energies ruled by Pluto/Hades (connecting it to Persephone) and Mars. It is a time full of transformations, spiritual depths, and invitations. Scorpio corresponds to the Death Card and 5 of Cups in the Tarot. Pondering the imagery on both cards will yield many insights.
Final Thoughts
Virgo season is indeed the fulcrum of the year. It’s the moment when everything shifts; it's the time to prepare while the joy of the harvest is still abundant and long before you are plunged into the deeper, more challenging aspects of winter as they manifest in your inner life.
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Get Ready for Virgo Season
If you would like to explore where you are now in this season of your life, what from the past is still influencing you, and what may be in store as the autumn seasons unfold and the year winds down, I’d suggest a Tarot reading.
Beginning at Virgo Season and through Samhain, I typically get many requests for readings. The autumn seasons seem especially suited to working with the Tarot as a tool for self-reflection and gaining a deep intuitive understanding of your life’s journey. I think it has to do with the thinning of the veil as the year slowly moves towards a close and our desire to put into perspective what’s happened since the beginning of the year, allowing us to shift gears and make informed changes before the year runs out.
During Virgo Season 45 min., Celtic Cross Tarot Readings are $79 for all Hedge Mystic subscribers; paid subscribers receive an additional 15 minutes for a full hour reading.
Learn more about my approach to Tarot and book your reading HERE.
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This is such a helpful and grounding and integrating summing up of the energies I’m feeling right now. Thank you!!
Love this! I also recently learned that in ancient Egypt, a papyrus document dated 1350bc writes about wheat and barley being used as pregnancy tests, the woman would urinated for several days on both barley and wheat grains. If the wheat sprouted she was pregnant with a girl, if the barley sprouted it’s a boy. If neither sprouted she isn’t pregnant