Mysteries of Life, Death, and Rebirth in the Garden

Today Dan and I went outside and opened a wonderful gift, our compost bin!  We have been battling our clay Missouri soil for years and have managed to work two decent raised beds for vegetables.  Last spring my mom passed on a compost bin that she wasn't using and all year long we have been dumping all of our vegetable scraps and coffee ground in there, my neighbor even donated some  pulp from her juicer! Occasionally we added a couple shovelfuls of earth or a few handfuls of straw, other than that, we've just let the sun, rain and Mother Nature take care of the business of the decomposition of the materials.

Our big black cauldron of life, death and rebirth, (aka the compost bin,)
provided our garden with a whole wheel barrel full of life-giving soil! 

It's hard to believe that this gorgeous rich humus full of nutrients was once kitchen scraps and yard clippings, this is a perfect example of the wheel of life in action!  We harvested fresh living growing vegetables from our garden all summer and he little ends of zucchini, tomatoes, the leafy tops of carrots and radishes all growing and full of life were placed in the compost bin.  There in the warm, soft cauldron, all the cells died off, they decayed, the original structure broken down to it's basest elements.  Coffee grounds, weeds pulled from the garden, and the entire plants that grew our wonderful vegetables all summer all found their dark rest there.  Watching the action of decay is fascinating, the process of the dank and moldy waste becoming a force for new life is one of the magical mysteries of the Craft.

We pondered these mysteries as we shoveled this lovely fertile compost into the garden bed, knowing that from death and decay, new life would soon burst forth!  When you work the earth to grow some of your own food, it seems such a shame to waste even the inedible parts of the plant, after all, those stalks and leaves worked so hard in the sun and rain to provide our family with sustenance.  Returning them with honor to the earth from which they came seems appropriate, and the reward for our effort is the opportunity to bring new health giving life back into the world!

The "Three Great Mysteries" card from my oracle deck  "The  Hidden Path"
See more of my magical art from this deck and more in my Etsy shop, click here!

The lessons that compost has to teach us is truly a great opportunity for anyone following a magical path to learn the mysteries of birth, life, death and rebirth and witness it in action!

Volunteer radishes growing in the garden, a gift from Mother Nature! 

To add to this lesson, we discovered volunteer radishes that had gone to seed and even though we haven't gotten our garden officially planted yet, those seeds have burst forth!

What a lovely gift from the earth!

The other night we had a salad with fresh radishes that were gifted to us from Mother Nature!  Those radish plants had died at the end of their season.  They dropped their seeds into the earth, pure potential, passing on their life to the next generation.  Those seeds rested in the dark earth all winter while the world lay in sleep beneath the snow and ice.  They knew when the time was right to begin their new life.  The radishes were delicious, and of course you know where the leafy tops went...you guessed it, right into the compost bin!  And the circle continues!

Brightest Blessings!