june divination journal

thunder, wonder, and worry

Greetings hedge dwellers! Casey Zabala here, interdisciplinary witch, artist, mother, and proud wyrd-o. This month’s divination journal features energetic musings, astral keys to hold onto for the month, and a Summer Solstice tarot spread to ground your seasonal celebrations. Enjoy — and if you feel called, pass this note along to a witchy friend seeking grounding as the Solstice looms.

This June begins under a full yet waning Sagittarius moon. We find ourselves integrating realization and digesting inspiration - all while a bit buzzy and tired. The Earth is trembling under the weight of war, genocide, and unfettered carelessness. The roses are blooming, tender and perfumed, reverberating in the early summer Sun. As we swing through the days that lead up to the Summer Solstice, we are aching for change that garners some measurable form of relief.

I’ve lived in many high desert regions, where June is synonymous with thunderstorms. I used to love the pressure of the humidity, the ominous clouds forming on the horizon, and watching the weft of rain cascading across the sky. Over the years my wonder turned into fear, as I scanned for flashes of lighting and worried about impending wildfires. Wonder and doom now live as side-by-side sisters, and hope has become a buoy during these times of precarious circumstances.

The energetics of this June find us sitting on the porch in the sticky heat, watching those dark clotting clouds roll into formation. Can we stay rooted in the wonder of the moment? Or do we fall prey to the worry, fall down the spiral towards disaster? Did you pick the perfumed roses and bring them indoors to enjoy before they lost their sweet scent?

My therapist told me that people who are depressed often have a better grip on reality. (I think she was trying to make me feel better?) Those who aren’t afraid of the doom, or death, are more able to understand life’s true reality: change. The trick is being able to hold both; to understand the destructive forces of life gives us a chance to behold the miraculous nature of our existence.

We witches, magical thinkers, new-world builders, and cycle worshippers have a difficult task to hold as we traverse the wheel of the year during late stage capitalism and polycrisis. We must hold space for Earth’s poetry of becoming, while casting spells that destroy the systems that threaten all of life’s magic. Perhaps practicing our devotions more fiercely, creatively, and ebulliently is part of this sacred duty.

The astrology on the horizon is building into a peak in early July. But we have June to fortify our spirits and the all important rite of Solstice to ground our wishes and cast our spells for a healing, just, and liberated future.

Solstice Magick:

All of the elements are celebrated at the Summer Solstice, but two that I like to pay special attention to are water and fire. Summer Solstice falls at the beginning of Cancer season (cardinal water sign) and initiates a time of sweetness, emotional care-giving, and comfort seeking. The Solstice commemorates the moment of the Sun’s peak potency, and so solar magic, solar gratitude, and solar healing are all ancestral practices at this time of year. At the Sun’s zenith, the Earth is receiving the Sun’s full radiance, and all beings are able to channel the Sun’s full vitality. Traditionally, medicinal herbs are collected at noon on the Summer Solstice for this very reason; the plants will have absorbed the Sun’s full healing potency.

Solar qualities are warming, life-giving, consistent, sustaining, light, brightening, and ever-lasting. If we are able to embrace Solar wisdom at the Solstice, we will be asking the Sun to embolden and increase the aspects within us and the aspects of our world that we hold most healing and central to our survival.

Make an herbal infused oil at Solstice and share it with someone who might need a reminder of light’s gifts. On Solstice eve, revel in the world that is ending; burn effigies that represent the toxic destructive forces at work in our world. Watch sunrise on the Solstice, imagining a new dawn illuminating a world turning towards healing, restorative justice, reparation, and repair. Make (compostable! sensible!) offerings to sacred water ways or springs to acknowledge their wisdom, intelligence, and necessity. Take a dip, cleanse yourself ritually, and set intentions for the next chapter of your conscious co-creation with the cosmos.

Sweet Spots:

• June 9th, Jupiter - Venus conjunction: This is a moment to center emotional delights. Activate the pleasure seeking parts of you and luxuriate in a sensual experience that lights up your sense of connection and kinship.

• June 21st, Summer Solstice: protect this sacred moment by practicing ritual, gathering in community, making art, relishing in the magical universe we are all inseparable from.

Lunations:

• Gemini New Moon June 14th ~ a new moon for dynamic inner healing work

• Capricorn Full Moon June 29th ~ a full moon for reviewing commitments

Solstice SUN Tarot Spread:

1. The Sun: in this spread The Sun symbolizes a core truth or point of vitality to orient around. Think of it as an anchoring and sustaining light in your life.

2. Area of increase: what is expanding, advancing, progressing and/or becoming within and around you?

3. Make an offering of: how can you show your gratitude or be of service at this station on the wheel?

4. What to harvest: Something is seeking resolution. What has ended its growth cycle and now needs to be used, enjoyed, celebrated and evolved away from?

Solstice Spell ingredients:

On the solstice altar are cottage roses, pink and lavender candles, every shade of green, a bowl of sweet water, ribbons for spell ladders, beach stones, cornmeal, liquid offerings for the gods. Bells and cymbals, a crescent shaped tambourine. Malachite, pyrite, Gold gem essence on the tongue.

Tell me, what patterns are emerging from your verge? What is taking up the most space on your Solstice altar?

Sending love through the madness!

Connect with Casey in the wild!