We had a bit of a warm snap last week, and all the snow on the lawn melted. Then the frozen ground began to thaw. It was certainly a lovely break, going out in just shirtsleeves, in the middle of Winter. It went on long enough that things have started to bloom—some dandelions on sunny hillsides, a tiny little purple weed in a sheltered bed. And despite knowing that winter was most emphatically NOT done, and that snow was around the corner (it is in fact fall right now as I write this), I took several deep breaths and sat in the sunlight, and smelled new scents in the air.
I could smell pollen and rain, mostly blown in by a strong wind from the southwest. I could also smell the bitter-til-its-sweet scent of hard dirt yielding to water. It was as if the ground was heaving a sigh of relief as it stretched and relaxed. The scent of mud was all around me on my hike, as I squelched down the muddy path to a creek swollen fat and high with melted snow.
Tonight is the Full Moon in earthy Virgo, opposing the imaginative Pisces. Coming as they do towards the end of winter, it is easy to be taken in by all the clues of sporing The soft ground, the smell of water and plants, all of these sensory hints about the coming fruitful season, they prepare us to receive the incoming season with joy, and to alert us that we are now witnessing the Ascent of the Goddess. The water and earth of this Full Moon is embodied in the soil waking up and the water releasing from ice, to flood and hydrate a thirsty Earth. The Ash Moon has been called the Flood Moon, because of all the water suddenly unlocked and moving across the land. It is easy to read in it our hopes for Spring, not here yet, but definitely on its way.