April's Cruel Side

Around this time in April, in several past years, I've posted listing some of the best known dark deeds coincidentally all happening in mid-April. My 2013 post went like this:

It never ends does it? Man's inhumanity to man. The dreadful events, deaths and horrible injuries in Boston yesterday are the latest addition to a blood-soaked list of tragedies here in the USA, and let us not forget, in countries abroad - some at our own hands.

I've written before about the darkness of this month in recent US history: 19 April 1995, the Oklahoma City bombing when 168 people, including children, died at the hands of home-grown terrorists; then the shootings at Columbine High School, Colorado on 20 April 1999; and April 16 2007 was the date of the Virginia Tech. massacre when 32 people were killed by a gunman, fellow student of those he murdered.

There's no rational explanation for this growing cluster of horror in what ought to be a happy and optimistic time of year, long winter behind us, trees greening - but .......

And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
"For hate is strong,
And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"
(From Longfellow's Christmas Bells)

In 2010 I wrote the post accessible at
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2010/04/cruellest-month.html.

These and others can also be accessed via the label cloud in the sidebar, by clicking on "April Events".


In 2019 April is keeping up its cruel reputation: Notre Dame on fire; attacks in Sri Lanka with at least 290 people losing their lives.

On a very personal level (and these pale into insignificance on a world wide scale):

On 23rd April 1992 my father died.
On 21 April 1996 I and my late partner lost everything we owned, except the few clothes we were wearing, my purse and our car, in a fire which consumed the apartment in which we'd lived for 24 years.

This year I found that the lumpectomy carried out a year ago wasn't sufficient, so I underwent full mastectomy left breast. That still wasn't sufficient, so a few days ago I underwent re-excision mastectomy and learned that the right breast ought also to be removed in the near future. As I said, insignificant in the great scheme of things, but a bit wearying for yours truly, again, in a month that promises renewal and all things bright and beautiful.

Let us hope, very sincerely, that future Aprils will not continue in this pattern!

Postscript - The post's title uses a thought from T.S. Eliot's poem The Wasteland.

Day of Venus

It's All Fools' Day, but it's also Venus's day. Ancient Romans celebrated The Veneralia on this day, in tribute to Venus Verticordia ("Venus the changer of hearts") and Fortuna Virilis ("Manly" or "Virile Fortune").

It was the Romans who named the month Aprilis, possibly a reference to the Latin verb aperire, to open (the season when trees and flowers begin to open); or perhaps as April, being sacred to the goddess Venus, and her Veneralia being held on the first day, Aprilis was originally Aphrilis, from the name of Venus's equivalent Greek goddess, Aphrodite (Aphros).

The cult of Venus Verticordia established in 220 BC, during the last years of Rome's Punic Wars, was in response to advice from a Sibylline oracle. A series of prodigies was taken to signify divine displeasure at sexual offenses among Romans of every category and class, including several men and three Vestal Virgins. Tsk tsk!!

"A series of prodigies"...hmm, obviously not referring to a band of baby mathematicians or lyre players, nifty beyond their years. Collins English Dictionary clears that up:

prodigy
1. a person, esp a child, of unusual or marvellous talents
2. anything that is a cause of wonder and amazement

3. something monstrous or abnormal
4. an archaic word for omen.

Ceremonials during Veneralia entailed all women, both married and unmarried, visiting the men's baths. It was a day for women to seek divine support and aid in their love lives. Wearing myrtle wreaths, they would make a libation of poppy with milk and honey and drink the potion while praying that Venus would bring them harmony and peace. Incense was also offered to the goddess in hope of hiding any perceived physical imperfections from view while the women were in the baths.

In 114 BC Venus Verticordia was given her own temple. She was meant to persuade Romans of both sexes and every class, whether married or unmarried, to cherish the traditional sexual proprieties and morality known to please the gods and benefit the State. During the Veneralia, her cult image was taken from her temple to the men's baths, where it was undressed and washed in warm water by her female attendants, then garlanded with myrtle. Women and men asked Venus Verticordia for her help in love, sex, betrothal and marriage.

See also: Wikipedia

The Other Side of April

Around mid-month each April, as years pass, I'm reminded that, as well as April showers, April violets, April in Paris, April has often brought more than the usual ration of loss and suffering. I'll not repeat the list again, but instead link to it in my 2010 post:
CRUELLEST MONTH.

This year, April has been living up to that title already. There was yesterday's news of 300 people missing after a South Korean ferry had sunk; the Kansas City shootings of the weekend; 22 injured in knife attack at a Regional High School last week; and the ongoing still fruitless search for missing Malaysian Airlines plane with its 239 occupants, lost since 8 March......

I've pondered before on whether there might be any astrological indication as to why this mid-April period so often brings tragedy, misfortune and suffering one way or another. I hadn't, until now, bothered to investigate the Fixed Stars around this mid-April/Aries area of the zodiac. There's a Fixed Star called Baten Kaitos with negative attributes, and relation to Saturn, which could be seen as a likely suspect, it's found at around 21 Aries:

 From Terry Nazon's website

This year, additionally, we have that pesky Cardinal Grand Cross involved too. Let's hope fervently that there will be no further examples to add to the list for April 2014.

Sweet April-time
O cruel April-time!
Year after year returning,
with a brow Of promise,
and red lips with longing paled,
And backward-hidden hands that clutch the joys
Of vanished springs, like flowers. (By Dinah Maria Mulock - pseudonym Mrs. Craik.)

"For Hate is Strong"

It never ends does it? Man's inhumanity to man. The dreadful events, deaths and horrible injuries in Boston yesterday are the latest addition to a blood-soaked list of tragedies here in the USA, and let us not forget, in countries abroad - some at our own hands.

I've written before about the darkness of this month in recent US history: 19 April 1995, the Oklahoma City bombing when 168 people, including children, died at the hands of home-grown terrorists; then the shootings at Columbine High School, Colorado on 20 April 1999; and April 16 2007 was the date of the Virginia Tech. massacre when 32 people were killed by a gunman, fellow student of those he murdered.

There's no rational explanation for this growing cluster of horror in what ought to be a happy and optimistic time of year, long winter behind us, trees greening - but .......

And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
"For hate is strong,
And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"
(From Longfellow's Christmas Bells)

Cruellest Month

April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
(From The Wasteland by T S Eliot)

Revisiting some of the words I wrote last year and the year before in mid-April:

There's something about this time of year that feels a little unsettling. I don't know what astrological factor, if any, might be involved because no two years have the same celestial configurations, other than Sun in the last degrees of Aries and first degrees of Taurus. Was it some perverse "anniversary" syndrome by the perpetrators that directed so many tragedies into the same few days? Or is there a common astrological factor? Perhaps elements of both.

On April 19, 1993 74 men, women and children died in the inferno at Waco, Texas.

On 19 April 1995 the Oklahoma City bombing of a Federal building by home-grown terrorists killed 168 people, including 19 children under the age of 6.

On 20 April 1999 the shootings at Columbine High School, Colorado when 12 students and a teacher were killed by two senior students.

On April 16 2007 the Virginia Tech. massacre when 32 people were killed by a gunman, fellow student of those he murdered.

(On a very personal level, for me:
On 23rd April 1992 my father died.
On 21 April 1996 I and my late partner lost everything we owned, except the few clothes we were wearing, my purse and our car, in a fire which consumed the apartment in which we'd lived for 24 years.)

I'll not attempt to find astrological correlation. There is correlation enough in the devastation wrought upon the lives of so many. Motive, method, and root cause may differ in each case, but results do not. The result was then, and is now, pain and sorrow.

Men die, but sorrow never dies;
The crowding years divide in vain,
And the wide world is knit with ties
Of common brotherhood in pain.(Susan Coolidge).

Part of the Oklahoma City National Memorial The Gates of Time: Monumental twin bronze gates frame the moment of destruction - 9:02 - and mark the formal entrances to the Outdoor Memorial. 9:01, found on the eastern gate, represents the last moments of peace, while its opposite on the western gate, 9:03, represents the first moments of recovery. Both time stamps are inscribed on the interior of the monument, facing each other and the Reflecting Pool.

Eventful Aries Cycle

Glancing down Wikipedia's list of events for this day in previous years, I noticed that it had been a particularly disastrous day, with high loss of lives. Three notable examples:

1945 – More than 7,000 die when the German refugee ship Goya is sunk by a Soviet submarine torpedo.

1947 – Texas City Disaster: An explosion on board a freighter in port causes the city of Texas City, Texas, to catch fire, killing almost 600

2007 – Virginia Tech massacre: The deadliest mass shooting in modern American history. The gunman, Seung-Hui Cho, shoots 32 people to death and injures 23 others before committing suicide

Searching further, I came across astrologer Jan Warren's article from last year:
"ON THE APPROACHING EVENTFUL CYCLE AROUND APRIL 19 "

I notice, too, that Jan has a more recent article on this topic:
"RECENT ARIES VIOLENCE "

Let us hope, and will, that 2009 will not provide any futher addition to those awful lists of events.

I dislike ending on a depressing note. There are a couple of events from today in history which reflect another side of Aries: the leader, the "firsts", these deserve a mention:

16 April 1912 – Harriet Quimby becomes the first woman to fly an airplane across the English Channel. Beautiful lady! Tragically she died in an aircraft accident on 1 July the same year.




16 April 1943 - Albert Hofmann, a Swiss scientist best known for having been, on this day, the first to synthesize, ingest and learn of the psychedelic effects of lysergic acid diethylamide aka LSD. Whether this was, in general, A Good Thing, is a moot point, but it was a "first".