Hail to all of you attuned beings who celebrate the Earth’s successive seasons! Here, in the Northern Hemisphere, Fall’s arrival brings cooler mornings and evenings, with the promise of bountiful harvests to come. The impending touch of frost should, ere long, ignite our trees’ leaves to blaze with vivid colors. Those in the Southern Hemisphere rejoice in the triumph of Spring’s ascending dominance over Winter’s dormancy. They may savor Nature as it rises from stasis, surging forth with renewed vigor.
Satanists find it fulfilling to luxuriate in a vital, carnal existence, embracing the majestic cycles of our precious, fragile island in the vast abyss of space. Our awareness invokes humbling respect as we attain ever deepening understanding of our beautiful and dreadful Earth.
Richard Strauss (1864-1949) left four completed magnificent songs on his desk at his passing, which were published as his Four Last Songs. I find them deeply moving in their sounding of autumnal sensibilities, and September from them, setting a poem by Hermann Hesse, is a fitting listen for the beginning of the new season. With images of a garden “mourning,” of the falling of leaves and the passing of Summer, the music captures a wistful nostalgia, with thoughts of regret and inevitability. Please follow this link to enjoy a performance by Arleen Augér with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by André Previn. This YouTube video has the score, so those of you who read music can appreciate the sensitivity of the orchestration—Strauss was a true master of that art.
In the Haunted Hudson Valley, The Witchcraft District is flourishing, and those who dwell here, as well as those who identify with our eternal sense of The October Country, typically find All Hallows’ Eve to be always in their minds and hearts. Spectral breezes will soon impel the tumbling leaves to swirl through the lengthening chill nights. Samhain looms to sweep us up in its dark mysteries—as always, we Children of the Night can hardly wait!
—Magus Peter H. Gilmore