Quarter of eleven at night.
Saturday’s Child
Through a process of desultory reading and writing I’ve arrived at a few insights about astrology mostly lost to people today. It started with an end note to Verlaine’s Saturnian Poems, saying he chose the title because of the work he had to put into them, as if ordained by Saturn. Then a week or so later, I rifled through Baudelaire and chanced on his poem addressing Sisyphus, whose punishment in hell was the pointless labor of pushing a round boulder up a hill eternally. Baudelaire also prayed for the term of his suffering to be short. I gathered from this the idea that for him, life is pain and suffering. The image of Sisyphus was taken up by Camus in one of his essays. The last thing came to me like an inspiration. Stephen Stills wrote a song, “Everydays,” he gave to Yes to record in 1970. The first verse goes,
Look at the sad goodbyes
Every day’s a killing time
Sun coming up outside
No men are born this time
Saturday’s Child stays home
Nothing to say, so long
In turn, the meaning of Saturday’s Child is revealed by an old nursery rhyme.
Monday’s Child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s Child is full of grace,
Wednesday’s Child is full of woe,
Thursday’s Child has far to go,
Friday’s Child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s Child works hard for his living…
Finally, you only need to make the connection between Saturday and Saturn to make complete sense of the role of hard work in the essence of Saturday’s Child. Saturn in astrological tradition is the tester and taskmaster for those it rules.
robgradens 