Beltaine in Australia: A Fire Spell for Becoming
Welcome. Beltaine is here, that point in the year where spring is at its peak and summer is just around the corner. Traditionally celebrated from October 31 to November 1, this year the exact midpoint between Ostara and Litha falls on November 8, 2025.
Down here in the Southern Hemisphere, we feel it differently, the days are longer, the air warmer, and the city is full of colour. In Naarm, the scent of jasmine still hangs on, while roses start to take over. The veil between worlds feels thinner…..
Art Witch Beltaine Altar with Australian Wildflowers
Hello Creative Alchemists,
Welcome. Beltaine is here, that point in the year where spring is at its peak and summer is just around the corner. Traditionally celebrated from October 31 to November 1, this year the exact midpoint between Ostara and Litha falls on November 8, 2025.
Down here in the Southern Hemisphere, we feel it differently, the days are longer, the air warmer, and the city is full of colour. In Naarm, the scent of jasmine still hangs on, while roses start to take over. The veil between worlds feels thinner, but instead of mystery, there’s a sense of life pushing forward.
This Beltaine is special for me, it marks the end of my Wheel of the Year series. From Samhain’s inward turn to now, we’ve gone through each season together, reflecting on how the cycle shows up in our lives and our art. I’m glad you’ve been with me for the ride.
A Brief History of Beltaine
In the Celtic lands, Beltaine signaled the beginning of summer, a celebration of fertility, abundance, and sacred union. Fires were kindled on hilltops across Ireland and Scotland to honour the sun’s growing strength. Cattle were driven between twin bonfires for protection and blessing, and couples leapt the flames together to seal love or ignite passion.
The festival’s name derives from “Bel” or “Belenus,” a god associated with the sun and healing, and “teine,” meaning fire. Beltaine was a time to welcome warmth, vitality, and creative life back into the world.
Beltaine Fire
In the Southern Hemisphere
Here in Australia, we mirror that energy at the opposite time of year, when our landscapes vibrate with life. While the Northern Hemisphere celebrates under May’s soft greens, ours burns gold. Wattles give way to bottlebrush, and the air begins to taste of summer storms. We light our symbolic fires not to chase away the cold, but to honour the rising sun within and around us.
Flowering Gum
Beltaine is not just a date on the wheel, it’s a feeling.
It’s the season when everything swells with potential. Ideas, projects, emotions, all of it wants to move, to bloom, to be expressed. It’s that restless creative pulse that won’t sit quietly anymore.
Beltaine feels like honey on skin, laughter spilling through open windows, music rising from studios and kitchens. It’s the confidence of colour and the audacity of joy. It’s life saying: go on, create anyway.
Other Cultural Celebrations and Observations
Celtic and European Traditions
In Ireland, May Day was the heart of Beltaine festivities, dancing the Maypole, weaving ribbons to honour the spiral of life. Flowers were gathered for crowns and doorways, symbols of fertility and renewal. Dew collected at dawn was said to bring beauty and healing.
In parts of Scotland, people made Bannocks (oat cakes) baked on open flames, offering the first piece to the spirits of nature for protection. In Wales, bonfires crowned the hills, and lovers slipped away into the woods to “go a-Maying.”
Maypole
Other Countries
Across Europe, echoes of Beltaine appear in spring festivals from Germany’s Walpurgisnacht (April 30) to the floral rites of Greece and Italy. Each holds that same heartbeat, celebrating the earth’s aliveness and the sacred marriage of opposites: sun and soil, body and spirit, creation and destruction.'
Walpurgisnacht fire dancing
Kulin Nations – Southeastern Australia, including Naarm
In the Kulin Nations’ seasonal calendar, this time of year is known as Buarth Gurru, the Season of Grass Flowering. The weather is warming, but the rains still visit. Kangaroo Grass begins to flower, and Buliyong (bats) swoop at dusk to feed on insects in the thickening air.
It’s a time of abundance and preparation, when the land hums with renewal. Country is alive, flowering, feeding, buzzing, reminding us that growth is not just about fire and sun, but also about the rhythms of rain and rest that sustain it.
You can learn more about the Kulin Nation seasonal cycle through the Royal Society of Victoria:
While the languages and practices vary across the five Kulin Nations, the rhythm of care for Country, seasonal observation, and reciprocity remain central. As we honour Beltaine, we can also acknowledge these deep, continuous relationships with land and season, holding both stories in our celebration.
A Fire Spell for Becoming
You don’t need a bonfire on a hilltop to honour Beltaine’s flame.
This simple ritual invites you to work with the element of fire in a gentle, accessible way, perfect for all levels of mobility and energy.
You’ll need:
A candle (or electric tealight if open flame isn’t possible)
A ribbon or thread in a colour that speaks to you
A small object from your creative space—a paintbrush, pen, feather, bead, or charm
A quiet moment and a willingness to listen
How to Begin:
Set your space.
Sit comfortably. Light your candle (or turn on your light). Take three slow breaths and feel your body soften.
Call the flame.
Gaze into the light. Notice how it moves, never still, never rigid. Let it remind you of your own creative pulse: alive, changing, impossible to hold too tightly.
Weave intention.
Hold your ribbon or thread and ask yourself, “What am I ready to bring into form?”
As you tie knots or wrap it gently around your chosen object, whisper your intentions. Each knot seals a promise, to nurture your spark, to create from truth, to honour the fire within.
Close the circle.
Place the ribbon near your candle or on your altar. Let it stay there through the Beltaine season as a quiet reminder that creation doesn’t need to be rushed, just tended.
Ribbons and Candle for a Fire Spell
Modern Ways to Celebrate
Decorate your home or altar with flowers, candles, and symbols of union, sun and moon, red and white, flame and water.
Dance, stretch, or move your body in any way that feels freeing.
Write a love letter to your creative self, the part that dares to make beauty even when it hurts.
Spend time in nature: touch bark, feel petals, notice the hum of bees.
Make or gift something handmade, creativity shared is Beltaine’s truest magic.
Share a meal with loved ones or simply light a candle and whisper gratitude for warmth, colour, and connection.
Foods and Feasts
Traditionally, Beltaine feasts celebrated the abundance of the land, fresh dairy, honey, breads, fruits, and greens. Oatcakes, custards, and floral syrups featured heavily, symbolising sweetness and fertility.
Libations and Offerings
Mead, cider, and herbal wines were poured to honour the spirits of the land. Milk and honey were left at thresholds or under trees as offerings for protection and blessing.
A Note for Australia
Our seasons differ, and so do our harvests. Instead of apples or mead, we might offer local honey, native herbs, or seasonal fruit. Use what’s abundant around you, lemons, passionfruit, strawberries, or native flowers. Honouring Beltaine here is about celebrating our spring’s fullness, not copying another’s.
Simple Recipe:
Honey, Lemon & Wattleflower Shortbread - A little golden biscuit to capture Beltaine’s light.
Ingredients:
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
½ cup caster sugar
2 tbsp honey (local if you can)
Zest of 1 lemon
2 cups plain flour
1 tbsp dried edible wattleflower or lavender
Method:
Preheat oven to 160°C. Line a tray with baking paper.
Cream butter, sugar, honey, and lemon zest until light.
Fold through flour and wattleflower until a dough forms.
Roll into small rounds, flatten slightly, and bake 15–20 minutes or until golden.
Cool on a rack. Best enjoyed with sunlight and good company.
Honey, Lemon & Wattleflower Shortbread
Locally Inspired Feast Ideas
Celebrate the turning wheel with ingredients native or local to your region.
Grilled peach and halloumi salad with native mint dressing
Roast pumpkin with wattleseed dukkha
Lemon myrtle panna cotta
Native honey and rosemary spritz (sparkling water, honey syrup, rosemary, and lemon)
A gentle reminder:
This feast doesn’t have to be complicated or exhausting. It’s about savouring what’s in season and giving thanks for abundance, not perfection.
Art Journal Prompt
What within you is ready to bloom and what must be released so it can?
Create a page that honours both. Use warm colours, layered textures, and maybe even a touch of gold. Let your marks move like flame, fluid, untamed, alive.
Art Witch Desk with open Art Journal
Oracle Insights: The Flower Spread
For this Beltaine, try this gentle flower spread, a bloom of insight rooted in intention. Lay your cards in a flower shape, with one at the centre and one at the base as the stem.
You’ll pull 7 cards total.
Card 1 – Stem / Root (placed below the flower):
What grounds me right now?
This is the base you’re growing from. Your current anchor, your stability, or the thing keeping you connected to yourself.
Card 2 – Bottom Left Petal:
What unseen or inner force is quietly supporting my growth?
This is energy you might not be naming yet, but it’s there, feeding you.
Card 3 – Bottom Right Petal:
What needs gentle care or protection as I grow?
This is where you’re still tender. It can point to a boundary you need, a pace you need to honour, or a part of you that doesn’t want to be pushed.
Card 4 – Left Petal:
What lessons or experiences from the past are feeding this moment?
What you’ve already lived through that is now acting like compost.
Card 5 – Right Petal:
What is currently in bloom?
What is already here, already alive, already happening — even if you’re downplaying it.
Card 6 – Top Petal:
What is ready to open next?
Where this energy wants to go. The direction of growth.
Card 7 – Centre of the Flower (final card placed in the middle):
What is at the heart of my becoming?
Core desire. Core truth. Core fire.
When you read the spread, notice the relationship between the stem and the petals. How well is what you’re grounded in, (Card 1), actually supporting what wants to bloom (Cards 5 and 6)? Does something in the Bottom Right Petal, (Card 3), the part that needs care, line up with what the Centre (Card 7) is asking for?
You can photograph or sketch your layout and paste it straight into your art journal. This becomes a seasonal self-portrait.
Beltaine Oracle Insights - Flower Spread
Playlist for the Season
Let the music carry that mix of witchy, warmth, sensuality, and creative release. Think soft guitar, earthy percussion, golden-hour moods, songs that make you want to move, paint, or simply exist in sunlight.
Closing the Circle
Beltaine reminds us that creativity is a living fire; it needs tending but not taming. As the wheel turns and this series comes full circle, may your own fire burn steady and kind.
Thank you for travelling through the seasons with me, from the dark of Samhain, the heat of Litha, to this bright, blossoming edge of summer. May your art, your heart, and your magic continue to grow wild.
Until next turn,
Some of the images used in this post are AI generated and were created by me to support accessibility and my creative process as a disabled artist.