The year is turning towards autumn, and harvest season is well underway. The Sun is now in Virgo, a sign known for being a bit of a perfectionist. Virgo has a reputation for being fussy and even critical, for being good at taking care of details and for being rather sensible. Ruled by Mercury, Virgo is the sign of mutable earth, and can be said to combine the qualities of air and earth. Strongly Virgo people are likely to be concerned with duty and with order, yes, but this is a very creative sign with a practical intelligence. Rather than being interested in abstract ideas and ideals, like the air signs, the intelligence of Virgo is applied - Virgoans seek knowledge which they can use and which has a practical value. They are good at weighing, measuring, calculating and labelling, at befits the sign of the harvest season.
Indeed, the constellation of Virgo has long been linked to harvest goddesses such as the Roman Ceres, Babylonian Ishtar and Greek Demeter. These are Great Mother figures, caretakers of the earth. The word Virgo, rather than meaning virgin as is commonly thought, actually comes from the Latin for self-contained or self sufficient. This is a time when many of us are reaping the harvest from our gardens to feed ourselves. The pictures in the post were taken at
Food from the Sky, which I visited this weekend with my family. This brilliant local initiative is making use of the roof of a supermarket to grow food biodynamically and organically, which is then sold in the shop below - ten metres from soil to shelf, as they put it. This is a perfect Virgo project - it uses the knowledge and expertise of volunteers and puts it to productive use, doing something concrete to change the way we live. Virgoans have a deep connection to the earth and are often concerned with the environment, and will always try to act to put their ideals into practice.
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| The poster shows signs of the zodiac and which plants / seasons correspond to them! | |
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Virgo is also the sign of the crafter, and Virgoans often use their mental ingenuity and love of detail to create beautiful things. William Morris, who famously advised that we have nothing in our homes that we do not
'know to be useful or believe to be beautiful', had the Moon in Virgo. For all of us, this is a good time to look are what we are creating with our harvest. Mercury is now travelling direct again and will soon join the Sun in Virgo, allowing us to move forward with our projects. We are gathering in our harvest from the blooming summer months, whether we have a glut of apples of a list of creative plans and new connections to process. Virgo can help us put our harvest to best use, so that we can be self sustaining throughout the winter, literally, creatively and spiritually.
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| Squash harvest, with plastic bottle greenhouse in the background. |