When we look to the Moon for symbolism we will always find our most familiar rhythms – the protection we give; the protection we get; our bodies; our gut responses; the monotonous miracles that build our personal tapestries of instinct and need.
The Moon in Sagittarius wants to expand. “Up and out” feels righteous and normal but Mars and Neptune spiral and dissolve some of the meaningful action. We can be lost in the Gemini story where we’re fragmented into unbelievable contradictory narratives. We can be caught up in the unity of certain purpose. Take your lock-box of personal truth and be willing to add in some knowledge.
Society’s weight grows beyond the painful fulcrum of its usual anchors: the exploitation and disregard for Black bodies, hearts, and minds. There are so many things to learn. White rage does its best to stoke the fire’s of its own warped fears and we see it: lined up and arrayed in full narcotic death-cult costume, protecting wrongness. The bravado of this Moon is tainted.
Trauma digs in here, in the patterns of the body. Eclipses take the Moon’s potent ability to affect matter and they use it to their own end. Protect your mind this afternoon. Find “Ketu” mantras on YouTube and play them in your earbuds. Do the deep breathing you keep telling others to do. Alcohol doesn’t mix well with Ketu eclipses. Protect your body. Hold your belly.
Eclipses have their own birth charts with cycles so much longer than a human life. In spring of 1966 we also had this series of eclipses. They check the dilation of the cultural cervix, blocking what should be ready for transition. The protests against Vietnam had begun by that point. The Black Panther Party was gestating the 10 Point Program; they were founded officially just in time for the next eclipse season.
The blockages inherent in this present moment remind us of what was blocked, revoked, stolen in the past. Be the black cohosh to dilate that womb open anyway. Be the castor oil to rumble the belly into letting go.
If you’re just joining the mass grieving process now, take a seat in the way way way back and spread your tiny prayers. Be small. You’re late. Give a shit about imprisoned youth and understand what Project NIA means by “community over confinement”. Support MD 150. Learn from apocalypse with “grace, curiosity and rigor” with How to Survive the End of the World show and follow up on the resources they offer.
This is a more astrologically extreme time than the 1960s. The longer planetary cycles place us deep into widescale rejection of structures that have been prioritized for the last 238 years, since the first Military schools were inaugurated in the United States.
We expect to see the hand of fate, the path laid out in felt unease; in pushes and pulls. But with this first eclipse we’re just squinting, trying to bring the possible new worlds into focus. The solar eclipse on Solstice will bring the whole doorway.
The collective horses are milling about, circling the falling empire, trying to map the many precarious paths to a different world, and each carries a precious cargo. There are seeds that must be planted – the intersection of Black love and Black justice sounds the wisdom bell and Venus returns from the underworld, done with the illusory trappings of status.
The competing narratives are impacting me too. I feel the eclipse window coming and I’m already sure I’ve typed too many words. Be well out there.