Ashes to ashes and dust to dust.
Birth and death are the only sure things in this beautiful, brutal world of ours and the best we can do is make the space between memorable.
In the words of Cancer author and cultural critic Hunter S. Thompson who lived by his own rules and died by his own hand, “Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!”
In celebration of that joy ride and in respect to our universal, inevitable demise, we bring you a list of probable causes of death for each sign in the zodiac.
This guide is meant to be satirical and is intended for entertainment purposes only.
Read on and live long.
This fire sign dies by swinging a baseball bat so hard they rupture their internal organs a la Aries slugger Jim Creighton, who hit a home run that sent him straight into the dirt. This sign is hard pressed to ignore a dare or pass up a wager as was the case for probable ram Sergey Tuganov who suffered a fatal heart attack after betting a pal 4K he could have sex for twelve hours straight. The nail in his coffin was a combination of coital cardio and the consequence of consuming an entire bottle of Viagra.
Taurus is the kind of sign that accidentally asphyxiates in a bag of chips or dies falling out of bed. Gluttony is the favorite sin of this herd, a fact made manifest in regal, champagne swigging, pastry loving bull King Adolf Fredrick of Sweden who legitimately ate himself to death on Mardi Gras in 1771.
Easily distracted and absolutely scatterbrained, Gemini dies while multitasking; attempting to text their ex, change the radio station, curl their eyelashes and crush up an Adderall all while operating a motor vehicle.
Often up in their feels and unable to express the scope of their despair, Cancer is killed by the crushing weight of their accumulated emotional baggage, unpaid parking tickets, tattered stuffed animals, sweater collection and mountain of unmet expectations.
Leo is the sort to fall to their deaths while attempting to take a tasteful nude on a balcony. Rulers of the fifth house of fun, there’s a high chance they will dance themselves into the grave like the denizens of Strasbourg did in the year of our lord 1518. In what is perhaps the most leonine death of all time, Jamaican activist and apex Leo Marcus Garvey died from a stroke after reading his own inaccurate and prematurely published obituary.
Perennially let down by their fellow man and ever caught between wanting to help and wanting to retreat, Virgo eventually dies of boredom, falls out of a tree or chokes to death on an herbal supplements and/or their own bitter disappointments.
A veritable gaggle of noxious flirts, notorious f**k bois and vain libertines, Libra is killed by the jealous wife/husband of their lover, untreated syphilis or complications from botched plastic surgery. Ruled by Venus, planet of love and luxury, it tracks that Libra George Plantagenet, when given the chance to choose his manner of execution, opted, quite poetically, to drown in a barrel of malmsey wine. Big ups to GP for being the rare sort of Libra capable of making a decision.
This is a trick question as a Scorpio never truly dies but instead lives on in the grudges they hold, hexes they hurl and curses they carry. Power players, practitioners of witchcraft and rulers of the eighth house of sex, death and other people’s money, this is the sign most likely to fake their own death and/or get away with murder.
Ever trying to have a good time all of the time and never wanting the party to end nor the music to stop, Sagittarius is killed by an errant champagne cork, dies laughing at their own or suffocates in a partially deflated bouncy house.
Industrious, punishing and concerned with gains, capital and otherwise, Capricorn is either crushed to death by a dropped bar bell, dies masturbating to a mattress covered in money, is killed by a dominatrix they tried to short change or murdered by a mob of disgruntled workers.
Because Aquarius is more alien than human, more mind than heart it takes a hello of a lot of effort to kill one. Consider Aquarius Gary Hoy, who, in typical fixed sign fashion, died while trying to prove a point or wicked eyed water bearer/wizard Gregor Rasputin who was poisoned, shot in the head, repeatedly bludgeoned and castrated before ultimately drowning in a frozen river. His pickled d**k is now the stuff of folk legend, revered for its ability to miraculously cure blindness and accurately predict .
Excruciatingly sensitive, enamored by escape and swinging wildly between absolute empathy and utter nihilism, Pisces, subsisting on little more than seawater and ether, dies of ennui or drowns in the bathtub.
Astrology 101: Your guide to the stars
Astrologer Reda Wigle researches and irreverently reports back on planetary configurations and their effect on each zodiac sign. Her horoscopes integrate history, poetry, pop culture and personal experience. She is also an accomplished writer who has profiled a variety of artists and performers, as well as extensively chronicled her experiences while traveling. Among the many intriguing topics she has tackled are cemetery etiquette, her love for dive bars, Cuban Airbnbs, a “girls guide” to strip clubs and the “weirdest” foods available abroad.