Spring Equinox arrives and brings to life creative energy saturated in Eros. Fertility returns to the land as plants rise and bloom, as insects awaken the nectar in flowers, and blossoms call pollinators into the sweetness of their liquidity. The goddess of Spring is calling animals to wake up to their urge to live and come out of hibernation, looking for food, looking for a mate, and taking in the fresh renewal of the earth.  

Pagan traditions have been celebrating the Spring Equinox as a festival of awakening, the moment of balance between day and night, the growing power of light, the renewal of fertility, and the regeneration of life that stretches and expands across the land. 

In Mythic feminine terms, this is when the goddess as the Maiden becomes fertile. You can think of this as an Estrogen holiday. In fact, the name of the Germanic goddess of Spring, Eostre, is etymologically related to the word Estrogen. Eostre is also related to the word Oestrus or Estrus; the female mammal (not human) heat – a phase of sexual arousal, and a readiness to mate. 

Ostara is the pagan name of the Spring Equinox. 

Check out this Spring Equinox reflection video:

Spring Equinox Meaning: Goddesses of Light, Renewal, and Rebirth 

Ancient traditions are filled with seasonal wisdom. Mythology from all around the world tells stories of darkness and light, of descent and return, of death and awakening, of the cycles of creativity, dissolution, and re-emergence. 

The Origin Easter is Rooted in Eostre; The Spring Equinox Goddess

In the Germanic traditions, the awakening of the natural world in Spring is personified as a beautiful goddess who moves through the forest and covers it with green. Wherever she goes, flowers grow, and joy returns, rising from the dark, rich soil of Winter. 

Rabbits and eggs have been symbols of Spring Equinox way before the church appropriated this pagan holiday and turned it to Easter. You can hear Eostre’s name in Easter. She wears a green gown and a crown of flowers and carries with her a basket of eggs. She is accompanied by rabbits and hares, and brings the renewal of life wherever she goes.  

The goddess Eostre was loved and adored by a humble rabbit. In her honor, because he loved her so much, he laid eggs so that he could decorate them and give them to her as gifts. Eostre was touched, as those beautiful eggs filled her heart with joy. She placed them in a basket and traveled the world gifting these brightly colored eggs to people she met. 

Spring is the season of Eros. And it’s not by coincidence that rabbits are symbols of Spring. We say; “fuck like bunnites” for a reason. They love to do it. They are here to remind us that life’s origin is pleasure. Rabbits, of course, are extremely fertile creatures. Not only is a female rabbit’s pregnancy short, and she can get pregnant again within 24 hours after giving birth, but she can be pregnant with more than one litter at a time. And so when Eros returns to the world after the dark season, bunnies symbolize this return. 

More about the archetype of the rabbit here. 

Eggs too are an ancient symbol of life, fertility and renewal, full of potential, possibility, and the promise of more to come. 

When the rabbit lays eggs in the story Eostre, we see fertility breaking the shell of gender and species, emerging renewed through the soil of the imagination as a possibility of something that we think cannot be, as an expansion of reality, as creative fertility. 

Spring arrives, and we are invited to crack out of limited beliefs, break open, and become new versions of ourselves, rise into our radiance as the sun grows in power, and emerge through a sacred rebirth of our empowerment.

If you want to do this deeply transformative work of renewal, and break limited beliefs that keep you stuck, get the Spring Equinox Somatic Ceremony and dive into a creative, soulful, somatic journey of embodied ritual, practices, prompts, and deep contemplation. 

Spring Equinox Goddesses of Light: Dawn, Radiance, and Renewal

The word Ostara, which is how many Pagans refer to the Spring Equinox Sabbat, means; “dawn” or “to shine.” 

In Greek mythology, Eos is the goddess of the dawn. In Homeric poetry, she is described as rosy fingered and saffron robed as she opens the gates of heaven so that the sun could rise, or rising herself on the edge of the river Oceanus to disperse the night and bring back the light.

In Ancient Egyptian mythology, goddess Matat gave birth to the sun every morning, and helped it rise in the sky. Her name means “growth” or “waxing in full strength,” and while she may have not been thought of in Egypt as a Spring goddess, her energy is that of the rising power of this season. 

In India, the Vedic goddess Usas is the rosy goddess of the dawn; a young maiden who chases away the night, and brings with her the morning light. She wakes the world up and sets things in motion. She is the flowing milk of the Mother, of the sacred cow, and of life itself. 

As the world begins to flow and move again, returning from Winter’s darkness and slumber, I imagine Indian goddess, Sarasvati, who is the radiance of creativity and intelligence, of art and of science, of knowledge and of poetry, riding her swan, and arriving like a flowing river of inspiration, to bless our own creative renewal, and invite us to the bright morning light of Spring. 

These goddesses remind us that at the moment of the Spring Equinox, we arrive at the balance point between day and night, and that this is a tipping point; from now until the Summer Solstice, light will continue to expand, and saturate the world with radiance, strength, and growth. 

These goddesses of light also remind us that darkness gives birth to light, that in the cyclical nature of reality there are periods of traveling in the underworld, followed by resurrection and return to life.

Persephone and the Return From the Underworld 

She brings with her flowers and bees, bedecking the earth with green lushness. She returns from her time in the world of the dead, where she finds her deep power in the shadows, where she integrates parts of herself she didn’t even know she had, where she becomes queen. 

Persephone’s story is woven together with the story of her mother, the Great Goddess of the grain, Demeter, also known as Mother Earth. It’s a story of individuation, erotic awakening, desire, shadow work, grief, Mother/Daughter relationship, blood mysteries, and the complexity of womanhood. It is also the story of the seasons and the cycle of the earth around the sun. 

In the original story, Persephone is said to be abducted by Hades, the lord of the dead, the god of the underworld. And that is an important part to include, to consider, to integrate, to remember. The violence, the injustice, and the oppression of the patriarchy is palpable. 

And as we interpret mythology, it’s important to think of them in different ways, to look at what else could be the meaning within them, and explore a variety of perspectives. 

I like to think that Perephone wasn’t abducted. Seduced? Probably. But not abducted. I like to give her back her power. I like to think of her as an empowered woman on a journey of transformation. Hades is hot. And yes, he desired Persephone, but I think she was turned on by him too. I imagine her getting on the back of his motorcycle because she chose to. Was she scared? Of course she was! Her mama told her never to do such a thing. But she was at that point in a girl’s life when she needed to taste the forbidden fruit.

In the underworld she becomes queen. She roots herself in her power. She becomes anchored in the shadowy parts of herself, which then allow her to return to her light. 

Yes, she misses her mother, the light of the sun, and the gentle breeze of Spring on her skin. But when she eats the pomegranate (the forbidden fruit again) that Hades offers her, she knows exactly what she’s doing. She knows that this binds her to him. She knows that this means she will have to descend again every year. 

Persephone’s return to the world of the living, and the arrival of Spring along with her, remind us to take the lessons, the empowerment, the integration of the shadow, and all the work that we did during Winter, and bring it all with us as we re-emerge and rise with the sun.

Astarte and the Cycles of Life and Death

Astarte is the Lady of Babylos. She is one of the oldest forms of the Great Goddess in the Middle East. She is related to Egypt’s Hathor, to Greek Demeter (which connects her to Persephone), and to Greek Aphrodite. Her shrine in Babylon dates back to the Neolithic age – it flourished in the bronze age. She was a nature goddess – a goddess of nature’s cycles.

Astarte is a creator. She generates life, and brings it forth from within her. She is also the power that sustains the world. She is food. Nourishment. And abundance. And she is also a destroyer – the fierce power of the Dark Feminine. She is a triple goddess. A maiden, a mother, and a crone. 

Astarte is the origin of the Spring goddess. As she travels up north she becomes Eostre. She  holds in her the power of all the seasons, and unfolds over time into many other forms of the Divine Feminine. 

Astarte is Ashtoreth. She is Ishtar. She is the origin of the Virgin Mary. and she also becomes the Persian Jewish goddess, Queen Esther (from the story of Purim). You can read more about Esther here. And yes, Astarte, Esther, Ishtar. Eostre, Easter – all of these names are related. 

Astarte is the queen of the stars. She’s the force of nature that eliminates the old and generates the new. Christianity turned her into the devil. Her underworld, dark feminine form was demonized. 

Isis and the Power of Renewal 

The power of Resurrection, the power to bring life back to the world, is held in the great ancient Egyptian goddess, Isis. This is a complex, beautiful, nuanced goddess, with a story that deserves its own essay, but I wanted to mention her here.

Isis brings her beloved Osiris back to life, but she also has to deal with his death, with reabsorption back into the soil, and into the dark night sky. She’s a goddess that lives in the space between grief and renewal. She’s not exactly the goddess of Spring. She’s a goddess, like Astarte, that moves through the whole cycle, and travels in between the realms. 

Isis is the story of return, resurrection, and life’s power of resilience. It’s not a simplified story. It reminds us that Spring’s beauty is woven with Autumn’s grief, that flowers are rooted in the compost, the decay, the dead of Winter’s night. You can read about Isis and Osiris through the perspective of the archetype of Death here. And you’ll find some Persephone pieces there too. 

As we come into this beautiful new season, we cannot bypass what is going on in the world right now. These are times of chaos, collapse, and complexity. Spring brings with it joy and pleasure, which we must lean into so that we can live through these hard times, integrate the lessons hidden within them, and remember to wake up to the beauty and find Muse within the mess.  

The complexity of Isis invites us to walk through this time with delicate nuance. You don’t need to abandon any part of yourself in order to embrace the beauty that surrounds you. 

Isis, Astarte, and Persephone are goddesses that hold multiplicity, diversity, and paradox. They are not simple. They call us into the weaving of our subterranean realms with the green of the earth, with the vastness of the sky. 

Spring Equinox is a moment that holds both darkness and light as equal partners in this spinning wheel of life. We can move into this season of renewal with an integrated, cohesive sense of self that invites us to rise, knowing that we will fall again. 

If you want to ritualize the season through an in depth journey with archetypes and embodied practices, join me for the Spring Equinox Somatic Ceremony.

Have a beautiful, meaningful Spring Equinox! 

And if you’re into what you read here, you’ll probably be into my Muse Medicine Substack. Subscribe here to get mythic magic every Monday. 

Much love,

Hagar