Beltane (1st May)
The old May Day and the modern May Bank Holiday, when the light is fast gathering pace, weaving new life and new forms in maypole colours and all of nature is alive with radiant beauty as the Queen of the May dances with Jack o’the Green. This spirit of harmoniously working together in groups is seen in International Worker’s Day or Labour Day. Taurus, fixed earth.
The month of May is about a relationship of opposites coming together, but they are not just to be interpreted literally as male and female. It also includes the relationship of an individual to
a group, white to colour and reality to illusion. Weaving is a relationship of opposites where single threads of different colours are woven together to make a fabric. Different elements are woven together to create the many forms of life on earth. On a mental level we take our perceptions of the outside world and weave them into a pattern of memories that we express through words, deeds and our life experience. It is also the relationship of our mind to the group we call our body.
May or Maia, in ancient Greek mythology is said to be the oldest of the seven Pleiades, and the mother of Hermes. According to Homer in the Hymn to Hermes, Zeus in the dead of night raped Maia, who avoided the company of the gods by living in a cave. She became pregnant with Hermes. After giving birth to the baby, Maia went to sleep. The infant Hermes crawled away while she was asleep. By the nightfall of his first day he stole some of his half-brother’s cattle and invented the lyre from a tortoise shell. Maia did not believe Apollo when he accused Hermes of being the thief. Zeus sided with Apollo, who exchanged the cattle for the lyre, which became one of his identifying attributes.
In Greek Mythology Apollo represents light radiation, Zeus, the father of the gods is the daytime sky that assists light to radiate from Heaven to Earth. Light radiation (Apollo) through Zeus (transmitter of light) makes Maia (the Moon) pregnant. Maia avoids the light of day and lives in the darkness of the mind and womb (cave). Maia gave birth to Hermes. Hermes is fast with wings on his feet, the messenger, he brings the light of the Sun to wake up the Moon and so invented the lyre or light extended into form. The moon reflects sunlight into the earth, it acts as a space to translate the infinite into the finite. The seed is made into a form.
Hermes started life as a thief, He stole the light for wealth and his own comfort. He then restricted the light from arriving at the Moon. He preferred to live in the land of illusion at the effect of his five material senses rather than live in reality. Maia is the land of illusion or being at the effect of what we think we experience. The five senses of Hermes blinded him to reality.
The one light (white) shines through a prism and then divides itself up into 3 primary and 3 secondary colours, a rainbow in
the cloudy expanse. The Sun is the source of the light, The moon reflects the light into the earth through different colours. The Lyre of Hermes is the pathway that leads us from the infinite to the finite and back again.
The month of May produces many colours, many forms, harmonious or disharmonious according to the will of the weaver, we all weave light to make the forms that we live in and through. A Maypole is traditionally a pole with coloured ribbons attached to it, the dancers move in a circle weaving the ribbons into a harmonious pattern. It is also the fruit bearing stalk or spinal column within us, it is the pattern of all forms. May is the time
for weaving a group of ingredients together.
We would say the one became the three became the many.
In the story of Taliesin (the fruit) and the Cauldron of Ceridwen, (container of life ingredients) the pot is stirred by an innocent young boy and a blind man (both part of us) who keeps the fire alight waiting for three drops of inspiration. Three seeds created the beanstalk for Jack. In the Christian story of Noah, his ark sailed on a flood of light (not water) his three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth gave birth to the many forms of light, not races as traditionally translated. In druidism the Awen is three bars of light that gave birth to a diversity of forms.
There are two main aspects to motherhood, Earthly and Universal, The egg (moon) in the womb and the egg (pineal gland) in the mind. In May they both come together to produce material form. These are all stories of the progenies of light or vibration, it is an illusion to interpret them as material history.
May is the land of illusion where things are not what they seem, the Sun, moon and stars do not really rise and set; they just appear to. The same applies to our thoughts and feelings, we make up what we think they mean and then live out of those appearances. The race of Mayans are a people who live in the land of appearances, in the land of many colours, but they came from out of white as the source of colour. The present expressed itself through the past and future using the four elements of fire, water air and earth to create form. May is an illusion but it is also points the way to reality, by following this illusion we can find the reality and eventually clarity of vision.
May your weaving create harmony, health and diversity in the coming months, while learning to express the pattern.
