Calendar of the Sun
Media Autumnus
Color: Brown
Element: Earth
Altar: Set out a brown cloth, an earthenware jug of water, dried stalks of yarrow in a vase, and
incense of many woods. In front of the altar set a great empty barrel, an earthen pot of soil,
another of the day's vegetation garbage, a smaller one of wood ashes, and a basket of gathered
dried leaves.
Offerings: Bits of hair or fingernail parings.
Daily Meal: Vegetarian.
Media Autumnus Invocation
Let us invest in the Earth
Beneath our feet
And see our returns in millenniums.
Let us say that our main crop
Is the ancient forest
Which we did not plant
And will not live to harvest.
Let us say that the leaves
Are harvested when
They have rotted into the mold.
Let us call that our profit,
And prophesy such returns.
Let us put our faith in the two inches
Of humus that will build
Under the trees every thousand years.
Let us listen to carrion.
Let us put our ears close and hear
The faint chatterings
Of the songs that are yet to come.
Chant:
Clay receives you
Earth has chosen you
Worms prepare you
Earth encloses you
(During the chant, several who have been chosen to do the work of the ritual come forward and
add the garbage, the ashes, the soil, the dried leaves, the yarrow, and finally the water to the
compost barrel. It is removed again to the corner until Spring.)
[Pagan Book of Hours]