Autumn Equinox- Demeter and Persephone and 66 Adorations to Demeter

On 20 March, the Autumnal Equinox in all its bright beauty burst through the cracks in my curtains. The day was bright and I had decided to do a ritual in honour of Persephone and Demeter. I found this to be a particularly poignant time to invoke Persephone and Demeter as I will be living on my own soon, amd moving away from my mother.

I will have to step up, and be independent of her, coming into my own the way in which Persephone learnt to be content and independent as the Queen of The Dead. Hekate, Persephone’s friend, will of course be by my side too, as my friend, my confidant. I will be saying goodbye to my family, some of my pets and the life I once knew, and I’ll have to embrace adult life, with one deaf little dog, a lizard and The Hedgehog. This is not an easy transition.

Neither was Persephone’s descent into the land of the Dead. Demeter raged at the loss if her daughter. The land became barren, humans died under her wrath, and Zeus had to make a plan.

Funny how all this is happening in the midst of the change from the harsh summer to the crisp autumn, from Pisces to Aries, in every ending is a beginning, in every beginning an end.

Whilst all this was going on, we know little of Persephone’s experience with Hades in the Underworld. She surely changed, a trauma of being taken away, or even moving away into independence willingly creates change. This initiation into her role as Queen of Shades, is cemented when she finally eats the pomegranate seeds and is forced to return to the underworld every year for a third of the time (according to the Homeric hymns). She learns contentment in the land of the dead, she finds happiness when she returns to her Mother.

This lesson is important on many levels, for me it resonates due to a similar ordeal, for others and at other times in my life it may mean something about sacrifice, and working through grief, understanding rebirth through the Mysteries, and finding personal power. It could mean descending into darkness to come out changed, it could mean working with the dead, as we pay our dues to Charon. For each of us, the meaning, the symbolism, the resonance may be different.

I gave my offerings of sweet wine and grain, apple and rose petals and honoured the transition. I had found the 93 Adorations of Persephone by Melittabenu and I wrote my own for Demeter. As a non-Hellenic practitioner my UPG may lead to different understandings of Demeter than others, I feel this best captured the way she has appeared to me. Our god/desses are not one-dimensional and if these adorations I’ve been looking over for the last week have anything to teach me/us, it is that.

I wrote my adorations using Goddess Aloud (Goddess Worship), The Homeric Hymns (Classical translated text), and Moon Magick (Neo-Wiccan Perspective).

I also wrote it outside, sitting under an apple tree, with crisp autumn leaves by my feet.

1. I adore thee, Mother on Earth
2. I adore thee, Lady of the corn
3. I adore thee, Lady of Sorrow
4. I adore thee, Measurer of Time
5. I adore thee, of the blue robe
6. I adore thee, Carrier of wheat
7. I adore thee, Crowned with corn
8. I adore thee, Giver of bread
9. I adore thee, Protectress of women
10. I adore thee, Who presides over the fertile earth
11. I adore thee, of maternal love
12. I adore thee, Lady of fruitfulness
13. I adore thee, Giver of agriculture
14. I adore thee, Queen of Law
15. I adore thee, Whose feet nourish the soil
16. I adore thee, Mourner of Persephone
17. I adore thee, Raging one
18. I adore thee, Who makes the earth barren
19. I adore thee, Who brings cold
20. I adore thee, Lady of the equal night
21. I adore thee, Who roams the land
22. I adore thee, Queen of the harvest
23. I adore thee, Mother of Dionysus
24. I adore thee, Who changes everything she touches
25. I adore thee, Spinner of the wheel
26. I adore thee, Who searches high and low
27. I adore thee, Confider in Hekate
28. I adore thee, Draped in black
29. I adore thee, Who knows despair
30. I adore thee, Desolate land
31. I adore thee, Fertile seed
32. I adore thee, Initiator of the Eleusinian Mysteries
33. I adore thee, Who ripens the meadows
34. I adore thee, Blighter of fields
35. I adore thee, Autumn leaf
36. I  adore thee, of the golden hair
37. I adore thee, Giver of the splendid gifts
38. I adore thee, Bringer of seasons
39. I adore thee, Daughter of Rhea
40. I adore thee, Who becomes the crone
41. I adore thee, Whose voice is crushed leaves
42. I adore thee, Queen among goddesses
43. I adore  thee, Nurse of babes
44. I adore thee, Veiled in mourning
45. I adore thee, of the fragrant breast
46. I adore thee, of immortal hands
47. I adore thee, Who buries deep in fire
48. I adore thee, Who brings bitter pain
49. I adore thee, Who makes us weep
50. I adore thee, Who imparts immortality
51. I adore thee, Who takes it away
52. I adore thee, Revered one
53. I adore thee, Source of joy
54. I adore thee, Beautiful mother
55. I adore thee, Who destroys
56. I adore thee, Terrible wrath
57. I adore thee, Who celebrates Persephone’s return
58. I adore thee, Bringer of darkness
59. I adore thee, Who ripens the vine
60. I adore thee, Lady of the golden butterfly
61. I adore thee, Who turns the grass
62. I adore thee, Who brings rebirth
63. I adore thee, Whose seeds fall to the soil
64. I adore thee, Who sows the land
65. I adore thee, Who reaps the bounty
66. I adore thee, Great Mother Demeter.

I  included the song “Persephone” by Kellianna in my ritual, as well as the “We all come from the goddess” song (the extended version), which contains the lines “Corn and Grain, Corn and Grain, All that dies is born again”

I believe working with Demeter and Persephone during the Equinox was a good move on my part as it solidified a relationship with the two goddesses, as well as helped me welcome in the season. Samhain’s focus will be different from my usual reliance on Demeter’s grief, and Persephone’s descent. I also feel the resonance of what happened in the myth and what is happening in my life now made the ritual all the more poignant and beautiful for me.

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