#space goddesses

Zeus is gravity– unseeable, unknowable, defying human understanding. He holds the planets in place. He slingshots rockets back home. He cradles Earth in a steady orbit and tells them that they are safe.

Hera rests on the rings around Saturn. She drapes herself across their icy surface, riding their steady rotations, ever-watching, ever-awake. 

Artemis holds the moon in her hands. Some call her goddess of the moon, but she knows that she is but a friend to Selene. She watches in awe as Selene glows, and she tries to bring that peace back to the forest with her.

Apollo lights up his sister’s hands as he rests upon the Sun. He surrounds himself with light, and he tries to find music in between the sunspots and the harsh solar winds. When he can’t find any music, he makes it for himself.

Hestia kindles the flames of the stars. She watches them grow up, and she mourns at their supernovas. She paints Earth’s skies with constellations, and she tries to keep the world aglow despite their dying light.

Poseidon takes pleasure in placing water in places where no one dares to look. He crafts great oceans in distant planets, at the center of unexplored moons. He knows that life is sacred, even if it is unknown.

Ares hurls meteors across distant skies. Asteroids are his cannonballs. Comets are his bullets.

Aphrodite watches in awe as Ares’ ammunition glides through the atmosphere. She sets them aglow and calls them shooting stars. She listens to the faraway wishes, but she can’t grant them all.

Athena plants ideas in the minds of faraway astronomers and cosmologists. She whispers of string theory, of the multiverse, of membranes, of dimensions. She smiles as ideas become theories and theories become facts.

Dionysus sends out constant reminders that the universe can never make sense. He muddles Athena’s great ideas and reminds us that the world doesn’t have meaning– it just is.

Demeter grows galaxies as if they are crops. She names them as if they are her children, “Sunflower”, “Andromeda”, “Tadpole”, and she nurtures them from seeds, waiting for the day that they will be ready for harvest.

Hephaestus sculpts quarks into atoms, atoms into elements, elements into entire nebulas. He knows that the other deities rely on him to make the universe work, but they seem to forget.

Hermes is the speed of light. He knows that he can’t be matched, can’t be broken, can’t ever be surpassed. He is infinite.

Hades sleeps at the center of blackholes. He pities those who quiver at the chaos, the terror, the horrible uncertainty of his gaping cracks in space; he knows that there is nothing to fear about darkness.