God can be loose. God should be loose, you know? Bigger-than, smaller-than, shaken-out, shaking out, holy in every sense, holy in the sense that we experience god as a sieve, you come closest to the knowledge of who or what god is to you, personally, when you are closest to slipping out of your own life through the despair-shaped hole in its floor, no matter what carved it there. God’s gotta be coming apart at the seams, always, because god’s gotta be remade, over and over again, into a million different kinds of flesh, yours, mine, the cows on the hill, the bees in the cosmos, the mockingjays on Mapleton, the pigeons in Prospect Park, the child your friend gave birth to and named Fox, the flesh of separation, too, all of us assorted around our various screens, captioning things, angling our faces, serving looks, being served, being silly, falling in love with each other, chasing away the love, god is pixelation, polemic, pandemic, public, or what you turn to in the face of these.
I wore god around like my son wears a dino robe, I wrote in an Instagram post I deleted because I don’t recognize myself without Instagram anxiety, and I can’t risk losing myself anytime soon. Boards over the floor; social media rituals over despair. I thought: No one can see how much I like writing about god if I dress it up with voice; here me and god are, hidden by a violent green plastic-turned-fuzz. Eventually, I figured out, most writers are writing about god, even, especially, when they’re not writing about god, we’re all, as Sabrina Orah Mark writes, “rushing the wall as if god were impatient, or actually there, and if there, then not there for long.”
The best way to understand the Hierophant is to think of it as where you go to church. The Queen of Pentacles, my favorite Queen of all, turns routine away from drudgery and back into its etymological roots, route, road, a path forward through small acts, the understanding that agency is simply making the best possible choice you can to get you where you need to go, given the resources, time, and obligations that flank each choice.
If you want to go to church in October, whether church for you is more writing time, or more reading time, or a good cocktail on a rooftop as the sun sets, or solidarity acts with striking workers, or a “no evidence of disease” diagnosis for a loved one, the Queen of Pentacles can help you get there by reminding you to give up, when you can, the long-suffering rage over daily life’s dawdy middle. The month’s eclipse cycle—on October 14 and October 28—will offer up enough drama and material change for you to get your thrills in, whether you want them or not. The agentic is the small, as it ever is, as god’s opposite and self-same, and now I’m rushing the wall robeless, breastless, still wearing a bra, still stopped too easily by my kid, a dusk, a web, silicone, a stitch, all patterns, a public, a voice.
Libra Rising: You find yourself relying on land, money, or resources from other people this month as you reconfigure your sense of self and relationship. What’s going on for you with home, debt, and institutions? What seems like a burden may actually be the way forward. A shift in how you perceive yourself occurs on October 14; it probably feels like it’s been a long time coming, and, paradoxically, it happens through a devoted attention to the good friends who have helped you reach this point. On October 28, you’re ready to say goodbye to a certain chapter of caretaking in your life—it’s time for you to be pampered, indulged in, and doted on for a little while. Thinking about “indebtedness” as “care” and vice versa inspires powerful life shifts for you in the coming season.
Scorpio Rising: You’ve often looked for “church” in your one-on-one partnerships, with close friends, lovers, and colleagues. This search is deepened in October, and don’t be surprised if the person you’ve been seeking all along appears from within the folds of your own neighborhood or friend groups, or is someone you already know on the most intimate of levels; this appearance occurs around October 28. On October 14, brace for endings around beauty, grief, and the body. Something needs to be let go of, and maybe time spent in a hospital, ashram, or solitary retreat could help.