The Flow State Herald: Edition 2, Virgo the Herbalist
The Flow State Herald
17 to 24 October 2026 · Edition 2 · Vol. I · No. 2
The Herbalist's edition, for Virgo rising
Read this first
- The week: Tue 20 Oct, Venus squares Pluto; Fri 23 Oct, the Sun enters Scorpio; Sat 24 Oct, Mercury turns retrograde.
- For you: The Library, 3rd house: the Sun, Venus and Mercury all gather there by Saturday, so reading, letters and errands go slowly and get checked.
- Do this: Tue 20 Oct: write down one daily routine and two lines on what it gives and what it costs.
- Dates: Tue 20 Oct, 2:56 am ET (06:56 UTC); Fri 23 Oct, 5:38 am ET (09:38 UTC); Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC).
Your birth chart is a castle: twelve rooms for twelve areas of life. Each week the planets open different doors, and this paper tells you which rooms are busy this week.
New to the rooms? They are explained on the castle page.
Album of the week
Flowers of Evil, Ruth White, 1969. A Limelight Records LP. Listen on Spotify. Record Collector review.
Ruth White, an American composer, recorded Flowers of Evil in 1969, reading poems by Charles Baudelaire over electronic music and altering her voice with speed changes, tape delays and echo. Limelight Records issued it, and both of her albums are now rare and sought after.
Field Notes: your sky this week
You are the Herbalist: the week opens with Venus pressing on your daily remedies and closes with Mercury turning back through the room where you read and write.
Which small habit in your daily routine is worth tending while Mercury slows down in your Library?
Venus squares Pluto · Tue 20 Oct, 2:56 am ET (06:56 UTC)
THE LIBRARY · 3rd house · learning, siblings, short trips and everyday messages
THE BATHHOUSE AND APOTHECARY · 6th house · daily routines, health and small remedies
Venus, retrograde in Scorpio, squares Pluto in Aquarius. The angle joins your 3rd house of reading, notes and everyday messages with your 6th house of daily routines, health and small remedies. What you read or say this week presses on a habit, and a routine kept only from habit shows what it costs.
- Tue 20 Oct: Write down one daily routine you keep out of habit, and add two short lines beside it on what it gives you and what it takes.
♀︎ Venus retrograde in Scorpio, 3rd house, square ♇︎ Pluto in Aquarius, 6th house. Exact Tue 20 Oct, 2:56 am ET (06:56 UTC).
The Sun enters Scorpio · Fri 23 Oct, 5:38 am ET (09:38 UTC)
THE LIBRARY · 3rd house
The Sun leaves Libra, your 2nd house of money, food and what you value, and enters Scorpio, your 3rd house. From here the Sun lights the Library, so reading, letters, calls and errands take more of the day's attention. Pantry and purse matters step back a little.
- Fri 23 Oct: Walk to a library, post box or small shop you rarely visit, and bring one printed thing home, such as a book, a stamp or a leaflet.
☉︎ Sun enters Scorpio, 3rd house. Fri 23 Oct, 5:38 am ET (09:38 UTC).
Mercury turns retrograde · Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC)
THE LIBRARY · 3rd house
Mercury, the planet of messages, turns retrograde in Scorpio, in your 3rd house. In the Library that slows reading, writing and replies, and errands can double back, so details are worth a second look before anything is sent. The week closes with the slowdown just beginning.
- Fri 23 Oct: Reread one message or form you have already drafted, aloud, and mark any word that could be misunderstood before it goes out.
☿︎ Mercury stations retrograde in Scorpio, 3rd house. Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC).
From here the Sun lights the Library, so reading, letters, calls and errands take more of the day's attention.
Tarot
Look. A queen in a red gown sits on a carved stone throne, holding a golden coin, with flowering vines overhead.
Ask yourself. What in the picture looks cared for, and what looks left to grow wild?
Show the reading
Then read. Queen of Pentacles, upright. Practical care, pruning the way someone does who loves the plant. Venus presses on a routine on Tuesday, so trim it and don't tear it out.
Look. A man leans on a long tool beside a bush of green leaves hung with seven golden coins.
Ask yourself. How long has he been looking at the coins, and what is he deciding?
Show the reading
Then read. Seven of Pentacles, upright. Stopping to look over slow work. The Sun arrives in your 3rd house on Friday, where reading and checking come before more watering.
Look. A young page in a pink and blue tunic holds a cup with a fish in it, seen upside down.
Ask yourself. What might the fish in the cup be about to say?
Show the reading
Then read. Page of Cups, reversed. A soft message is late, or hasn't been said. Mercury turns retrograde in your 3rd house on Saturday, so gather what's ripe and let the rest wait.
Cards: Pamela Colman Smith, Rider-Waite-Smith tarot, 1909.
Planet of the week
In your chart. Mercury sits in Scorpio in your 3rd house, the Library, the room of reading, notes, calls and errands. In ordinary life that makes it the planet behind your inbox and your small trips this week.
This week. Mercury, direct in Scorpio until then, turns retrograde on Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC), and stays retrograde through the end of the week.
Hindu. In Hindu tradition Budha, the planet Mercury, is the son of Soma, the Moon god, and Tara, the wife of Brihaspati, the teacher of the gods. Soma carried Tara off and a war followed until Brahma stepped in, and Tara admitted the child was Soma's; the boy was named Budha, "the wise". Source
Norse. The English Wednesday comes from "Woden's day", a translation of the Latin dies Mercurii, because Roman writers matched Mercury with Odin. Snorri's Prose Edda tells how Odin took the mead of poetry from the giant Suttungr and flew it home to the gods as an eagle. Source
Chinese. Mercury goes by Chenxing in Chinese star lore,. It is the Water planet, tied to the north and to the Black Tortoise, a snake-wound tortoise guarding the northern sky. Sources: the name and the Four Symbols.
The Drawer: the museum object
Look first. A tall white jar with two loop handles and a wide neck. A lobed blue outline on the front frames a cross above a ladder, and blue dots and short strokes run around the shoulder and rim.
Context. Probably made in Siena in 1425 to 1450 from tin-glazed earthenware, it carries the arms of the Hospital of Santa Maria della Scala, whose emblem is a ladder topped by a cross.
Notice. Look at the ladder and cross. The emblem sits where a label would, so the jar names its owner before anyone reads a word.
The deep dive
This is how one scholar, reading Greek word by word, showed that the books of Hermes Trismegistus were far younger than their reputation.
Around 1460 an incomplete Greek Corpus Hermeticum arrived in Florence in manuscript. Cosimo de' Medici had Marsilio Ficino put Plato aside and translate it into Latin first; the translation dates to 1463. Ficino held that "Hermes Trismegistus", Hermes the Thrice-Greatest, was an ancient Egyptian priest older than Plato and a source for him.
That belief rested on a misdating. The name itself is a merger: Greeks in Egypt matched their Hermes with the Egyptian god Thoth, and the combined figure became the supposed author of a body of Greek texts.
In 1614 Isaac Casaubon, a Swiss-born philologist, read those Greek texts the way a herbalist reads a leaf, for small details of style and content. He argued they were not ancient Egyptian but belonged to the first centuries CE. Present-day dating puts the texts between about 100 and 300 CE.
The dating is certain enough to teach. The weight of it is interpretation: Frances Yates called Casaubon's redating a blow to Hermetic natural theology, while Jan Assmann and others note that belief in an older origin continued afterwards.
To think about: What detail would convince you a text is younger than claimed?
Go further: Ficino's Pimander, from the Brandeis library
Sources: Encyclopedia.com on Hermeticism; Bryn Mawr Classical Review; First Things on Egyptomania; Hermes Trismegistus.
This week's calendar
- Sat 17 Oct: Jewish: Shabbat Noach is the Sabbath when the portion Noach is read, telling of Noah, the flood, the ark and the rainbow covenant. Source.
- Mon 19 Oct: Hindu: Ninth day of Navratri: Maha Navami, when Ayudha Puja honours the tools and instruments of daily work. Source.
- Tue 20 Oct: Hindu: The tenth day, Dussehra or Vijayadashami, closes Navratri; many towns burn effigies of Ravana. Source.
- Fri 23 Oct: Chinese: Autumn's last solar term, Shuangjiang or Frost's Descent, starts at 5:38 am ET (09:38 UTC). Source.
A line to keep
The Lord hath created medicines out of the earth; and he that is wise will not abhor them.
Ecclesiasticus 38:4, King James Bible.
How this was made
Times are Eastern (ET), with UTC in brackets. The sky is calculated with the Swiss Ephemeris. Pictures come from museum open access collections and are credited in each caption. For reflection and enjoyment, not medical, financial or legal advice.
