The ancient myth of Orpheus and Eurydice is beautifully playing out in the stars overhead starting this week, when Mars makes a triumphant move into the region of Scorpio stars.
The region of Scorpio has always been associated with the underworld, and all season the planets Mars and Saturn have been forming a triangle in the southwest sky with the brightest star there. This week, Mars will be like Orpheus, taking flight into this underworld, as though to rescue his beloved Eurydice.
Here's the tale: Orpheus inherited the stringed instrument known as the lyre from his father, Apollo, and he was so gifted with it that he could charm life out of the rocks, he could tame the wild beasts, he could even bring the gods to tears.
He fell in love with the maiden Eurydice, but she was bitten by a poisonous snake and she died, which meant she was taken into the underworld realm of Scorpio. To free her, Orpheus did what no one had done before~he used his musical charm to gain entry to the underworld, and by playing for the god and goddess there, he was granted his wish to lead Eurydice back to the upper world, on one condition: that he not look back.
Orpheus did look back and he lost Eurydice, and when he later died, his instrument was placed among the stars. But what about Eurydice?
Eurydice we can imagine is Venus in the sky, and soon she’ll make the same pass across this threshold of Scorpio, as though following her beloved out of the underworld. If you keep watch until early next year, you’ll see Venus nearly catch up with Mars in the sky, only to “fall back” in retrograde motion, just like Eurydice, bearing the song of Orpheus in her heart, instead of her beloved in her arms. It’s a sad tale, but one way to imagine it is that while Orpheus is memorialized by a star in the heavens, Eurydice comes to life every time we hear the song of the Earth.