Magic is Alive
Hildegard von Bingen, renowned 12th century German Benedictine abbess, writer, composer, visionary, artist, medical herbalist, philosopher, and mystic (yes, wow!), wrote her final theological testament, “Book of Divine Works,” beginning with a vision of Caritas, the spirit of Divine Love, clad in a robe as bright as the sun, speaking as nature incarnate: I am the supreme and fiery force who sets all living sparks alight and breathes forth no mortal things, but judges them as they are. Circling above the circumscribing circle with my superior wings, which is to say circling with wisdom, I have ordered the cosmos rightly. But I am also the fiery life of divine essence: I blaze above the beauty of the fields, I shine in the waters, I burn in the sun and the moon and the stars. And with the airy wind I quicken all things to life, as with an invisible life that sustains them all. For the air lives in viriditas and in the flowers, and the waters flow as if alive, and the sun lives within its own light. And when the moon has waned it is rekindled by the light of the sun and thereby lives anew, and the stars shine forth in their own light as though alive. This invocation bears beautiful testament to my Earth-Sky theme. As, like Hildegard, in addition to the fields and the flowers, I firmly believe both the waters and the stars are “as though alive.” It seems fitting to invoke these words now, poised as we are to move into the summer months, with the Summer Solstice point arriving on June 21, when “the supreme and fiery force” of the Sun will be shining its longest day for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere. Equally fitting is Hildegard’s invocation of the “airy wind,” and the fact that “the air lives in viriditas and in the flowers” as we find the Sun in Air sign Gemini. Viriditas is a word Hildegard refers to often in her writings and songs (which some of you may know I have been blessed to be singing for a number of years in a weekly group), by which she means lushness or fecundity. And indeed, June surely is the time when we witness the fecundity of the growing things, such as the elegant California grasses. While some of these now need to be quickly trimmed down for “fire hardening,”one can still enjoy the beautiful waving fields when driving about, as well as the garden as fecund feast. |
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It is truly an act of magic how creation produces so many colors and shapes vibrant with devic energy out of the many months of cold and rain. And this year has been particularly amazing, with so much water pumped into the ground by blessedly abundant rains. After two years of severe drought, during which I had cut back my water usage dramatically, this spring offers a sharp contrast of almost untamable growth and color in the garden. Perhaps no accident that as well, we continue to have an abundance of fertile Taurus energy in the sky, with Jupiter and Uranus remaining there till 2024 and 2025 respectively, and the North Node until July, when it will transition back to Aries. Jupiter expands what it touches, and while earth sign Taurus affects other realms besides the Earth herself (see my prior blog posts on this), it is primarily concerned with bringing the Divine into physical fruition. It is interesting that Hildegard describes the ‘airy wind’ as quickener of life, and how air lives in the greening and blossoming of things. It’s not just a matter of good soil, rain, and sunshine (earth, water, and fire). Life needs Air as vital catalytic agent. David Hinton, in his book, Wild Mind, Wild Earth is of accord when he considers Air as breath, which he states surges through all life. He describes the Cosmos as a single tissue, dynamic and generative through and through, matter and energy a single breath-force surging through its perpetual transformations… |
Zodiac Alive
This brings us to one of the chief astrological signatures of now, Gemini, whose tagline is I think. Prior to mounting my recent class on Gemini, I had not been so aware of the riches of this sign. But, as happened pursuant to researching Taurus, I found that the more I learned about Gemini, the more its scintillating realms and signatures popped up at every turn.
What I continue to notice is that when one looks at life through the archetypal lens, the archetypes not only show up, they wink back! Much like how when one truly engages with animals, treating them as equal relations with love, respect, interest, and care, they offer same back—one can have real, two-way relationships with these other mysterious beings. The same is true with plants, which have been scientifically proven to have intelligence and sentience.
Well now I find, as I deepen into my Earth Sky Journal and classes effort, that so too the stars are talking back, not just in the complex patterns of natal charts and transits, but simply through the zodiacal sign that the Sun resides in every month. This only affirms that the 12 zodiacal archetypes are real forces that reside in the collective unconscious, and when the Sun travels through a given sign, it awakens that force and manifests itself in myriad ways, if one has the eyes to see.
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Magic Weaver
Some of my recent awakenings about the sign of Gemini have pertained to its connection with magic, as well as how it asks us to leave our entrapment in rational linear thinking, and leap out of the very box from which it came. Because while we do associate Air sign energy with the thinking function in astrology, thinking was not originally intended to be a Descartian slam dunk.
Gemini’s ruler, Mercury is traditionally affiliated with Hermes Trismegistus, whose “Hermetic” writings centered on alchemy, magic, and astrology. This is how we come by associating the sign Gemini with magic. Fittingly, an online talk about magic came my way recently through teacher and intuitive, Lee Harris. He points out the distinction between our personal magic (qualities like friendliness, creativity, kind-heartedness, articulateness, wisdom, humor, and inspiration), and our spiritual or Divine magic (our intuitive, sensory, and energy awareness abilities) and suggests that integrating both the human and the divine aspects of magic, becoming a bridge between the two, puts us in a state of Flow and opens us to synchronicities.
“Earth and Sky sponsor the growth of each other, with one foot in the ground, the other in the sky,” he says. I love how I find Earth-Sky allies everywhere! (Although yes, one needs to be quite the gymnast to have one foot in the earth and another in the sky!) He plays with words in fun Geminian fashion in saying we need to fix the “mess” to become part of the “mess-age”, in honing our own magic, whether it be through music, art, play, physical prowess, healing, or communication. He wisely advises, “Never use the state of the world as an excuse to disconnect from your magic.”
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Borne by the Air
Mercury is traditionally portrayed as the messenger god, propelled by winged feet. And the Air element is connected not just with breath, but with wind, which is of course is entirely unpredictable and “flighty,” a term sometimes applied to Gemini, not quite in its highest manifestation. But yes, Gemini can get lost in flitting about, not staying with any one thing long enough to gain direction, let alone a conclusion or meaning. (This is the job of its polarity sign, Sagittarius—to synthesize facts and ideas into a system of Truth). True to form, Gemini is dubbed the butterfly of the zodiac – beautiful, dazzling, mutable symbol of transformation—here one minute, out of sight the next!
On this idea of thought being associated with the vagaries of the wind, David Hinton describes preliterate thought among primal cultures, and even our own modern thought as being outside of Time, despite our language structures operating within what he calls a ‘metaphysics of time.’ “Thought itself is more spatial and cyclical and impermanent, just as spoken language is: wandering and vanishing, fragmenting and branching, moving somewhere new and then returning to earlier thoughts, thoughts then reshaped and soon themselves vanishing.”
One could say our entire culture has gone madly Geminian with this fragmenting and branching, and its multiplying of ideas and endless information (not to mention data), promoting ADD in so many young people, and many of us olders as well. Present case example is how hard I find it to reign in the length of these journal posts, because one thought always leads to another, and another. Drawing connections, too is a Geminian tendency, or plight as the case may be.
I have about five writer/thinkers vying to be included in the conversation, but thankfully Saturn rules my 3rd House, to do with the Gemini-informed realm of writing and teaching, and Saturn is good with focus and discipline. So Saturn wants to finish the thought, started above, about how Gemini’s genius asks that we occasionally jump out of the boxes of rational mind (Gemini Jack?) that we inhabit. Whether we know it or not, these boxes are formed and disseminated by our inherited culture and our own psyches, as coping mechanisms to navigate the labyrinth of life’s complexity, or fend off fears of what is to come, and wounds of traumas past.
Applied with presence and Beginner’s Mind curiosity, Gemini offers an invitation to upend convention and consider new ways of thinking and responding, new angles and lenses on things, like the Fool, the Trickster, and the Clown have traditionally done. (Humor too is a Geminian shaft of light that helps us transcend the stories we tell ourselves.) The ‘magic’ here is that in so doing, higher wisdom is invited in, as if on a sudden gust of wind.
Gemini is not about just the smart thinker who knows things, it’s about openness to unforeseen visitations of insight, or magical interventions, such as by “angels” (often in the form of ordinary folks we encounter randomly). It’s also about being willing to be turned upside down entirely, with its ruler Mercury being affiliated with the Norse God Odin, who hung himself by one foot from an immense, sacred ash tree, serving as his ‘gallows,’ a tree whose branches extended into the heavens.
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Magic Never Died
Weighing in on magic in our modern lives is beloved musician, wordsmith, and thinker Leonard Cohen, who had Sun, Venus, and Neptune all in the other Mercury-ruled sign, Virgo (personal disclaimer, also my own Sun sign). Being the second Mercury-ruled sign, Virgo is concerned not just with gathering all the cool news and sharing it as Gemini is, but about discerning what is important and relevant, and refining it so that it is delivered just right (sigh). Leonard did surely do just that.
In his long poem, “God is Alive, Magic is Afoot,” he plays with words and meanings in true Gemini trickster stride:
God is alive, magic is afootGod is afoot, magic is alive
Alive is afoot, magic never died
God never sickened
Many poor men lied
Many sick men lied
Magic never weakened
Magic never hid
Magic always ruled
God is afoot
God never died
God was ruler
Though his funeral lengthened
Though his mourners thickened
Magic never fled
After 15 more stanzas (worth listening to!), he concludes with:
This I mean to whisper to my mind
This I mean to laugh with in my mind
This I mean my mind to serve ’til
Service is but magic
Moving through the world
And mind itself is magic
Coursing through the flesh
And flesh itself is magic
Dancing on a clock
And time itself
The magic length of God
Invoking Time, he strays into Saturn’s realm, but we will keep ourselves on topic! Although much could be said about the magic of stretching or shrinking time, which is in fact possible, through use of Mind, or mindset. These ‘magical’ tools surely influence outcome.
Chiming in to invoke magic as a sacred antidote for dealing with the “wicked of the world, and the smoke and mirrors” of our time, here’s Rising Appalachia, exhorting us to Make Magic. With a nod to Earth and Sky, they chant All that magic in my cup, I’ll photosynthesize.”
GPT3 - Not Alive!
As to the biggest, newest Geminian phenomenon afoot, the GPT large language models sweeping through so many industries and threatening displacement or worse, we have calming words from neurologist Oliver Sacks, who presciently penned these ideas three decades ago, as quoted in The Marginalian.
We are not incoherent, a bundle of sensations, but a self, rising from experience, continually growing and revised. The brain is not a bundle of impersonal processes, an “It,” with the “mind,” the “self,” hovering mysteriously above it. It is a confederation, an organic unity, of innumerable categorizations, and categorizations of its own activities, and from these, its self-reflection, there arises consciousness, the Mind, a metastructure… built upon the real worlds in the brain… Through experience, education, art, and life, we teach our brains to become unique. We learn to be individuals. This is a neurological learning as well as a spiritual learning.
While there is fear afoot about the potential dangers of this new, mind-boggling feature of technology, there is also the possibility that the fear arises from the Geminian beast itself, which is its off-centered tendency to fabricate flights of fancy that are not necessarily true. We humans get so caught up in believing anything we think! Here, particularly in the heat of the Gemini sun, we need invoke the adage, Don’t believe everything you think!
There is hope that we can tame this tool, which has no heartbeat, and breathes no air, and use it wisely, as we must with all other forms of technology, without its causing the downfall of humanity. I think we have greater things to fear here, like climate tipping points. But to the latter, I recently attended a Stanford University-sponsored forum about the interface between GPT and the need to create an ecologically based civilization that operates within the Earth’s limits, with equity for all non-human and human life. The panelists proffered at the end that GPT could conceivably serve to accelerate global awareness about the climate crisis, and thereby more significantly spur action.
And thankfully, the bot still can’t do everything. My handyman showed up yesterday to try to solve a problem with my gas stove, into which I’d spilled water, and which 3 weeks later was still not functioning properly. His first step was to consult ChatGPT. I was impressed at first – he said it had helped him on other jobs. But in the end, it couldn’t help with my situation as he couldn’t figure out how to get at the malfunctioning sparking mechanism that GPT was yammering on about (my handyman was converting the text to a robot-voiced audio). So we were thrust back into old-fashioned human ingenuity: give the water in the stove more Time (Saturn) to evaporate!
One final, and perhaps most important point about this: a favorite depth psychological astrologer, Mark Jones, suggests that, clever though these GPTs may be (with seductive outlines, bullet points and numbered lists!), they present information without wisdom, and are stripped of emotion and soul energy, as well as context. They also are not capable of love!
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Birdland
Returning to three dimensions, another phenomenon associated with Air sign Gemini is those beings whose byways, like the butterflies, is the air: the precious, and indeed “flighty” birds! (My new besties, since my beloved cat Venus crossed over.) And as we know, like Gemini, the birds are very chatty!, and busy with many things. Also, they are quite charming with their sense of humor I find, each species in its own way.
The oak titmouse has on occasion played a hilarious game of peek-a-boo with me from behind her perch on the feeder; the chickadee flirts outside my office window, hopping around the frame and branches above while peering quizzically at me as I type with furrowed brow; the Anna’s hummingbird executes her jaw dropping dive bombs accompanied by the loud screech of her wings; the woodpecker doesn’t need to do anything special (except rat-a-tat-tat) because he sports his dashing red cap with contrasting black and white coattails; and the mockingbird stuns in the breadth of her imitative melodic repertoire (quite the Gemini trickster herself, making one think she’s someone else at times).
So, with summer at hand, as with the birds, light-hearted Gemini invites us to let go of our stressors and frustrations, and try on play and laughter. The magi also asks that we try to integrate both sides of the duality of life, seeing things as both/and, instead of either/or. Gemini’s connection to the Divine is through wholeness, learning to include the other face of things, and in so doing, drawing down insight into new ways of seeing.
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Astral News
Thankfully, there is not as much intense transit activity this summer as there had been, but here are a few astral notes. Pluto in retrograde has now re-entered Capricorn, where it will stay until Jan. 21, 2024. This marks a time of final review of those material plane structures in our lives that are needing either dissolution or perhaps just renovation with an updated, yet practical vision and form that matches who and where we are now in our lives. Such structures can include time-held family (or other) traditions, and how we organize our time and our finances, as well as how we distribute our energy in the daily round. Those with planets in the final degrees of Capricorn or any of the cardinal signs will be particularly called to this task.
Along these lines of ‘the task,’ Saturn at 7° Pisces turns retrograde on June 18th,. This marks a time, until Nov. 3, when we may slow down with outer projects and go more internal with the work of examining illusions and fears—perhaps there are some “authorities” that no longer need to be taken as such. It’s also a time when we can get grounded with a strategy for completing unfinished business, so that we can ultimately move forward in a way informed by (Piscean) spirit or creativity.
Also of note is that Venus has entered Leo, where, because of retrogradation, it will stay for an unusual length of almost four months. Venus here invites a feast of beauty and dazzle, as befits the Queen. I was at an art show in San Francisco recently called Bouquets to Art, where floral arrangements were created in front of select paintings, which to me beautifully embodied the colorful and deeply creative expression of this Venus placement.
The New Moon on June 17, at 26° Gemini, includes a square to Neptune in Pisces. This could be a good time to put (or channel) feelings into words, or perhaps into music or another creative medium. Helpful here is that the Gemini energy invites us to contact our Muse. But we must make sure we have emptied ourselves of worldly distractions (Saturn in Pisces work) in order to receive the call.
At the Solstice on June 21, the Sun enters reflective Cancer, ruled by the Moon, so at this time the archetypal energy will pull us deeper inwards. I always feel a special quality at this time of year, as the watery pull of the soul seems to imbue the natural world with the light of the deep feminine. It’s a great time to drop in to the stillness, and see what you find, or feel. More on Cancer next time! And if you want the full dive, you can sign up for (or purchase, if after the fact), my Cancer class here.
Further Meanderings
I will leave those of you who care to venture further afield with a link to a fascinating conversation between a true Gemini trickster magician, Bayo Akomolafe, and Jeremy Lent, “author and integrator,” whose brilliant books invite us to embrace the transition to an ecological civilization that our time calls for. Bayo asks that we consider the ‘cracks’ and the ‘glitches’ as entryways into new ways of being and perceiving. The cracks are invitations, generative of hospitable places of new speciation, like pandemics, autism, and errancy…Modernity maintains itself by pushing the spillage back into the ship. We need a politics that pursues errancy. One where failure is strangely generative, and disability becomes ability. We must stay with failure as crack, as moment when something else is crystallizing.
Oliver Sachs, quoted in The Marginalian: https://www.themarginalian.org/2023/05/02/oliver-sacks-making-up-the-mind/?mc_cid=8d72b1057b&mc_eid=547a2b05f8
Rising Appalchia song, Make Magic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTNMQQdt7Cg
Leonard Cohen reads Magic is Afoot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3enVT53yDLM
Jeremy Lent with Bayo Akomolafe – https://deeptransformation.network/posts/you-make-my-soul-tremble
Jeremy Lent – https://www.jeremylent.com
Bayo Akomolafe – https://www.emergencenetwork.org/bio/bayo-akomolafe/
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All photos copyright Diana Badger 2023