Begone, Blockage and Stasis!

One of the most befuddling and irritating phenomena of recent developments is the inexplicable inertia that has captured humanity despite situations that seem, on paper, to guarantee dynamism and volatility. Contrary various doomsayers, soothsayers, and terminally online wastrels, the institutions that define modern life haven’t crumbled in spectacular fashion; instead, they’ve been hollowed out and made into puppet shows. Bad puppet shows, the kind that lack scripts and sober employees. Our pessimism (and by our pessimism, I am referring to everyone on the planet who isn’t a pedophilic billionaire vampire or one of their thralls) is surely understandable when we consider the trajectory of the last decade or so. Now that we’re almost to the halfway point of this foul year of your lord 2026, let’s give ourselves a headache and recap.

A mobster whose favorite pastime was starring in a reality television show captured the government of the most heavily armed nation in the world, and no one did anything about it. In fact, they did so little about it that after he was ‘voted’ out, he was promptly ‘voted’ right back in, even after the world discovered his predilection for sexual assault of both adults and children. Economic developments not entirely unrelated to a government-sponsored sex trafficking and black mail operation have stratified wealth more extremely than it was during The Gilded Age, and our new, algorithmic robber barons are gleefully ushering things along. Consequently, material inequality has sky rocketed, as it often does when petty dictators are in power, but the barons have thus far run successful Hail Mary plays whenever collective vibes start to lean toward guillotines and guns. Look, everybody…aliens!

Israel’s genocidal mania is rippling outward from Gaza into Lebanon amidst a truly stupid war with Iran, the consequences of which the West has barely begun to feel because, when we do feel it, oh lord, and I am talking to any lord that decides to answer, we are really going to feel it. Over promising and under-delivering AI ‘innovation*’ is scaffolding a U.S. stock market that has been vacillating unhealthily for several years, and the fields of science, journalism, government, and tech continue to hemorrhage people and positions while the party line of the ruling class is, “Recession? What recession? Would we have all this bunker money if we were in a recession?!” The current timeline feels like we’re playing Dungeons and Dragons™ in The Upside Down, using an infinitely-sided die from hell that ensures every roll will introduce uniquely evil, face melting, dark mage bullshit. With bad hair.

*AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Despite all of this, Western society remains locked in the behavioral patterns of yore. We are getting behind on credit card payments, commuting to work, paying $9 for one tomato, and keeping on keeping on. We do this while concentration camps facilitate child rape and torture, disappear the ‘wrong sorts’ of people and citizens are beaten or shot if they dare to notice, yet only in quiet pockets of conversation is bewilderment voiced; not at the way things have changed, but the unsettling ways that they haven’t.

We should probably be careful what we wish for.

The full moon, pointing her ring light at us from Sagittarius on May 31st, exposed our inertia and frustration. Sagittarius is a place that churns with activity and never stops, expanding physical and intellectual horizons at the behest of its ruler, Jupiter, and it is Jupiter who is signaling an end to stasis. Zeus’ planetary avatar has been transiting Cancer, the place of his exaltation, for the past year, and that beneficial placement has softened a lot of gnarly 2026 astrology. This was softening, Cranky!? Oh my yes, yes it was. Various planetary configurations involving Mars, Saturn, and Pluto, horsemen of the non-biblical apocalypse, have historically high casualties when they play together. The aspects they formed in early 2026 were a bit lighter, devastation-wise, than they’ve been in the past thanks, in part, to Jupiter. So it’s almost as if this moon, a powerful moment of mutual reception, was a farewell kiss between Selene and Zeus; it’s been fun, a lovely little reprieve, but I suppose we better get on with it, they seem to be saying. So what is the ‘it’ we need to get on with?

Action, swiftness, fortitude, and progress; these all describe the decans where Jupiter’s moon perfected at nine degrees and some change of Sagittarius, which corresponds with the Eight and Nine of Wands. Those are the fiery, minor arcana of tarot that indicate it’s time to stop fucking around. No more waiting, no more restriction, and no more stasis. After the icy stillness of Scorpio, Sagittarius comes in like a horse kicking down the barn door and says, Go. Get the show on the road. Jupiter is also getting an assist, of sorts, from Uranus, who is throwing his weight around Gemini, the sign directly opposing Sagittarius, suggesting that the entire mutable axis between The Archer and The Twins holds a clue about where all this imminent acceleration will take us. Sagittarius puts things together and holds space for optimism, but Gemini breaks things apart and reserves the right to skepticism; the houses they occupy in a chart reveal where tension will wax and wane over the next six months, until December’s new moon in Sagittarius.

We can delineate the U.S. natal chart as an example; The United States, a Sagittarius rising, experienced this lunar illumination in her first house. This suggests that a stalled expansion is finally getting under way in the character of the nation and citizenry, thanks to Luna revving engines in Jupiter’s fiery domicile. She also directed a spotlight at places of social cohesion that are fracturing and reforming, much of it happening as a result of disruption in our country’s seventh house (Gemini) of close allies. Jupiter values coalescence, but Mercury’s air domicile disarticulates things as a rule, and that’s where Uranus, god of sociopathic tech bros, has been upending the status quo when it comes to foreign relations. So, the character of our nation—the way our allies perceive us, the views of the citizenry, etc., could either fracture or gel into something new as a response to unexpected changes with close allies.

Will this lead to good things? That’s a question with various possible answers depending on whether the circumstances are personal or collective. It would be nice to think cohesion of any kind might be good for ‘Murica, but plenty of stuff that infiltrates our zeitgeist is objectively not good for the state of a nation; xenophobia, moral panics, and sweeping obedience to crazy plutocrats are just a few examples.

On the flip side, an increasing number of people seem to be reckoning with the true character of their country, despite ongoing social fracturing. In an optimistic scenario, skepticism could grow among those who once believed propaganda masked as history until their eyes and ears betrayed them. Sometimes present-day revelations prompt us to work backwards to glean the truth of things, which is how we come to find that the sociopath in charge of 2026 is a direct result of the sociopath that was in charge of 1776, down to pulling the teeth of their victims. Do Americans have the capacity to be honest about the kind of country this has always been? (And let’s be real, it is white America that needs to internalize the truth of this place. Everybody else figured it out an embarrassingly long time ago. There was a Childish Gambino song about it and everything.)

The personal astrology of this axis between Jupiter, Mercury, Sagittarius and Gemini feels far more productive. A generous read on our strange passivity is one that takes human psychology into consideration and points to people’s need to grieve a loss of normalcy and precedent, even when that normalcy was a lie. Hell, especially when that normalcy was a lie, because if we knew it was all bullshit, we wouldn’t be sad in the first place.

Maybe it has taken this long to rouse ourselves to action because the sheer amount of upheaval has overwhelmed our synapses and forced us into stock stillness, like rabbits on a busy road. May’s full moon was our bleeding-heart motorist, then, jumping out of a car with the high beams on to shoo us into action with a good natured Go on! Git! Jupiter is telling us, through the moon, that we must expand, shift, and coalesce around a new philosophy because an epic fracturing is on its way. Uranus is the truck that will break us apart once he reaches us, lapping up the miles in Gemini as he picks up speed. Let’s see what we can do in the Sagittarius part of our charts to avoid getting run over.

The following horoscopes will resonate for the rest of this lunar cycle and over the next six months more broadly, though I expect the first major point of clarity or escalation on this axis to occur around July 4th, 2026, when Uranus and Mars form a conjunction in Gemini. Mars will be co-present with Uranus in Gemini throughout all of July until August 11th, so the friction discussed in the following horoscopes has a whole ass summer to pop off! Another hot spot for the Gemini/Sagittarius axis will engage around July 17th, 2026, when Uranus and Pluto form a trine between Gemini and Aquarius, respectively, turning up the volume on themes of dismantlement, group think, and existential crisis. As unpleasant as that sounds, outer planet nonsense is usually collective, not personal, and the volume will be loudest for the mutable signs of Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, and Pisces.

Hellenistic horoscopes manifest most accurately by rising sign, but you can read some combination of ASC, Sun, or Moon if, like me, you loathe others telling you what to do.

Aries

Unstick The Ninth House/Dismantle The Third House

Rams always mean to follow through on grand, bold plans for world domination, but intricate prep work has never been a strong suit of this archetype; Aries people are more of a punch first, think about prison later sort of folk. It’s likely that the denizens of Mars’ masculine domicile have some really great ideas and dreams that they’ve been sitting on for many months, though, and have yet to actualize. This isn’t down to laziness, Aries - it was a pisser of massive proportions to have Saturn, Neptune, and Mars setting off bombs in your first house this winter, the result of which was restriction, delusion, conflict, and sickness. That shit could keep a Capricorn from being industrious, which is no mean feat. Your fellow fire sign is riding to the rescue in the realm of education and expansion, which means any secondary studies you’ve put off can finally bogart your attention as obstacles start to fall away. Tell your inertia to shove it and take the class, read the books, and commit to gaining new knowledge, whether that is through internal consciousness or external travel. Travel, education, and legal proceedings that have been nibbling at the edges of your life can be delayed no longer, so sally forth. This is the kind of lunation Aries lives for; the kind that gives your spark permission to start a fire.

Taurus

Unstick The Eighth House/Dismantle The Second House

Mars is currently putting you through the wringer, Taurus, but, believe it or not, our most recent bout of lunar acceleration might improve things. Conflict and illness courtesy of that little red bastard in your first house likely shortened the fuse of your patience and made you more amenable to change than usual. This is actually a positive development for an archetype that resists disrupting their routine of sitting in the garden, then sitting on the couch, then having an expensive snack, then sitting in the garden again, even if said disruption is the elimination of unsavory contracts and karmic attachments. It’s time to cut ties with old commitments, beautiful Bull, and that could be any old attachment that no longer serves you; perhaps finalizing a divorce settlement, breaking a shitty lease, or telling problematic relatives that you don’t care about the inheritance as long as you don’t see or hear from them ever again. Your spouse might also experience Uranian upset in matters of career or finance that changes your own relationship to money, promoting total reinvention in the way you make a living. Normally, the words ‘total reinvention’ are enough to send Taurus into a cold sweat, unless said reinvention could increase material comfort and security. Oh, now you’re listening.

Gemini

Unstick The Seventh House/Dismantle The First House

Believe it or not, Gemini, there are relationships that exist outside of the one you have with your chatty alter ego, and that is where this galvanizing lunation has aimed its flood light. Uranus is lending oomph to your desire for change as he haphazardly unplugs devices in your first house of self, so it’s natural for tension to creep toward the opposing axis. Paired Gemini may have recognized a relationship road block a while back that their astrological ADHD prevented them from addressing, but that is likely to increase in volume over the next two weeks, to the point that it drowns out all other narration. Solo Gemini are gaining important clarity about needs, both in and outside of partnership, as they expand interpersonal expectations. Let’s be real, though, this is mostly about you; your hang-ups, your inability to narrow focus, your conversational quirks, and your shadows. Uranus, the loose cannon big brother to your ruler, Mercury, is upending your identity and smashing precedent. If you aren’t who you thought you were, Gemini, it follows that your partnerships aren’t what you thought they were, either. That doesn’t have to be a bad thing, but it could require you to embrace a new modus operandi in the way you connect, or don’t, with others.

Cancer

Unstick The Sixth House/Dismantle The Twelfth House

Whatever is making the inside of your head feel weird and unstable is having an effect on other parts of your life, Cancer; specifically, the really crappy parts that involve cleaning your house, working a job, and the general daily slog. It’s understandable if those tasks are too much when you are ill in any capacity, but change waits for no Crab, and your ruler is guiding you to push through the stasis in your house of service. How does the moon get your attention in Sagittarius? Well, she might re-ignite enjoyment that you once had in a job, domestic task, or caretaking project by changing up location and participants, for instance, or you might get an opportunity to take on work you enjoy that also benefits other people, and I know you love that, Cancer. It’s also possible that Uranus has dismantled something in your world view or brought about unexpected confinement that is forcing expansion in daily routines. Either way, internal upheaval is in dialogue with your external, physical self and the way you show up for what must be done, often in service to others. This could be a good thing, especially if you’ve been meaning to change jobs, adopt a cat, or take on volunteer work; anything that re-energizes your daily slog will get a nice boost in the butt. Or shell. Butt-shell.

Leo

Unstick The Fifth House/DismantleThe Eleventh House

The moon is shining her light on all the things that fill Leo with zesty joy, and the spots she’s directing you to examine may have some surprises in store. Uranus has begun his cool guy disruptor tour through your house of friends and alliances, so it’s possible you’ve started aligning yourself with new, somewhat eccentric social circles. (Guild of Fire Eaters and Sword Swallowers, anyone?) This naturally intersects with your creative output and interests, which are expanding and shifting in dialogue with changes in chosen associates. Maybe you really did meet some fire eaters lately and think, hey, I might really kick-ass at fire eating, hand me that lighter fluid? Leo tends to align their creative, extracurricular joy with an audience in mind, because everyone is a potential audience to the charismatic feline, which makes Leo’s fifth/eleventh house connection particularly loud. Very often, our friends are also our audience, because who else shows up to watch you bang a guitar on the PBR-soaked floor of a dive bar? The thing is, your Fire Eater friends would rather be doing circus tricks at a night market than stuck in a watering hole, so it’s natural for Leo to expand their creative output accordingly.

Virgo

Unstick The Fourth House/Dismantle The Tenth House

This lunation is turning up the volume on Virgo’s domestic and professional life, and - as is typical of mutable signs, the exchange is fluid in a way that makes pinpointing the place of initiation difficult. So what’s been happening, lovely Maidens? Has Uranus upended your professional or public trajectory in a way that is greasing the wheels for changes at home? This might include anything from job loss that necessitates a cheaper living situation to a new professional opportunity that requires long distance relocation. The sticky point in Luna’s spotlight could also involve domestic relationships that need to shift in response to professional disruptions, particularly if there are lawyers or lawyer adjacent people in Virgo’s home. (Virgos often have legal eagles in the family, courtesy of a Jupiter-ruled house of ancestry. No wonder y’all are so nit-picky.) Additions to living situations, like picking up an extra roommate to save on rent or moving in with family, may feel precarious at first, but the Sagittarius moon is a consummate optimist. Additions to your living situation could bring positive benefits throughout the summer, in ways you never anticipated.

Libra

Unstick The Third House/Dismantle The Ninth House

This lunation is quieter for you, Libra, but there are still lessons to glean. Unique changes in secondary education, travel opportunities, and the way you build knowledge, generally, are gathering momentum as Uranus smashes through things in your ninth house, which might be contributing to issues this moon is illuminating closer to home. The spotlight shining on your neighborhood, daily interactions, and local travel could reinvigorate a desire to explore the places often thought as mundane, but that contribute greatly to our wellbeing. Chatting with the barista matters, as does waving at the crossing guard, bike riding with neighbors, and exploring your little corner of the world in the same way you may dream of exploring Paris, Switzerland, or whatever far flung vista your beautiful heart desires. Aspects of your exploration house that have been disrupted—planned foreign travel, lengthy formal studies, etc., might be what catalyzes a newfound interest in activity closer to home. Local gatherings can be just as stimulating as exotic sight-seeing, it turns out.

Scorpio

Unstick The Second House/Dismantle the Eighth House

Scorpio doesn’t take collaboration or attachment lightly; like swans, Scorpio prefers to mate for life, and by that they typically mean the end of the other person’s, not their own. (I suppose a Scorpio isn’t much like a swan in any other regard, unless swans have mutated to attack betrayers with deadly poison and fatal stingers.) An unexpected development in contractual attachments like business partnerships, association commitments, and pooled resources has had you pondering a new approach to wealth acquisition, and this lunation could burn through your inertia and set you to taking action. Arachnids don’t need to change their money-making game entirely; in fact, your best bet is to build on an idea you’ve implemented in the past at some point, utilizing Jupiter’s knack for making existing paradigms bigger, better, and luckier. Yes, you might be separating from an old connection, but if anyone can work with diabolically abrupt transitions, it’s Scorpio.

Sagittarius

Unstick The First House/Dismantle The Seventh House

Changes in relationships have led to a mild identity crisis for many denizens in Jupiter’s fiery domicile, but, really, Sag, who hasn’t encountered that at one point or another? Uranus is doing his irritating thing in your house of close relations, and unexpected disruption between close friends or a spouse could work alongside Luna to draw you deeper into your own identity; health, appearance, and foundational ideology. A fight, separation, or formal change in relationship status may galvanize Sagittarius to add stimulating layers to their life, and person in the form of new skills, alterations to appearance, or expansion of deeply held ideologies. Any revelations prompted by relationship fuckery are about to manifest fast and furious, as a quick glance at the U.S. chart demonstrates. So who are you, really, Sagittarius, and what have you been slow walking when it comes to individuation? The Archer loves a conquest and often feeds their excitement jones through connection with others, but Luna just pointed out the truth that Sagittarius often ignores; you can’t solely rely on others to provide chaotic/good fun. Some of it has to come from you, too.

Capricorn

Unstick The Twelfth House/Dismantle The Sixth House

Unexpected changes in Capricorn’s daily routines—job, appointments, chores, etc.— are giving you time to marinate on the esoteric, psychological elements in your consciousness, and while it might not be especially loud, Capricorn could notice it in dreams and other quiet moments. Oh, you don’t allow for quiet moments? No shit, you insane, overachieving Sea Goat. This lunation is highlighting parts of life that you are amazing at ignoring like mental health, subconscious desires and restrictions, and yes, the significance of dreams both nocturnal and diurnal. Saturn’s goatish children love a routine, and when those get upended it fucks with your focus. Maybe your work schedule has been flipped on its head, or care giving tasks have unexpectedly multiplied now that your Aunt Irma had a hip-replacement, or your neighbor dropped off her cat for a weekend getaway and never came back to get him. Now you have a cat, but it’s not the end of the world! In fact, you can use this opportunity to be just as productive and focused in therapy, dreams, and the veterinarian’s office as you are with everything else.

Aquarius

Unstick The Eleventh House/Dismantle The Fifth House

Much like your polarity (sunny, extroverted Leo,) abrupt transitions in creative endeavors, hobbies, or children are prompting a deep dive into your social circles near and far. Perhaps it’s just dawned on Water-Bearers that there are other people who share your passions, and maybe—hear me out, now—you should hang out with them. Aquarius is often drawn to circles whose participants think big and take action, but you don’t usually desire intense, one on one time with individuals. That’s changing thanks to Luna’s May MagLight™, and you’ll realize that shallow associations don’t quite cut it anymore. This new, expansive attitude could lead Aquarius to bring newcomers into an existing social circle, or it might shine light on current connections in a way that makes knowing more about the people, the cause, or the ideology desirable and exciting. If the Uranian change in your fifth house involved children, an urgent need to join parent groups and play date pods could be actualized over the next two weeks. Conversely, Aquarians whose kiddos have left the nest might rediscover social groups that they haven’t had time for in about eighteen years, igniting extracurricular interests and and a totally out-of-character desire to engage with others.

Pisces

Unstick The Tenth House/Dismantle The Fourth House

It’s possible you have new, exciting digs in which to lay your head, gentle Fish, so congratulations are in order, even if the change occurred in an unexpected or abrupt fashion. Pisces might also be experiencing a series of shocks involving the people living at home, and that connects somehow with momentum finally building in your career and public profile. Whatever happened at home is contributing to a desire for professional momentum, or vice versa; it’s difficult to tell where action verses reaction occurs with mutable signs because guys constantly vacillate, like bioluminescent, deep sea creatures. Something about your public self requires expansion and increased cohesion at the same time your house of roots, home, and ancestors is actively growing and changing. Mundane consequences of Uranus in the fourth house could include structural upheaval with your physical domicile or emotional friction with family or others with whom you cohabitate, but those developments might also be connected to fruitful professional growth. Use this summer to your advantage, Pisces, and you might end up feeling irritatingly adult.

Like The Old Mountain Dew Ads, We’re Getting Extreme

After the crucible of April, the last thing we all need is for everybody and their brother to be on some bullshit. Unfortunately, after revisiting a few older papers I wrote on Imperial Rome, I can confirm that the only thing dying empires have in abundance are the last things any citizen needs; billionaires, literal garbage, illness, crumbling infrastructure, war, and yes, heaps of bullshit. It hasn’t gotten high enough to suffocate us in the stench, yet, but these things take time; Rome’s slow decay unfurled over a century. We’ll know it’s time to flee when our neighborhoods are overrun with Visigoths and prisons switch from lethal injection to crucifixion as a way to save drug costs. If that sounds hyperbolic, consider the salad days of 2024, when the idea of an American Gestapo shooting protesters in the street just because they felt like it seemed hysterical, and liberal centrists verbalized as much to any cowardly asshat who might buy it. Holy shit, were they wrong. The psychotic machinery of ruling class America has proven time and again that when it wants to kill you, you will be killed and you will stay dead, son of god be damned. I mean, a resurrection? In this economy?!

Collective astrology has been astrology-ing into remarkably swift manifestation. An insanely confrontational quad conjunction between Mercury, Mars, Saturn, and the Sun began around April 9th, which is also when the leader of Earth’s most armed nation posted a public message about annihilating an entire civilization. The restriction of Saturn swiftly tamped down any action, though, and news reports could barely keep up with the hesitant two-step the U.S. government has been conflating with strategy, announcing genocidal intent on a Friday afternoon only to mutter about ceasefires on Monday morning. Like one does, when one is a narcissistic dementia patient whose handlers have convinced him that the White House is just the new set of The Apprentice. By April 19th, the frustration of Mars and Saturn together was in full swing and everyone was pissed. It felt like the economy should have crashed, but somehow it didn’t. Logistically, we expected a dramatic oil shock in North America that still hasn’t manifested in any way other than elevated pricing, which is disconcerting when the facts on the ground align more closely with dystopian fiction than run-of-the-mill recession. Instead of active war, we exist in a state of paralyzed dread. Instead of The Road, we’re stuck at Don’t Look Up. The most egregious manifestation of this stop/start/Saturn/Mars frustration came on April 25th, when another credentialed, young, male normie shot at the cretin responsible for our looming supply chain catastrophe and - I can’t believe I’m saying this - he missed. Yes, again.

There is no better allegory for the complete frustration, angry stasis, and unproductive violence of a Mars/Saturn conjunction in Aries than a third, THIRD failed assassination attempt on a President of the United States by a man who, on paper, seems like he’d know more effective strategies for taking down a tyrant than barreling through a hotel like a rhinoceros and shooting madly at the air. Mars lent his destructive energy to April and the Sun was ready to sacrifice a patriarch or two, but Saturn spoke to the American people through the secret service, apparently, and put an end to the martial fun before it began. Neptune, i.e. the Father John Misty of planets, is likely responsible for the delusions of both the attendees and the young man in question, resulting in a melee that was shameful for everyone involved, from the corporate media to the chivalrous men of the Trump regime*. Ah, April. You will not be missed.

*Honorable mention goes to Kash Patel’s pleasegoddon’tletmepuke eyes at the press conference while Todd Blanche, i.e. Temu Tommy Lee Jones, was speaking.

Once our Sun abandoned the war mongering of Aries to roll around in the Venusian pastures of Taurus, the universe presented us with a gift of painful, emotional clarity in the form of a Scorpio full moon. Excellent, one might think to themselves, emotional clarity is exactly what the doctor ordered for navigating this shit show…which would be true if this emotional clarity coincided with a Virgo moon, Libra moon, or some other socially intelligent zodiacal temple, but Scorpio is not that place. It isn’t a place of social stupidity, either - rather, this sign is too intelligent. Creepily so, which makes Arachnidland a place of obsession that can devolve into either homicidal paranoia or virulent loyalty, depending on the weather. Mars’ feminine domicile reflects his complete lack of chill, filled as it is with spyware, red wine, and (probably) the refrigerated corpses of his enemies, which will manifest in us throughout the next fortnight.

To be fair, this isn’t all bad at the personal level. Many clients and friends of mine had very productive changes occur when the Aries conjunctions perfected; they quit jobs they had hated for years, left perennially unhappy relationships, and jumped at chances that cowed them in years past. The rest of this transit might play out similarly for us, depending on individual natal chart variations, because Mars is a combative, productive shot of liquid courage. A break-up is frictional by nature, but the friction is worth it when it leads to a healthier situation afterwards, and the same concept applies to the crescendo of feelings May’s full moon released. Intense emotions often lead to action, and breaking out of this apathetic, saturnian stasis could place us in a better position for progress.

The axis between Taurus and Scorpio is stubborn and karmic; the former is a place of creation and the latter one of destruction, the former focused on gain, the latter on loss. The powerful position of Mars has made both places feel overwhelming, because that’s how Ares rolls; like the girl with the curl in her hair, when he is good he is very very good, and when he is bad he is horrid. Exacerbating the vibe of this martial lunar cycle is a cardinal square between Ares and his dad, Zeus, whose planetary avatar is still exalted in watery Cancer, the place in our charts that will be begging for us to please, chill the fuck out. A compromise must be struck, then, both in our own minds and in the actions of the collective; Mars is our reactive passion, and Jupiter our better angel. Old one-eye isn’t telling Mars he’s wrong, necessarily, he’s just asking him to take a breath and stop scaring the kids. Jupiter believes in conflict resolution through structure, conversation, and goodwill, so we’ll need to balance our intense desire to take action with the downstream effects of such action on friends and family.

These horoscopes are meant as guidance for navigating what will be a very intense next ten days; not physically, but mentally and emotionally. We are going to want to scream, cry, and hit people over the head with hammers, but I have it on good authority that the state will incarcerate you for such things, so approach the following delineations as gentle, loving reminders to relax and talk through building rage before getting wild and crazy in aisle three of the hardware store. As always, these horoscopes are based on the Hellenistic whole sign house system, so your rising sign will be most accurate as far as the area of life this energy will be felt, but you can also read your sun and moon signs if you want to be a stubborn bitch. This stubborn bitch understands.

Aries

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Eighth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Second House

Mars of No Chill in the First House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Fourth House

Luna is eliminating some things in your house of transitions, Aries, which also contains resource extraction completely out of your control, like a spouse losing a job, the government challenging your tax deductions, or an aged relative kicking you off the will. This definitely sucks, but the scorpionic traits of paranoia and suspicion might lead you to overreact and tumble into hysteria. (Aries, over react? Never.) Simultaneously, there is a slow, optimistic build-up in the way you pad out life’s necessary materialism like money, housing, clothing, and weapons. You might be gaining clients steadily, earning consistent brownie points with the boss, getting traction on a side hustle, or creeping closer to a juicy financial windfall; whatever it is, it allows you to balance some of the tension with unforeseen loss. The key to scoring wins on this gain/loss axis will be a sense of restraint. Not easy while Mars is feeding you cocaine in your first house, but if anyone is up for a challenge, it’s Aries. It will also be highly beneficial for you Rams to contain your intensity around friends and family - they’ll actually provide insight and soothe your internal temperature, while simultaneously clarifying the reason you behave the way you do. Families are sneakily insightful like that.

Taurus

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Seventh House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the First House

Mars of No Chill in the Twelfth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Third House

I know Taurus, I know. You’ve only just escaped the high voltage clutches of Uranus in your first house, and now you’ve got surprise issues that need dealing with in a close relationship. Do not despair! Just as you enjoy working slowly and steadily on accumulation, Scorpio takes a glacial approach to release and elimination, so it’s likely this interpersonal friction has needed addressing for a hot minute. Given the physical, mundane associations with Luna and the body parts ruled by Scorpio, you might need to work out some intimacy and trust issues with a spouse or partner. Interestingly, your quality time with Uranus may have catalyzed this relational friction by dismantling outdated beliefs about yourself, thereby changing the kind of partner you want to be. You may also experience some negative self-talk, rage, and doubt in the very back of your psyche thanks to douchebag-du-jour Mars, who is squaring Jupiter from your house of mental health and the unseen. This means you can find succor in your local dive bars, coffee shops, social media penpals, and siblings, biological or otherwise, which dovetails nicely with the domestic vibes of Cancer. Does that mean I can sit in the garden with my sister, drinking margaritas and eating chips, asks hopeful Taurus? Yes, yes it does.

Gemini

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Sixth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Twelfth House

Mars of No Chill in the Eleventh House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Second House

I hope you’re ready for some re-balancing in your mental and physical routines, Twins, because the celestials will have feedback after opposing each other on this axis. Uranus just popped his destabilizing ass into your first house of self, which will be a seven year journey wherein you intermittently mutter whatthefuck? at the parts of you ripe for dismantlement. The last lunation performed recon in those places of transition, and your job, chores, and daily life maintenance are first on the chopping block. Gemini is infamous for analyzing issues to the point of paralysis, often delaying necessary changes in your approach to the mundanity of life, but Mars will be having none of that. Mars thinks your ruling planet is a pussy who talks too much (his words, not mine) and he would like you to stop thinking and just do the damn thing. Hate your job? Quit. Been putting off maintenance appointments? Book them all now. Feeling weak and sedentary? Get out of the house right now and play some tennis or pickleball, which provides the bridge to your next area of discontent; you’re social groups. There is a dialogue happening between your money and your friends, so you’ll be agitating for something new to happen with both. Be very careful, Twins; martial volatility could have you trading regretful communication or reacting quickly and thoughtlessly with your fellowship, threatening valuable connections. Bite your tongue until May 18th.

Cancer

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Fifth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Eleventh House

Mars of No Chill in the Tenth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the First House

Scorpio is a place of examination, and the moon is shining her autopsy lamp on all the places you Cancers get your ya-yas out, which are in the domestic sphere more often than not. Parent Crabs might be sussing out issues or habits with their kiddos that need to end or dramatically transform, and your house of social networks is ready to lend comfort in the form of solar support (Apollo is a big cheerleader.) That could include anything from playdate groups to a local PTA, and the same applies to child-free Cancers; not the kids part, but the balancing act between elimination and accumulation in your houses of fun and large social groups, respectively. Are you even trying to have fun, goddammit? Or is it possible you’ve lost interest in something that hasn’t been vital for a long while? In the same vein, arty Cancers may find themselves dramatically shifting the tone/style/medium of their creative output, or even losing inspiration entirely, which in turn changes the demographics of patrons. Given Jupiter’s position in the sandy beach house of your beautiful self, I’m betting on expanded recognition beyond your current social profile, either because of, or in tandem with, your career.

Leo

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Fourth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Tenth House

Mars of No Chill in the Ninth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Twelfth House

You’re not spending as much time at home as you’d like, Leo, either because work has been absolutely popping off, or because you’re avoiding domestic issues, which could include anything from interpersonal dynamics to actual, physical issues with your domicile, like a remodel, inspection, or roof repair. On a positive note, this Aries energy can be used to power through anything you’ve been putting off around the house or with your family. There will be tension on this axis for the next ten days, so pausing or treading lightly is wise, given how martial the vibes are at this moment. Conversely, your public and professional endeavors are raring to shower you with abundance, so exploit that for all it’s financially worth, as well as the accolades. You love accolades. Just be cautious about getting so pumped that you veer from enthusiasm to egotism, because Jupiter is thundering about your house of secret enemies, and nothing riles them up like seeing you succeed. It’s also possible that an opportunity to grow, spiritually or intellectually, is being thwarted by hidden forces or some kind of confinement, and Mars is going to agitate you until a solution is found.

Virgo

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Third House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Ninth House

Mars of No Chill in the Eighth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Eleventh House

If you’re feeling under siege in your neighborhood or a favorite hang-out spot just closed, you can send your thank-you note to this Scorpio lunation. A light has been shown on something that is either being eliminated or needs to be eliminated, so your local NIMBY’s might be going wild over a homeless shelter, strip club, or some other pearl clutching nonsense. This is all coming from the great yellow orb in your house of education and philosophy, so a new perspective has clued people in to the things that need changing, which, for some people, will involve friends and acquaintances you see regularly. Perhaps a certain corporate owner’s behavior has come to light as unsavory and everyone has joined a boycott, or there is outrage over a new, 18+ business being built too close to an elementary school; whatever it is, try to maintain some sense of perspective about it. Mars is turned up to an eleven in your house of karmic debts and third-party money, creating friction with social groups.

Libra

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Second House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Eighth House

Mars of No Chill in the Seventh House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Tenth House

You might be a bit anxious about your finances at the moment, Libra, and the possibilities are myriad. Given the position of our hefty yellow star in your house of taxes and inheritance, it’s feasible that a spouse or other family member is contributing to your cause, but it’s making you more, not less, skeptical of your own material security. Your house of partnership is a little spicy already, thanks to Mr. Mars, and it’s easy for relationships to become combative over mismatched financial prosperity, as well as any shared material issues. Thankfully, Jupiter is your saving grace, sprinkling his generosity throughout your house of career and public self. There is still a tension to hold between running yourself into the ground with eighty hour workweeks versus playing video games all day and sponging off a relationship, so fight the Scorpionic temptation to see your situation in extremes. For some Libras, recent death or loss may have been the spark that illuminated your financial situation, in which case throwing yourself into work isn’t the worst way to cope. Just keep in mind that your closest person needs attention, too. The dialogue between your close relationship and your career may get spicy enough that something has to change.

Scorpio

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the First House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Seventh House

Mars of No Chill in the Sixth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Ninth House

There is some pretty classic tension happening for Mars’ feminine temple denizens at the moment between Mars in Aries and Jupiter in Cancer, highlighting friction in the way you approach practical routines. Jupiter is reflecting your desire for expansive adventures in philosophy and education, but the bullshit of life keeps getting in the way. Who wants to be stuck slinging coffee or doing dishes instead of traveling the world like a glamorous expat? Not you, that’s who, but we can’t get fancy until we have the boring parts of life under control. It’s not all bad, though - lucky Scorpio has some fun stuff going on in the partnership house that doesn’t involve a chore wheel. Attached Arachnids might be enjoying a new stage of intimacy with a spouse, and solo Scorpions may be the only people on earth enjoying the dating scene right now. That’s because your connection style has matured in key ways over the past few years, and there are some questionable things you used to be drawn to that no longer fascinate. This last full moon is illuminating a final transformation of self; perhaps you’re craving a dramatic change in appearance or have organically shifted some core personal values. When a new person appreciates us in a new way, our confidence for risk taking skyrockets, and suddenly we've become a more authentic version of ourselves. Change, as always, looks great on you, Scorpio. Keep it up.

Sagittarius

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Twelfth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Sixth House

Mars of No Chill in the Fifth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Eighth House

Sagittarians are not traditionally suited to buckling down and focusing on mundane tasks because Jupiter, their ruler, considers wanderlust a birthright. Archers want expansion and excitement, but it’s difficult to prioritize such things when you need to, I dunno, show up to your grocery store shift. This tension between your physical reality and cerebral desires is getting blown out of proportion by Mars, who is compounding the full moon friction while also agitating matters of joy, creativity, and children. The upside, Sag, is your giant, good-time-guy ruler in Cancer, a sensitive house of transitions. It’s no wonder Sagittarius takes a zen approach to loss and change (most of the time) when Jupiter hangs out here; he is exalted, intuitive, and only wants the best for you. Financial stuff with a spouse or relative might butt up against your fifth house endeavors, though; for example, a partner’s pay raise, contingent on relocation, could interrupt plans for to join a theater troupe, host an art show, or have a baby. Whatever is happening, avoid the Sagittarian inclination to eschew shadowy, mental reflection in favor of constant, restless movement, because something is going on in your house of secret enemies and subconscious shadows that needs attention. Have you been making your therapy appointments, Sag? Don’t make me come over there.

Capricorn

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Eleventh House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Fifth House

Mars of No Chill in the Fourth House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Seventh House

Mars is encouraging a bit of an overreaction in two places, Cap; your social groups and public associations, and the familial, domestic sphere. It’s exhausting to be fighting demons both at home and with friends, whom you may be perceiving with a newly discerning eye due to creative differences or increasingly divergent interests. Tensions are bonkers high and someone may be taking things extremely personally, but this might also blow over organically once Mars leaves Aries, so don’t estrange yourself just yet. On a purely irritating note, most people endure accidents when Mars is in the fourth house; cutting themselves in the kitchen, smashing thumbs in the garage, etc. You can find solace indulging in fifth house pleasures like kids or hobbies (including side hustles, since Capricorns often mistake work for their hobby) as well as in your spouse or closest partner. That relationship is the cause of slightly more productive tension involving parents or other family, who are either the purveyors of, or are reacting to, intense emotions on your part. For some Sea Goats this might play out literally, with Mars causing breakage and structural issues in your physical house, which you may then be tempted to burn down for insurance money. Resist the temptation. Aries-style impulsivity is affecting this entire situation, so the same advice applies; until Mars enters Taurus on May 18th, dynamic changes in your domestic environment will happen slowly.

Aquarius

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Tenth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Fourth House

Mars of No Chill in the Third House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Sixth House

Tensions between work and home have been brewing, Aquarius, and you may want to dedicate less time to the former and more to the latter. Prioritizing domestic issues will feel like luxury under the Taurus Sun, acting as a balm on the irritations at work. The temptation to be cruel, especially with your communication, remains strong for the next two weeks or so, and I do not recommend giving in to that impulse at work. This is not the time to be flip or shirk responsibility; most managers do not enjoy communication addressed to them titled, “To Whichever Mud-Brained Dingus Will Approve This Time Off.” It’s also not a bad idea to get off social media while Mars is bopping around your third house, because you’re likely to say something you’ll regret later, or to encounter overtly hostile rhetoric that throws you off your game for the entire day. Focus on the places you can win right now, which is your physical routines and daily tasks…IF you don’t make life difficult for yourself by saying something you shouldn’t. It isn’t worth it and you have bigger fish to fry. Pffft. What did you think was in that giant vase of yours, anyway?

Pisces

Full Moon of Karmic Bills in the Ninth House

Sun of Karmic Paychecks in the Third House

Mars of No Chill in the Second House

Jupiter of Massive Chill in the Fifth House

You’re finally ready to change something in your house of expansion, gentle Pisces, and that could affect things like secondary education or apprenticeship, spiritual studies, or an international relocation. If you’ve been putting something off in this arena, try to suck it up and do it. It may be that something closer to home needs your attention, possibly due to a financial shock, since Mars has a stranglehold on your house of material security. The solution may be to drop a few extracurricular activities in order to deal with practical, daily routines, whatever that looks like in your corner of the aquarium with siblings, friends, and acquaintances. Pisces is notorious for needing routines that are easy to maintain, lest they float away on a tide of procrastination. Don’t entertain fantasies of a winning lottery ticket, either - Mars is creating some friction with the fun parts of life, where your generous ruler has brought some luck over the last nine months, but he’s at a disadvantage when he squares off with Ares the Dickhead. Jupiter will be busy trying to keep the war god in line, which means hobbies, creative outlets, and activities with kids might change up unexpectedly due to the dialogue with your financial situation.

“Those that will judge
Will say you’re aloof
But you know the truth is a seed
You know what you need
Is a conflagration

‘Cause when I see the blood
And the bits of your broken tooth
It gives me the proof that I need
It’s the proof that you bleed
It’s a revelation.”

Andrew Bird, Cancer

Everything Is On Fire

This year’s April new moon is deceptive, but it isn’t Luna’s fault. She’s just doing what she always does, waxing, waning, and setting the tempo of our earthly fortune - or, in the case of Homo sapiens most unfortunate gender, the rhythm of our biology.

Aries kicks off the astrological year with assertive, generative fire - the element that both creates and destroys, depending on how it’s harnessed (and who does the harnessing.) The furnishing in Mars’ masculine temple is hot and sharp, largely acting as a war room where Zeus’ ill-favored son strategizes, fumes, trains, and fucks. In lieu of art, walls are covered in guns, swords, and knives, but you have to weave between multiple roaring braziers to reach them, and you’re probably going to burn yourself. Mars’ burns himself all the time, because that’s what happens when you’re a lusty, rash asshole who acts first and thinks later, and the subject matter largely occupying his brain centers his desire above everything else. There is a shamelessness to Mars that is both infuriating and refreshing, and it’s on display most hilariously when he is the Greek Ares who takes what he wants when he wants it, often to the detriment of everyone around him. Aphrodite was forced to marry Hephaestus, but Ares rightfully called that bullshit and his continued carnality with Aphrodite was so brazen that Hephaestus trapped them in a net during the act. Aphrodite, being a woman, was humiliated and shamed, but Ares? Dude has no shame; he stayed thrusting through the whole thing.

It’s easy to see Mars as a bad guy, thanks to his categorization in both ancient Mesopotamian and Hellenistic astrology as a malefic voice from the gods, but he can embody necessary, worthwhile characteristics in the right circumstances. In many ways, Mars symbolizes the pain of birth and the ugliness that is necessary to release a spark of life; severance from the mother via a sliced umbilical cord. It is no coincidence that our first act in the earthly realm is to bleed.

In this foul year of your lord 2026, human civilization is experiencing ego death in order to birth something healthier, but that means we must pass through the pain of cell decay before we are fertile for new growth. Like the chaos and rage of a volcano, we’ll be useless for naught but violence until enough cooling time has passed and the ashes of the past settle into fallow soil. This is the crucible; the painful immolation that molds its captive into a thing of beauty and value. Like its resident, the Temple of The Ram is a place of messy, bloody catastrophe - a killing field where only the shameless survive, clearing a path so the rest of us might sprout from it’s red soil. It’s the paradox of life on this planet that we need killing fields and orchards in equal measure, but we never want to admit it.

In many myths, Ares is a brawny, combative dum-dum who loses just as many battles as he wins because it was his sister, Athena, who bestowed diplomacy and strategy to leaders and battles - Ares was considered the muscle, the brute force that nebbishy old Greeks considered too declassé to venerate; but, when invaders landed on their shores or merchants needed strong arming, they had no problem invoking his archetype. Just as Ares is shameless, we are ashamed of him, and of those martial qualities that deep down, we all possess.

This is the place our watery Luna is rebirthing herself, and she’s doing it in the company of the host himself, Mercury, Saturn, Neptune, and the Sun. That is a diverse group of gods in one violent room, and it’s the kind of party that puts everyone on edge. This New Moon occurs at 27 degrees in Aries - well past the first decan where the aforementioned dude planets are stationed. Symbolically, then, both Moon and Sun have surpassed everybody else, though they no doubt chatted along the way. Our celestials likely heard all about the recent Saturn/Neptune conjunction issues when they visited the slower fellows; crumbling institutions, dying economic systems, pedophilia and war. The result of this fiery pile-up is tense paralysis, caught as we are between knowing what Saturn wants us to fix, and desiring an immediate, dramatic solution that would make Mars proud. The very nature of Saturnian rot means it requires a novel fix that is just as slow and incremental as the decay that brought us to this point, because anything else is too extreme to have staying power.

Luna is giving us an opportunity to seed possible solutions and a new approach, but she’s bound up in the malefic planets, so cogitating on this new thing is a better idea than actualizing it for now, because Aries is a reactive, impulsive place. Any opening salvo we make in Mars’ domicile will be premature and poorly planned, likely to cause more friction than it alleviates. Instead of running around with your hair on fire, take stock and make moves, but only in your head. Relax, bide your time and play the long game; there’s plenty of shit on fire, already.

The following horoscopes will resonate for the rest of this lunar cycle and over the next six months more broadly, given the co-presence of Saturn in Aries, which we’re stuck with until April 2028, so when I tell you to apply these archetypes to a long-term game plan, I mean long as in years, not months. The initiatory, cardinal signs of Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn will feel this most acutely because it’s hitting their foundational, angular houses, but everyone will get a taste, depending on individual nativities, so don’t feel left out quite yet. Since I am both a cranky and Hellenistic astrologer, you will extract the most pertinent information according to rising sign, but I have personally noticed relevance with both my rising and my sun sign horoscopes, so read through both to be the most ass-kissy consumer of astrology in existence.

Aries

Chaos Orgy in the first house

Aries, I feel your fucking pain. Everyone started coming into your domicile at the close of February, before you even came home - no invite or appointment, they just barreled their happy asses into your space and started wreaking havoc. It began with both of your peepaws, Neptune and Saturn, reflecting everything you’ve ever done wrong, then giving unsolicited advice about your appearance and long-running habits, then attacking the entire framework of your life as you’ve arranged it. Neat! Your Dad the Sun and a few other authorities came over next, cosplaying military generals and telling you to ‘be all you can be,’ which mostly means be like them. By the time you arrived, your Dad was arguing with the old guys about how best to reach your goals and dissecting the pros and cons of various weaponry. Still reeling from the intrusion, picking up empty snack wrappers and shell casings, you would have missed the arrival of your extremely loquacious friend Mercury if they didn’t loudly announce everything they’re doing at all times, both in-person and on social media. It’s a melee, Aries, but you weren’t feeling it in your body until your mom the Moon walked in, at which point everything landed, the way mothers make things land, and you are tired, sore, and in need of a nap. Your mom is here, now, to set you straight, so listen up; you don’t have to tackle everything at once. Do Neptune and Saturn have a point about an outdated framework? Yeah, probably. Do you need different inspiration and a little more discipline, as the Sun is suggesting? Absolutely. Is your chatty BFF Mercury engendering your combative speech and creating conflict by refusing to shut up? Always. Still, Luna knows best, and she is telling you to pick ONE PLACE to focus your energy on for the time being, because if you try to start anew in every one of these areas you will explode.

Taurus

Chaos Orgy in the twelfth house

Before you read this horoscope, Taurus, I need you to go get a toothsome snack. Got one? Good. Now sit on your most comfortable piece of furniture. (I know they’re all comfortable, Taurus, just humor me and pick one.) There is a house party happening in your subconscious, and it’s getting unhinged while you nap in your bedroom. Expect a lot of false starts in the realm of mental health; days when you feel like you’re really making progress because you didn’t once think of burying yourself alive in the garden will be undercut by days of frustrating inertia and depression. This is because Neptune has made himself at home in your twelfth house of secrets, enemies, and hidden struggles, many of which manifest through conflict in Aries. Saturn exacerbates things through restriction because he wants to make you earn your growth, so you’ll run into obstacles as you try settle the demons in your head - doctors will be hard to find, people you thought were your friends will reveal themselves to be dickheads, and your sleep habits could become erratic. Mercury wants you to express this frustration, but you need to be cautious about the how and when, because Bulls have a tendency to hold their feelings back until it’s too late. When they can no longer physically contain their frustration, they burst forth like a landslide and bury well-meaning people alive. Don’t do this! The Moon is giving you a chance to make a new plan for your brain, one that bridges mind and body and will allow for physical release of mental stress. Get outside and do a little Ferdinand the Bull role-play. Make a schedule for whatever activity you like, and if you don’t like any, then make a schedule for trying a bunch of different things until something lands, because it is imperative that you allow your body to act as a release valve for your brain. Plus, you can reward yourself with a Snickers afterward.

Gemini

Chaos Orgy in the eleventh house

It’s getting spicy in public for Gemini - not you specifically, but the social groups and associations with which you’ve been aligned up to this point. If the tenth house is public work, then the eleventh house is public connections; think church groups, boards you might sit on, trade associations, Girl Scouts, fight clubs, Shriners…you get the idea. Your chaos orgy isn’t necessarily personal, Twins, it’s happening via association and will require you to think about whether or not you’ve outgrown some of your social constructs. Saturn and Neptune are reflecting a very frustrating push/pull vibe here, in the sense that you may desire a new social circle but continue to hit road blocks whenever you start to distance yourself; maybe there are people begging you to remain committed, or your under a contract of some sort that needs finishing out. The opposite could also be true, too - you might dearly love an organization that is forcing your departure due to difficult circumstances like lack of funding, drama, or scandals. This forced stasis is irritating to Gemini because you prefer being allowed to flit and flutter about like a meth butterfly, and now that Mars has joined the party, you're feeling combative about your freedom. Your ruler wasn’t far behind, either, so not only are you raging on the inside, you’re letting everyone know with some fairly harsh language. Enter our mother figure, the Moon, who would like you to grow a pair and make better, healthier social connections instead of taking your dissatisfaction out on others. It’s not going to happen all at once, so don’t force it; just engage in some exploration outside of your usual groups. Whatever decision you’re paralyzed over, make the choice that is novel and uncomfortable for you. Oh, all choices do that, you say? Too bad.

Cancer

Chaos Orgy in the tenth house

I’m guessing work has started to suuuuuuuck, Cancer, for what could be any number of reasons. Perhaps Saturn and Neptune have been chipping away at your stale role, or nearly obsolete field. You may have sensed a disturbance in the occupational force in late February, like management getting axed or rumblings of a corporate buyout, but it’s taking time getting to you. Low grade anxiety about a negative change in status, which is very Saturnian, is butting up against rage-fueled delusions that involve pooping on your bosses desk and letting that stand as a resignation letter, which is very Neptunian. (Plutonian and martial, too, what with all the vengeful defecation.) Now that Mars and Mercury are involved, friction is more likely to increase than decrease, and thoughtless remarks, combative behavior and immaturity will infiltrate communication channels like email and socials. It’s a shit show. Thankfully, your ruler has also entered the fiery chat, and she’s reflecting your need for change by planting the seeds of a new public or professional endeavor in the dirt of your career. You may have to endure chaos for a bit, but if you can resist the temptation to upend anything without a solid plan, any transitions you make down the road should be smooth. Start small, look for something you can ease into without upending your entire career, and avoid using your superior’s furniture as a latrine. For now.

Leo

Chaos Orgy in the ninth house

Lions involved in higher education…how are we feeling? I’m going to guess things could be better. Leo approaches intellectual and philosophical expansion with gusto, but current circumstances feel like you’re spinning your wheels; you have identified areas of knowledge that need expansion, but obstacles continue to prevent action. Whether you’re teaching or matriculating, chaotic energy is mucking up everything from scheduling to assessments, making it difficult to gage progress and improvement. Saturn might be saying no to something that you really wanted, like a year long internship with a Danish theater troupe, but Neptune was the only reason you entertained such a thing in the first place, so you’re at a bit of a crossroads. Mars is making you fight for every scrap of enlightenment, intellectual, spiritual, or otherwise, and it’s possible this madness is forcing you to rethink your philisophical position and the frameworks you’ve relied upon to explore the world. Mercury is encouraging you to speak up and make a change a.s.a.p., but you’re not in a position to do it; a frustrating impasse that makes Leo want to roar and force everybody’s hand. This will not work.The Moon would like you to grab some low hanging fruit as a way to assuage your frustration, because the big changes for which you earn will not have staying power if you attack them now. Bide your time and enact little, easy changes that lay a foundation for larger transition down the road. Thinking about a formal religious conversion? Keep doing your homework and sit pretty in your current situation. Foreign travel or relocation? Whet that whistle with research and shorter, more condensed exploration. Wait for Mercury, the ruler of scholars and thinkers, to get out of Aries before jumping in to a new situation; only then will your endeavors have staying power.

Virgo

Chaos Orgy in the eighth house

Weird stuff is going on in your house of karmic bills, Virgo, creating instability and uncertainty around outstanding debts that you owe and are owed to you, which is enough to drive you completely insane. Virgo loves a perfected plan, but it’s impossible to stick to such a thing when everything is in flux, so my advice is not to bother. Saturn has probably brought your attention to an existing imbalance - think ongoing alimony disputes, inheritance issues, or odd developments with a spouse’s money - but he’s also blocking your access to avenues of reconciliation. This only incites Mars’ anger, which in turn lights a fire beneath your ruler to find a fast solution, because Mercury also hates it when things move too slowly. Contracts and business exchanges may be awaiting your approval and signature, but recklessness won’t serve you; the nature of Aries means that any agreement you enter at this moment may not last. Mercury isn’t as detailed or accurate in Aries as they are in your own house, so jumping in to a binding agreement of any kind, especially those that deal with other people’s money, is unwise at this time. I’m not saying you can’t prepare for it, I’m telling you not to enact it quite yet. Luna is reflecting your desire for a new situation, but she wants you to be realistic about it and not go breaking or signing binding paperwork willy nilly. What you can do with this Moon is go through the fine print of anything to which you are already committed to ensure nothing gets past you when it’s time for negotiation, which sounds like your ideal Saturday night, Virgo.

Libra

Chaos Orgy in the seventh house

I’m so sorry my beautiful, loving Libra, because you’ve got the crappiest end of the stick next to Aries, who is holding on for dear life right across from you. Your house of partnership is looking unhinged for both the single and attached versions of Libra, and much of that craziness can be laid at Saturn and Neptune’s wrinkly feet. The sign of The Scales is always attracted to more decisive players in the realm of intimacy, largely because there is nothing Libra loathes more than making decisions and enforcing boundaries. When there is friction within the realm of partnership, though, this can lead to Libra outsourcing their agency and becoming a doormat, convincing themselves that placation is love. When Mars joined your seventh house party, spiciness between you and a partner or potential partner increased - typically Libra’s cue to become even more accommodating. Don’t do it! I’m not telling you to rip anyone a new asshole, Libra, though that will also be tempting thanks to the addition of Mercury to your Aries melee. The Moon is showing up to help you see a future beyond whatever situation is happening right now, and she wants you to get comfortable letting romance be uncomfortable. Instead of rushing to reassure (or, conversely, to blow up the entire relationship) try hanging back to observe how things transpire when you don’t immediately assuage or accommodate your other half, or even the person across the table on a first date. Use the beginning of this lunar cycle to test out a new relational approach. Instead of immediate acquiescence, try letting small disagreements stand as they are and observe the result without taking action. As lovely as it is to be in lock step with a partner at all times, it’s also unrealistic, and the type of delusion from which Neptune and Saturn are desperate to break you free.

Scorpio

Chaos Orgy in the sixth house

People love to talk about how uncompromising and mean Scorpio can be, failing to realize that the person who takes the brunt of their unflinching scrutiny and rigid valuation is themselves. Things are nuts in The Scorpion’s house of necessary, practical bullshit, which includes physical routines and habits, hourly work, household chores and necessities, as well as scheduling and maintaining the boring foundation of daily life. You probably didn’t need Saturn and Neptune to tell you that some of your routines are outdated and no longer working, but they’re doing it anyway in order to break you out of the stagnation over which you’re convinced you have no power. Your hot blooded ruler doesn’t like it when he’s denied satisfaction, though, so Mars started egging you on to make immediate, dramatic changes to your life’s banal framework once he popped into Aries, the physical manifestation of Scorpio’s psychological battlefield. As a result of this contradiction, you’re frustrated with both yourself and your environment, because you know everything would proceed more smoothly if you could just get a better handle on the nuts and bolts of life. Mercury isn’t really helping, because your words are cutting and deadly during the best of times, Scorpio, and they are unflinchingly brutal when you feel as paralyzed as you do right now, so the first thing that needs to happen is a nice, deep breath. Ahhhh. The Moon isn’t stopping you from overhauling your daily planner, but she is asking you to make improvements one at time instead of flipping your schedule on it’s head and expecting everything to run smoothly. Your tendency toward extreme action will not serve, Scorpio, because flying off the handle has no staying power beneath Saturn-dominant astrology. Slow your roll.

Sagittarius

Chaos Orgy in the fifth house

Centaurs get the shiny, optimistic side of this astrology despite the mixed and jumbled signals involving hobbies, creative endeavors, and children, but that’s how it is for Sagittarius during their time on Earth; they have methods for plating shit sandwiches that make them fun and appetizing instead of repulsive, which is why Sagittarius can be found doing carefree cartwheels when every other zodiac denizen is contemplating a dive off the roof. It’s hard to keep you fuckers down, but Saturn and Neptune are doing their level best. You’ve probably identified an issue that needs correcting regarding things that bring you joy and endeavors that you take on simply for the love of the game, as the kids say. It’s possible you no longer enjoy benefits from favorite activities, and if the aforementioned kids are in your life, you might be experiencing some friction that’s convinced you to shake things up. The trouble is, hurt feelings, injuries, and the occasional diplomatic incident are too often the result of a Sagittarius ‘shaking things up,’ so Mother Moon needs you to chill out before making any grand gestures like converting the garage to a welding station or packing up the kids and moving, unplanned, to Costa Rica. First off, you don’t even know how to weld yet, and second, there are simpler solutions to childhood doldrums than international relocation. Mars is making you itchy for action, though, and Mercury in Aries has worsened your foot-in-mouth syndrome, encouraging reckless statements and impulsivity, so it’s important to hold off on any massive changes. Instead, use this new Moon to lay the groundwork for new adventures by gathering information; this way, you don’t have to detach from seasoned passions quite yet. You don’t want to upend status quo fun time during this lunation, because it won’t last. Instead, find new ways to invigorate old routines as a stop gap until inspiration strikes.

Capricorn

Chaos Orgy in the fourth house

Home is where the heart is, and that heart is probably filled with anxiety for Capricorn right now. Sea Goats might have seen the Saturn/Neptune conjunction play out literally in the form of a flooded basement, gas leak, or foundation rotted by termites, but it could also have shown up in heavier, symbolic manifestations like the death or hospitalization of a parent or grandparent; either way, your fourth house looks like a rough holiday dinner with extended family. Papa Saturn wants you to grow the hell up and put your home in order, and he’s revealing all the hidden decay as a way to get you started. Militant cousin Mars has just decided to join him, which means you wanted all of this taken care of yesterday and the length of time it’s taking to sort your domestic sphere is pissing you off. Your other busybody cousin, Mercury, won’t shut the fuck up and his irritation is increasing your irritation, leaving you snappish and longing for a decent chunk of time in which everyone leaves you alone so you can deal with your domicile and finally get some real work done. Before you run yourself ragged, Cap, take a moment to ponder the Moon; she is present, she is flexible, and she is embodied. She knows you’ve been clued in to domestic issues that have probably been festering for a long time because, let’s be honest, you prioritize your professional life over everything else nine times out of ten. Luna would like you to avoid treating your private realm like your public realm just because there are things that need fixing, however, because it won’t be sustainable in the long run. This isn’t the kind of situation that you can ‘solve’ with an eighteen hour stretch of work; it’s the kind that requires a perspective shift and dedicated efforts over time. We’re going for balance, here, dear Goat, so start small. Maybe reduce professional efforts by two hours a week and dedicate that time to whatever domestic kerfuffle needs an overhaul. This is a marathon, not a sprint.

Aquarius

Chaos Orgy in the third house

You’ve likely identified that something is amiss in your house of siblings, daily travel, and communication, Aquarius, courtesy of your gerontocratic ruler, Saturn. He wants you to overcome it by thinking of new, mature solutions, but that’s a tough ask when he’s stuck in his grandkid’s war room and indulging in some rare (for him) immaturity and recklessness. Any simmering spice between, say, you and a sibling, a neighbor, or an important correspondent has the capacity to erupt and worsen the situation, especially once Mars entered Aries and ratcheted up the latent combativeness of all parties. You come off as aloof on the best of days, Water-Bearer, and Mercury in Aries is tilting you toward cruelty as you become more frustrated, so be extremely careful with all forms of communication, specifically emails and texts that never properly convey tone. You’ll be tempted to react instantly to perceived misunderstandings, aggressive drivers, and incendiary gossip, but the Moon would like you to exercise caution. Identify one main structural issue, whether that’s your car, route to work, mail delivery, or petty sister, and contemplate a long term strategy to alleviate the tension. Aries is an athletic place, so getting out into the neighborhood more as a pedestrian could ease transportation woes, just as physical bonding time with a sibling in the form of a fitness class or competitive game could act as a release valve with said sister. If all else fails, sign the two of you up for a boxing class and punch her in the face. Mars will be so pleased.

Pisces

Chaos Orgy in the second house

There is a ton of sound and fury in your house of value and finance, and yes, Pisces, I know you wish things like money didn’t exist. Unfortunately, Saturn probably clued you in to all the ways a Neptune-inspired, unicorn-riding, barter-system fantasy is hobbling your capacity to grow wealth, but your tendency to procrastinate means you go to sleep at night mumbling, “Oh yeah. Money. I should do something about that,” before you pass out and forget all of your responsibilities. Then you wake up in the morning and ignore it again. However, Mars and Mercury are reflecting impatience and spikiness that are quite out of character for you, little Fish, and the tension between financial immediacy and emotional turpitude is making even generous, empathetic Pisces want to run around like your feet are on fire. (That’s a real possibility with so many planets in Aries, fyi.) The first thing this Moon would like you to do is pause and take a breath without falling asleep, then take a measured look at your bank account. Any shortfalls are probably due to questionable habits or shoddy bookkeeping, which means this isn’t something you’ll be able to fix with a single cash infusion, so put that Lotto ticket down. Take inspiration from your water brethren’s fluid ruler and allow space for waxing and waning - you won’t shore up material value overnight, and you won’t make sustainable inroads by overhauling your lifestyle, either, because abrupt changes after years of calcified tendencies rarely stick. Instead, this Moon wants you to start one new, wallet friendly habit and stay with it until it’s second nature. Ditch one fancy beverage per week, or start selling the clothes you don’t want every time you clean your room. If it’s a new skill set you need in order to increase earning potential, make a plan and start small before you start waltzing around town like Jeff Bezos, because this won’t be solved overnight.

The walls are bending shape
They got a Cheshire cat grin
All blurring into one
This place is on a mission
Before the night owl
Before the animal noises
Closed circuit cameras
Before you’re comatose

Before you run away from me
Before you’re lost between the notes
The beat goes ‘round and ‘round
The beat goes ‘round and ‘round
I never really got there
I just pretended that I had
Words are blunt instruments
Words are sawn off shotguns

-Thom Yorke

What Fresh Hell Is This and What Is That Noise?

For what seems like months, the same song has been playing in my head; a retro number from ‘the before times;’ layered in gloom and guitars that warn of a nebulous future, wherein fact is indiscernible from fiction. If I’m not singing it to myself, I’m letting it swallow me through my ear canal while I type in coffee shops and curl into myself, cat style, on public transit.

There has been a lot of collective, urban commuting in my life as of late; subway stations that smell of post-work humans, buses crammed with kinetic, shouty high schoolers, and waiting. So much waiting. The masses of transiting American humanity have thickened in reaction to geo-politics; oil, impunity, and violence are dominating both gas pumps and phone feeds thanks to my country, the nation state iteration of a toddler who steals other kids toys while covered in his own shit.

I follow the venerated urban tradition of women wearing very large headphones on the subway so that I might a) dissuade any man from speaking to me, and b) sink into my own customized dystopia soundtrack - bleeps, bloops, and the tech-weary anguish of Thom Yorke’s falsetto* among other late nineties doom music. Fare enforcers demanding papers, wizened men crouched and shivering beneath cracked, ceramic tiles, and electronic signage dripping rainwater present a fitting tableau for any part of the Radiohead discography beginning with O.K. Computer; 1996’s prophetic soundtrack for future shock and the reason that so many Xennials are looking at the world and muttering, “told you so.” It’s not because we’re oracles - it’s because we became adults during Y2K, a time period so stupid that it clued those of us paying attention in to just how cooked civilization would be in ten years or so. The idiocy of this past decade is everything we should have expected from a society convinced their computers would vaporize the world because of three zeroes.

*The best part about being sad and listening to Radiohead is that you can make up any words to fit your current milieu and they all work, as long as you leave out the consonants. In fact, that’s the best method for imitating Thom Yorke, who turns phrases like “jigsaw falling into place,” into, “hicksaaaaah ahhlen innoo peeeehhhss,” and sounds extra depressed while he does it. For years I thought he had a speech impediment and was very proud of him for overcoming it.

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Two more planets fall like dominos into the Aries war room this week, and the United States has begun, maybe, and then paused, maybe, what some of us suspected was inevitable, but that we hoped could be averted anyway; a multi-front war that is likely to hammer a crucial nail into the coffin of Western imperialism. We will soon glimpse the termination point of a system predicated on infinite growth in a finite space, and it is full of rabid capitalists that are desperate to prolong inevitable collapse. Just one more petrodollar conflict, bro, one more, and we swear everything will be better. The foundational wrongness of modern life - destroying, consuming, wasting - has burned holes in our civilizational DNA and is proving fatal, the way a tiny glitch in an algorithm will crash a program if it runs for long enough. Instead of collectively reckoning with transition, reality has become optional, having bent so far that it is now inverted; humans aren’t even fighting our own war, we’re having computers do it for us, and our military transformation from video evidence to video propaganda to video game is now complete.(Cue Thom Yorke crooning the walls are bending shape on the soundtrack.) Pete Hegseth may as well live stream every fucking slaughter on Twitch, for all the gravitas he brings to the table, which is to say, none, unless that gravitas is boozy, ice cold, and strong enough to erase the taste of orange game show host semen.

Unfortunately, we’ve spent enough time questioning the reality glowing from our phones that we’ve inevitably begun to second guess the things in front of our faces in real life with real consequences - and who can blame us? The headlines keep getting stranger, social and political norms keep dissolving, and people are continuing the mundanity of daily life, which might be the weirdest part of it all. Oh hey Dave, howsitgoing? Kids are good, did you guys want to get together and see a movie on Friday? You know, if we haven’t all been vaporized yet, hahahaha. Cool, I’ll check the showtimes. The President of the United States has been credibly accused across multiple agencies, states, and decades of fucking children, has threatened an entire nation of people with war crimes multiple times, is aggressively incarcerating citizens his regime has labelled ‘terrorists’, and the only thing we’re doing about it is clocking in to work and meeting Dave at the movies afterward. The walls of normalcy are definitely bending shape.

This nightmarish unreality dramatically stretched and warped during Mercury’s retrograde in Pisces last month, which Christ-in-a-cardigan-sweater-thank-god is finally beyond the shadow degree of their initial station. Pisces is the most amorphous of water signs in no small part due to it’s astrological modality, though; the Temple of The Fish is a place of mist and sublimation, as opposed to the summer lake vibes of Cancer or the solid ice sheet that is Scorpio. It is hard to escape with intact sanity. The evaporative quality of this last stop on the zodiac symbolizes an ascension of our spirits as we pass on to the ether and are born again in the flames of Aries where, finally, we’re made solid. Creation via the destruction of fire. Jarring though this transition may be, Aries is a welcome respite from Pisces for many because, here, vagueness becomes specific, confusion clears, and passivity is replaced with direct action, often punching. Aries loves people who punch people.

However, no amount of confrontational Mars fuckery will undo the damage done to our perception of reality, both in spite and because of stellar efforts by the Western propaganda machine, and how is that for an eerily accurate manifestation of Mercury in the mutable water sign? Deliberately sowing confusion and deploying vague messaging has worked both for and against the propagandists; compromised media, kleptocracy, and technological hubris in the form of AI has ensured that none of us will believe our own eyes ever again, so increasingly, I and my fellow citizens believe nothing. Benjamin Netanyahu is dead? No he isn’t, he’s getting coffee with his six fingers. Jeffrey Epstein hanging out in Tel Aviv? Sure, we think. He’s probably at the same cafe as Bibi, with a designer baby he forced a captive teenager to birth. The only one he didn’t eat.

Information is so questionable and copious that it all fades to the background, what the boys of Radiohead once called fridge buzz when ripping on pop radio. Fridge buzz songs aren’t bad enough to be hilarious, but they aren’t great, either, so humans unconsciously relegate them to white noise. That’s what has become of miracles and tragedies in the age of information; they both get turned down to ‘meh’ as we go about our day, otherwise we would all be curled on the floor in twitching fetal positions from trying to slam fifty gigs worth of current events into our ten gig brains. The result is that everything happening all at once may as well be nothing happening at all, something Mercury-ruled neurotics Virgo and Gemini know all too well. It’s hard to blame Dave for deciding to lose himself at the cinema.

We’re not actively listening to the song of 2026 because, frankly, it sucks. Blurry Pisces is poor in boundaries, deadlines, and specifics, but wealthy in capitol F-feelings, so that is all Mercury has been able to gift us since late February - communication rife with emotion and very little else. We’re attacking Iran, but no one can articulate a concrete reason for this imperial campaign; they may have been building a nuclear program, or it may have been destroyed. There may or may not be a ceasefire, which may or may not open the Strait of Hormuz to freighters. Trump demands it open, unless he’s demanding to blockade it himself, which Iran was already doing, but apparently statecraft now consists of telling your opposition, “I’m not a poopy head, you’re a poopy head, and you can’t block me because I’m blocking you harder.”

Ample reasons to investigate a number of billionaires and bankers have been discovered in the Epstein files, but no one has so much as subpoenaed these assholes, and no clear legal reason for this stasis has been cited by any party. Most people are poor, in debt, and unable to seek medical care without selling an organ, but the economy is doing great and it isn’t in a recession, it’s simply ‘k-shaped.’ The Ayatollah is dead, then he’s alive, then he’s mutilated, then he’s negotiating with the U.S., then he’s dead again, but it doesn’t matter because U.S. military might is absolutely crushing Iran and we don’t need any boots on the ground. Or, we didn’t, until we sent about five thousand Marines over to Kharg Island for a quick sortie that could last for a week or several years, depending on which day reporters speak to the regime. Not to worry, this isn’t really a war, even though we’re totally winning it. It wasn’t even an attack when the U.S. killed the leader of a sovereign country, it was a ‘preemptive strike’ on a nation that does not have nuclear weapons by a nation that DOES have nuclear weapons, whose stated purpose was to destroy the nuclear capabilities of the former nation, the one that doesn’t have them. By the country who not only has them, but is the only nation on Earth who has used them against another nation.

Confused? Tuning out? No matter, it wasn’t important - it’s just the fridge. Buzzing.

But WHY Has This Hell Felt So Fresh?! Like a Continuous Mercury Retrograde?!

A couple of massive things coincided with poor Hermes doing a moonwalk in the land of fog and delusion, and I covered them in depth here if you feel like getting depressed all over again. (Me, I haven’t stopped, but I also live in a state with cheap, legal weed, which is really great at taking despair and squishing it into a manageable ball of ‘meh’ that goes absolutely great with sad, British rock.) First, this retrograde commenced a mere six days after the most significant aspect of the past year, if not the decade; the Saturn/Neptune conjunction in Aries. Neptune compounded the incomprehensibility of collective communication once Mercury stationed because confusion is one of Poseidon’s main calling cards, in addition to delusion, paranoia, and religious zealotry, words that sound like the latest bureaucratic brainchild of The Heritage Foundation. We’re pleased to announce the formation of BDPRZ, the Bureau of Delusion, Paranoia, and Religious Zealotry, fine men and women in the government tasked with sneaking into your bedrooms at night and making sure you’re only fucking through a hole in your bedsheet. Now, please welcome our nominee for Director who definitely didn’t get this idea from the depraved porn he watches with his son, Mike Johnson.

Second, most of this retrograde occurred with both Mars and the North Node co-present in Pisces, i.e. our war-mongering dickhead planet and the ravenous head of the dragon. Rahu, as the dragon is known to Vedic astrologers, represents things we crave to our detriment; hunger that gets us into trouble when we cannot temper it. It’s no wonder we find ourselves in such a perilous geo-political moment with largely the U.S. to thank for it - yankee war pigs have had their eye on Iran since the 1950’s in anticipation of a global economy that runs on petrol.

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There is nothing a modern capitalist has ever craved, to his own detriment and the detriment of so many innocent people, than sweet, sweet crude oil, and combative moves from the U.S in this region have a long and tragic history, which has been pushed to the forefront of our collective consciousness by our communication planet. That well worn axiom about old friends and enemies landing starring roles whenever Mercury retrogrades applies to nations, too.

At this very moment, Hermes is one nipple hair’s breadth from Aries, and while I’d like to say the destabilization of our shared reality should cease, I don’t think people’s brains and bodies will recover so quickly from the tearing of our experiential tether, especially when the fabric has ripped in so many important places. (…the walls are bending shape…) Additionally, Neptune is transiting through the volatile, early degrees of Aries for the next zodiacal year and many after, so angry propaganda, and reactive, emotional speech with little basis in reality will be with us for a while. Corporate media’s fanatical headlines about a booming economy, dangerous migrants, American military awesomeness, and a public consensus embracing extrajudicial incarceration are featured alongside contrary headlines, often on the same landing page of the same publication. Linguistic twists that obfuscate the true nature of things in the U.S. have been the journalistic default for a decade, at least, but they have become especially obscene since February, as the aforementioned ‘preemptive strike’ talk demonstrates. The walls of normalcy aren’t simply changing shape; they have bent to the point of ontological crisis.

Okay, Which Circle of Hell Will We Enter Next and What Kind of Music is Playing?

I’m so glad you asked! From this moment on, Mars is now in the first degree of his rash, thoughtless, masculine domicile, Aries, which - surprise - Neptune and Saturn have been fucking around in for the last few months. The rest of April looks volatile and destructive because of this unhinged orgy in Mars’ battle castle, and the biggest issues are as follows:

1. THE WAR PLANET IS NOW ON EASY MODE IN HIS FAVORITE KARAOKE BAR. Think of the zodiac signs as temples. Jupiter’s feminine temple, Pisces, is full of painting supplies, books of poetry, and drugs. The bathtub is always running in Pisces, not to be wasteful, but to provide sonic inspiration. This is where Mars had been hanging out for over a month, and he didn’t really care for it - it belongs to his father, Jupiter, who hates him, and it lacks any of the comforts that a warmongering little shit needs to feel empowered like weapons, fire, and maps. So for the past month or so, Ares’ martial efficiency has been crippled. The best he’s been able to do is wage a war of confusion and obfuscation, letting the mirrors fog up so that no one can see what he’s getting up to in that bathroom. He’s flung some paint around like a chimpanzee Basquiat and withheld strategic information, but that’s about it. Conversely, Mars becomes an excitable, pumped up hesher in Aries, stomping around his garage and singing Panterra. He has his old standbys at his disposal; fire, guns, bombs, maps, generals, knives, blood money, etc., and he knows exactly where everything is, which means he can be extremely, viciously effective. So from April 9th until May 15th, the volume of collective violence that began in February will swell to ear-splitting levels and the brutal lyrics will be clear and irrefutable. This ‘pretend WWIII is background noise’ bullshit we’ve all been doing won’t be possible much longer.

2. THAT SATURN/NEPTUNE BOP FROM FEBRUARY WILL BE BACK ON THE CHARTS. As previously stated, Neptune and Saturn are also puttering around Mars’ house, so those two senior citizens also have access to his fire power and martial lust. A weaponized Neptune can turn belief and spirituality into brutal domination, and Saturn in Aries typically manifests as fast, violent crumbling of aged systems and leaders. A hoot, these guys. Furthermore, Mars made an exact conjunction with Neptune at the second degree of Aries on April 12th, combining the planet of subconscious spirituality with the virile battle god and producing something disturbingly close to a holy war, or someone who has holy war aspirations. At the same time that happens, transiting Mars will be one degree away from a perfect square to natal Venus in the U.S. birth chart, suggesting increased conflict and rhetoric that creates friction for Venusian subjects, often women and children. Like, oh, say, new Epstein files revelations. Further furthermore, Saturn and Mars combine forces on April 19th at the seventh degree of Aries, a volatile conjunction that tends to exacerbate people’s innate combat tendencies. Grandpa Kronos wants restraint, but his foolhardy grandson wants action, so the restless energy of this aspect feels like sitting on an ancient, yet still very live grenade. Unscrupulous players will give in to base instincts of rage, lust, entitlement, and resentment, so we need to be cautious about arguments during this period, in the sense that they will neither end well nor solve any problem. Unfortunately, the same implication applies to the global collective; armed conflict is likely to devolve into bloody quagmire under an inharmonious combination of Saturn and Mars, and we can expect to see violent attacks on aging frameworks, as well as immature leaders stumbling into catastrophe because they lack wisdom. The way this foul year of your lord 2026 is going, it will be both.

3. THE TRASH TALKING PLANET WILL HAVE A GUN. For extra fun, Mercury will join the zodiac’s weirdest frat party on April 14th when they skitter into Aries, and fighting words will suddenly carry enough weight to have real consequences. Individually, we will all fare best if we avoid conflict during this period, no matter how frustrated or rage-filled we become, because Mercury’s ass can now cash the cheques their mouth writes. There will undoubtedly be instances where better judgement is ignored, and we’ll be tempted to treat Hermes like a nerdy kid who mouths off, laying into people or threatening to smash their glasses, but that would be a terrible idea. If we open our eyes a bit wider, we’ll see that the little trickster has back up in the form of a senile grandpa, super soldier brother, and an unemployed uncle on peyote, each of whom are brandishing military-grade firepower. Back away slowly.

   From there, Hermes will make all the same pit stops that Mars did through this past February’s greatest hits - they make a conjunction with Neptune on April 16th and proceed to form an angry barbershop trio with Saturn and Mars on April 20th. This suggests a dramatic collective event(s) that will be exhaustingly discussed and telegraphed to the public; something big enough for the world to stay glued to the headlines. Given that Mercury also rules trade, commerce, media, and speedy travel, we’ll probably be hit with restrictions in those areas throughout this time period, especially considering the conflict and strategy (Mars) surrounding the Straight of Hormuz, a waterway (Neptune) at the heart of our current global conflict (Aries.) Those restrictions could look like price gouging, fuel shortages, and at the most extreme end of things, work stoppage as a way to conserve gas and oil. With Mars in the mix, we may also see violence or disruption at ports and fueling stations, considering how chill and normal everyone behaved during the gas crisis of the 1970’s.

4. THE MOON BRINGS US A CHANCE FOR A NEW ERA. In between all of this dumbass, war porn nonsense we will experience a new moon at the twenty-seventh degree of Aries on April 17th, and she will be supercharged with all the passion and strength of Mars in a steroidal rage. The hyper-initiatory quality of this moment can’t be overstated; a new moon is the beginning of her cycle, and Aries is the beginning of the zodiacal year, which is all occurring during the U.S. Pluto return, itself an event that kicks off a brand new 248 year cycle. The average lifespan of an empire. It’s hard to take this as anything but the celestial sphere screaming it’s message at us, then writing it on a board in all caps and underlining it three times just to make sure we get it. And that message is, shit is about to massively change.

Music in Purgatory

A jigsaw falling into place
So there is nothing to explain
You eye each other as you pass
She looks back and you look back
Not just once, not just twice

Wish away your nightmare, wish away the nightmare
You got a light, you can feel it on your back
A light and you can feel it on your back
Your jigsaw falling into place

-Thom Yorke

This astrology and this moment in time is thick with echoes of the past and hints of the future, intertwining like a DNA helix that we’ll be mapping into the 2030’s, so it’s unhelpful to reduce planetary movements to any one or two particular days. We will be experiencing everything on all of the days, which is understandably exhausting. Isolating different aspects or transits is comforting, because we can circle the time of a gnarly conjunction and say, “Ha. You’re not catching me with my pants down, planets. This isn’t Epstein Island.” We attempt to control our universe by tracking the stars in our planners that way, or at least lend favor to an outcome. If only we remembered how deep Neptune stores our delusions, we might relax into the notion that we aren’t here to control, but to to observe, and observation requires us to pay attention. Bearing witness doesn’t happen if we allow details of current events to fade into noise and coordinated crimes against humanity to become fridge buzz.

Over the next two weeks, Saturn and Neptune will present us with worrisome developments like violence, weather disasters, and mass hysteria, but they’re also gifting us an existential opportunity to see through the manufactured assurances that everything is fine, nobody has been screwing kids or eating babies, and dropping bombs on people liberates them, actually. Mars is bringing more pointless war, make no mistake, but he will also provide strategy and courage for those of us who oppose him. Mercury might finally stop blowing smoke up everyone’s ass and communicate, albeit cruelly, the real cost of upholding convenient fantasies, but it will still take diligent discernment and cross-checking of facts to ascertain truth. The propagandists are going to double-down instead of cease, because that’s what true believers do when they’ve convinced themselves of their specialness and savior hood, but the trickster works both ways; mental acuity will also increase among the resistance, as long as we’re paying attention. As long as we listen to the lyrics.

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April weather is intermittently pleasant in much of North America, which means we’re all losing layers and uncovering heads and ears in public, taking on the visage of blinkered, recently hibernated bears. Climate anxiety and the general state of things has made people visibly appreciative of things like cherry blossoms, clear skies, the sounds of birds, traffic, and mundanity, all of which were on glorious display the other day as I left work. It seemed a shame to sonically insulate myself to the good parts of my city when everyone was smiling on the streets and occasionally stopping to squint at nests and snap photos of colorful bugs. I walked to the train with unfettered ears and encountered a young man in a smart suit and a messenger bag stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, head canted to the heavens, hands lightly tucked in his pockets, oblivious to the tide of tourists that broke around him like a river around a rock. The evening sun painted his face gold from the nose up. I don’t know what so mesmerized him beyond one white, puffy jet trail high on the horizon, but his eyes stayed half-lidded while the tension leaked out of his shoulders. I moved with the crowd around him and left him to his peace.

I descended into the subway, to the platform that often features pamphleteers and buskers, when the reedy tones of a karaoke machine broke through the usual din of underground humanity. A petite woman was tucked against the shower tile wall with a Hello Kitty microphone and a very expensive-looking purse, singing something familiar in a heavy Korean accent and messing with tiny knobs on her digital accompaniment.

I stopped to listen and readjust my tote bag on my shoulder, taking in her powder blue peacoat and richly jeweled gel tips. She looked like she just finished her office job, or maybe a shopping excursion at Sephora, and I wondered which it was before I finally latched on to the tune she was belting; it was “How Deep is Your Love?” by The Bee Gees. I looked for a tip jar or payment app sign before walking past her to the turnstiles, but she didn’t have one - she was just singing in the subway because she wanted to, I guess, her pristine heels tapping every time she swayed to the chorus. “Cause we’re living in a world of fools, (tap-tap) breaking us down, (tap-tap) when they all should just let us be, (tap-tap)…”

It sounded pretty good, and the song successfully burrowed into my brain as I strolled down the platform, hair blown back, headphones mute around my neck. “How deep is your love, is your love, how deep is your love?" I muttered, matching the pitch of the train brake squeal before boarding. I hummed it all the way home, trying to remember the vibrant, weird parts of the world that are too important to let fade into the background, but I couldn’t recall any lyrics past the chorus. Maybe I’d never known them; I’d been listening too passively in the early parts of my life, back when the disco era still blared from car radios and gas was $.89/gal. I decided to look them up on various websites when I got home, amazed I had never done so before. I needed the precise words and message that The Bee Gees were caterwauling in a version of America that no longer exists, even if they were disappointing and stupid. The option to let things wash over us is no longer available. Like Y2K, disco, connection, diplomacy, and so much else, it has faded into the realm of nostalgia.

The Present

The rain stutters, Puget Sound is topped with whitecaps, fit women in puffer jackets walk their labradors by the water, and the SeaHawks logo peeks through Saturday night clouds of vapor. While the rest of my country freezes, conditions just shy of the forty-ninth parallel range from inoffensively cool to chilly, which is also an accurate descriptor for the general attitude of the Pacific Northwest. It’s not that we’re mean, per se, it’s just that we don’t trust strangers, acquaintances, family, or anyone we date, and this attitude seems to be spreading from the Cascades to the Mississippi river and beyond. Jumpy suspicion underpins interactions among pedestrians, Uber drivers, and grocery shoppers as we survey our fellow man. Proud boy, ICE, or evil barber I’ll wonder to myself as I watch a dude with a fascist haircut fondle apples in the produce aisle, usually as several other women silently do the same. If his hands reach for a Red Delicious, we know he shouldn’t be trusted, so we keep a thumb near our phones. Video evidence is always one tap away, hiding, grenade-like, in my pocket. Tell me when, I think. When, when, when.

In much the way I imagine people felt during the Red Scare of the 1950’s, I am unnerved to the point of social ineptitude; the silence before conversations, news reports, or a political TikTok feels like waiting to be electrocuted. Terrible things are happening all around us, but modern society is proving its ability to hyper normalize everything from concentration camps to genocide to billionaire baby-eating. Casual connections that once released social pressure are now jittery with information overload, like we’re all barely refraining from cracking in front of total strangers and roaring NO REALLY WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON at everyone within earshot. We’re willing to try things we might never have entertained before for a tiny bit of relief, of certainty; things like crystals, spell kits, tarot decks, or advice from irate oracles like myself. I dish it all out to people who, like me, are both skeptical and desperate.

What do you do with the blue crystals?

I’ve never had a tarot reading I don’t know what to do.

I was looking for something to soothe a broken heart. Is that dumb?

Do you know of any rituals for anxiety or depression?

Do the cards say if I’m ever going to get married?

Does it say when I’ll stop being alone?

Does it say when I’ll get another job?

When is this situation going to end?

When will I recover from this?

When will it get better?

When will I…?

When?!

When is the most consistent query I get, and sometimes people don’t have anything specific in mind. Often, they simply gesture at the world through the window and say, half joking, so when is all this going to stop?

I’ve only recently plugged back into the collective after time in solitary confinement, and I would love to say I’m surprised at the state of things. I would also love to have a definitive answer for when they’ll change, but that would be a lie bigger than ICE commando Greg Bovino’s coat. (Ed. note - I’ve just been informed that Bovino’s coat is actually a boys 4T and that Bovino himself is extremely tiny. Lilliputian, in fact, which is why he shall be known henceforth as Pocket Storm Trooper. I apologize for the error.)

The aspects coming at us this month strongly correlate with dramatic, sometimes violent transitions throughout history, and they happen rarely enough to dismiss as coincidence. How rare, you ask? At least every 248 years rare, thanks to everyone’s favorite, miniature rapscallion, Pluto, who is starring in a crappy remake of the founding of the United States titled, “1776! This Time With Nukes!”, and who spends at least twenty interminable years in every sign.

Pluto is just one small player on a galactic board, though; he will be interacting with Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus in worrisome ways that have always, and by always I mean every time they occur in human history, dramatically shifted civilizational paradigms. The fact that so many people are shocked at the conduct of the United States suggests a failure to incorporate historical, big picture thinking into our daily analysis, because if you know anything about history, you know it has dumb rhymes and accelerates as it progresses, like white people trying to clap on beat. By that I mean, society becomes more complex with each century that passes, and that complexity accelerates with each new innovation and discovery until we find ourselves in a future with tiny computers we treat like pets and LLM’s that can help anyone create a realistic video of Kristi Noem latching her fanged, plump mouth to the neck of a golden retriever and exsanguinating it. Like Nosferatu. (Ed. note - I’ve just been informed that such a video of Kristi Noem is likely real and not AI. Again, I apologize for the error.)

Modern individualism coaxes us into adopting very narrow perspectives, which can be somewhat forgiven when literal worlds of information are at our fingertips, accessible from anywhere, anytime. If one were to give every bit of information available the proper intellectual due, one’s brain would probably fry like an egg - unless one is a Gemini, then it feels totally normal. The rest of us specialize, shrink our apertures, and access only what we want using microscopic, ultra-tailored communication like social media, private digital channels, and biased search engines. Everyone is a specialist without truly being aware of it, because we’re operating in spheres so homogenous and minute that we don’t know what we don’t know, and the result is a dangerously fractured reality.

Think of the old parable about three weirdos in a dark room with an elephant, who can each touch only one part of the creature in order to guess which species they’re dealing with. The person touching the trunk thinks it’s an anaconda, the guy fondling a foot thinks it’s a turtle, and the pervert holding its tail…you know what? Let’s not poison our minds with the pervert’s thoughts. The point is, if they could touch and see the entire room - the walls, the ceiling, the elephant, and each other - their grasp of the situation would be a dramatic improvement on their previous assessments when Jeffrey Epstein, or Jigsaw, or whoever it was stuck them in a pitch black room with angry megafauna.

Big picture thinking and broad perspectives are necessary for identifying and understanding eras, especially dangerous ones, and I’m sorry to say that’s where we’re about to be ensconced; in a dangerous era. For this reason, appraising current astrology from a distance before zooming in on specifics could increase our odds of survival and, ideally, decrease anxiety and reactivity.

So let’s back away from the enraged elephant that is this foul year of your lord 2026 and connect the dots between some of the major astrology occurring therein. The picture formed will not only illustrate the species of horror we’re dealing with, it may also illuminate a path to victory over kleptocrats, fascism, and environmental catastrophe by revealing the connective tissue between catastrophes. We can’t afford to despair or check out; we have to work toward a future in which no one has to watch another Saw movie ever, ever again.

The Past

A useful study of astrology will always point us to historical analysis because it’s the most objective way to get a handle on major signatures of assets and transits. Ptolemy wasn’t just pulling planetary attributes out of his butt; he was studying the centuries of astronomical activity and co-present earthly events which occurred well before he was born, thanks to fairly diligent record-keeping by ancient Babylonians and Greeks.

Instead of applying delineations without context, the best and most nerdy mundane astrologers will look at the nature of events that coincided with the astrology in question. This is how Saturn became known as a depressive, mysterious time lord, Mars as a hot-headed douchebag that starts wars, and Venus as a pretty lady who inspires justice and beauty. The ‘regular watchings’ of people in Mesopotamia would often read something like, “The active, red god planet is close to the sun and Sargon has slaughtered a thousand Sumerians. Also, that dipshit Rimush cut himself on a rock again.” After compiling enough history, Ptolemy could identify thematic consistencies of each planet based on concurrent events - if Rimush and thousands of other people throughout history experienced accidents and battles every time Mars was prominent in the sky, he would come to be known as a huge douchebag who portends blood, combat, fire, and severance.

The following aspects and transits are not a comprehensive list for the year, but they are historically the loudest and most consequential, so it’s worthwhile to investigate them as one big picture instead of a series of siloed events, for reasons I’ve already mentioned. If recorded history is civilization’s diary, then maybe star patterns can be used like a secret, second copy that flashes us the pages before we write them. They aren’t concrete answers, but they might hold clues as to what is going on, how we can come out better on the other side, and when it might be over. When, when, when.

Too many respected astrologers have been proven right about these significations for me to pull punches, so fair warning; they have gnarly implications for the next twelve months, if not the next half decade. I’m a negative bitch, but I believe that meeting difficulty head-on is preferable to getting caught with our pants down, exposing our elephant tail to the perverts of the Epstein class. So, let’s minimize contact with sharp, dangerous things by staying informed and dodging rocks at just the right time. No one wants to end up like Rimush.

2026 Eclipse Chaos

Solar Eclipse in Aquarius - February 17th

Lunar Eclipse in Virgo - March 3rd

Solar Eclipse in Leo - August 12th

Lunar Eclipse in Pisces - August 28th

Eclipses scared the ever living shit out of ancient people, and for good reason - natural disasters and the deaths of kings coincided with these moments in the lunar cycle with worrisome frequency. King Herod, Emperor Augustus, Rama IV, King Henry, Princess Diana, and many, many other royal figures have died during or close to an eclipse, and some biblical scholars interpret the bible’s mention of “darkness” on the day Jesus Christ was crucified as an eclipse reference.

As part and parcel of such intense happenings, eclipses accelerate earthly processes, nestled as they are around the equinoxes, which mark the change of seasons. Equinoxes kick off Gemini and Virgo seasons, mutable signs of the zodiac that were traditionally thought responsible for ‘turning’ the wheel of time to the next season and transitioning the weather here on Earth. We’re now wrapping up on the Virgo/Pisces nodal axis, which will be fully complete by February 2027, so we probably won’t encounter any new horrors in early March or late August (fingers crossed.) The oh shit factors here are mid-February and mid-August, because these will be the first eclipses on the Leo/Aquarius axis, and their power will be magnified by the greater benefic and malefic, respectively.

The eclipse on February 17th will probably be unnerving because the temple of The Water-Bearer is hosting said eclipse, and Aquarius is ruled by Saturn. By virtue of being the most dour, ‘out there’ god planet, Saturn usually brings us bummer eclipses, but the February eclipse of 2026 is burdened with extra gravity. Why? Firstly, it occurs while Saturn is at zero degrees of Aries, which is a volatile, immature place. (Simply typing that sentence woke Mars up from a nap and caused him to rush into my living room shouting, “Did someone say volatile and immature?!” Then, he shit on my rug.) Secondly, it occurs mere hours before Saturn and Neptune join at this combustible degree. Thirdly, this eclipse will be co-present with Mars and the god of existential catastrophe, Pluto, so corresponding events will all be filtered through Hades judgmental gaze.

The Personal: Look to the Aquarius house in your birth chart, because these are the topics in your life that will experience accelerated, uncomfortable change in the weeks surrounding the eclipse. The house that lands in Leo will also be relevant, because eclipse revelations often illuminate some imbalance or tension between opposing ends of a zodiacal axis. A chart with the second house is in Aquarius could experience transformation involving money and value creation, for instance, but not in isolation; debt and third-party money will also be involved, because those are eighth house topics that dwell in Leo for such a nativity. Major beginnings and major endings are always palpable during eclipse season, especially if they are related to situations we’ve been slow-rolling or ignoring in hopes they would resolve themselves. Fixed signs will bear the brunt of this axis, so the revelations and quick changes for Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius will be extra loud in February and we can expect a ‘response’, or additional development sometime near the August eclipse in Leo.

The Mundane: The United States is clearly the geopolitical actor shitting in everyone’s cereal this decade, regardless of where one lives, and the land of Yankee Doodle Dipshits has an Aquarian third house in its nativity. This could indicate major beginnings and endings in U.S. commerce, communication networks, and domestic travel; think of social network/digital outages, market disruptions, and extremely destabilizing news stories. When August rolls around, revelations about the opposing house which governs education, the legal system, and religious institutions will build on the data that February’s eclipse provides. Intersectional possibilities between these houses might include new laws that govern speech, religion, or money, which doesn’t sound worrisome at all.

It might not be all bad, though - remember that solar eclipses have a historical pattern of killing leaders, too, and I would facilitate a permanent Internet crash myself if I thought it would eliminate even one ruling class psychopath. The February solar eclipse will be opposing Donald Trump's AND J.D. Vance’s first house of self, while the August eclipse in Leo will occur in their first houses and oppose their seventh, which governs close relationships. Maybe they’ll eat each other.

Saturn/Neptune conjoin at zero degree of Aries on 2.20.26

This is the big one guys - an astrological meeting that only occurs every thirty-seven years and hasn’t occurred in Aries since 1703, a year of murderous volatility for Russia and Europe that included religious wars, natural disasters, and various political shenanigans that resulted in mass casualties. The successive conjunction years were not much better, and we see a clear thematic pattern emerge when we analyze these conjunctions collectively instead of individually. If you are a masochist and wish to dive deeply into this misery, I recommend following the work of Nick Dagen Best, who is both an astrologer and historian, as well as Chris Brennan (whose podcast I listen to obsessively) and Richard Tarnas. The following themes are the loudest and most obvious from even a brief skimming of history:

Plagues and Popular Uprisings

Smallpox in Quebec in 1703, Spanish Flu spread via a stupid world war beginning in 1917, plague decimating the Russian army in 1738 after they tried to get saucy with the Turks…you get the idea. Geysers of slithering, disgusting microbes erupted from the crust of warfare and peaked with every Saturn/Neptune conjunction until the widespread adoption of vaccines in the 1950’s, frequently racking up as many, if not more casualties than the conflicts themselves. We had high hopes of beating those microscopic assholes for good after Jonas Salk worked his magic in 1953, but the conjunction of 1989 told everyone to hold it’s beer and spawned a deadly, new epidemic; the AIDS crisis.

Armed uprisings against established power compounded death in many cases, because putting a bunch of unwashed dudes in small spaces is never terribly hygienic…and there were a LOT of armed rebellions associated with this conjunction. Saturn is the planet of age and wisdom, but he’s ALSO the planet that signals to Earthlings when our structures are too old, too outdated, and in dire need of retirement, which could explain the predominance of youthful rebellions during these Saturn/Neptune years. Consider the following:

• American colonists and the proletariat of France famously decided they had enough monarchic bullying under the conjunction of 1773, which was the year that Sam Adams and his merry band of trolls began attacking British ships and telling them to fuck right off with their tea.

• During the conjunction of 1809, the Swedish executed a coup and told their monarchy to take a hike while Tyroleans in Austria revolted against French and Bavarian occupation, and during the next conjunction of 1846, settlers in California revolted against the Mexican government and declared California a republic.

• The following conjunction of 1882 saw violent uprisings in Egypt and Korea later dubbed the Urabi Revolt and Imo Incident, respectively, and during the conjunction of 1917, the world knew only peace. I’m just kidding. Instead, all of Europe warred amongst themselves and brought Russia and America with them. Even within the confines of WWI, though, separate, sizable anti-war mutinies and rebellions took place against the French, Italian and United States militaries. Despite complex, intra-Western peace treaties ushering in some stability after WWII, imperialism continued bloody rulership in places like Africa and West Asia.

• Native Kenyans revolted against the British in 1953 in what was later referred to as the Mau Mau rebellion, and by 1989, countries in the ‘Eastern Bloc’ that were little more than glorified vassals for the U.S.S.R each successfully rebelled and established independent governance amidst the public crumbling of Stalin’s empire and the fall of The Berlin Wall.

The Personal: Disease is a big signification of this alignment because age and infirmity are Saturn’s bread and butter; they are the ultimate restrictions to human immortality, itself a Neptunian concept mired in delusion. Nothing lives forever, and even if it were possible, you couldn’t find a worse candidate in the universe for such a thing than squishy, corruptible Homo sapiens. Nevertheless, Elon Musk, Pete Thiel, and the other chinless wonders of the so-called Dark Enlightenment continue to seek a fountain of youth - they’re simply doing with chemicals and code what Ponce de Leon and Cortes did with ships and slaves. And that thing is wasting. Our. Money.

Avoid falling into tech bro fantasies of chilling in cryo-freeze or becoming a robot and use this conjunction to get real about your limitations, age-related and otherwise. Go to the doctor, get a teeth cleaning and dental check-up, and think about assessing your diet. Stop eating like you’re fifteen if you were ever on MySpace, and take advantage of modern vaccines while you still can for reasons that may soon become apparent….

The Mundane:…because some shitty disease is about to make a comeback. Measles is out of control, participation numbers for flu and covid vaccines are dropping year over year, and the man with power to do anything about it thinks sucking on a raw, unwashed cow tit is more effective than modern inoculation. Does anyone know what happened to bird flu? The answer is no! They don’t, because the government with the most money to throw at public health has stopped doing so, just as they have stopped funding USAID, the international program that, among other things, paid for mass inoculation in developing nations. Those programs weren’t just fluffers for U.S. soft power abroad; they did double duty as plague prophylactics by tamping down deadly mutations of things like malaria and Ebola before they could ever get started. Now that ableist conspiracy theorists are in charge of public health and oil lobbyists run the E.P.A, continued deforestation and rising, bug-a-licious global temperatures seem destined to spawn a new pandemic. Don’t put those masks away, is what I’m saying.

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Bad Weather and Border Bullshit

Neptune is a triton wielding ocean god in ancient Western mythology, which may be why he kills so many people at sea when he’s in a bad mood or aspecting one of the malefic planets. When his watery, homicidal tendencies are married to Saturn’s cantankerous need for restriction, Neptune speaks to Mother Nature’s ornery side and prompts her to exact revenge on humans through earthquake, fire, and deadly storms.

• The Apennine earthquakes killed around ten thousand Italians during the Saturn/Neptune conjunction of 1703, which was also the year an extratropical cyclone ravaged the English Channel and killed a whopping eight thousand people off the coast of Britain - a death toll so massive and unexpected that it’s known in the annals of history as the Great Storm of 1703. Very original.

• At the next conjunction in 1738, a Dutch slave trading ship capsized at a river port, and those benevolent traffickers bolted, leaving around 700 enslaved humans to die in chains below deck. Europeans are just so charming and sophisticated. Later that year, a British ship approaching America wrecked off the coast of Rhode Island, killing over two-hundred people.

• None of those disasters were quite as, say, toothsome as the snowstorms encountered by the infamous Donner party in 1846, which stranded them in the Sierra Nevada mountains for three months and forced them to enjoy long pork a la cart, nor were they as deceptive as the Bombay Cyclone of 1882, which was supposed to have killed ten thousand people in June of that year. Perplexingly, despite its inclusion in various historical texts and reports, weather scientists eventually sussed this event out as a hoax perpetuated by some sensationalist American rag in the 1940’s. No records of such an event existed in local Indian texts, and historians eventually acknowledged that ten thousand people would have been a ridiculous chunk of the population at that time, whose disappearance would not have gone unnoticed. The Great Bombay Cyclone is Neptune at his most meta; he’s associated with hoaxes like the Salem witch trials and natural disasters (like cyclones) but it’s a special treat for him to see them merged into one giant, pissy signature like this. Well done, Bombay Cyclone.

A word that most concretely defines Neptune’s nebulous, watery nature is dissolution. Just as the tide erases sandcastles and evidence, Neptune can dissolve borders and partitions, themselves a major kink of Saturn. Old Kronos never met a wall he didn’t want to put up or tear down, and he extends that desire to invisible borders when combining forces with Poseidon’s illusions, which may explain why geopolitical borders often shift in tandem with these conjunctions.

• The Napoleanic Wars of 1809 futzed constantly with various European borders, and in 1846, the United States and Britain would both engage in territory disputes over Texas and Kashmir, respectively, having taken them as spoils of imperialism. That same year, the forty-ninth parallel was officially declared the border separating the United States from Canada, and the poor, misunderstood District of Columbia, which had been ceded to the federal government in 1790, was thrust back into Virginia’s hands by George Washington with a truculent, “Don’t wannit!”

• 1917 was a year of hefty border changes thanks to WWI, of course, (interestingly enough, it was also the same year that a couple of children in Yorkshire, England staged realistic photographs of faerie cottages and passed them off as legitimate, a classically Neptunian hoax the kids wouldn’t cop to staging until 1981.)

• In 1953, the ill-advised Korean War came to a close and the strangely intimate border between North and South Korea was officially established, and in 1989, Germany reunited in tandem with the collapse of the Soviet Union, whose old borders would dissolve and retreat with stunning speed. I watched German citizens on television as a child in 1989 as they broke the crumbling symbol down with their hands, one decrepit stone at a time, beneath the Soviet’s ancient, sodium flood lights and rusted barbed wire. It was visual confirmation of an ideological death and one final nail in the coffin of collectivism and communism. The fate of modern capitalism and all it spawned remains to be seen in 2026, but the astral omens are not encouraging.

The Personal AND The Mundane: I’m not sure there’s much to be done about a crazed class of elites fighting with each other for territory, which is always the foundation of any bloody conflict. The state can take many things from us, but they can never own our interior selves, which is why I gravitate toward spiritual and intellectual expansion in times of political peril. The present crystallizes atop structural ruins of yore, so it behooves us to take advantage of 20/20 historical hindsight, free of social media propaganda. Pick a conflict and learn about it from an actual book, not Tik Tok. Russian history alone is deeply intertwined with this conjunction, and the Bolshevik revolution of 1917 is what galvanized the U.S. to vilify communism and labor solidarity, which would lead to the hysteria and persecution of the Red Scare in 1953 and the general aversion to socialism that still grips monied Westerners today. The Rise and Fall of The Third Reich is another useful tome that maps the journey from administrative fascism to visceral state brutality, which could be useful for recognizing these red flags at home.

More granularly, the house that lands in Aries on our natal charts is the place we’ll want to brace for impact, because that’s where clarity about aging systems will occur. Disasters, both man made and natural, cannot be avoided, but that doesn’t mean we need to wander the earth in a naked state of ignorance, either. Stay aware of your surroundings and informed (within reason) of the things happening in your neighborhood/town/city/state. If an earthquake strikes, it will be people down the street ensuring each other’s safety, not their congressional representatives. We have far more local control than we think, but we’ve been propagandized to frame our fellow humans as NPC’s when they’re actually valuable Pokemon that need catching and nurturing. So go collect them all.

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Mars/Uranus fixed square at 27 degrees Aquarius/Taurus on 2.27.26

Mars/Uranus join at 3 degrees of Gemini on 7.4.26

This is another doozy of an event, and the timing suggests physical consequences manifesting in response to whatever existential crisis is set loose by the Saturn/Neptune conjunction in February.

We’ve already experienced disruptive violence at the outset of this particular synodic cycle for Mars, which began with a solar conjunction on January 9th and coincided with massive anti-government protests after paramilitary agents executed an American citizen, Renee Good, in Minneapolis, MN. The first square, or initial difficulty, with this cycle occurs in late February and may involve something that came to prominence during Uranus’ Taurus sojourn. Cryptocurrency, bitcoin, or other financial bugaboos from Uranus’ trip in Taurus (from 2018 through the present) could follow the geopolitical turbulence of February’s Saturn/Neptune conjunction; not a fully mystical prediction, obviously, when we consider the intermingling of politics and finance.

Historically speaking, this conjunction brings spice to the United States specifically because it is a repetition of the country’s dangerous founding; we default (and have always defaulted) to violence when faced with dramatic transition, as the Mars/Uranus conjunction in our native eight house predicts. Our latest reminder of this regrettable tendency transpired on January 6th, 2021, when rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol days before such a conjunction perfected in Taurus.

• The first in a series of our founding Gemini conjunction occurred in June, 1774, when King George simultaneously pissed off every American colony by issuing the Quartering Act, which forced your average John and Abigail to house British soldiers against their will. That rage would alchemize into the first Continental Congress and lay the foundation for The Declaration of Independence to be signed during the next Mars/Uranus conjunction in 1776.

• Days before the Mars/Uranus conjunction in Gemini in 1861, Confederate soldiers attacked Fort Sumter and began America’s bloodiest war, which would reach a high mark of destruction by the time those planets met again in 1865, once General Sherman brought the Confederates to their knees with a devastating slash and burn campaign across the southern states.

• When Mars and Uranus met in Capricorn in February of 1917, the United States was embroiled in violent border skirmishes with Mexico, themselves contending with a populist revolution. When a poorly handled German telegram to Mexico was intercepted by the British, America got wise to undercover plotting by Germany to pull the U.S. into WWI, ostensibly by promising Mexico hefty land spoils if they would formally take up arms against the U.S. The Mexican government wisely declined, but this amateur communication snafu, in addition to stupidly aggressive U-boat attacks on Britain by Germany, was enough to lure the U.S. into the war.

• The same conjunction in 1943 coincided with the Allied troops mainland invasion of Italy on September 9th, a strategic turning point during WWII that would eventually seal Mussolini’s doom. For the next year and a half, Mars and Uranus met at key moments for Allied forces; in January of 1944, Dwight Eisenhower took charge of the troops in London and began planning an extensive invasion of occupied France, while Stalin’s army was able to free Leningrad and gain ground against Nazi forces in occupied Poland.

• The most devastating iteration of this conjunction occurred in August of 1945, ten days before the exact perfection in Gemini, when the United States dropped an atomic weapon on Japan. It was 8:15 a.m., the clouds had cleared above Hiroshima, and war-mongering Mars lit a fire with Uranus, planet of Promethean folly. Ares inched closer and Nagasaki evaporated three days later. Survivor accounts from Japan described the aftermath - bodies memorialized in ash, oily, black rain, and bleeding orifices - as, “hell on Earth.”

The Personal: The loudest manifestations of this aspect will be collective and U.S.-centric, given the aforementioned natal chart placements of Mars and Uranus, but we’ll probably catch heat from this in our microcosms, too. The Gemini area of our charts will be peppery with unexpected friction as well as accelerated cognition, especially involving planning and innovation. This combination has effects similar to Adderall - it heats up the brain’s processing power and boosts synapse efficiency, but it also makes us a bit snappish. Be wary of in-fighting and messiness as the conjunction draws close, because people do reckless, weird shit in the name of winning beneath this planetary combination. Uranus gooses people’s willingness to destroy, even when the consequences are dire; think of the shittiest work situation you’ve ever been in, and how you might have entertained, briefly, blowing up your company building just to start over. (I’m kidding, obviously none of us would ever do that. Especially not me. Never even thought about it.) It’s a juvenile and impulsive reaction that rears its head when we’ve been stuck in frustrating, oppressive situations for too long before the whole thing bursts like a winter pipe.

The Mundane: New, grotesque forms of warfare seem to be the most ostentatious signature of this aspect; a lethal combination of Mars’ violent extremism and morally grey, Uranian innovation. Both of these chodes are associated with destruction by fire, accidental or otherwise, and electronic whoopsies in particular follow Uranus wherever he goes. Prepare for tech meltdowns that have physical consequences, like the plane-grounding Crowdstrike crash that accompanied this conjunction when it occurred in Taurus in 2024, as well as worrisome geopolitical developments. Don’t forget that the so-called ‘Twelve Day War’ between Iran and the United States Israel popped off riiiiight as a fixed square perfected between none other than Mars and Uranus.

The Future

It’s far too easy, if we only look at these big moments, to assume everything is fucked; to dive headfirst into a jug of Carlo Rossi wine, because if ever there were an excuse to drown in crappy, Catholic alcohol, living through the Fall of Rome 2.0 would be it.

However. Dramatic, civilizational shifts do not have a monopoly on our future; a lot of lovely astrology will hold us aloft between grim moments. Jupiter and Venus are both in their signs of exaltation until March 6th, and they meet up for a trine on June 8th that bestows luck and harmony to our personal endeavors. In fact, much of the microcosmic astrology is hopeful, which suggests individual successes amidst collective chaos. Many of us will reinvent ourselves into something bigger and brighter because of collective woes, not in spite of them.

But what is it? Everyone still wants to know. What is going to happen?

If spring of 2026 repeats historical, Saturnian themes, we can expect popular unrest, geopolitical turbulence with a side of financial instability, and the demise of some key authority figures…but is that truly surprising? Anyone with working eyeballs likely saw these things coming since 2016. Neptunian themes of deception, secrecy, and the power of unseen forces are already playing out in public conversations about elite sex trafficking rings and their connection to politics, revealing long running deceptions that can no longer be ignored. Everything old and dying that we have stubbornly refused to replace - bureaucracy, infrastructure, ideologies, and hierarchies - will reveal the depth of their hold on us when they crumble to dust.

By July, we can expect heat from both political friction and geological warming; there will be saber rattling, reckless actions, and conflict between nations. Autumnal eclipse season will force further dramatic change by revealing secrets and forcing abrupt changes in leadership, likely involving Russia, the U.S., or Iran, and I shudder to think about what lies ahead for the hearty natives of Greenland. The United States may still make a show of token democracy in November, but expected turbulence will make a great excuse to ‘pause’ elections, and Venus brings palpable ick factor to proceedings in October when she retrogrades through Scorpio and Libra. When we get to 2027, many of us will have a different view of the world - not bad, not good, but hopefully, more truthful.

But when will it be over? When can we breathe, sit down, maybe make some pancakes? When, when, when? The political waves might crest by April, 2028, when Saturn leaves pugilistic Aries for earthy Taurus, having whipped us with another of his painful lessons about gerontocracy. Will it be over, then? Not totally, since Uranus won’t leave Gemini until 2032, so rebellions, innovations, and disruptions could continue to mess with us for several years. Okay, but, then it will be over? Eh…vengeful oceans and fiery disasters will probably continue throughout Neptune’s Aries transit, which isn’t over until 2038, and Pluto, the guy who stays at every party for far too long, won’t leave Aquarius for the gentler, kinder waters of Pisces until 2043.

Is that when? Seventeen years for this to all be over?

I wish I knew when, I really do. But time is eternal, the universe is vast and no one would ever put a crank like me in charge.

I just work here.

Alecto Chaos will always be free, because The Cranky Astrologer is a filthy marxist who is bad at math. If you or your friends are rich and enjoy cursing, though, I can stick extra profanity in these missives for just $5 a month!

Paralysis.

This is the place I’ve lived for a month, a landscape of shadow and fog that mutes throats, stops motion, and sedates minds. We roused ourselves enough to walk the shores of the Puget Sound on New Year’s Day, my kids and me, after weeks of isolation, and the damp, granite sand sucked at our boots with every step. Sonorous freighters lowed in the distance. The beach was dotted with clusters of pink, quivering flesh, various winter footwear, and dogs, some of whom raced in and out of the tide to join the squealing, shivering humans. Air and sea were uncannily matched in volume (heavy) and color (gunmetal.) It’s hard to tell where the sky stops and the ocean begins during the dark season, which might be why so many of us stumble in and drown in winter. We cannot avoid what we cannot see.

Time is relative, more in this foul year of 2026 than ever before, what with all the disappearing institutions, propaganda, and AI slop masquerading as reality. I don’t know how long I’ve been gone, because time is the thing demons steal right after they steal universal compassion and shared reality; Sisyphus lacked a stop watch by design, as did Prometheus, and any Evangelical Christian will tell you that time in hell moves differently than time on Earth. That’s how the devils of the pit maximize misery, keeping their subjects in the dark about when the pain will stop. It could end anytime or it could go on forever.

I have ceased timekeeping because it was fruitless in the same way schedules in prison are fruitless, existing only to remind the inmates of their incarceration, stasis, and total lack of agency. Those lucky enough to have never been in the U.S. prison system only learned that brutal lesson during the pandemic lockdown, but handily forgot it in order to restart the financial flow from America’s capital spigot. What does the date matter when every day unfolds the same way? If time is only a human construct, what are we really keeping track of? My current theory is that we’re simply recording our own tragic stupidity. So I can’t tell you when I disappeared or when I’ll return; I can only unfurl my brain like a map of feelings and place it on the table of this sad ship.

My kid’s best friend died by suicide at age thirteen…this month, last month, last week? I don’t know. I forgot to mention that this map is still in progress and we’re marking the jagged rocks as we navigate an abyss. Grief punctures like icebergs; it fools you into thinking it’s smaller than it is with subterfuge, and you never see the violence coming. Shipwrecked. We don’t know where the shore is.

Henry* was at our house frequently - a placid, courteous kid who liked to cook and go to farmer’s markets with us. He played video games with my child, went to school with my child, and jumped on our parent’s trampoline with my child when the days were long and my mother-in-law’s lavender was in full bloom. They ran in the grass and jumped in the pool, over and over in the same sequence. Trampoline, grass, pool.

When he made an attempt this fall he was promptly kept in a children’s hospital, assigned an anti-depressant, and released into the wild two weeks later. It seemed he was improving, the doctors said he was improving, and everyone decided everything was fine. I gave him a rhodonite for forgiveness and healing because I remembered the two of them, Henry and my kid, hoarding rocks and seashells the Pacific Ocean spat out last summer. We found out what happened when, having received a single word text, goodbye, my kid frantically tried to contact them, only to have a relative pick up the phone. I know it was morning because those moments are now embossed on my brain.

There was a man walking his dog and a giggly toddler past our garden, the sky was still brightening as I listened to my husband on the phone. Alien speech, by turns morose and panicked, buzzed around his ear. The ping of the dryer prompted me to get up and gather the laundry mid existential crisis. Pavlov would be pleased. The normalcy of regular comings and goings is obscene in these moments and my brain began to loop itself into itself, crocheting horror into the mundane fabric of life.

Henry is dead and I have to get the mail before our neighbor’s dog starts barking at the mailman. Henry is dead as I prep a natal chart, noting that Saturn is in late Pisces, a place comprised of tears. Henry is dead and I’ll need to make sure we feed the cats before we leave. Henry is dead as teenagers tackle each other at the bus stop, as my husband answers work emails, and as we weave through other customers at the grocery store. The world is behaving the same way it was last week, the week before, and the week before, and I want to yell at everyone to fucking stop it because they should know the same pitiless ache that my child knows in this moment. They should know that Henry is dead.

*Names has been changed to protect privacy

Lamentation.

I wish I could tell you about Saturn instead of Henry - how he is barreling toward a conjunction with Neptune that will drastically change our world, how he doesn’t let us get away with anything because he guards the boundary between this life and the next, how he ate his own children to teach them a lesson and became trapped in the lesson himself, but I can’t. That would require faith that I do not currently have. I don’t feel qualified to tell anybody about anything, because Henry is dead and I neither stopped it nor saw it coming.

I have two children who have maturated within one school system, which means everyone knows everyone and we often repeat teachers from grade to grade. Many of the instructors have kids in the same school system, because although my town likes to masquerade as a big city, it really isn’t. So when we received another communique from the superintendent about yet another student death by suicide mere days after Henry died, we recognized the name and my husband held my hand while I buried my head in his shoulder. You get good at silent crying when you have children who don’t need to see it.

Administrative communication lags during the holidays, so we didn’t receive confirmation until later(this week? last week?) that the second child was the only daughter of one of our high school teachers. My oldest kid’s teacher, in fact, who is now on indefinite leave after his middle-schooler removed themselves from the corporeal plane. Words like ‘astounding’ and ‘bleak’ don’t do the last month enough justice. The present is a dark morality play, except that it isn’t a play; it’s a nightmare that we wish we could escape, but the world inverts itself when you are paralyzed by grief. We think we’re swimming to the surface when we’re actually swimming down. Peace only exists during sleep, and my entire household has given up on anything beyond achieving that sort of calm whenever we can get it. I don’t know how long our schedules have revolved around mourning, because time is relative and Henry is dead.

I have paused paid subscriptions to my work, shut off my phone, and ignored digital communication, because I only have time to lay in bed with my youngest as they fall asleep and to sit on the couch with them when they are awake. Normally, I would be tracking future astrology transits and digging in books and charts for historical recurrences throughout my day. Maybe delineating daily tarot cards for the masses. I tried to do these things at one point, but I wound up researching youth suicide statistics instead because my ghoulish consciousness never passes up an opportunity for misery. It seems child suicide has been increasing by eight percent every year since 2008, and it is now the second most common cause of child death in my country. The first, of course, is guns. It feels pointless to write an astrological summation or a tarot card to tell the future, because a country that makes life so cheap, that throws its own children away so flippantly, has nothing good coming for it. A quick perusal of recent national or international news should make that sad reality abundantly clear; nothing good is coming for us.

It’s exactly what we deserve.

I don’t have it in me to make guesses about the future or provide clarity on the present. I’m swimming in the bitter waters of Saturn and Neptune, and it’s cold as fuck here at the boundary of Pisces. Instead, I make food we all eat and find movies for the four of us to watch under blankets in a dim living room. I find puzzles for everyone to stare at, brush our cats and accept the occasional, prickly feline hug. We only managed a trip to the beach out of habit, despite our collectively glum state; it is tradition around these parts to dunk oneself in the ocean on New Year’s Day, and certain members of my family are militant in their participation. So, we donned swimsuits under sweaters and cautiously joined the crowd that was roasting sausage over bonfires and teetering in and out of portable saunas. The landscape, at least, seemed to sympathize with us - sunless, heatless, and dotted with grim rock piles. Cairns, I thought, looking at the stone formations. The old method of marking our dead.

My youngest and I walked the beach, rock hunting, when we came upon a recently deceased sea bird. He was stretched across the sand so elegantly that I almost thought he was resting, eyes closed, wings folded and slack, like he was waiting on an imminent back massage. My kid asked if anyone was going to pick him up and wondered aloud what would happen to his body, and neither of us could shift our eyes from the pitiable tableau. I know they were thinking of Henry, and of the question that cracked me open like an egg the previous week.

Mom, can you still have an open casket when someone jumps off of a building?

It rang in my ears while I thought about the bird in front of us and bit down on my tongue because I would not, would not lose my shit in front of my grieving child. My nails dug half moons into my palms and I was glad for the camouflage of wind and mist, ever present on the northern Pacific Coast. Can you still have an open casket when someone jumps off a building? I snapped back to the present when I realized they were still waiting for an answer about the bird, and I could tell they desperately wanted to touch it. I told them we couldn’t touch it, not even to dispose of it. Nightmare scenarios of avian flu had me clamping my hand on their forearm and pulling them closer.

“But what will happen to him? Is he just going to rot out here?”

“No,” I said, glancing up at the sky, at the moon I knew was waxing to its ultimate fullness behind impenetrable cloud cover. “He’ll get pulled into the ocean with high tide,” I murmured, ruffling their hair. Back to where he came from.

My response was met with a contemplative grunt and a lingering look down the shoreline at the crab shells and varied sea detritus. My oldest kid, who won’t be a kid for much longer, had emerged from the water like a hypothermic Venus and was getting dressed, our signal to leave. We lingered - the salty smell of decay was oddly grounding, and the tears I expected didn’t materialize. Instead, they peered at me with quiet buoyancy.

“Is this all gonna get sucked back into the ocean, then? With high tide?”

“Yes,” I said. “It all goes back to where it came from.”

“Us, too?”

Yes. Us, too.

How Soon Is Now?

I’m beginning to feel a lot like Morrissey lately, which I don’t like one bit, considering he’s a racist piece of shit and the weakest member of The Smiths to boot. While I don’t share those proclivities with Mr. Human Grumpy Cat, I do notice my propensity of late to view the world through a cynically depressed microscope, which leads me to think and write only about horrible people and terrible tragedies as they pertain to our society and skies. Then, when the astrology finally, brutally plays out, it jumpstarts another cycle of depression and has me repeating my angsty bullshit all over again, which typically boils down to, “Pluto is doing things for fascism, Mars is doing things for psychopathy, Saturn is eating children, and the moon was also there - let’s all have a nap and wait for the asteroid!” Then I chew on my fingers while staring out the window, searching the graphite sky for something, anything that could be good news.

Everybody knows in their bones, to varying degrees, that our kicky little capitalist adventure has crested a normalcy summit and is on the downslope to Mad Max territory, we’re just not sure how long or extreme this descent will be.

Many historians and sociologists agree on the major catalyst of every dead civilization’s downfall; massive inequality driven by a ruling class rife with psychopathy, narcissism, and Machavellianism, i.e. the dark triad that infused both Ted Bundy’s and Jeffrey Dahmer’s spongey brains. This feels like a solid theory as to why our government and board rooms are filled with pedophiles and criminals, as a few psychiatric papers have theorized; evil men built evil systems that in turn reward, you guessed, it, evil.

All of that to say, there probably isn’t much you or I or even an armed fleet of wise, benevolent wizards can do about the current state of the world, because history is going to be made either way. What we can do is navigate our own neck of the woods with as much grace and compassion as anyone can muster while staying engaged enough to see trouble when it meanders down our driveway looking for some labor to exploit, people to cage, or creatures to torture. Sometimes the planets wiggle into formations that make even that low bar very difficult to clear, and those are the days that I usually recommend blankets, cats, and Enya until things seem manageable. At other times, the planets pair off into such interesting, volatile groups that we can use them proactively to offset the bullshit that President Bundy and Vice President Dahmer (or the narcissists in your own life) are spreading throughout the world, and the holiday season is bringing exactly that kind of astrology.

Soon is…December

When Jupiter made his ingress into Cancer this past June, various astro nerds pointed out the downstream effect of louder lunar transits over the course of Old One-Eye’s stay in crab land, and that is exactly what we’ve seen. This year’s moons have been tough - they are stronger, weirder, and their manifestation seems to be taking place over a more extended timeframe. It makes sense when we reflect on Jupiter’s main kink, which is to make things more vibrant and expansive, which he will continue to do in the moon’s domicile until July, 2026. He is super charging the relevance of full moons, new moons, eclipses, and daily transits, but we can avoid being blindsided by the intensity if we keep track of important lunar goings on for the duration of the effects.

Our last new moon was close enough to Mercury to be part of the trickster planet’s conjunction with Apollo, who quickly opposed Uranus in the final degrees of Taurus. During his staring contest with Uranus, the Sun ALSO formed a trine with Neptune, injecting extra feelings into our feelings and amplifying our reactions until we reach the new moon in Sagittarius on December 19th. These are unusual significations for any lunar cycle and quite the zodiacal pretzel, so let’s look at the building blocks of this new moon’s watery connections, since we’ll want to work with them until late December.

NEW MOON = a conjunction between our two luminaries that begins a new synodic cycle for Luna, who traditionally rules our bodies and earthly fortunes (as opposed to the Sun, who represents more of our mental ideals and grand ambitions, as well as our leaders)

MERCURY = tiny little shit disturber who brings messages and rules technology, communication, short distance travel and anything requiring speed, they orbit very close to Earth and thus affects these things on a personal level

URANUS = a much larger shit-disturber, one of two ice giants who lives in the exurbs of the solar system, Uranus also rules technology but in a broader, existential fashion that affects the human collective more dramatically than any individual - he also rules innovation, disruption, air travel, and electricity

NEPTUNE = a big dreamy, oceanic planet in the same neighborhood as Uranus, this guy reflects the collective subconscious and can be representative of hidden desires, hang-ups, and fears

SCORPIO = the zodiac’s dark, intuitive, stalker-ish whole sign house who acts as the feminine crash pad for everyone’s favorite dickhead, Mars…this is a place of secrets, taboos, and conflict, but unlike Aries (Mars’ other domicile) Scorpio’s weapons are subtle; their vengeance quiet, their intuition frighteningly accurate

When we examine the basic functions of each planet co-present with the moon, a picture emerges as to how each planet behaves in Mars’ house of sexy sex; Mercury becomes investigative and sneaky, Uranus disrupts secret keeping (or he disrupts something in such a way that no one notices until it’s too late) and Neptune pushes our darker, taboo desires out of the subconscious and into our conscious mind. If you’ve been paying attention to the news, you know that Mercury reactivated new communication from an old scandal that is classically Scorpio in content; taboos, sex, and international blackmail schemes.

Adding to the above complexity is the nature of retrograde movement, something ALL of the above planets were experiencing when this cycle initiated. Planets in retrograde reflect our need to review, revise, and autopsy old experiences, and they’re infamous for hosting blasts from the past in the form of ex-lovers, ex-friends, and forgotten, loose ends.

So what does this mean for us as we navigate Sagittarius season? It may mean that whatever vexes us in the present has an answer buried in our past; a previous situation that lacked sufficient resolution needs re-examination. If we missed something, anything, Mercury in Scorpio will find it and reveal it in shining, sunny glory thanks to their recent solar conjunction. Unfortunately, Uranus throws a bit of tension into the mix; he’s talking about weird shit and making complete turnabouts in an area of life we considered settled, and though it will feel disruptive and irritating, it might be the spark that starts our illuminating journey through the past and into a new present.

The complexity of this moon cycle means we’re deep diving into something that already has legs - this wasn’t a lunation for initiating projects so much as it was meant to deepen our progress or understanding of an ongoing situation, probably via freshly uncovered information. When Mercury rolls over the shadow of their retrograde, they’ll re-activate the Scorpio new moon - but now in direct motion, so we could see new developments in this old situation around December 10th, and things will palpably progress until the new moon in Sagittarius on December 19th. This is exacerbated by the Gemini full moon on December 4th, since she is ALSO ruled by Mercury, who is still slithering through the temple of Scorpio. The secrets are still being revealed, folks.

The nature of an opposition figures heavily into the following horoscopes because we’re in the throes of a tense lunation between the Scorpio and Taurus axis, wherever that lands for you. Saturn in Pisces connects this lunar cycle with the mutable square madness coming up throughout December, as does wily Mercury, because they both stationed direct and are helping us wrap something up that has been cooking for a long time…and much like a federal prosecutor tracking down the Epstein client list, they are ready to serve.

For that reason, I’ve paired each whole sign house with its opposition, Scorpio with Taurus, Aries with Libra, etc., in an effort to reach beyond mere forecast into broader understanding of the ongoing dialogue between our houses and signs. This is the axis setting us up for action throughout Sagittarius season, the emotional and spiritual motivation that took root during November’s water trine deluge. The heavy Mercury and Uranus involvement suggests that, for many of us, some fundamental belief was totally upended or dismantled last month, and now we’re itching to take action.

I recommend reading your ascendant sign for the most accurate interpretation, but many people utilize a combination of rising/sun/moon horoscopes to get a blended picture. I say do what you want! This missive originates from a country that isn’t exactly free, anymore, but I.C.E. hasn’t started rounding up contrarian mystics, yet, so we have a little time left for spiritual disobedience. Uranus sparked a rebellion in some area of your life, and it’s time to get off your ass and embrace the upheaval.

Aries/Libra

Uranian Opposition: 2nd and 8th Houses

Spiritual Revolution In: Wealth Creation

Aries…Typical delineations of the second and eighth house axis prioritize money, but it can also involve tension between what is traditionally acceptable versus what is taboo or secretive, socially speaking. For Aries, Uranus is now disrupting the second house of value, resources, and money, though that isn’t automatically negative; it could indicate totally unexpected, left-field opportunities for wealth accumulation like cage-fighting gophers or live-streaming your daily hair removal routine. (Don’t knock it ‘till you’ve tried it.) It’s also possible, Rams, that someone or something from the past is part of an unexpected depletion of value in your life, like a divorce settlement or forgotten I.O.U., and that is what triggers your Uranian rebellion in the realm of earnings.

Looking Ahead: December’s fiery squares take place between the 9th and 12th house for you, Aries, emphasizing conflicts in your belief systems. Like a butterfly flapping it’s wings and causing a gale three thousand miles away, this financial shake-up might be the seeding point of a faith crisis - perhaps the opportunities coming your way are lucrative, but morally uncomfortable. Are you willing to flip a financial table based on new found convictions?

Libra…For fair-minded Libras, the tension might lean harder in the opposite direction; the new moon in your house of value might have had you revisiting past revenue generators and finding them useful again, as if the lemonade stand you ran as a kid has become en vogue again. This happens concurrently with disruption in your karmic debt load, though, which could suggest anything from marrying rich (well done!) to finalizing inheritance from an ancestor’s estate. However it manifests, this lunar cycle changed your perception of value and abundance, which will allow Libra to focus less on the nuts and bolts of ‘earning’ and more on the quiet, esoteric space of philosophy and mental health.

Looking Ahead: Sharp elbows and crankiness will be taking place across your 3rd and 6th houses, Libra, which cover our day-to-day movements and service to others, indicating that you may feel overburdened and under appreciated for all the little, habitual things you execute for others on a daily basis. The upheaval in Libra’s house of third party funding might have something to with this, causing you to examine why your task list always looks as insane as it does. Do you need to examine your motivations and expectations regarding service to others?

Taurus/Scorpio

Uranian Opposition: 1st And 7th Houses

Spiritual Revolution In: Relationships

Taurus…The Bull does not typically enjoy disruption or radicalism, so having Uranus back in their first house of self isn’t their most favorite transit. Retrogrades are usually revisiting a previous disruption, or they indicate a series of smaller shake-ups in a situation that was already getting flipped like a table, so bulls might experience an addendum to drastic changes within themselves between 2019 and June of 2025. Bulls who changed style, diet, or some intrinsic belief could be due for another modification, and it’s possible that a new relationship or recently formalized romance has something to do with it, courtesy of the new moon, Venus, and Mercury prancing about the house of partnership. (Or perhaps, considering Mercury’s retrograde, it’s an old relationship that’s getting a remake.)

Looking Ahead: Friction might arise between Taurus’ 8th and 11th houses as December’s mutable squares perfect, likely involving third party abundance, social groups, and valuable coalitions. It may be obstacles to fundraising for a cause with which Taurus newly identifies, or a rift among associates pertaining to use of funding and materials. Like a political candidate confronting questionable donations, zodiac Bulls have some self-reflection to do. Are you still aligned with the community that you’re funneling resources to?

Scorpio…The hits may keep coming for Scorpio, but all this water is still pretty comfortable for everyone’s favorite arachnids, even when it’s choppy and transitional. All those transits through Scorpio’s first house reminded them of their intrinsic ambitions, some of which were in direct conflict with partners and relationships. Uranus is reminding Scorpio why they need to get revolutionary in their romantic outlook, resulting in major relationship changes like break-ups, paradigm shifts, and a wee bit of drama. Okay, fine, a lot of drama.

Looking Ahead: Tension will accelerate between the 2nd and 5th houses until we hit the winter solstice, which means Scorpio’s value creation will be in conflict with joy and creativity…honestly, whose isn’t? You’ll be driven to increase material security, but it could require you to deemphasize passion projects, hobbies, and sexy time with partners, which might have a connection to the Uranian disruption of your relationship house. Is increased material security worth sacrificing time spent on partners, children, and passion projects?

Gemini/Sagittarius

Uranian Opposition In: 6th and 12th Houses

Spiritual Revolution in: Self Care

Gemini…There may be no other sign in the zodiac that benefits more from unbreakable, foundational routines than Gemini, a whole sign house that I liken to an extremely busy coffee shop that multi-tasks as a book store, post office, and music venue. The Twins flit and fly all over the place, but an upheaval in the 12th house of secrets and unseen difficulties probably forced Gemini to examine any daily habits, or lack thereof, which contribute to unhealthy mental shadows. Something has ended, or needs to end, so feel your feelings and dive headfirst into some shadow work.

Looking Ahead: December’s mutable squares will cause squabbles between Gemini’s 7th house of relationships and 10th house of career, which is also where Saturn has been running Gemini through the wringer, pooh-poohing your professional ambitions. Change that you’ve been resisting via avoidance or procrastination is about to be forced upon you as a matter of circumstance - like friction between you and a spouse regarding careers, for example. Can you embrace a frightening change that requires abandoning all other options?

Sagittarius…You’re probably trying to wrap something up, Sag, but the completion process is moving so slowly that life feels static, and you really, really hate that, because stasis is deeply depressing to the the vivacious Centaur. Your impatience will only exacerbate shadowy, 12th house bullshit, so try getting out of your own ass and shifting focus to better daily habits and service to others. Broadening our perspective often assuages impatience.

Looking Ahead: Speaking of daily habits, Mars is now roaring in your house of self and one of the best ways to appease him is to engage in competitive, physical activity. Funnily enough, going for a jog or absolutely crushing your brother in a wrestling match can help you cope with self-doubt, depression, and other lingering mental restrictions. Mortal combat with family members might be extra appealing right now, given Saturn’s presence in your house of home and ancestry, but make sure you don’t go crazy; the shadows of our childhood usually require a mental fight, not a physical one. Are you ready to synthesize shadows from your past with your present ambitions?

Cancer/Capricorn

Uranian Opposition In: 5th and 11th Houses

Spiritual Revolution In: Creative Expression

Cancer…Tension has stretched like a telephone wire between your social groups and your happiness muse, Cancer, so what gives? It’s possible that a burst of creative productivity is taking you in a direction that requires a new audience or new associates because your current social group isn’t supportive of the changes you’re making. The choice to create children, for example, often puts us at odds with our childless friends as the difference between the two realities becomes stark. It’s alright to seek new camaraderie when you split off into a new direction - that’s how we expand our community.

Looking Ahead: Much like Sagittarius, Cancer will benefit from a new physical maintenance routine or athletic challenge (as athletic as you get, mon Crab, which often isn’t very.) December’s mutable square pits Mars in your 6th house of physical ‘must do’ against Saturn in your 9th house of ‘nice to do’, so if you’re dying to expand your mind via school or travel, make progress with the boring, practical shit first, even though you hate it. Can you see the practical tasks of life through to completion if a grand adventure waits on the other side?

Capricorn…Something unexpected is affecting your typical outlets for fun, Capricorn, and Sea Goats easily become ambitious automatons without a release valve for pleasure - and before you tell me that work IS what brings pleasure, Cap, save it. You need engaging activity that has nothing to do with success and everything to do with passion for a well-balanced life, but something has recently thrown a wrench in your joy. Like children, hobbies don’t nurture themselves, Cap! In order to re-engage, consider dipping a cautious toe into new, eccentric social water, meeting new people and forming new alignments. Pretend it’s a job, for god’s sake.

Looking Ahead: The mutable square dance taking place throughout December hits Capricorn’s 12th and 3rd houses, introducing friction between the shadows of your mental health and daily interactions. Mars can be stubborn and foolhardy in Sagittarius, so what is this bee in your bonnet, Capricorn? There is clearly a feeling of restriction with Saturn in your Piscean third house, so it would seem there are things bubbling up in the back of your mind that you really want to say to people, but you know you shouldn’t. Can you serve your subconscious in the day-to-day by speaking authentically, yet remain sensitive to your environment?

Leo/Aquarius

Uranian Opposition In: 4th and 10th Houses

Spiritual Revolution In: Work/Life Balance

Leo…Something unexpected has shifted your professional landscape, Leo, and while it may have been in the works for a while, now, the finalization of such a dramatic change can still be jarring. For most of us in the modern age, a major variable of any career change equation is the effect it may have on our domestic routines; it’s normal to consult all household members about relocation, compensation, and scheduling, at the very least. The new moon might have ginned up more family enthusiasm for whatever professional change you’re having to make, but it also introduced new headaches and questions as you exit the realm of ‘possibly happening’ to ‘definitely happening.’

Looking Ahead: December’s friction heats up between the 5th house of fun stuff and the 8th house of uncontrollable transformation for Leo, which will benefit Leo’s famous creativity and vivacity if your cards are played correctly. Whatever soggy mess Saturn used to force transformation on The Lion - debts coming due, financial skeletons in a spouses closet, or some other embarrassing crisis - is wrapping up, and that makes Leo impatient to focus on their core mission of being worshipped. You must see a difficult transition through to the end before your passion can be embodied and telegraphed to the world.

Aquarius…The Water Bearers have been balancing a new professional development with unexpected shenanigans at home, and it’s taking longer to iron out than you would like. Aquarians could be dealing with relocation, repairs, or family drama, and focusing on your professional big picture in order to cope with personal messiness is textbook Aquarius, who, like Randall from the movie Clerks, hates people but loves gatherings.

Looking Ahead: For Aquarius, the mutable square fun hits your 11th house of public associations and 2nd house of wealth creation, suggesting friction between bank accounts, resources, and social networks. For Aquarians who have changed jobs or relocated, you might have issues finding new associates to befriend or joining an established social clique, or the expense of socializing could discourage Aquarius from trying altogether. (Because of the aforementioned people-hating.) Conversely, Water Bearers who have to stay at a workplace that has become abruptly unpleasant will wrestle with alternatives, and they’ll need to decide if the paycheck is worth the unhappiness. What private things are you willing to sacrifice for an improved professional life?

Virgo/Pisces

Uranian Opposition In: 3rd and 9th Houses

Spiritual Revolution In: World Engagement

Virgo…Uranus made this lunation cycle a bit more interesting than usual for methodical Virgo due to chilling in your 9th house of philosophy and exploration riiiiiight as November’s new moon peaked in your 3rd house of communication. This suggests that a destabilizing moment in Virgo’s faith, education, or travel may have kicked you into high gear and pushed you to complete something third house-y like renting a separate studio space in your neighborhood, working on a project with siblings, or writing a book titled Perfect Parallel Parking…A How To.

Looking Ahead: The bee that crawled into your 3rd house bonnet has buzzed over to the 4th house of domesticity, reflecting Virgo’s focus shift from improving the neighborhood to improving your own home. Knowing Virgo, that could mean beautifying the garage, optimizing the communal chore list, or re-arranging the bedroom furniture, which leads to possible friction with partners and spouses. Maybe they liked the bed where it was and wish you would calm down. (Impossible.) Since Saturn is finishing up in your watery partnership house, he wants you to take some lessons with you before he leaves regarding your boundaries, Virgo. Are your partners growing with you, or apart from you? What are you truly attempting to do with all this fussing? Are you partnered with the right people, or are you trying to improve something that is fundamentally unchangeable?

Pisces…In November, Pisces had to contend with disruption in the local environment that may still be affecting daily interactions and routine transit. This affected Pisces’ ability to broaden horizons and explore interests outside the typical circle of concern, which is very annoying for an expansive, Jupiter-ruled sign. Fishes want to live in the ether and explore the nether realms! Maybe you planned to go to an ashram for a few months to meditate, but had to ditch that plan in order to babysit the guy coming to fix your internet service because he gave you a three day window for when he MIGHT show up. Focus on the practical for now, Pisces - you can’t become one with the universe without wifi.

Looking Ahead: What a pooch screw of a transit this has been for everyone in the temple of The Fish! You’ve undoubtedly matured, Pisces, but the process was likely a huge bummer because Saturn loves to throw things at us that we must overcome. In the 1st house of self that means body issues, brain issues, and the way you are perceived by others may have undergone painful but necessary transformation - a leveling up, if you will. December builds on the changes you’ve made thanks to Mars, who is heating up your career and public image, which has always been an exploratory place for you, Pisces; you focus on the journey, not the destination. Your saturnine transformation might have you seeing your current professional environment in a new way…and it might not be flattering. Are you ready to remake your public image in a way that reflects your newly matured, authentic self?

Riding in the car to work is a treat in the late, PNW autumn because the freeway offers unfettered, if fleeting, views of forested mountains and fogged-over water; the haunted cottage core that a repressed, middle-age Mormon woman made mainstream when she rocketed to fame on the backs of her sparkly vampires. The Twilight cinematic franchise had exactly one thing going for it, and that was the moody coastline of the Northern Pacific Ocean. (Alright, it actually had two things - the PNW coastline and an animatronic baby whose face was so uncanny valley that it verged on psychological violence. The CIA, FBI, and Mossad all wish they had something like this baby in order to more efficiently torture international spies, and I personally found it to be the most hilarious and fascinating aspect of the series.)

Given that this part of the country is eighty percent waterway, even the mundane morning commute looks like a postcard; granted, the postcard is from a very sad person on a very ominous pier, but it’s still giving more Pinterest shipwreck mood board than gory horror flick. It’s beautiful, odd, and singularly American.

Last weekend, the air had settled at a drizzly fifty degrees, and the downtown skyline was doing it’s best Turin’s Shroud impression for those of us driving southbound past Lake Union around ten a.m. Fog had settled so low that it muted distant skyscrapers to faint watermarks, gray as mourning doves. Gray like the bloodless lake, the concrete freeway median, and the metal of their own skeletons. I knocked my forehead against the passenger side window with a muted ‘thump’ as my husband drove, gaping at the city’s delicate, unsettling appearance. Structures at the water’s edge reflected just as faintly on its surface as they did on the horizon, creating an underworld that perfectly mirrored the top. A city haunted by its own twin.

Like a West Coat skyline on a rainy day, the United States, and much of society at large, I suspect, is haunted by past iterations of itself. You wouldn’t be remiss, for instance, if, upon waking from an eight year coma you looked at your phone, skimmed the rage bait headlines and assumed you’d only lost twenty-four hours. It has become impossible to tell if we are in some hellish dimension of stasis and this is tonic immobility, or if we’re still moving forward in time but making exactly the same, poor choices, over and over again like a circuit in dire need of disruption. We became the ghost in our own machine.

BREAKING NEWS…Trump is POTUS! He probably raped children with Jeffrey Epstein and a disturbingly large amount of the ruling class, but it doesn’t matter because they have all the money and we’re on the verge of another Great Depression! Do young people really need higher wages when they have protein Starbucks Lattes? Oh, and Kim Kardashian wore clothing about it. Bitcoin is UP!

This isn’t simply a replay. Living in 2025 feels like the creepier sequel to something so unpleasant that it has imprinted itself inside our borders and is now impossible to remove. An ancient, psychic stain, or what paranormal nerds refer to as a repeating phantasm, can haunt a geographic location the way a deep wound haunts a human dermis - even healed, the raised seam of the scar offers a faint echo of the pain that accompanied its creation. There are eyewitness accounts of such things; a doomed train from the late nineteenth century showing up again at its crash site 100 years later, a fatal spot on the interstate that ices over, inexplicably, on the same day each summer, and the icy water that lingers over the location of a long dissolved shipwreck are all examples of psychic scars. As it is with skin, we only notice them when we’re actively seeking them out, skating fingertips lightly over our sloughed off scabs and cut places.

My country really IS a haunted burial ground built over the bodies of indigenous people, and after those poor souls were ground completely into the dirt, long before the Seattle Space Needle could see its reflection in the ocean, European colonizers mixed the blood of immigrants and enslaved Africans with sand to pour the foundation of our new institutions. Along with the blood of women. Lots and lots of women. And children.

As I suspected, when Venus entered Scorpio in early November she twisted the knife of delayed justice a bit more earnestly than she did in Libra, and the government has tripped across the scar of it’s own repeating phantasm. The steady drip of rumors about Donald Trump and his friend, sex trafficker, blackmailer, and rapist extraordinaire Jeffrey Epstein, became a gushing wound when congressional representatives from both parties released 20k files of correspondence from the Epstein estate into the public domain. Suddenly, everyone everywhere cares about abuses of power and media bobbleheads are clawing over each other to scoop up the most salacious details of the decades old case, too often missing the broader horror story. Epstein was operating with impunity by the eighties, just like his friend Donald, and they partied with the same wealthy oligarchs from Russia, Saudi Arabia, the U.K., and Israel, but it took until 2025 for anyone to notice, apparently, despite the FBI having Trump on their criminal radar since 1973. Maria Farmer, one of his many victims, told the government about Epstein in the early nineties, and even though she was ignored, she survived. Too many victims who spoke out decades ago are ghosts themselves, buried by a system that was designed to benefit one type of person - it’s wealthy, male architects.

We are in the middle of a grand water trine between Saturn in Pisces, Jupiter in Cancer, and Venus in Scorpio, practically guaranteeing intense, emotional breakthroughs. Scorpio will always uncover filthy secrets, and Venus has been on a vengeance tour since she escaped her retrograde shadow in Aries this past spring…but was all of this a secret, really? Did anyone ever doubt that powerful men treat the world as their own personal Fleshlight™? Has anyone looked at these men in detail, and I mean really looked at them, and thought anyone would ever fuck them without being forced or paid? Really?!

When Judgement shows up in a tarot spread, comeuppance, or at least the appearance of comeuppance, is likely. Pluto, the planetary correspondence for Judgement, has such a wide, distant orbit that he inspires one to think in karmic platitudes. The wheels of the gods grind exceedingly slow, they say, but they are also supposed to grind exceedingly fine, and while we have plenty of proof for the former assertion, I highly doubt any human will be around in 248 years to check on the granularity of Pluto’s justice, regardless of how often rich men inject themselves with their children’s blood. I doubt we need to freakishly extend our lifespans to find out how this ends, either. If the ghouls who were raping children and hoarding power at the founding of the United States haven’t been held to account in over two centuries, it’s naive to think that the people doing it today will, either, no matter the number of ghosts rattling their chains on our soil.

That’s the pisser I took away from this week’s cards - there may be an outcry for justice, but it will fall on mostly deaf ears. The oldest perpetrators, the men who have already laundered their money through charities and transferred control of their empires to their offspring, will be exposed for the cause and turned into sacrificial sheep, probably because they don’t expect to live long enough to do time. Everyone else in Congress and the White House will make a loud example of them in order to say, “See? Case closed, we got the bad guys and are putting them under house arrest with their private sex nurse and stacks of plutonium, where I assure you they will suffer. Epstein is over and we never need to mention it again. Now let’s talk trans terrorism.”

Every time another name leaks from Epstein’s inner circle, the size of his implied influence grows, and his connections to global politics are revealed to be nebulous and extensive - so extensive that total ignorance on the part of his associates would have been impossible. They knew. They all knew. JP Morgan knew, Deutsche Bank knew, Hollywood knew, and every administration since Reagan knew. They knew Jeffrey Epstein trafficked children as part of a trans national, political blackmail operation, because that is how powerful men have always run the world, and in order to remain proximate to that power, they said nothing. Justice for these children is not only not promised, it is unlikely, given historical precedent. That isn’t a new story; it is a very, very old one. Old like a planet. Old like a scar.

Monday, 11.10.25…Moon in Leo

Money is on everyone’s mind in one way or another, according to this misty, forested Ace of Coins, the elemental card of material security and earthly abundance. A single hand, obscured by ether, offers us a fruitful beginning amongst lush evergreens as if to say look at all this possible abundance…get on that, would you?

There is no clarity here, though - the brass pentacle is half obscured, as is the forest in the background, lending some precariousness to our plans. Abundance is implied, but not guaranteed, which could indicate our reluctance to fully commit to a new material endeavor, or it may be that the endeavor has yet to become fully fleshed out. We are looking through a keyhole and only seeing a tiny portion of reality, which indicates a need to widen our scope to verify the truth of this prosperous vision. Regardless of whether it’s real or bullshit, prosperity or the lack thereof is on everyone’s minds.

Green fluorite is used to bring order out of chaos; to achieve clarity by slicing through mental fog. The mist surrounding the illustrated evergreens echoes the calcite base of this crystal, suggesting something is being obfuscated. We have dreams of comfort and prosperity, but that may be all they are. Or is this someone else’s dream of luxury?

On this day…An audacious poisoned provision was reported to be part of the congressional bill to re-open the government - one that would reward Republican senators with 500K in a successful lawsuit against Jack Smith for searching their phone records after the January 6th riot took place. This is all very normal! Not the work of grifting sociopaths with Ivy League degrees at all, wouldn’t you agree?

An approaching conjunction between Mars and Mercury certainly contributed to fighting words, communication wars, and brazenly criminal speech and behavior. Trump himself threatened to sue the BBC for $1 billion dollars over an edited clip of his January 6th speech, because of course he did. I’m beginning to think Trump only knows a couple figures by heart - like Dr. Evil, he knows that words like ‘millions’ and ‘billions’ exist, but is clueless as to the actual math behind them.

Tuesday, 11.11.25…Moon in Leo

Our Five of Pentacles is a maudlin affair; a bundled, downtrodden figure appears to be pleading with a religious authority of some sort, both oblivious to the stained glass window of the church behind them and it’s gilded border of pentacles. There is misery and anxiety here, visible in the shadows cast on the icy ground and the starved hunch of the penitent as they cling to a possible lifeline.

A carnelian perfectly replicates the hearty, orange church bricks, acting as a call for action and energy. The situation needs more urgency and vigor than we have shown thus far, lest we lurch toward a catastrophe of material circumstance. All things financial may not be looking up, but to be fair, how would the penitent know? They also refuse to look up for possible messages, instead allowing themselves to be beaten down or deceived.

On this day…Americans continued to feel the financial pain of a shuttered government even as Donald Trump used the power of the pardon to free 77 people convicted of crimes during the J6 riot, but if you’re worried you’ll never hear from these patriots after today, don’t be! They have a tendency to show up in the justice system again and again, lured to crime by the honeyed words of their divine prophet, himself a seasoned criminal.

Speaking of Donald Trump’s criminality…thanks to House Republicans rashly dumped trove of Epstein emails, a dramatic kerfuffle has erupted in the collective between the sort of people who think raping children is bad and the sort of people who should be shot into the sun from a cannon. Mars and Mercury continued combining their energy to generate combative conversations and calls for action from an increasingly wide cast of characters, and each new name dropped as an Epstein correspondent kicks off various internet fires. Assumptions about our social hierarchy are being challenged as people realize the entire ruling class may be involved in sex trafficking the children of the poorer classes below them.

Wednesday, 11.12.25…Moon in Virgo

Ace of Swords reversed is illustrated in cold, clean lines, down to the metal hand from which the weapon slips. This card encompasses the element of air; whip smart, rational, communicative, and aloof. The sword impales a crown and covers a laurel wreath, symbols of authority and justice that are thwarted or corrupted when reversed. Speech serves to manipulate instead of inform, the cutting edge of the sword representing the shadows of sharp words and a cruel approach.

Lepidolite, cleanses, detoxifies, and supports the breaking of bad habits and vices, aligning with the lavender of our third-eye chakra, which houses our instincts and intuition.

On this day…The clown car that makes up the United States body politic got down to business passing a bill to re-open the federal government. After two months of furloughs, lay-offs, and Grinchian rebukes of food programs for poor, elderly and disabled folks, the Spam™ goblins that pass for Republican congressmen gave the Democratic congressmen everything they wanted, which, joke’s on us, was nothing at all. The Democrats, acting in their capacity as controlled opposition and sociopathic game show hosts, transparently slithered past the picket line by getting lame duck Senators to throw themselves on their spears, by which I mean, “Could you show up to political talk programs spewing inane excuses that my dog wouldn’t even try as to why we just tossed millions of Americans down the drain of the healthcare system? Thanks ahead of time! Anyway, hugs and kisses, love Chuck.”

Also today, Donald Trump and company displayed a rare case of ‘the rattles’ when Trump called an impromptu meeting with Fascist Tits McGee and one of the few Republican House reps that went on record to force the release of all Epstein files to the public, Lauren Boebert. The running theory from press and pundits alike as to the ‘why’ of an impromptu meeting in The Situation Room was that Trump and Co. attempted to persuade Boebert to remove her name from the aforementioned congressional petition. Boebert refused.

Thursday, 11.13.25…Moon in Virgo

Judgement is a Plutonian landscape serving as the launchpad for our ghosts, who embrace an existential reckoning with open arms. Pluto deals specifically in shadows, secrets, power and depravity, present here in the ominous holes from which our spirits emerge. The matching black of a Stygian sea in the background evokes the old quip about being made of, then returned to, dust. When this card turns up, something big is bubbling up to the surface, and it’s impossible to tell if our humanity will be destroyed or restored by Pluto’s hefty revelations.

Bourbon-colored smoky quartz soothes, strengthens, and detoxifies, particularly as it pertains to emotional baggage - the very thing Pluto likes to crack open and show the world, with or without our consent. Its appearance along side this card suggests that we would benefit from unburdening ourselves of old beliefs and faulty assumptions. Only the penitent are offered absolution.

On this day…America inched closer to true bipartisanship as the slow, steady trickle of Epstein correspondents continued to splatter the social and mainstream media channels with piss. The equal opportunity list of elites with questionable morals and communication skills has grown to include Clinton-era White House lawyers, Israeli Prime Ministers, scientists, artists, Hollywood producers and actors, financial executives, and world leaders. It is the casual complicity that staggers.

Friday, 11.14.25…Moon in Virgo

The King of Swords is a mouth full of sharp teeth and a head full of horns according to the antique anatomy of Paracelcus’ notebook. Like all air signs, he can be a rational leader who is more interested in ones and zeroes than the intangible nuance of the human experience, and though he is fair, he sacrifices one form of intelligence to go all in on the other. This penchant for details and impersonality can be exacerbated by a Mercury-ruled moon, which infuses everyone with the Virgoan holy trinity of process, service, and rules.

This king straddles the last ten degrees of Taurus and the first twenty degrees of Gemini, a place of material anxiety and intellectual rigor that coheres nicely with the “I got mine, so fuck everyone else,” mentality of billionaires, politicians, and titans of industry. (A disturbing number of people in the American administration of new fascism contain hefty Gemini placements in their natal charts. Trump himself was born with the sun and Uranus in Gemini.) Our data saturated modern age has cultivated a peculiar new discourse; it is easier than ever to sound relatively intelligent while spouting deeply regressive, unserious philosophies to a cabal of slavish acolytes.

The witchy shale formation known as black tourmaline often serves as occult worker ibuprofen - it can’t fix everything, but it sure fixes a whole lot. This absorptive rock sucks up negativity like the Brawny quicker picker upper - it’s good to have around whenever we encounter unpleasant people or situations. It can’t make people nicer, but it can suck all the potency out of their malice.

On this day…In America, Epstein chatter continued to spiral out of control in the public domain and was soon joined by rumblings of a volatile, doomed stock market, due largely to unrealistic valuation of AI pushers like Nvidia. Mars and Mercury continued one of the worst collabs in history and telegraphed as much conflict-driven reporting as possible in a single news cycle; Israeli settlers continued to commit crimes against humanity and the Palestinian people by burning mosques and villages, and the United States defense department announced a formal operation against a new, completely invented form of terrorism that allows them to kill people on boats in the Caribbean whenever they feel like it. This is the problem with the tarot suit of swords, generally - they reflect a binary cognitive style that can inflict more harm than good, regardless of motivation. Anyone who doesn’t fit the Trump administration’s definition of patriotism is now the enemy; there is no middle ground.

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Saturday, 11.15.25…Moon in Libra

This iteration of Judgement is far less stark than the previous one, inked as it is with the full color beauty that plays nicely with a Libra moon, but it’s rarely a comfort when fraught major arcana show up repeatedly in one week. It means heavy shit is going on.

A blue-haired ruffian, likely the sort of person that fascists screech about contributing to the decline of western civilization due to their barista job and avocado toast habits, or some such nonsense, is either uploading or downloading powerful revelations directly through their retina. Crosses on a hill in the background evoke death, rebirth, and the notion of truth setting people free, so what is the truth being burned into our penitent’s retina? Pluto, the dealer of final judgements, only deals knowledge heavy enough to shift paradigms, and the bright white of the barista’s ocular pits indicate truth that can never be unseen once it is seen.

A complimentary pull of clear quartz reminds us that discerning the truth regarding what people say versus what they don’t say will be an ongoing task, and it could indicate we are being consistently deceived in a way that won’t soon cease. Use your intellect to see past propaganda and break down the walls of cognitive dissonance that form in every human’s mind.

On this day…Aside from the endless, breathless reporting on slow leaking Epstein emails, airstrikes on random-ass Caribbean crafts continued, killing three unidentified individuals on open water, courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer and SecDef Pete ‘Wolfenstein’ Hegseth. Ken Klippenstein and other independent journalists begin sounding the warning that Palestinian activists have been screaming for the last two years - once your government decides that anyone can be labelled a terrorist, well…everyone can be labelled a terrorist.

It may be one small dam amidst a vast river system of injustice, but the Holy See returned sixty-two Indigenous artifacts to Canadian bishops today so that each one might be repatriated to their tribes of origin. Each piece had been stolen by the Vatican from North American tribal land back in 1925, and apparently it takes about 100 years to realize that killing people, forcing their children into abusive detention centers and taking their stuff makes them angry.

Sunday, 11.16.25…Moon in Libra

The infamous betrayal of the Three of Swords is softened a bit by jubilant pop art and an apricot agate, but the thrust of this card always remains the same; a total suckfest that is beyond our power to change. Painful clarity about a person or relationship has been attained, but the agony of knowing how wrong we’d been is likely to permanently scar our psyche. Despite the air emphasis of Libra and the suit of swords, hints of the impending water trine between Saturn, Jupiter, and the sun are visible in the sheet of rain behind the wounded heart, amplifying our sorrow and pain. We are torn, like the muscle of a heart, between agonizing clarity and a return to comfortable ignorance, but we know it’s a false choice. We can’t un-know what we now know.

Apricot agate is a stone of gentle grounding and balance; it splits the difference between the vibrant energy of carnelian and the gooey affection generated by pink tourmaline or rose quartz. Apricot agate gives people who wear it a sensible boost of can-do spirit instead of, say, an overwhelming urge to form a drum circle. (That’s definitely what rose quartz is for.)

Like the rainbow sky behind our punctured heart, apricot agate balances painful clarity with tentative hope. Yes, there are terrible things happening all over the world, and terrible people are perpetuating tragedy, but we can’t do anything about it unless we stay grounded by acknowledging moments of ease and comfort, even small ones.

On this day…I’m sorry to say that very little has changed. The ghosts of Judgement will continue to plead for a reckoning, while their grave god spins in the shadowed corners of space. Until he comes around, we wait.

What The Hell Has Been Going On?

This is what I asked myself last week, when nascent optimism about October’s wet gardens and leafy sidewalks proved fleeting once I rose from bed on Thursday, blindsided by crippling physical agony. This is new, I thought. Mental distress is understandable and expected, these days - the loosely aligned criminal elite who are cosplaying as the U.S. government have shucked off any pretense and settled, with relish, into their authentic sociopathy. They have shuttered social programs, carried out extrajudicial killings with impunity, and developed gaudy condo blueprints for the next episode of their new show, Slumlords of the Red Crescent. As I write, a hellish monument to Atlantic City and D-Team mobsters is being constructed with taxpayer money - the same money that our criminal overlords refuse to return to a starving citizenry. Normal humans in my country and around the globe have been in a place of mental anguish for most of 2025, and while many of us have yet to turn to hard drugs, I think it’s safe to say we’re wondering if heroin is really as bad as everyone says. What if we just did a little heroin? To take the edge off, you understand.

Mental distress was not the cause of my immobilization these past weeks, though, despite the state of the world; the hush of rain endemic to Washington in autumn is a chilly balm to those of us who love a gothic landscape. In fact, autumn is the one time of year that Pacific Northwesterners smile without prompting, myself included. The only other time we do that is when we’re talking to someone’s dog.

I wasn’t any more depressed than usual; I went to bed the drizzly evening prior and slept, I think, like a normal human with normal human limbs, nothing amiss, nothing pulsating with agony. My body must have been dying to homage Kafka, though, because by morning I was unable to turn my head right to any degree, and my shoulder on that side was immobile, toasty, and aching, as though some sort of psychic tarantula had settled it’s hairy self on my trapezius muscle and set to chewing.

I couldn’t sit and work in any meaningful way, because every static position involving a chair felt like torture at the hands of the cenobites from Hellraiser; hooks like teeth in my thoracic spine sent lightening bolts of pain down my dominant arm while Pinhead slither-spoke something to me about exquisite torture. Great. The pinnacle of south node fuckery in my sixth house of Virgo had landed, but I never consciously touched the puzzle box that set it off, I swear. I’m a daily yoga devotee, almond mom, and general occult weirdo, and the fact that after paying more attention to my spine health than most I still succumb to injuries while literally unconscious is a real kick in the pants. It was probably supposed to be.

See, new moon in Libra on October 21st had a party line going to Saturn via quincunx, and it infused us with more sobriety than enthusiasm. We were prompted to bid farewell to something massive, because if we didn’t, nothing new could emerge as an alternative. Never forget that Libra is the gateway to the underworld, the nasty place we all need to visit when we want the real truth, the unvarnished truth, and nothing but that truth.

Some secret part of my psyche decided to twist my body into knots and keep me in a state of rigor mortis for over ten days, and the parallels to our collective experience are not lost on me. We know something is terribly wrong, but are physically incapable of doing anything proactive because the same forces responsible for our misfortune have us pinned to the floor. We work jobs that we hate to give money to people who already have more of it than we ever, ever will, and those jobs, along with the small issue of family care, eat up any mental capacity we have for civic engagement and broad, philosophical pondering of possible solutions. Ironically, this modern feudalism now fails to fulfill its primary purpose; people aren’t even getting paid, yet are expected to continue working at least eight hours a day, for…what? Their karma?!

Everything hurts, no one is having fun, and we didn’t suss out the problem until it crippled key parts of our citizen body. Like a badly reviewed one woman mime show, I have been re-enacting the ennui of my nation in a prone position for two weeks; I was a flipped, victimized turtle gobbling muscle relaxers and muttering about eighth house stelliums until I passed out each evening. After consulting several kinesthetic types in my life, we concluded that I’ve been aggravating my upper back muscles because of my pillow, an ancient lump of polyester too ill-shaped to support my occasional stomach sleeping*. Apparently, it doesn’t matter that I spend my waking hours being conscientious and crunchy, teaching yoga classes and jamming calcite crystals in my back pockets for bone health like a SoCal freak show - the damage was done without my knowledge during somnambulance, with only my subconscious as witness. Waking habits mean next to nothing, I am learning, if we chuck our common sense out the window when we’re at rest. The body remembers what the mind forgets, and my body, much like the citizen body of the world, is really pissed off.

*I am only now learning that we’re supposed to replace those things every once in a while. Are pillows not guaranteed for life? Do people shop for pillows? Did I spend too much of my life living in a punk house?!

So What the Hell Is Going On NOW?!

We are now in the throes of what could be a very painful, emotional Scorpio season. Mars and Mercury jumped into the terrarium first, clearing a path in dank shadows to fit our blazing star of a sun, who followed them on October 23rd. Grandpappi Saturn has been retrograde in Pisces for a while, and Neptune has finally stationed to join him, chilling his mentally ill ass at the notoriously difficult twenty-ninth degree of the water element’s weirdest, most permissive denizen. We also can’t ignore Jupiter, who has supercharged the volume of every moon transit since June from his exalted sojourn in sensitive Cancer, which is ALSO the place that anchored a trine between him and his least favorite son, Mars, on October 27th. Whew.

Taken altogether, we just had six major celestial bodies drowning in the intensity of water, seven if we include the north node, that little bitch whose counterpart is responsible for all of my health issues since spring. Mars just moved on, Mercury will revisit in retrograde, and Venus hasn’t joined the party yet, but she will when she enters Scorpio on November 6th; gods help us all once that occurs. Scorpio is a whole sign house of hard truths, and no one gets off lightly.

If the lazy cliches and old astrology books I read in the early nineties are correct, anyone born under this sign is basically Sherlock Holmes if he was a hot sex addict who sometimes ate people, and while that isn’t an entirely unfair characterization, it is far from the whole truth. People love to both love and hate the zodiac sign of Scorpio; the venomous arachnids themselves are paradoxically repulsive and magnetic, metal enough to look great in tattoos, but disgusting enough in real life that they would cause even the most grizzled, Pantera-blasting motherfucker to run screaming into the night like a harried mezzo soprano. (Have you ever seen a scorpion in the flesh, exoskeleton, whatever? They are repellant and fascinating.)

Mercury only just dipped out of Scorpio, and up until now, they’ve spent almost a month doing what one might expect of a tricky fuck like Hermes when they’re in the wily, feminine domicile of Ares; uncovering secrets, power plays, and hidden motives, occasionally to the tune of violent conflict and fiery emotions. During their recent transit through the house of sexy secrets (10.6 through 10.29) we were privy to a variety of pretty juicy, tabloid-worthy revelations like the following:

• Randy Andy of the British Monarchy was unceremoniously stripped of titles days before Virginia Giuffre’s posthumous book, Nobody’s Girl, was published, which feels like classic Mercury in Scorpio. Even in death, Virginia was able to communicate the perversions of powerful men.

• A few innovative tricksters, filled with the combined energy of a Mercury/Mars conjunction, broke into the Louvre and stole precious imperial jewels in broad daylight, in one of the sexiest, most stylish heists the modern world has ever witnessed. There were fedoras! Scooters! Masks! Mercury leans toward the criminal in Scorpio, as the planet of big, speedy brains, and Mars revels in provocation and impulsive lust when he’s sitting in his arachnid chariot. Together they made cinematic crime, and this fellow Scorpio was rooting for the thieves.

• Mercury also amplified wily, manipulative propaganda from our craven political class during their run in Scorpio, colluding with Mars in all thing militaristic and violent - the U.S. isn’t committing terrorism in the Caribbean, you see, we are simply extra judicially prosecuting ‘narcoterrorists’, according to SecDef Wolfenstein. The nastiest, most cynical instance of this linguistic magic trick might be the supposed ‘ceasefire’ in Palestine, a concept our murderous billionaires have sold to the world just by repeating that word, despite the near constant and continued bombardment and slaughter of civilians in Gaza. This is both the glory and the horror of Mercury and Mars in Scorpio - they could convince the devil to set fire to himself with little more than their verbal finesse.

What Happens Now?

Now comes the rain, my friends, and quite a bit of it.

Every damp, chilly corner of November will get a taste of this astrological storm, but the deluge doesn’t kick-off until later this week, once Mars and Uranus blow things up from their mutable opposition. We do get a lovely little interlude mid-week, courtesy of a full, luscious moon in Taurus, but Venus pulls on some fishnets and slinks into Scorpio soon after, so we don’t get a huge amount of time to roll around in the velvety, satiating arms of Taurus. Our girl Aphrodite is done with the conciliatory nature of Libra, apparently, and in need of a BDSM dungeon. Well, wouldn’t you know it! Immediately after typing those words, Pluto reared his frozen head and rasped, “Did someone say they’re looking for a dungeon?! Buying or renting?!”

Let’s all ignore the dwarf planet with the booming voice for a second while we take a look at the archetypes we’ll be wrestling with until mid-November.

MARS OPPOSES URANUS, THEY COME TO THE CONCLUSION THAT EVERYTHING SHOULD BURN DOWN

Prominent Days: Monday, 11.3 - Friday, 11.7

Mars in Sagittarius: Jovial high school jock who joined the military to see exotic places and learn about different cultures - he didn’t want to kill people, but it doesn’t really bother him, either

Uranus in Gemini: Uranus in Gemini: Ornery tech eccentric working in government I.T. by day, coked-up anarchist working to bring about the Dark Enlightenment by night

THE LIGHT - Mars in Scorpio, as we’ve observed, manifested his combativeness via manipulation; SecDef Wolfenstein isn’t a subtle bloke, but even he tried to use sophisticated spin to justify murdering Venezuelans and firing several senior generals when they dared to disagree. The temple of Sagittarius is far less subtle and far more loopy, full of dumpster fires, bicycles, expired airline vouchers, candy, and flamethrowers, so don’t be surprised if American militancy presents as cartoonish and scattered over the next month. (I should say more cartoonish and scattered.) Centaurs are flighty, impulsive, kinetic, and fun-seeking above all else; they make jokes that don’t land, are accident prone, and love meeting new people to inadvertently offend. These qualities might seem more appropriately delineated as a shadow of this transit until we remember that blunt clownishness can be far easier to circumvent than subtle manipulation. We’ll definitely see the war bullshit coming, and that’s better than not knowing at all.

On an individual level, this aspect energizes us to try new things, take chances on passion projects, and stay brave in situations that normally have us running for the hills. Uranus doesn’t have much of a moral center in Gemini, but he’s innovative and intelligent, so his little face-off with Mars could be useful for anyone working in start-ups, seeking venture capital, or midwifing their own unique business into the world.

THE SHADOW - My biggest fear about this aspect is the likelihood of unfettered stupidity; Mars in Sagittarius is not the brightest bulb, and though Uranus in Gemini is very intelligent, it’s a specialized sort of smart that isn’t often co-present with common sense or philosophical depth. Uranus loves flipping tables, and in the context of 2025 that could mean technological outages, air travel issues, grid failures, and the bone-chilling possibility of nuclear mishaps. Place him across the table from Mars in Sagittarius, basically a boundless golden retriever* with a sub-machine gun, and it’s easy to see how things could go horribly wrong. Watch for major outages and blustery saber rattling on the collective front, as well as electrical issues and freak accidents in the personal sphere.

*Speaking of armed, stupid dogs, SecDef Wolfenstein has a Sagittarius rising and a Gemini sun. Observe how humbly I rest my case.

VENUS GETS THE MOON ALL COZY AND HOPEFUL IN TAURUS RIGHT BEFORE SHE FUCKS OFF TO SCORPIO

Prominent Days: Wednesday, 11.5 - Thursday, 11.20 (with intermittent influence throughout the next six month lunar cycle)

Moon in Taurus: Practical neighbor whose mortgage is fully paid on her large house and enviable, otherworldly garden; makes her own squash bread and brings it to all gatherings

Venus in Libra: Benevolent, successful event planner with a knack for networking and a secret, eternal fear that she will never have enough accessories - good with people, bad with deadlines

THE LIGHT - Comfort is the watch word of this lunation, both the giving and receiving. This femme forward moon wants everyone to be happy, if only for simple things, and she reminds us of everything we have in order to center us in gratitude and reality. Notice the jewel-toned trees, the smoke on a gust of wind, and the taste of your dinner, this moon says, because nothing is forever and we are lucky for every second. Is the world shit? Well, yes, but it isn’t all shit, so our job over the next two weeks is to recommit to the tiny bits of sparkle that hide amongst the muck.

This is the kind of energy we can use to patch up fractured relationships, smooth over miscommunication, or win over an opponent with the gift of pie. Truly, if you’re in the middle of a sticky situation and people are being spiky, bring them food. There is nothing so potent, so absolutely transformative under a Taurus moon as a surprise meal, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this lunation is coinciding with massive hunger across the globe and in the U.S.

Grace, gratitude, and practicality are the tools Venus is gifting us, and we’ll feel more generous and empathetic toward our fellow man when we acknowledge how fortunate we are in comparison to many. The sparkle we’re seeking might be internal - something we generate from sheer stubbornness and a refusal to do what idiots tell us, which is very Taurean, come to think of it. The archetype of Venus, that pearlescent, ultimate woman to Rome, holds human connection as our most precious resource and the thing that makes living beautiful. Her message will be important to remember as we move through a fraught autumn.

THE SHADOW - The only downside to this moon is its brevity.

VENUS AND PLUTO TRADE BARBS DURING A FIXED SQUARE, THEN GET NAKED ABOUT IT

Prominent Days: Thursday, 11.6 - Sunday, 11.9

Pluto in Aquarius: Master of disguise, brilliant criminal in the vein of Kaiser Soze, has a bone to pick with authority, keeps dirt on everyone, basically a sociopath

Venus in Scorpio: Remember how Scorpios are often generalized as sexy, cannibalistic, Sherlock Holmes-type figures? Okay - now make Sherlock a woman

THE LIGHT - Anyone looking to rekindle something with an old flame, have an affair, or persuade a vanilla spouse to try something less, er, traditional in the relationship could have a smashing time beneath the beams of this aspect. The first degree of any ingress often feels like plunging your face in ice water - bracing, invigorating, and casually masochistic in a sexy, self-improvement sort of way. The Libra to Scorpio transition takes Venusian energy and multiplies it by ten, then adds a few cuffs and horse tails to it, making it an ideal ingress for bedroom sauciness. Pluto takes that formula and adds shadowy complexity; think explosive make-up sex with an estranged partner, intense conversations that spark obsessive, possibly unhealthy physical interest, or a surprise orgy. (Obviously Pluto would try to sell Venus on group sex - the house of Aquarius always prioritizes the community over the individual. Pearl clutchers need to get some Wet Wipes and step into the polyamorous twenty-first century, for God’s sake.)

THE SHADOW - Criminality, obsession, stalking, and catastrophic break-ups are all just as possible as orgies when these two get together, because they're both a little mythologically deranged. Imagine Moriarty and Sherlock if they ever gave in to the raw, animal magnetism between them and boinked for a solid twenty-four hours. Do you think their epic antagonism would simply disappear? Of course it wouldn’t! They would try to kill each other as soon as they got dressed, and their porny escapade would arm them both with effective manipulation material for years. Sex, sexuality, and sex roles are ripe for weaponization under this aspect, so be smart and cautious with partner choices - it will be very easy to succumb to the lure of forbidden flesh, only to then be reeled in and eaten.

Secrets, hidden agendas, and power plays are all turn-ons for Pluto, which means we could also uncover unsavory truths about sex and sexual relations in the collective realm. Keep your eyes on the wealthy elite and smarmy politicians; Pluto may be their patron god, but Venus in Scorpio packs a knife in her garter belt and she plays the long game when it comes to justice for women, children, minorities, and sex workers.

Alecto Chaos will always be free, because The Cranky Astrologer is a filthy marxist who is bad at math. If you or your friends are rich and enjoy cursing, though, I can stick extra profanity in these missives for just $5 a month!

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What Should We Do?!

Shit sucks, but it is possible to work productively with tough astrology by anticipating our own tendencies, in addition to the likely manifestations of the collective. No, really, it is!

Regarding the Mars/Uranus FUCK!SHIT!UP! party, think of the following:

• Observe extra caution regarding issues that you know make you defensive or reactive - Mars loves thoughtless reaction. Write a note on the back of your hand, sniff lavender throughout the day, carry an amethyst…whatever will serve as a reminder to step back from conflict, take a moment, and cool off. Staying off social media is never a bad idea.

• Allot extra time for air travel and tech updates, and watch the news for updates. Geopolitical fuckery and left-field military operations are not out of the realm of possibility, either, but staying circumspect and tempering volatile reactions on an individual level is still the best course.

Regarding the full Taurus moon of creature comforts:

• Invite people to dinner this week for no reason at all and make sure you include dessert. What are we, animals?! Consider cookies, at least.

• Take a moment to tally up everything that contributes to your current material security, however meager it may be. What would life be like without those things?

• Take a nap. Taurus loves naps.

Regarding the Venus/Pluto SEX!DWARF! orgy:

• Keep conversations honest and respectful both in and out of the bedroom.

• Follow your gut - if someone gives you a weird vibe (weird in a cannibal way, not a sexy way) then go home. Unless those things are one and the same to you, in which case…um, enjoy?

• Take this opportunity to have the deep conversations you’ve been putting off or avoiding, as Pluto and Venus often reward depth with satisfaction and gratitude.

• If a committed relationship is getting boring, this is the perfect opportunity for the kind of experimentation that requires deep trust.

• Think critically about any salacious gossip in the news, particularly sex scandals among the elite or seemingly trite political gossip; there is likely a much deeper story happening in the shadows.

Election Week 2025 Post Script…

After the bulk of this newsletter was finally complete and I was able to take a crabbed, decrepit victory lap around my living room, election results came in on the West Coast for mayoral and gubernatorial races across the country; the first of such since the second Trump administration came into being.

While the Democratic Party will never have my loyalty or admiration, considering how badly their brand of neoliberalism has cock blocked any true progressivism in my country since 1945*, it was still energizing to see Trumpism, and by extension authoritarianism, receive a sound whupping in nearly every race reported. If we were to put party aside for a moment and focus on the most basic facts, it’s hard not to be at least a little stoked that Virginia will have a woman at the helm for the first time in that state’s history, and in January of 2026, New York City will inaugurate it’s first Muslim and first Democratic Socialist mayor when they swear in Zohran Mamdani. Over two million New Yorkers showed up to the polls, the most turnout in a mayoral election since 1969, while both the states of New Jersey and Virginia recorded the highest level of turnout for their gubernatorial races in history. I want this to be good news, of course. Everybody who knows immigrants aren’t ingesting our pets wants this to be good news, but the sorrowful, cynical core of my being remains unconvinced and stabs me with internal doubt. Although, that could just be my trapezius muscle.

*Since FDR pissed everyone off with his, “all babies should eat” shtick, U.S. politicians made it their mission to unravel the New Deal almost immediately after his death. Yep, they’ve been at this for a while.

For a little bit on Tuesday night, non-MAGA folks experienced something that’s been light on the ground since 2008; optimism and community. From the Edison bulbs of Brooklyn rooftops to the rain-beaten window panes of Seattle’s dive bars, many people relaxed and chatted in the way you do when you aren’t afraid your neighbor is going to pistol whip you for having a rainbow pin on your puffy vest. It felt like progress; like the beginning of a cure to this chronic ailment we’ve been dealing with since 2016, if not longer. I would have joined the party, but the feeling of a freshly forged iron poker digging into my spinal column brought me back to my senses. I was going to have to call a physical therapist in the morning and that rigamarole would proceed more smoothly with a sold nine hours of sleep. Chronic body issues are rarely healed by a quick fix or a pill pop - they normally require a much slower, longer care plan. Even then, they may never fully heal.

My last physical therapist was a spry, blond woman of indeterminate age whose white sneakers were so spongey that her ponytail swung even at rest, like a dowsing pendulum. It was my hip the last time around, and I hadn’t known what I did to injure myself then, either. I sat awkwardly on my good ass cheek and described the symptoms, my meticulous self-care, and daily activity, my bewilderment at the situation palpable. She nodded and ticked off the possible causes like she’d seen them all, which see probably had.

“Poor mattress will do it every time. Sleeping on your stomach, which is really bad if you don’t have the right support, can do it,” she offered happily, as though my entire right leg weren’t on fire.

“It’s always the stuff you’re doing on auto-pilot, you know? Lay down here and let’s recreate your position when you’re conked out, then I’ll teach you some basic exercises to strengthen the affected muscles. Consistency is key, though,” she admonished, narrowing her eyes. “You can’t just do them a couple times and then forget about them, especially if this is happening in your sleep. You’re gonna want to incorporate a regular routine.”

Forever, I wondered? I have to keep doing this, or risk turning into a husk of burning, rotten joints?! Fuck youuuuu, sixth house.

I worked the hip stuff out eventually, but I fear a repudiation if I return to the same therapist with a different ailment, because she’ll know I didn’t take her words to heart last time. My physical relief was fleeting because I dropped the ball - I didn’t keep up with the exercises, I didn’t upgrade my ancient pillow, and I didn’t switch to a pair of gleaming, orthopedic high tops. I had hoped that simply showing up to my appointments enthusiastically would be enough to keep Pinhead’s cenobites and that muscle tarantula, the thing eating my body from the inside out, at bay.

But I rarely hurt myself when I’m awake and paying attention - most of us don’t. We hurt ourselves slowly, over months, years, and decades of blissful, ignorant sleep.

Astro News - The Loudest and Clearest Astrology of Recent Events

1. Viewing the Kirk assassination as a bellwether for fascist escalation based on both the U.S. and Trump natal charts

2. The domino effect of the government shutdown as a reflection of the lunar nodes

3. The inescapable, Plutonian nature of Jeffrey Epstein fallout may be the ruling class’ existential crisis

Astro Forecast - The Loudest Upcoming Astrology and What it May Portend

1. Pluto and Mercury revealing Epstein-ish secrets

2. Mars and Uranus causing a massive disruption

3. Uranus retrograding back to Taurus, which is the house of public health in the U.S. natal chart

Decan Walk 2025 - Signs and Vibes to Watch for According to Tarot

1. The first ten days of Scorpio correspond to the Five of Cups

2. Beware the Scorpionic tendency towards pessimism and vengeance, especially from people in power (Looking at you, Tangerine Peen.)

“I am terrified by this dark thing

that sleeps in me;

All day I feel it’s soft, feathery turnings, it’s malignity.”

Sylvia Plath, Scorpio

The Moon, Mercury, and Mars

Welcome to spicy week number 7,452 in the U.S.A., hosted by surgically enhanced billionaires, a car full of clowns that calls itself congress, a dementia patient, and his found family of scrappy fascists; it’s like the Brady Bunch if it was somehow whiter and more brazenly Christian Nationalist. Humanity around the globe, and certainly here in America, did not escape eclipse season so much as we succumbed to it, allowing key pieces of ourselves to burn up in the astrological chaos that included assassinations, terrorist attacks, and still more atrocity gleefully undertaken by the same people we thought we paid to fix the roads. Silly plebeians.

The wheel of time accelerated its turning throughout September and modern humanity, which has enjoyed the view at the top of this wheel for a century, caught a glimpse of our future descent; progress quickly and sloppily unmade, visibly decaying as our descent picks up speed. It’s impossible to remain at the top of a universal wheel without some serious footwork and death defying acrobatics, and most of us simply aren’t that nimble. Maybe the next episode of Christian Nationalist Brady Bunch doesn’t have a happy ending because it has become a morality play, like the episode where everybody is an asshole to housekeeper Alice and she leaves; the point of these episodes isn’t to be happy, but to learn a lesson.

This week came in hot, astrologically, courtesy of an explosive full moon in Aries, a new Mercury transit in Scorpio that now conjoins Mars by whole sign house, and a fixed square between Mercury and Pluto that will undoubtedly showcase the worst attributes of each planet as we slouch toward Bethlehem. On the bright side, that rough beast, Mars, is doing the slouching in his sexy arachnid house, which means civilizational downfall won’t just be unsettling…it might be erotically unsettling. Perhaps that’s what Donald Trump means when he talks about, “the gay agenda.”

Everyone’s least favorite planet and douchebag deity has taken Mercury into his feminine domicile, offered him snacks, fetched him a drink, and then invited him to fuck with us the same way Mars has always fucked with humanity; by stoking our instincts for lust, volatility and conflict. The ruler of Aries and Scorpio is pushing for action while Mercury completes our indoctrination, feeding us information in such a way that we’ll end up exactly where they want us; angry, irrational, and thirsty for blood. Maybe. We might also surprise them.

Try to approach the next month cautiously instead of fatalistically; our speedy planet of speech is an effective manipulator in Scorpio, so we can expect spin, lies, equivocations, and propaganda to be presented as authenticity, both personally and collectively. If it feels like a key player in your life is spouting bullshit, or writing cheques with their mouth that their ass can’t cash, they probably are. We’ll need to remain skeptical about mainstream messaging long past the point that this aspect separates, too, because Mercury will eventually station retrograde in Scorpio, prolonging the oily double-speak to which we’ve grown far too accustomed.

The interplay between Mars, Mercury, and Pluto focuses mainly on transformation, which will become increasingly apparent as the year winds down. Transformation is Scorpio’s bread and butter, and not the gentle kind - the gross, angry, dramatic kind that happens when a nation and her people must adapt to a different world, or important institutions crumble, or when a beloved character leaves a long-running sitcom. It doesn’t always end happily, but it does eventually end.

The following horoscopes will resonate for the rest of this lunar cycle and incorporate the Mars and Mercury transits, as well as the Pluto square and Aries full moon. Some of us will notice more obvious connections than others, but for the most part it will be Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn who feel hardest hit. Since I am both a cranky and Hellenistic astrologer, you will extract the most pertinent information according to rising sign, but I have personally noticed relevance with both my rising and my sun sign horoscopes, so read through both to be the most ass-kissy consumer of astrology in existence.

Aries

Full Moon in the first house

Mars and Mercury in the eighth house

Pluto in the eleventh house

If you’re exhausted, Aries, it is completely understandable; this lunation landed right on top of you, your body, your essence, and your selfhood, which probably caused fatigue and self-doubt in equal measure, which Aries absolutely despises. This lunar flattening could be signaling a need for transformation, which itself has roots in your current social circle. Pluto, you see, likes to decimate things that have outlived their usefulness, and it’s possible that Aries is hanging on to people who have done exactly that, through no fault of their own. We all grow and change, but if we deny or delay important transformation it can explode, messily and hurtfully, just as Mars and Mercury are probably encouraging right now in your eighth house, Aries (assuming you’re one of the Rams clear of troubles with a spouse’s money, or some other I.O.U. coming due unexpectedly.) Your worst impulses are often tempered by a diplomatic partner, so don’t be afraid to lean on those close to you for feedback as you muddle your way through whatever changes are coming down the pipeline.

Taurus

Full Moon in the twelfth house

Mars and Mercury in the seventh house

Pluto in the tenth house

This super moon highlighted a couple things for Taurus; first, conflict in a relationship that is tempting you to get all bull-in-a-china-shop about it, and second, the exposure of a few subconscious triggers that you might want to mention in therapy. The catalyst for this whole shebang is hiding at work or in whatever other public endeavor you’re involved, thanks to existential Pluto mucking around your tenth house of career. It’s typical for some of us to alchemize professional frustrations in our close relationships, but that doesn’t make it any more fair - shouldn’t we just take the frustration directly to its source? Yes, yes you should, but those frustrations might be tangled in a knot of shadows deep in the recesses of your brain, which is why a little reflection and twelfth house-friendly therapy may be in order. Do you really have hidden enemies at work, Taurus, or are the same inclinations that have you getting spicy in relationships just making you feel like you have hidden enemies at work? It’s worth a ponder over a pint of Haagen Daaz.

Gemini

Full Moon in the eleventh house

Mars and Mercury in the sixth house

Pluto in the ninth house

The stars are getting the impression that you want more out of life than you’re getting right now, Gemini, and this may have something to do with the friends and associates who populate your eleventh house. Pluto is providing kindling for this from your place of education and expansion, which is like an Oxford library full of conflicting literature for Gemini. All the ideas! All the theories! No time for real world application! For real, though, your insatiable thirst for a moving target of extraneous knowledge can cause friction in the more practical areas of life like earning a paycheck, cleaning the house, and properly hydrating, which could lead to a realization about which friends challenge you and which enable you. When the company you keep ceases to be stimulating the risk of boredom increases, and I’m not sure there’s anything more dangerous to the world than a bored Gemini - maybe a double-crossed Scorpio? On the other hand, buckling down and dealing with your responsibilities may actually be the mental stimulation you need, which is ironic, considering you often avoid them. Social groups should encourage our personal ambition, sure, but not so permissively that they enable delusional thinking; good friends always tell you when you’re showing your ass.

Cancer

Full Moon in the tenth house

Mars and Mercury in the fifth house

Pluto in the eighth house

Your least favorite activity might prompt painful clarity over the next lunation, Cancer, and yes, I’m speaking about work. This moon is lighting up your professional and public engagement in a serious way, and it may get so intense that you consider changing occupations altogether. Proceed with caution, because the roots of this friction live two houses down in your Aquarian house of transformation, taboos, and inheritance, which chatty Mercury wants to telegraph through your creative passion. In layman’s terms, your difficulty with transition, third part funds or eccentric desires are best expressed creatively, and you’re probably realizing that a nine to five job is not conducive to such things. Resist the urge to tear everything down and debut a gallery show about how much your boss, Peter, sucks - you could wind up burning important bridges, the absence of which will bite you in the ass once Mars and Mercury stop being mean in your house of creativity. Everyone is a little on edge right now, including your boss and co-workers, so keeping the snarky art at home will allow you an outlet without blowing up a much needed paycheck. Either that or do what the rest of us do to let off steam; make cruel memes about your boss and post them anonamously. Take that, Peter.

Leo

Full Moon in the ninth house

Mars and Mercury in the fourth house

Pluto in the seventh house

Conflict has been bubbling in your education, travel, and philosophy house for a hot second, Leo, and it’s possible that the solution lies in your area of home and family, as well as your house of relationships and deep interpersonal commitments. Leo takes naturally to action and expansion, like any good fire sign, but the clarity gifted us by the recent full moon is prompting you to examine domestic and romantic relationships as they relate to your own worldly exploration. When relationships live in the temple of Aquarius, as your do, the tendency of the native is toward eccentric, daring, and unique individuals and circumstances, which can definitely cause tension in the house of home and roots. If your boyfriend/girlfriend/polycule dislikes your provincial family, then the appeal of foreign travel or relocation that you can blame on schooling makes a lot of sense. Conversely, if there has been friction in your major relationships of late, then a long, fortifying, international trip might be just what Leo needs.

Virgo

Full Moon in the eighth house

Mars and Mercury in the third house

Pluto in the sixth house

A part of your life feels in dire need of transformation, Virgo, especially if you’ve been avoiding anything drastic or loud by virtue of your demure inclinations; sometimes big changes have no choice but to to play loudly! Mars is transiting his domicile in your place of communication, and your ruler is right beside him, chatting with Pluto about routines, habits, and various tasks that require your infamous discipline. Dour Pluto excavates any house he travels through for dirt, so what is he finding in yours that requires a reckoning? Perhaps your daily routines need a refresh in order to maximize the benefits of your neighborhood, and whenever a Virgo has to rethink habits it is an existential crisis of profound magnitude, no matter how many of us assure you that freaking out is unnecessary. Change can actually be a good thing when it’s in the name of constant self-improvement, and your upgrades will inspire everyone around you to strive for the height of perfection.

Libra

Full Moon in the seventh house

Mars and Mercury in the second house

Pluto in the fifth house

Libra is often attracted to people who are action-oriented and decisive because they have a difficult time prioritizing such things for themselves - they’re too busy handwringing over the perfect social calculous that will bring, if not world peace, at least peace to a few city blocks, an urban office, a classroom, one side of the dive bar, or what have you. When a full moon hits your house of interpersonal relations, Libra, some of your repressed agency expresses itself in spicy ways, causing a bit of friction with spouses or close friends. Material security might be behind current conflicts, given that Mars and Mercury are conspiring to send a message from your second house that connects, in some way, to your fifth house of art, joy, and children. The dwarf planet of dread often forces reckonings, so Libra might be mulling over having children or not having children, chasing or abandoning an artistic dream, and grappling with the financial implications of all of the above, which, in turn, contributes to interpersonal friction. I advise you to lean on your sense of justice and communicate honestly about these anxieties to the people around you, Libra. You don’t just keep them around for their beauty, despite the lies you tell yourself.

Scorpio

Full moon in the sixth house

Mars and Mercury in the first house

Pluto in the fourth house

Scorpio hates anything pedantic, so I’ll cut to the chase - you have to get a handle on your daily habits, you murderous freak, and you’ll likely need to analyze your childhood to do so. Your ruler is getting tight with Mercury in your first house of self, angrily sifting through all the incidents that made you YOU, and unsurprisingly, the dark ruler of both The Underworld and your shadow self is rooting around in your formative years for something Mercury can work with. Many Scorpios endured unusual, restrictive, or absent parenting that set the stage for their deep-seated trust issues, and this moon is calling attention to some of the terrible coping mechanisms you’ve developed as a result. This is the perfect lunation and planetary placement for you release any of the following; eating poorly, neglecting sleep in favor of internet stalking, pushing your body past it’s limits to strengthen your sense of control, avoiding new friendships because you anticipate betrayal, and eschewing productive new routines in favor of quiet, vengeful fuming. These things are not helping you, Scorpio, they just make it easier to hurt other people and feel justified in your behavior.

Sagittarius

Full Moon in the fifth house

Mars and Mercury in the twelfth house

Pluto in the third house

When you get a bee in your bonnet, Sag, especially involving the pursuit of passion, no one can stop you from doing something dumb, but I’m going to try. You will be tempted to steamroll anything that gets in the way of your fun, creatively or otherwise, over the next few weeks, perhaps because you’re avoiding a heavier conversation festering in your subconscious, where Mars and Mercury are hanging out all month. The quicksilver planet is filling your head with the shadows of your third house of siblings, speech, and early education via Pluto, so what issues have been lurking there? Children are a common link between the third and fifth houses, so centaurs thinking of parenthood might want to deal with any unresolved sibling/grade school issues before leaping into caregiving or publishing a scathing childhood memoir. You might also need to take an unvarnished look at your own communication when you butt up against an obstacle to creative expression - when speech falls into the temple of Aquarius, it means the native can come off as insensitive, wacky, and unwilling to compromise, which means you might be contributing to your own creative frustration. Review the vibe of your comms and soften your approach.

Capricorn

Full Moon in the fourth house

Mars and Mercury in the eleventh house

Pluto in the second house

“Viciousness in the kitchen,” as Plath once said, is an esoteric way of telling you that conflict will play out at home over the next two weeks; either about your house itself, the residents within, or those who taught you how to keep a home, Capricorn, i.e. your parents or parent-adjacent folks. This moon perfected just as Mercury moved into your place of public groups and social circles to have a little relay race with Pluto, who will be digging up secrets and perversions in your house of value - Capricorn’s favorite place aside from the house of career! Maybe you’ve fallen in with a social group that conflicts with domesticity, somehow, or you’ve had to seek a different personal circle due to financial desires, one that accompanies relocation opportunities and a chance at ladder climbing. While it isn’t unusual for Capricorn to seek camaraderie that strengthens their economic capital, something about this situation creates friction at home that will demand attention, so you may as well nip it in the bud before it gets too gnarly.

Aquarius

Full Moon in the third house

Mars and Mercury in the tenth house

Pluto in the first house

It makes sense that Mars rules your house of communication and commerce, Water-Bearer, since that’s where the bulk of your impulsivity and immaturity manifest. Mars also rules your career house, and this combination makes for a native whose speech and work ethics are immutable, regardless of critique by friends or colleagues. That approach might not serve you this week, Aquarius, because Pluto is working to kill off parts of your ego in the first house, and Mercury could bring some of that tension into the workplace through harsh feedback and difficult politics. This moon is shining a very powerful spotlight on interpersonal communication, which means you might want to take a look at how you are being perceived when you speak - aloof? Stubborn? Uncaring? Eccentric? To be fair, these are typical shadows of Aquari-speak, but softening your approach might prove necessary if you want to expand your circle of influence, and who are you kidding, Aquarius? That’s all you want out of life.

Pisces

Full Moon in the second house

Mars and Mercury in the ninth house

Pluto in the twelfth house

It’s not that we don’t trust you, Pisces, but if you’ve been neglecting money or prosperous endeavors that ensure material security, you’ll probably experience friction with other people due to financial stressors. Money is usually stressful for Pisces, mostly because y’all wish it didn’t exist, but this particular situation may involve entanglements with educational or religious institutions that will need to be resolved if you want to reach important goals. Any Pisces trying to travel for college or some sort of spiritual undertaking might need to reckon with a funding shortage, and that reckoning will involve hot emotions and harsh language, which is not a natural way for gentle fish people to engage. Don’t forget that Pluto is going to be rewiring your mental health for the next twenty years or so, and the Lord of The Underworld really wants you to get better at confrontation and standing up for yourself, so start lesson number one this week and try not to cower or fold in the face of confrontation. Get simpatico with the Mars energy in your ninth house and hold your fucking ground - ask for extensions, plead your case, or call up some past due favors to deal with any funding shortfalls…anything to resist your usual roll-over-and-take-it strategy.

What is happening?!

Weather at the 47th parallel in the American West has finally become autumnal. After months of our bitching, sweating, Spam™-pink faces and illogical ensembles, we woke up today to the hush of rain and a sixty degree sky the color of steel. Pungent summer scents of grilled meat, sunscreen, and hot garbage have been washed away and replaced with the bland, vaguely metallic smell of ‘damp’. Imagine, for a moment, that you live in a can of water chestnuts; that’s what Libra season smells like at the 47th parallel.

Various ancient mythologies up to and including the Greek pantheon liken this time of year to Persephone’s (or Proserpine’s, for you Roman bootlickers) descent into The Underworld, where food is scarce and the sun is non-existent, which sounds awfully similar to the seasonal worst case scenario for humans before electricity when confronted with autumn; starvation, frigid temperatures, and loneliness. Now that we have ceded control to people who want to make the Victorian Age Great Again by bringing back debtors prisons, plagues, high infant and maternal mortality, and death by weather, the downward spiral of modern civilization feels guaranteed, just like the deadly chill of winter.

We call this ‘The Big Dark’ in the PNW, which would lead a normal person to think that we have a jubilant opposition called ‘The Big Light’ but they would be wrong - we don’t speak of the good weather at all around these parts, because if we did, people from other areas of the country might move here, and a reliable portion of those transplants, those beneficiaries of our loose, coffee stained lips, would undoubtedly be Californians. This would end in disaster, because once you give a Californian a home, his appetite is just as bottomless as that mouse and his cookie from the children’s books. If you give a Californian a condo, he’ll want a spot on the P.T.A. If you give him a spot on the P.T.A., then he’ll run for city council, and once he’s on the city council, it’s only a matter of time before every block has a boutique gym with a juice bar and an expensive, kitschy diner with portions so large they’re served via wheelbarrow. No wonder the goddamn mouse was diabetic.

I don’t have a problem with Californians generally, but if I wanted to live amongst them I would move to, you guessed it, California. Fortunately for everyone involved, I can’t stand the sun, people who tan, show business, Disneyland, or Gavin Newsom, so I plan to stay hidden in the gloomiest, lushest landscape this cursed country has to offer.

I and other vampires love The Big Dark, but a good portion of transplants cannot get used to it, especially if they were lulled here after a visit in May or June and relocated during another summer. Even when they are told what to expect from October through April, even if they watched it rain in our movies or read about our serial killers in a book, a transplant’s inaugural Big Dark is always an endurance test from which none emerge unscathed. If, like me, they end up toughing out the next few years, then The Big Dark starts to grow on them the way moss does on trees, and soon they, too, will cease chattering about the quality of our summers in mixed company, lest the next stray Californian get any ideas. (Why relocate to a place for exactly the same climate, anyway? Why not just keep your property value-raising asses in your home state?)

Those who cannot achieve simpatico with The Big Dark, the normals who enjoy things like seasons, usually retreat to the tan, serotonin-rich bosom of their previous neighbors within one to three years. They return to sunnier climes because no matter how detailed a description we give transplants of The Big Dark, there is no substitute for experiencing it.

Even when we tell people that by January they’ll begin to salivate at the thought of a vitamin D chew. Or that they’ll feel as though they’re living on the set of Nicole Kidman’s The Others for eight months out of every year, only more depressing. Seasonal affective disorder sounds like a celebrity invention, but Californians quickly discover that it’s real; so real, it can make a person want to chug enough NyQuil™ to hibernate under their couch cushions until June.

None of these warnings will sway people, just like they didn’t sway me; they will cling to the idealized version of the PNW in which they first set foot and suffer the consequences of their delusions later. The periwinkle sky and swaying trees they experienced for a moment will prove unreliable and intermittent, like an erratic haunting by their previous homeland. Just you wait, I think, whenever I pass a pair of well-heeled lip fillers on the street. The cartoonish gloom that existed as an intellectual exercise before relocation will become your weighted reality, and depression is about to sink in your guts like a submarine. I can identify recent transplants every year by early March - they’re the ones plodding numbly about their day wearing four mismatched sweaters with barely leashed desperation in their eyes, their pupils silently shrieking, when, when does the fucking sun come back it’s been dark for five months my god won’t someone KILL ME?!

I know, I know - I don’t need to be so mean to the Californians, who I can grudgingly admit are often lovely people. They’re just doing what we’re all doing and trying to find a way to survive. Some of us are chasing survival to different states or countries, willing to endure both culture and climate shock for a chance to outlast whatever the fuck is going on with humanity right now. A few others are digging in by compiling Signal contacts, canning produce, and distributing Ham radios. Most of us aren’t doing much at all, though, outside of our typical work/eat/sleep routine. Like misguided Californians with money to burn, we are busy convincing ourselves that the dark, dreadful, shitty future we’ve been warned about isn’t really going to come, and even if it were, surely it won’t be that bad. Persephone ended up rather liking hell, Right? Right?!

Well, the descent has begun, and we’re about to find out.

Why, Goddammit, Why?!

Acceleration, baby. Ancient Greek astrologers devised what we now term the tropical zodiac as a way to track and observe seasons and, more broadly, the quality of our time on Earth; the term ‘tropical’ grew from the greek root ‘tropos’, which means ‘to turn’. The recent autumnal equinox and accompanying eclipse are examples of that accelerated turning, and just as the transition from Virgo to Libra can include jarring changes in weather, temperature, and sunlight, so, too, can cultural, sociopolitical, and personal changes feel rocky and accelerated during eclipse season.

If September felt like a time warp, one that included so much farce, devastation, tragedy, and cartoonish villainy that you thought you were reading The Onion high on mushrooms, then congratulations, your capacity for observation is in tip top shape. Eclipse season of 2025 was one for the vault, as the esteemed Dr. Frank N. Furter might say. Our September 7th lunar eclipse, which occurred in Pisces and was thus ruled by Jupiter, included plenty of ideological tussles and legal developments that fall well under the purview of Zeus’ planetary avatar, who rules the legal system, higher education, religion, and philosophy, among other things. In the weeks that followed:

• American ideologue and podcaster Charlie Kirk was assassinated on a university campus in Utah.

• Israel escalated civilian bombing campaigns in Gaza, then attacked neighbors Yemen, Lebanon, and Syria under the auspices of ferreting out ‘terrorist ideology’, continuing the human tradition of disguising land grabs as religious and ideological crusades.

• Kids in Nepal decided they had goddamn enough of a corrupt government and commenced a riotous Gen Z protest.

• The Brazilian Supreme Court convicted the South American Trump of coup-plotting and sentenced him to twenty-seven years in prison, weirding out all the North Americans who thought plotting a coup nabbed you the presidency instead of jail time.

• Writer E.Jean Carroll made Donald Trump her bitch yet again when the courts rejected his bid to overturn the 2019 civil ruling that found him liable for sexual assault.

• Numerous manifestations of the lunar eclipse involved one of Jupiter’s lesser known significations when he’s in a water sign, which is long distance air or sea travel. The Trump Administration’s indiscriminate destruction of Venezuelan boats in Caribbean water might fall under this umbrella, as might Russian drone shenanigans in Polish and Romanian airspace, and several, fatal maritime disasters off the shore of the Democratic Republic of Congo and the coast of Libya.

Two weeks later, we observed a solar eclipse in Virgo, which placed another fraught new moon under the rulership of Mercury, who behaves like a scamp even in the best case scenario. Hermes is the opposite to Zeus in every way that counts; he is analytical and detail-oriented, whereas Zeus is a broad, top-down sort of thinker. Their domiciles reflect the same tension - Pisces is about generosity and abundance, whereas Virgo appreciates asceticism and purgation, which was elevated to gruesome levels immediately following the solar eclipse on September 21st, during which:

• Israel continued to starve Palestinians while the world watched. Deaths increased exponentially and were comprised largely of children, who perish faster from malnutrition due to their growing metabolism.

• Various journalists, regular shmoes, and at least one comedian were fired or suspended from their place of employment as right wing retribution for Charlie Kirk’s murder, often for simply publishing Kirk’s own words and political positions. Pam “Tits McGee” Bondi declared hate speech prosecutable by law and J.D. Vance encouraged the doxxing of anyone deemed insufficiently mournful of Kirk, himself a staunch free speech advocate. Independent fact checkers verified that Kirk wasn’t the only casualty of the September 10th shooting; irony was also shot dead.

• The giant tapeworm in charge of H.H.S. declared Tylenol public enemy number one and pregnant women who experience pain as a close second when he suggested that both cause autism, which means pregnant people will now be denied bodily autonomy AND pain relief in the name of ableist Jeezus.

• The United States racked up something like a million new mass shootings and subsequent deaths in the weeks following the solar eclipse. Alright, maybe not one million, but good gods there were too many.

In short, the lunar nodes were feeling spicy. On top of all that, several peripheral astrological aspects occurred within the confines of eclipse season and manifested in their own peculiar ways; the deluge of conflicting information and conspiracy theories surrounding Kirk’s murder and the identity of other mass shooters had Neptune’s moist hands all over it, and a Mars/Pluto square certainly delivered on it’s promise of stochastic violence in various places around the world. Let’s look at some of the new transits that kicked off beneath the shade of our Libran downfall, as they will continue chattering at us in the lead up to a full moon in Aries.

SUN OPPOSED NEPTUNE, TURNED LEADERS OF MEN INTO WHINY DIAPER BABIES

Prominent Days: Sunday, 9.21, thru Friday, 9.26

Sun in Libra: The consummate politician, owner of the whitest teeth and most balanced perspective, which is a nice way of saying that he takes no strong stance on anything in particular but makes for a very attractive cypher - occasionally hides deep-seated evil

Neptune in Aries: Esoteric, geriatric painter in the middle of his third wind because his weed was spiked with coke, hides knives in his clothes - not evil, just confused and reactive

THE LIGHT - Oppositions are the tensest of aspects; imagine the planets as two people who despise each other who are then forced to have dinner as a way to ‘work out their differences’. Without a mediating planet, the only thing in which these guys can engage is a staring contest across one increasingly sweaty charcuterie platter. The best case scenario would see them focusing on art or creativity over dinner - Neptune might be able to convince sun god Apollo to finance a watercolor show if he can resist all the weapons lying around Mars’ domicile, and Apollo might find Neptune inspiring, if a little unhinged. Shades of this dynamic could be seen in the free speech debacle involving a late night talk show host and the show business players who spoke out, in largely milquetoast fashion, against his cancellation.

THE SHADOW - Neptune can be a delusional, paranoid, old hippy, and his nebulous phobias were on display courtesy of an American government apparatus that deemed this throwaway, mediocre monologue snippet a satanic affront to god, who in this instance could be Charlie Kirk or Donald Trump, it’s hard to say. No one mentioned Jesus or Zeus, anyway.

Anytime an opposition between planets occurs on the Aries/Libra axis, conflict between the ego of the self (Aries) and the human instinct for connection and collectivity (Libra) becomes loud and obnoxious. The free speech implications of Kirk’s assassination fallout are obvious, i.e. the right of one person to say what they feel v.s. the decorum of group expectations. We also saw a bit of this when Tapeworm Brain made several delusional announcements over this time period about Tylenol, Mifepristone, the MMR vaccine, and….anything. Anything that comes out of Tapeworm Brain’s worm mouth sets one man’s delusions against established, scientific group consensus, which is a depressingly astute example of Neptune in Aries giving the sun in Libra a giant headache. One for which we all be denied painkillers.

THE SUN, PLUTO, AND URANUS FORMED A GRAND-ISH AIR TRINE, ALLOWING FRICTIONLESS DELIVERY OF DISRUPTIVE IDEAS AND SECRET POWER TRANSFERS

Prominent Days: Sunday, 9.21 thru Friday, 9.26

Sun in Libra: The consummate politician, owner of the whitest teeth and most balanced perspective, which is a nice way of saying that he takes no strong stance on anything in particular but makes for a very attractive cypher - occasionally hides deep-seated evil

Uranus in Gemini: Ornery tech eccentric working in government I.T. by day, coked-up anarchist working to bring about the Dark Enlightenment by night

Pluto in Aquarius: Master of disguise, brilliant criminal in the vein of Kaiser Soze, has a bone to pick with authority, keeps dirt on everyone, basically a sociopath

THE LIGHT - The best thing these three accomplish when they’re working well together is an almost painless midwifing of eccentric, untested ideas into the basic bitch collective. Uranus and Pluto are great at existential innovation when they mess around in air signs - coding AI to become a deity, surveillance software that can count your nose hairs, etc. - but they’re not necessarily ready for prime time. Wacky inventors need a normie intermediary to get their point across, as anyone who's listened to Elon Musk speak likely understands. Enter our sun in Libra, who was born for prime time and revels in his role as a charming salesman, successfully pitching radical ideas to the ruling class like they’re Ferraris.

THE SHADOW - When the air element decides to be shady, it can put sneaky water signs to shame. In this instance, the sun provided cover for power transfers and deals in the technology realm, likely reflecting Uranus’ main kink. During this timeframe, TikTok was sold to a Bond villain goatee and the goblin who runs Fox News thanks to Donald Trump’s crony capitalism, which we also have to thank for government involvement in Invidia, SpaceX, and Palantir. Interestingly enough, we also saw a reversal of this dynamic when Microsoft terminated services for the I.D.F. on September 25th, once it became widely known that Israel used it’s software for mass surveillance of Palestinian civilians long before October 7th, 2023.

Before we give Microsoft a barely passing grade in their performance as humans, remember that they - alongside Google, Amazon, Palantir, Babel, and Meta - have already developed and used A.I. surveillance software within the testing grounds of Israel and Palestine. The same software was imported to the U.S. and used to track communications of student visa holders who engaged in pro-Palestinian activism. Personally, I wouldn’t be surprised to find it in use for mass surveillance of American citizens as I write, likely attracting my very own spy/penpal from one of the three-letter spook shows out of Quantico. Gargle my balls, pig. Hi, new friend!

MARS AND PLUTO ELBOW EACH OTHER IN A FIXED SQUARE AND NOW THE HOTHEADS ARE ARMED

Prominent Days: Tuesday, 9.23 thru Sunday, 9.28

Mars in Scorpio: Charismatic, intimidating military guy, covertly plays the long game to achieve his priorities, which are outwitting his enemies, fucking his enemies, and killing his enemies, in no particular order

Pluto in Aquarius: Master of disguise, brilliant criminal in the vein of Kaiser Soze, has a bone to pick with authority, keeps dirt on everyone, basically a sociopath

THE LIGHT - If there are any ancient grudges you’ve been keeping alive, this aspect reflected the perfect opportunity to serve up revenge at subzero temperatures, and the Trump regime took full advantage. Anything involving deep investigation (or deep obfuscation) is activated by Pluto, so if you suspected nefarious behavior on the part of a spouse or loved one, this was the moment to drive your quarry into a trap of their own making. Diving into the endless rabbit hole of petty internet stalking also yields powerful results beneath this aspect, as recent political doxxing activity illustrated, but remember that Mars is still a hothead in Scorpio and your foe will not go gently into their own good night. Violence begets violence, etc.

THE SHADOW - If this aspect were depicted as yin and yang symbology, the black portion would look like an ocean engulfing a white flea, and eventually the whole shebang would be overrun with darkness. These two planets, in these two domiciles, are dangerously, seductively volatile; Mars in Scorpio takes everything personally, and Pluto in Aquarius will offer up any dirty secret he needs to in order to keep the opposition vulnerable. There is a plethora of military bullshit being reflected by these two jerks; Israel is exterminating a population in order to extract wealth from their land, which several high-level Israeli officials have stated aloud, and it certainly looks like Vladimir Putin, himself a Scorpio, is executing phase one of some anti-NATO, anti-European power play. Pluto himself rules the riches and resources buried in the Earth, which is the main reason Ukraine is getting smacked around by opposing regimes like a badminton birdie. What fun.

MERCURY AND JUPITER GET INSUFFERABLE DURING A CARDINAL SQUARE AND INSTITUTIONS TAKE A BEATING

Prominent Days: Tuesday, 9.30 thru Friday, 10.3

Mercury in Libra: Neurotic socialite who holds board positions at several charitable organizations, gets other fancy people to pledge funds by looking cute and refusing to shut up at parties

Jupiter in Cancer: Pronatalist podcaster who built an enormous media empire around his ‘dad’ persona, known to be traditional, optimistic, and a bit stupid

THE LIGHT - Anyone able to hold the tension between Mercury and Jupiter might develop a more balanced approach to problem-solving beneath this aspect. Squares typically exacerbate the shadow qualities of each planet, but Mercury and Jupiter are so diametrically opposed that their worst impulses often cancel each other out. Anyone with a tendency to gloss over systemic shortcomings, either due to misplaced optimism or sheer laziness, might be able to drill down on specifics and make small, powerful changes with Mercury breathing down their neck. Conversely, if you have a tendency to get lost in the weeds when tackling big tasks, Jupiter could widen your aperture by keeping Mercury’s obsessive, compartmentalized obsessions at bay, giving you a view of both the forest and the trees.

THE SHADOW - The United States government shut down right as September turned into October, and the congressional spending resolutions are a rather succinct example of a Mercury/Jupiter tension; the budget itself is very big picture and requires the scope of a generalist, but it has devolved into a pissing match over specific details, like Obamacare subsidies.

Mercury is concerned with justice and connectivity in Libra, so we’re hearing very specific arguments from one side of Congress that highlight consequences for individuals in this country like loss of healthcare, poverty, and death. Conversely, the more powerful majority in Congress is repping Jupiter by using vague generalities with a healthy dose of tribalism to sway public opinion. Xenophobia is an unfortunate shadow of Cancer that twists her natural affinity for home and family into toxic rhetoric about who ‘belongs’ in a community and who does not, so this moody cliquishness can be felt in the constant back and forth about immigrants stealing jobs, doctor appointments, and pets, or whatever the hell the Fourth Reich is claiming lately.

Persephone’s descent was slow and discombobulating, traveling as she did through Erebus, the primordial dark. The Underworld warps time and space as a rule, so it was difficult for her to orient herself or remember things.

When was the last time I ate? When was the last time I saw my mother? This Hades fella isn’t so bad looking, actually. What were the rules again…oooh, pomegranate!!

Depending on the person telling the story, it was either Hades himself, the dissolution of time, or good, old-fashioned boredom that acclimated Kore to hell and transformed her into Persephone. However it occurred, every version of this myth ends with Persephone getting comfortable enough in her dire circumstances to settle down and eat a few pomegranate seeds, cementing her connection to hell and damning her to live there for half the year, every year, throughout eternity. Did she consciously decide to enjoy The Big Dark, the way some of the rest of us have? Or did she convince herself, in service to her own complacency, that it wasn’t actually as bad as Demeter warned; that she could learn to live with it?

Maybe what Persephone could have used is a change in perspective, like the kind I have when another transplant from sunny climes up and flees, but not before giving me a thousand-yard stare and uttering, “You like this weather?”

Yes? Maybe? I thought that I did, as an elder goth and executive misanthrope who has always reveled in circumstances that normal people find wet and depressing, but I’ve begun to question myself. I’m not native, after all - I hail from a place with gregarious strangers and definitive seasons, and I used to be the sort of person who would chat with my neighbor even if we had nothing in common aside from the busted mailboxes on the ground floor of our greystone flats. I know who I used to be, and I know who I am right now, but the journey between the two is fuzzy and difficult to parse. Like a frog in boiling water or a Greek goddess drilling through Earth down to hell, these changes happened imperceptibly and with no deliberate intent on my part; I acclimated to the darkness by deciding not to fight it.

Now it’s October and we’re barreling toward truncated days and marathon nights, unconsciously acclimating ourselves to dark circumstances. The nebulous shadows of winter. Of decline. It's no longer question of whether or not we’re headed to The Underworld, but how long we’ll stay once we arrive.

When the Californians split, it might be time to go.

The Season of Learning That Everything We Do is Wrong

September is what I like to call mutable sign bullshit time, which I suppose more genteel astrologers refer to as ‘eclipse season’, but I stand by the uncouth title. Too many uncouth things have been going on lately, or perhaps not enough uncouth things have been going on, it’s hard to say. Our sun’s annual ingress into Virgo always begins at an energetic clip; a jumpstart for folks who have wrung every drop of sea water out of their summer and are ready for autumn to smack them in the face with long sleeves, PTA meetings, and gourds. So many gourds. Right now, the harvest maiden is cranking the shaft that turns the wheel of the year, ushering our transition from suntanned hedonists into conscientious harvesters of crops, planners of the future, and buyers of notebooks with collegiate ruling.

By the time Virgo season wraps up, though, our quality of time will have changed significantly; it’s colder, we have difficult, crappy homework that makes us feel stupid, and the crucible of the eclipses will have put us through an emotional wringer. Like Kore during her descent, everything we were before must burn away so that we arrive to the underworld stripped of our old trappings and ready to mature. Think of eclipses as acceleration - we started a transformative process some time ago, but our luminaries decided we were taking too long, prompting them to plant their spherical foot on the existential accelerator of the universe. It sounds intense because it is - in fact, ancient Babylonians believed eclipses were omens that foretold rocky transitions and unexpected leadership changes due to things like death, coups, and improperly stored crops.

DEMETER AND THE BLACK MOON OF 2025

This year we kicked off Mutable Sign Bullshit Time™ with a black moon, which is how people who treat The Farmer’s Almanac as a hymnal refer to the third new moon in a season that has four total. So that means we get a second new moon in Virgo on September 21st, (yay!) but it will also be a solar eclipse (Boo.) Ancient Mesopotamian astrologers considered eclipses bad omens, particularly for kings and rulers (likely because they did have a tendency to die), but I also wonder if the slow retreat of late summer’s sun infused ancient people with a general sense of dread and anxiety. This would be totally understandable, given that the quality of a late September harvest could dictate how many of their fellow villagers starved to death over the course of winter.

It makes sense, too, that early civilizations imagined a self-possessed maiden holding delicious, valuable wheat in the constellation illuminating September’s night skies; I too feel more motivated to complete my variety of back-to-school tasks and cold weather prep with a diligent, focused woman like Demeter hovering over my shoulder and telling me to manage my time, fix my mistakes, and clean up my mess because she is not my fucking maid, how many times must she remind me? Virgo still maintains a solid association with the Greek goddess of the harvest, and her mythology has always given me progressive, managerial vibes; she worked hard to feed Olympus, but she went on strike as soon as one of the bosses stole her daughter and committed a flagrant workplace violation. Demeter told Zeus, the head honcho, that if Hades didn’t follow the rules and return her daughter, then she wouldn’t be clocking in and Olympus would starve. She remained true to her word, went on strike for six months, and only went back to work when Kore returned as Persephone. As the kids say, we stan a Greek goddess with class consciousness.

ANOTHER LAYER OF SHITTINESS IS…THAT’S RIGHT, IT’S SATURN

Right now, the equinox axis can be observed as a zodiacal teeter-totter between Virgo, our self-sufficient maiden who tells everyone to wash their hands before the harvest, and Pisces, aquatic dreamers who help Earthlings to face their Dark Night of the Soul so that we can be purified and reborn. Both temples, Maiden and Fish, embody the archetypal feminine, in that Virgo seeks to gently guide us into the dark with our larders well-stocked, and Pisces asks us to embrace the truth revealed in winter’s shadows so that we don’t forget the lessons we need to bring into the upcoming agricultural year. The discomfort we have all been feeling since late August is a result of this tension - tension between the practicality of Virgo and the nebulous spiritualism of Pisces, between realism and idealism, and most importantly this year, between who we truly are and who we thought we were.

Complicating and exacerbating this tension is Saturn, a.k.a. Grandpa Time, emitting his old guy stink in the house of Pisces, opposite this new moon/solar eclipse. He’s sitting across the table from Virgo and taunting us; throwing obstacles in our way and negating our ambitions, all so he can lord our immaturity over our heads. “See?” Saturn says. “I told you weren’t ready for this, and you aren’t.” So, Saturn is going to give us a roadmap of our shortcomings in the hopes that our blood and bashed egos will help us get to where we are going. He’s a giver like that.

The following horoscopes will resonate throughout autumn and will reactivate in spring of 2026, especially for the split-minded, mutable signs of Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius and Pisces, who can expect a loud - like, Motorhead loud - next six months. The best thing I can say is that mutable signs are the most open-minded and nimble about fast transitions, so all of you double-bodied eccentrics will probably be alright, despite these eclipses occurring in your important houses. If you are lucky enough to be a fixed or cardinal sign during this eclipse, you’ll still hear the death metal that the mutable sign station is playing, but it will be subtle - less like nails on a chalkboard and more like a gentle murmur from a supportive friend.

I’m including the entire lunar axis in these horoscopes because they both matter, and I’m including Uranus because he’s currently running amok in Gemini, yet another Mercury-ruled, mutable sign (He’s also part of the unholy air reckoning that Pluto kicked off last year, so he’s a major contributor to 2025’s unique instability. The fucker.)

A solar eclipse in Virgo means that Mercury has a heavy hand in what will transpire, and Uranus, a planet that already shares a worldview with wily Hermes, will likely influence the depth of chaos we’re experiencing. Let’s dig in to the fun!

Aries

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 6th House

The more tedious aspects of life might need a refresh from you, Aries, and you may have received a hint about them when the black moon crested. If you haven’t been planning things like doctor appointments and tune-ups, you should probably get on that, especially for any mental health issues. You may also be guilty of avoidance and procrastination, which results in ample time for play but not for work - the sort of thing that contributes to feeling anxious and behind.

Uranus in your 3rd House

Putting on the disguise of neighborhood busybody would be sort of subversive for you, Aries, and for that reason I think Uranus wants you to give it a shot. Your sixth house issue will still be active, and may even intensify, by September 21st, so it’s possible that you’ll embrace a more efficient Aries while at a library, coffee shop, or some other public meeting spot. Get meditative about daily tasks, Aries, and they may calm instead of frustrate you.

Lunar Eclipse in your 12th House

You have done a lot of shadow work this last year; not because you wanted to, mind you, but because it could barely be helped, considering the astrology. Saturn and Neptune have been doing a number on your sense of identity, so don’t take it badly if a few ghosts are still rattling around the attic of your mind, reminding you that you aren’t perfectly healed. Who is, honestly? The Time Lord wants you to mature, so he’s bringing your attention back to your psyche and subconscious to put some issues to rest that you thought had been taken care of. Turns out the things lurking in your mind need a little denouement.

Taurus

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 5th House

The August 23rd moon in Virgo kicked off new possibilities in your house of joy and creativity, but it might also have alerted you to some of the difficulties you can have accessing unfettered fun, Taurus. As a fixed, Venusian sign, you have hedonistic inclinations that can be difficult to fulfill because of your conservative approach and preconceived notions. Having a routine is good, but you really should try new things now and again to exit a creative slump. Taurus’ with kids whose routine is feeling stale will benefit from a concerted effort to update activities, so stop relying on the old park/playdate standbys.

Uranus in your 2nd House

Disruption is not a favored state in the life of Taurus - like J.D. Vance, those born in Venus’ feminine earth temple really, really love their couch time (Not in the pervy way, though - that’s where the similarities to everyone’s least favorite Cabbage Patch Veep end.) If technology has any role in your craft or daily work, don’t be surprised if it’s on the fritz more frequently this month; Uranus just stationed retrograde in Gemini, and it’s going to make things very unstable. Fortunately, Uranus is also responsible for technological breakthroughs, so it’s possible that you’ll come up with innovative solutions to whatever fuckery the rebel planet foments.

Lunar Eclipse in your 11th House

Something interesting in your social circle could be revealed under this moon, mein Bull, perhaps involving the crystallization of new groups, or of boundaries within groups. The last new moon in your fifth house felt like it was prompting you to foster new creativity, which may in turn expose you to different, exciting communities, and if there’s been any friction in your current social scene, some time spent with different people could neutralize it.

Gemini

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 4th House

Your approach to family is more mercurial than any other part of your life, Gemini, and the first Virgo moon of this season might have sparked a new phase in parental relationships, or at the very least, offered a new light by which to perceive your parents, grandparents, and family in general. Any kind of friction that has been simmering at home could erupt into a full blown boil by Libra season, so it might be a good idea to get ahead of it, and pay close attention to patriarchal figures in your life, as solar eclipses tend to hit them hardest.

Uranus in your 1st House

Brace yourself for this Uranus retrograde, Twins, and revisit moments from your past without fear; you won’t have an accurate picture of who you are without an honest assessment of who you were. All this self-reflection might lead to drastic makeovers and new special interests, as well as clarity regarding murky elements of your childhood.

Lunar Eclipse in your 10th House

Okay, so what is going on at work, Gemini? Issues you assumed were buried might need a coda or autopsy in order for you to move on, and there are likely copious emotions involved, since the ruler of this house is mucking around watery Cancer right now. Maybe this looks like a vulnerable conversation with a co-worker, wherein you both come clean and clear the air regarding previous friction. It’s also possible you’ll choose to exit your current profession permanently due to an issue like retirement, an abrupt career pivot, or the necessity of parental caregiving.

Cancer

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 3rd House

Changes in your neighborhood might be accelerating, as might changes with siblings and daily expenditures, which you obviously hate, but exciting new activity might reinvigorate you. A novel opportunity could arise closer to home, or with a recalcitrant sibling, once you say goodbye to whatever long term ninth house adventure the lunar eclipse is helping you close out.

Uranus in your 12th House

Prepare for wacky-ass dreams and subconscious urges now that Uranus is retrograde in your house of secrets, Cancer, which includes things like buried memories and people who pretend to like you but actually hate you. (The twelfth house is weird.) Uranus in Gemini is chatty and disruptive, so make space in your life over the next six months to download uncomfortable, personal revelations and use all the sick days, therapy sessions, and dream journals that you need - but be cautious with elicit substances, because this is also the place where addiction thrives.

Lunar Eclipse in your 9th House

Your mind expansion journeys tend to work best when they are shared with other empathetic parties. What’s the point in traveling to Paris if you don’t have a companion willing to compare notes on how the Arc d’ Triomphe made them feel? Pisces is a sign of metaphysical endings, and somewhere in this house of mind expansion lie issues that need finality on your part. Travel, religion, and deep academic dives fall into this house, so if you’ve been hanging on to an exotic experience or an extra educational degree, this lunation is ushering closure and purpose. Just be mindful of fantastical thinking and overextension of resources, because it’s not a good idea to become an international jet setter unless you have international, jet setting money.

Leo

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 2nd House

Practical changes may need to be made in your material security, Leo - namely, the way you earn and maintain it. Banking and administration is very boring to lions, but you know what isn’t boring? Being good enough with money to impress friends and family alike with spa days, fancy dinners, social nights out, so get your shit together and maximize your earnings like an adult. Unless you’re already famous, there is plenty of work to do generating funds, so put your nose to the grindstone for a bit.

Uranus in your 11th House

You might experience a disruption in the way you interact with clients or an audience, especially if they occupy the digital realm, or if you rely on social media to engage with said clients. A destabilizing event could also occur within your current social group, and tempting though it may be to dig in, take sides, and add to the drama, it’s probably best to sit this one out.

Lunar Eclipse in your 8th House

Leo can imagine anything as lush, dramatic cinema - even things like death, shameful taboos, and the administrative paperwork of taxes. Since your house of transformation lands in Pisces, Leo can be a little unrealistic and lazy about settling up I.O.U.’s and keeping track of debt. This is not good! in fact, it is directly related to the Virgoan smack down that you’ll be receiving in your house of generated wealth, and it’s very possible that an unexpected bill, courtesy of Saturn, is meant to light a fire beneath your more practical, entrepreneurial butt cheek. If you have one of those.

Virgo

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 1st House

Virgo is notorious for a willingness to workshop any area of their lives in order to improve it, which will be a saving grace when shadows obscure your personal ideals on September 21st. There were probably hints of this unease, this discomfort with parts of your own beliefs or personal approach as the last new moon in Virgo crested, and some aspect of yourself has been feeling stale and increasingly inauthentic as a result. It’s time to workshop your own brain for inefficiencies, Virgo…now you’ll know how other people feel getting your feedback.

Uranus in your 10th House

Change is coming to your professional life, Virgo, and you might experience your first taste now that Uranus is moving backwards in your career house. It might be something simple at first, like a new career modality. Working from home, or some other paradigm-shifting locale, could stop or start, as could the use of important technology or communication channels. For some of you, these smaller shifts will build the foundation for disruption, up to and including an entirely new career.

Lunar Eclipse in your 7th House

Something people like to forget about when it comes to Virgo is your impeccable memory vault, which makes sense for a zodiac sign that elevates minutiae above generalities. This month’s lunar eclipse is painting with broader brushstrokes in your partnership house of Pisces, though, and it makes previous relationship friction seem a bit petty. Did something bother you at the time? Yes, yes it did, but new cosmic downloads are likely making the ‘something’ that bothered you seem pretty minuscule these days. Saturn is still fucking around with your relationships, and hairline fractures in the way you’re connecting with a spouse could either reseal themselves or crack wide open, depending on your approach.

Libra

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 12th House

Your inclination when faced with some previously hidden, unsavory truth is often to make a face and run in the other direction chanting, “Not it, not it, not it,” and while that might serve you for ten months out of the year, it doesn’t work during eclipse season. What may have begun as an inkling of discomfort on August twenty-third will become palpable revulsion by September 21st when a situation that seemed copacetic reveals itself to be adversarial. Anxiety dreams and nightmares might actually have been telling you something relevant if they involved a friend-turned-enemy, egregious gaslighting, or disquieting childhood flashbacks. Something needs examining, Libra, and you can’t avoid it anymore.

Uranus in your 9th House

Traveling might require an open mind for the rest of the year, Libra, as well as any big education plans now that Uranus is tooling around your house of philosophical expansion. Disruption here could manifest as abrupt changes in locale or educational schedule, as well as delays or cancellations. Considering the technological nature of both Gemini and Uranus, you could also encounter technological failures or restrictions when it comes to scheduling classes, trips, and other self-enriching activities.

Lunar Eclipse in your 6th House

Sometimes you delude yourself about your own practicality, Libra, and you think yourself fastidious and diligent in your daily habits, though it’s only partially true. This eclipse in Pisces might gently remind you of the consequence to slacking off in the area of health, chores, and other mundane but necessary routines. If, for instance, you’ve become less consistent flossing with each successive month past your last dental cleaning, this is the kind of lunation that will tweak a cavity or cut open a sore gum just to remind you about it. Just take the L from the universe, then do what you have to do to fix it - see a doctor, clean your room, pay the late credit fee, whichever.

Scorpio

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 11th House

Scorpio is notoriously picky about associations - people must display a hefty degree of loyalty and originality for autumn’s arachnids to find them worthy of their effort. As we draw closer to late September, you might find yourself wondering if your social circles are still a good fit, especially as you explore intense new hobbies and creative inclinations. If the lunar eclipse in Pisces helped you update an artistic modality, the solar eclipse in Virgo will have you thinking about how to update your creative connections, too.

Uranus in your 8th House

There is a ghost in the machine of your transformative eighth house, and it will affect the way you transmit your messages of karma, death and re-birth. Third party money often lands in this space, and rebellious Uranus could jam the signals on financial transfers involving spouses, inheritance, or forgotten I.O.U.’s, or, worst case scenario, a literal death is communicated in broken, inconsistent fashion because of technological breakdowns or interference.

Lunar Eclipse in your 5th House

Melancholy might be fueling more of your creative impulse than it usually does once this moon hits, Scorpio, launching a few dark, subconscious delusions to the surface for examination. Thankfully, you’re Scorpio, so examining shadows is often cathartic and freeing instead of dreadful, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t anxiety-inducing. Beware an inclination to obsess and wallow for no good reason; self-expression doesn’t always need to be depressing or irate. Sometimes it can be both!

Sagittarius

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 10th house

The professional sphere is a place Sagittarius often acts against the cliched version of himself via rigidity and perfectionism - to the Sagittarius mind, if one must spend time working for other people and sticking to a schedule, than one had better really, really like the profession. The lucky Archers who enjoy their careers could be inspired to add more to their plates or put in for promotion, and anyone experiencing ennui might realize it’s time for a substantial pivot. Either way, this new moon is a reminder that the perfect career might not exist, and managing your expectations could be the difference between employment and bankruptcy.

Uranus in your 7th house

Misunderstandings with partners and weird new entanglements are possible as the rebel planet breaks and remakes things in your house of relationships, Sag, and this is the sort of planet who will make mountains out of molehills like old texts, emails, and social profiles. Dating apps could play an interesting role here as well, since Uranus feels ownership over innovative technology and he loves to flip the script on everyone.

Lunar Eclipse in your 4th house

Your home, roots, and family is where your empathy lives, Sagittarius, and the lunar eclipse in this house could prompt an intense emotional reckoning. It’s probably something you or your family have been dancing around for a while, so a concrete development acts as bittersweet medicine and forces you, coughing and sputtering, to acknowledge a difficult reality. Endings can be less painful if we are willing to face them head on.

Capricorn

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 9th House

Since the Virgo new moon on August 23rd, you are tempted to move your laser focus toward acquiring new skills, or to re-honing latent ones, which is great! Of course, this desire may play tug of war with your day-to-day responsibilities, and you’ll be tempted to eschew locally accessible modalities in favor of less accessible, more prestigious options. You don’t need to move to Spain to brush up on your foreign language skills, as ambitious and cool as that sounds, nor must you attend Harvard to become a lawyer. Break out of the earth sign mindset and get more flexible in your approach to greatness, or acknowledge that you have more preparation to do before jaunting off to Bali.

Uranus in your 6th House

Like any good Capricorn, you do best when you approach daily monotony and habit maintenance with a detailed plan, accountability through communication, and a palpable direct path from effort to results. It makes you shudder when you hear of people just raw dog exercising whenever they feel like it, without a schedule, results tracker, or group thread, because that sounds like a waste of time. You may want to take a cue from these go-with-the-flow types, however, because Uranus thinks your routine needs a shake up and he’s prepared to upend first and ask questions later. Your Fitbit is going to break, your work schedule will become more fluid, and your dentist/doctor/trainer could move away, forcing you to rethink the way you maintenance yourself. It’s fine, you can start a new spreadsheet about it.

Lunar Eclipse in your 3rd House

Communication is important to you as a means to an end, Capricorn, so your digital footprint is often focused on self-promotion, sneakily or otherwise. This eclipse might be highlighting some of the ways that approach has fallen short, and perhaps even extended into the way you show up for neighbors, siblings, and other people in your town/city/county/coven. Like, you know you can socialize and make connections just for fun, right? Not everything we encounter in this world needs to be advantageous, and the things modern society infuses with advantage (the Ivy Leagues, Parisian getaways, seven million dollar yoga retreats to the moon, what have you) do not guarantee success.

Aquarius

New Moon and Solar Eclipse in your 8th House

Merging finances with a spouse, getting a yuuge, unexpected bill, or hearing about the death of a distant relative are all eighth house shenanigans that can catalyze a new life direction, and all are possible during this eclipse season, Aquarius. Some fussy little detail may have been missed on a form that will put you into debt, but it could also force you to make changes that will retain more wealth in the future, as irritating as that is. You’ll be less annoyed if you pay more attention to the big picture than the small one.

Uranus in your 5th House

You are one of the few signs that could enjoy this Uranus retrograde, Aquarius, and I mean that in the best possible way. Throughout winter and into spring of 2026, the planet of disruption could flatten your creative muse and screw with whatever leads you to joyful abandon, though once you get over your initial fixed-sign intractability you’ll find this upheaval invigorating. The shared revolutionary sensibilities between Uranus and Aquarius play nicely together, and you may start seeking ever more provocative activities to bode your time until guillotine construction is complete.

Lunar Eclipse in your 2nd House

I’ve noticed that Aquarius often wishes money didn’t exist, or if it must exist, Aquarius feels strongly that only Aquarius should be the one to overhaul the system. You won’t get to do that on a massive scale quite yet, but you can certainly start the process in your own life, and the lunar eclipse on September 7th illuminated your blind spots when it comes to building wealth. You may also be ready to level up a current commercial endeavor, but make sure there isn’t any debt hiding in the shadows that will negate an investment in your future.

Pisces

New Moon and Solar Eclipse 7th House

Okay Pisces, take a deep breath and get zen for a moment, because an escalation in relationship drama is probably on the table this month, though not all drama is necessarily bad. Fishes in partnerships that retained their rosy glow might ascend to the next level, which could include moving in, getting engaged, or going to that BDSM club everyone’s been whispering about. On the other hand, if cracks appeared in your romantic foundation with the perfection of Virgo’s August 23rd new moon, then they are likely to deepen or rupture. Nothing is unsalvageable, but it’s up to you to be honest about re-balancing your own needs with the needs of a partner.

Uranus in your 4th House

Wiring gone haywire in your childhood home? Have your parent’s identities been hacked and stolen, causing you to spend a zillion hours trying to show them why using their current pet’s name for every password is goddamn idiocy? If you haven’t yet, Pisces, you may soon experience these things and more while shit-disturbing Uranus hangs out in your angular house of roots and ancestry, and if you’re not too careful, the wiring could get touchy in your home, too.

Lunar Eclipse in your 1st House

September 7th’s full moon is holding a mirror to your personal shadows and asking you what you would like to do about them, Pisces. These aren’t novel issues; if you’re confronting things that need changing physically, mentally, or spiritually, you were likely shown a glimpse this past spring during the first eclipse in Pisces. It’s also possible that this desire for change is intertwined with the relationship issues of your Virgoan relationship house - are you prioritizing yourself too much? Not enough? Are you trying to kick that people-pleasing, overly generous tendency in order to shore up some boundaries? All noble pursuits, but remember that Rome wasn’t built in a day and the journey is ongoing. Dramatic transformation of the self is heavy work.

“…we can predict the future, when we know how the present moment evolved from the past.”

-Carl Jung

“It's the mystery of iniquity
Said it's the misery of Inequity
Said it's the history of Inequity
When it all, all falls down
It's the mystery of iniquity
Said it's the misery of Inequity
Said it's the history of Inequity
When it all, all falls down”

-Lauryn Hill

Carl Jung was a big tarot fan, the fact of which alone is enough to drive a certain type of educated, elite, normally male human to apoplectic befuddlement when he’s busy berating someone about their stupid beliefs. Many of them do it as soon as they’ve paid for a reading with me that they didn’t really want, either because their spouse persuaded them to do it or a friend taunted them into it. Leaning back in their chair, mob boss style, these sorts are often bedecked in crosses, sports memorabilia, or other ‘lucky’ symbolism, and they weave a healthy dose of dismissiveness into the discomfort they telegraph.

So, you gonna tell me my future?

You don’t really believe this crap, do you?

So like, whaddo people get out of this?

In a moment when transactionalism is our new deity and nothing is begun without a profit motive, the notion of looking at pocket art to reflect on universal themes is considered a waste of time at best and a satanic, feminist plot at worst. I know this because a man once recited ten minutes worth of Jordan Peterson quotes at me ere he pulled a single card, but I managed to lighten him up by the end when I told him that I actually shared one important belief with Peterson, which is that navigating life as a human requires the consistent, hearty consumption of illicit drugs.

Cartomancy is a colander; the clients that ascribe relevance to this soothing, up jumped Rorschach activity get what they need when we use it to sift through their memories. People that subject themselves to it so that they may disprove it usually still enjoy it, because enjoyment can exist without belief; the symbolism of it, the random crystal facts, and jokes about perverted art on the spicier decks are all worthwhile takeaways. Many of these clients rarely, if ever, dedicate an hour to themselves; an hour to reflect on their choices, to investigate their flaws, to be the main character, for a change. Sometimes, after a reading, non-believers are astounded and walk away on unsteady legs, complexions turned porridge-toned. Sometimes they’re just amused.

Isn’t it confirmation bias, I’m often asked, or are you just grifting people!? (At thirty bucks a reading I’m not sure these people use the word grift in the same way I understand it - to me, a grift implies I’m making some sort of massive, immoral bank, when the only costs my readings cover are coffee and ibuprofen. I’m riiiiiiich!!!) Tarot, astrology, et.al. may indeed be formalized confirmation bias, but that needn’t devalue the practice; trying to see your symbolic self in pictures is still a fascinating exercise that illuminates our secret little brain rooms.

Am I like that? people wonder as they fondle the gilded edges of a court card. Do I do that? they ask, looking at a man hiding swords. Could this be what’s going on? we think, looking at a figure squashed under The Wheel of Fortune. Sometimes the cards are so spot-on that even I get creeped out. Sometimes they’re not, but we still learn so much from being wrong. Seeing everything we aren’t laid out on a table in front of us can be a pleasant validation of who we are.

“man always felt the need of finding an access through the unconscious to the meaning of an actual condition, because there is a sort of correspondence or a likeness between the prevailing condition and the condition of the collective unconscious.”

-Carl Jung

Last week felt gravely transitional, a key moment that illustrates the increasing suckfest that is life in the United States in 2025. The word suckfest seems appropriate in light of unrest in other regions; the quality of life in America is not the brutal tragedy of genocide in Gaza, for example. Our children are not being dismembered by foreign bombs in Seattle. American life isn’t quite the static despair of South Korean and Chinese bed rotting, either, nor the sad resignation felt by nations like Greece and Italy as their populations empty themselves with the steadiness of a sieve.

America, right now, is a petty, juvenile, dangerous place - a suckfest. The sovereign state equivalent of a high school john, riddled with obscene graffiti and unimaginative, Sharpie-drawn slurs, sprayed repeatedly with urine. My country is a place you go to piss, shit, get high, or fuck, and then leave as soon as you are done with nary a backward glance at the urinal cake we call democracy - it’s nearly completely dissolved, anyhow.

We experienced so much pointless violence last week, so much oligarchic shadiness and orchestrated chaos that I’m impressed any one incident took precedence - but of course, the one thing that the Epstein class wanted, perhaps even needed to cut through the low grade buzzing of our collective conciousness is the only thing that did.

Dependable information is thin on the ground regarding the assassination of an alt-right podcaster on the tenth of September in this foul year of your lord, 2025, but don’t worry - wild, undependable presumptions and assumptions are being offered by anyone with a smart phone to fill the void. The shooter has been identified as an elderly, trans radical gender terrorist, a right-wing Mormon and budding meme lord, a closeted gay man with a trans girlfriend, Zohran Mamdani, a nefarious cabal of Antifa members, an Islamic terrorist (the Coca Cola Classic of xenophobia), Israel, Bigfoot, and that one Teletubby with the purse. He’s one of those, bro, our extremely principled politicians and broadcast corporations keep assuring us, winking. Would we lie to you?

A review of history tells us that yes, authorities are usually lying to us. The first front in a war between the government and the governed is always communication, and any veteran can tell you about war’s fog - the impossibility of discerning fact from fiction in the moment of battle when violent chaos prevents clarity. A full picture cannot emerge in real time because we can’t see everything, there are canons going off in our ears, and our adrenal glands are hulking out, so we have to wait for the aftermath to begin an analysis.

So often, tarot clients who were confused by something in the moment of a reading reach out to me weeks or months later to report on all the ways it finally made sense, and daily tarot readings for the collective work similarly; we might be baffled in the moment, but reviewing cards with the advantage of hindsight can serve as our post-war analysis. A little defroster for the fog that hovers over weeks like the last one.

More terrible moments are probably queued up in the green room of the universe, waiting for their spotlight, but if we do our homework on bullshit that already happened we can prepare ourselves for the bullshit of the future, right? We’ve only experienced part one of this eclipse boogaloo, and believe it or not, last Sunday’s lunar eclipse in Pisces was gentle compared to expectations for this Sunday’s solar eclipse in Virgo. Many people like to say we shouldn’t fear astrology, and that’s true, but timely postmortems of both the stars and the cards can prepare us for the next shock. Especially if they show us what we missed.

Monday, 9.8.25…Moon in Aries

Matcha dripping downwards and a tea mug clutched with hopeful hands illustrates Monday’s Ace of Cups reversed, an elemental card of water, emotion, and possibility. We encounter delays, negations, and restrictions to a new emotional endeavor when this card is reversed, and it can have the dampening effect of a used towel. The energy produced by this caffeinated cup of feelings is stymied - we wanted to connect with something, but we’ve been rebuffed.

Lepidolite offers support during emotional turmoil and purification of the third-eye chakra - the things we know, without knowing we know them. The numerology of today’s date, eight, foretells clarity that can be disappointing, but lepidolite is thought to strengthen endurance thanks its substantial concentration of energy rich lithium.

On this day…SCOTUS ruled that ICE can detain people based solely on their appearance and Missouri joined the right-wing effort to gerrymander the country and solidify minority rule. POTUS released communication declaring war on it’s own citizens in Chicago, complete with an AI enhanced Trump dressed like Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now, although city and state officials told press they hadn’t seen much action to match his big talk. Later in the week, Trump would publicly back off the Windy City due to ‘legal headaches’, then announce his intention to redirect the brownshirts to Memphis, TN, the city and state government of which is a bit more amenable to fascism for Jeezus.

As a once and forever Chicagoan, I join my midwest brethren in chagrin. That he thought he could come for the city of big shoulders and bigger balls is hilarious, because even the most conservative, racist, corrupt Chicago cop doesn’t like the government telling him what to do. Oh, you wanna come here and do my fuckin’ job for me, pal? You want to climb in bed and fuck my wife for me while you're at it, too, smart guy? The fuck outta here.

Tuesday, 9.9.25…Moon in Aries

Our High Priestess is giving nineties realness in her rosary and bandage dress while she chills in the ocean like an extra from Baz Luhrman’s Romeo + Juliet. The priestess shares a mythos with Selene, Hecate, and Persephone; she’s willing to descend into the Underworld, eat a pomegranate, and gain special, hidden knowledge.

Turquoise, a color associated with throat/heart chakra connection, repeats itself in the waves surrounding our moon goddess and the crags of raw amazonite that accompanied her pull. Speaking truth directly from the heart, even when it’s dark and inconvenient, is a quality shared by both the priestess and the crystal. She’s the goddess of the moon, and the doesn’t shy from fiery rhetoric when traveling through Aries, masculine temple of Mars - rhetoric that, given the events of this day, sounds an awful lot like, “Fuck the government, burn it down.”

On this day…Nepal’s prime minister resigned after a week of youth-driven protests against the corrupt government turned deadly when police turned water cannons, tear gas, and live ammunition on it’s own citizens. Other international spiciness on this day includes the collapse of France’s coalition government and the order by Israel to evacuate Gaza as they continue executing civilians, who, it bears repeating, have nowhere to go. Finally, in perhaps the most vengeful iteration of the High Priestess, news outlets printed a reproduction of Jeffrey Epstein’s infamous birthday book and the sophomoric misogyny* within, featuring Trump’s drawing of what is clearly a headless, pre-pubescent girl with his signature as her nascent pubic hair. Yeah. Remember what I said about a suckfest?

*If you have yet to peruse the pedophile book, click this link for a PDF of the entire thing, and to see what huge, lying pieces of shit the entire wealth class is.

Wednesday, 9.10.25…Moon in Taurus

Ace of Elixers a.k.a. cups, resonates with the flowers in bloom that surround it and telegraphs securely capped fullness instead of the slow leak of Monday’s Ace of Cups. The anatomical heart label lets us know where we’ll feel the blood, vibrancy, and energy of this new possibility. Black Tourmaline, psychic sunscreen of the witch world, aligns the root chakra and grounds us in a place of protection and practicality. Remain embodied, cautions the tourmaline, because it is dangerous to live totally in emotional, spiritual states. We must remember that we are part of the physical realm, not above it, or the physical realm itself will take pains to remind us.

On this day…Someone crawled onto a rooftop in Utah and shot alt-right podcaster and provocateur Charlie Kirk in the carotid artery, ultimately killing him, and much of America promptly lost their minds. Like the ‘Opposite Day’ for which we dressed to celebrate spirit week in high school, liberals began defending everyone’s right to say vile things online and conservatives began doxxing people who didn’t appropriately perform grief in their socials, resulting in some pretty high profile firings, brought to us by the political party of freedom. In hindsight, the pulmonary detail on the Ace of Elixers bottle is an unsettling echo of Kirk’s gushing artery on hundreds of live streams.

Attitudes about speech aside, Utah’s gun laws allow for both open and concealed carry on college campuses.

Not to be outdone, Evergreen, CO hosted another school shooting on this day that resulted in hospital visits for two students and death for the third, who was also the shooter, but the attention to this dead child was rather muted and remains hidden behind the shadow of Kirk’s assassination. Colorado’s gun laws allow for permitted open and concealed carry, but do not allow them on school campuses.

Also lost in the noise on this day, despite a public drumbeat that doesn’t seem to be quieting, was the defeat of a bill that would force the release of all Epstein files, thanks to Republicans in the Senate voting NO on transparency. By late evening, the American public was busy scrutinizing a video statement from the White House that clearly utilized AI to tune Trump’s visage and voice, and within which he called for retribution against ‘the radical left’ for the shooting, despite the fact that the perpetrator and motive were still unknown. It was a tense, otherworldly evening and it felt like America was parodying itself.

Thursday, 9.11.25…Moon in Taurus

Three of Pentacles is illustrated here by a pyramid of bones; relics that prove our mortality and form one of the most balanced ancient shapes we know of, the tripod. Threes are the foundation of human society, the first step from coupledom to community, and they always indicate a pooling of resources and teaming up with others to reach a shared goal.

Often when pentacles show up in a reading they represent material security, which usually means health and wealth. In this instance, they may indicate small groups combining power behind the scenes.

Crystal bitches use Ruby Zoisite to assist in emotional transmutation, which allows people to synthesize things like grief, despair, disappointment, and sadness into something productive and enlightening. Like many multicolored crystals, ruby zoisite helps us internalize duality as a natural state of being - the ruby is a grounding, sacral chakra stone and zoisite opens the heart chakra, green being the color associated with love and prosperity in both Vedic and Roman traditions.

On this day…Hysteria hit record highs as the extremely online sniped at each other and promoted conspiracy theories about a transgender cabal that teaches people to shoot like Army Ranger snipers. Trump appeared at an official 9/11 memorial event looking decidedly less peppy than the AI video released the previous evening had portrayed him, and health conspiracies began to circulate after photographs captured Trump with a prominent droop to one side of his face, a la stroke or Bell’s Palsy. His hands continue to sport deep purple bruising that peeks out from poorly applied pancake concealer. Is J.D. Vance the one doing his makeup?

Friday, 9.12.25…Moon in Gemini

Strength shows us the qualities of our sun in Leo - charisma, vitality, confidence, and authority. A feminine figure rides her lion in triumph and touts her success in taming him by brandishing a fiery heart; a heart won through inspired compromise instead of forceful domination. Like Leo, the tarot angel of strength is persuasive, charming, and possessed of quiet strength until she roars.

Though not technically a crystal, stalagmite embodies the slow, steady growth of emotional and spiritual fortitude, birthed as it is by subterranean water over millennia. Take your time, the stalagmite says - be thorough and relentless.

On this day…The apprehension of a suspect (for real this time, as opposed to Kash Patel’s two oopsie doopsies that muddied the already foul water of public opinion) was announced by POTUS on a fluffy, Friday morning news show instead of police officers or FBI agents through legitimate communication channels. Totally normal, nothing to see here. The suspect was not a trans woman, but a white, cis, gamer boy from a gun-loving Republican family in Utah. Despite all evidence to the contrary, corporate media, right wing talking heads, and the Trump Administration continue to push the narrative that the suspect had extreme leftist views, using terminology of vengeance, righteousness, and hefty doses of Old Testament brutalism. It feels oddly coordinated.

Another oddity was Erika Kirk choosing to ‘address the nation’ regarding her husband’s death, despite the fact that neither of them were public servants. She wore a white suit and treated us to another tonally bizarre speech, rather like Trump’s, in which she whispered devotionals with an icy stare and promises of biblical vengeance against an unspecified they. The cadence of that speech was replicated on her Instagram account, down to the uncomfortable. Pauses. For. Effect. Most of us aren’t reading too much into the behavior of a grieving widow, other than to note it’s weirdness. Did she designate a photographer before draping herself over his casket, or were these photos snapped by an extremely disrespectful friend who threw decorum to the wind and thought fuck it, TikTok will love this? Either scenario is uncomfortable. One example of interesting mystical hindsight is the matter of Erika Kirk’s hair, which is conventionally leonine, long, blond, and acts as the focal point in many of her funereal photos. Perhaps she is the figure riding on the back of a lion and alchemizing two separate causes into one.

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Saturday, 9.13.25…Moon in Gemini

This iteration of King of Pentacles is a wealthy, ominous corvid and the avian equivalent of a distinguished authority figure who knows his way around both nature and machinery. Often he is revered because of his practical skills, leadership, and good judgement, as he shares traits with the astrological houses of Leo and Virgo. Earth signs usually prioritize material security, so when the King of Pentacles shows up, men with money and authority are behind current, collective events.

A complimentary pull of lapis lazuli reminds us that discerning the truth regarding what people say versus what they don’t say will be an ongoing task, and it could indicate we are being consistently deceived in a way that won’t soon cease.

On this day…Airstrikes on Palestinian civilians continued and intensified on this day as Israel continues the international iteration of a homeless sweep. Doctors confirm that thousands of dead kids in Gaza have single head wounds from sniper fire. The IDF is reportedly picking off laggards like birds on this Trail of Tears, because Bibi would like to hurry up and get to the ‘enrichment through real estate deals’ phase of mass displacement. Strikes on Qatar, Yemen, and Lebanon by Israel under the shaky auspices of fighting Hezbollah don’t seem like they bode well for the region, either.

Sunday, 9.14.25…Moon in Cancer

A tweaked out club kid from the early aughts appears to be hanging upside down in gravity boots and taunting the collective, but he’s actually the Knight of Cigarettes reversed. This odd specimen and his horsie embody transitional energy between Cancer and Leo, the shadows of which include immaturity, recklessness, and a volatile, egotistical manner with others. The knight is passionate and charming, but he’s also illogical and conceited.

Labradorite is a seeing stone favored by mystics and witches in equal measure to see the truth of a situation, no matter the strength or complexity of a lie. (A useful skill to have when you make a living as a fortune teller, astrologist, or general weirdo). The hidden, iridescent colors of labradorite suggest spiritual illumination and prompted geologists to come up with a new name for this stone’s shimmery property, labradorescence.

On this day…By the end of this rancid week, the rhetoric of government officials began to sound suspiciously retro, echoing similar language utilized between 1938 and 1945 by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Between Sunday evening and the Monday morning news blitzkrieg, Stephen Miller told reporters that the Trump Administration would use Kirk’s assassination to dismantle the organized left using state power, DOJ head Pam ‘Fascist Tits McGee’ Bondi said the government would begin prosecuting ‘hate speech’ as a crime, and a Facebook group started a community spreadsheet for doxxing people who committed the crime of not caring about Charlie Kirk. If we continue a detailed scrutiny of tarot cards from the recent past, perhaps we’ll spy some of that American freedom the cretins in charge claim to protect, nestled in the landscape of the arcana.

Or maybe when people speak of freedom these days, they’re speaking about symbols and archetypes, and nothing to do with real life at all.

This episode also features delineation of the first and second decals of Virgo, featuring the eight and nine of pentacles.

What was happening?! A Pluto/Venus opposition, that’s what.

Pluto, Pluto, Pluto…is anyone else sick of this guy yet? Must he constantly show us the worst sides of ourselves in order to force an existential crisis? Just as our sun left the spicy confines of Leo, dialing down both atmospheric temperatures and summer exhibitionism, here comes the reigning bureaucrat of the afterlife to shove our shadowy deceits and worst impulses back in our faces. The almost-September air grows a little bit cooler every day and the dampness of seasonal transition is asserting dominance like an atmospheric anvil, weighing down every breath, every news story, and every outcome.

Venus decided, as she runway strutted through Leo this past week, to oppose Pluto in Aquarius and force an examination of our relationships, both individually and with the world at large. Reckonings are in the air, along with smoke particulates and vape clouds of the terminally anxious. Our skies are hazy due to wildfires, volatile precipitation, and something called a haboob; a dust storm straight out of Frank Herbert’s Dune that rolled over Phoenix, AZ this week and had people searching for worm sign and KN95 masks in equal measure.

The vibes are as heavy as the barometric pressure, and we’re beginning to crack under such weight - losing our minds and cannibalizing our countrymen in daily mass shootings. Our government is responsible for a weaponized deployment of the military on its own citizens, as well as the uncomfortable, collective revelation that Americans still eat at Cracker Barrel. It’s like we live in a dingy snow globe, one that has been shaken so vigorously, and for so long, that certain particles refuse to settle, our atmosphere thick with the human tendency to push things as far as we can.

It was already a weird summer, one that exists in the humid, liminal space titled, “Not Yet Totally Fucked, But Feeling Fucked Enough!” Money keeps getting tighter, and the people in charge keep inventing distractions and strange qualifiers to convince people that money isn’t actually tight, or it isn’t as tight as they think, or if it is, it will only be tight for a little while longer and then everything will be awesome, bro, they pinky promise us. Major building blocks of life are conditional in the United States right now; our paychecks, our groceries, our citizenship, and our public health.

Even the things we observe with our own eyes are up for debate - there is no such thing as climate change according to our perpetually tan, authoritarian overlords, so there is no more National Weather Service to tell us when the sand beneath our feet might turn into a great, big air devil and eat us, or when a storm system the size of Australia will dump a Great Lake’s worth of water in our backyards. Surprises are patriotic!

We are afforded only the bare minimum of governance, and it must align with whatever the whims of the current administration are, who themselves were elected by only 30% of the nation’s citizens. This means the rest of us, and by extension, much of the rest of the world, get to close out the light season with zero assurances about our future. Or any future. Which is where the guy who passes final judgement comes in; a downgraded dwarf planet and the avatar of Hades.

The chaos in the United States is nothing compared to the chaos inflicted by us. We are not suffering through a genocide on our own soil - we’re simply funding one across the ocean. We’re not currently subject to martial law on a national scale, instead, we sit primly on our hands and allow the government to soft launch domestic militarism - a city here, a city there, some underground gossip about national conscription, but nothing formal. We rarely see formal announcements of authoritarianism, historically speaking. Tyranny encroaches at a crawl, like a poisoned insect, but becomes anthropoid in the moments people look away; it’s carapace a costume that disguises the armed soldier beneath.

Hyper normalization of our circumstances has officially commenced, creating a stasis among the population and a weird, airless sort of collective landscape. Nothing is changing for the better, but if we squint really hard and go about our day as though it’s 2015, we can pretend we’re in the Pacific Ocean instead of a decrepit toilet. The seas are warming but the glass protecting Western Empire is deceptively shiny, the bubble of ignorance still intact, despite evidence in front of our own eyes that it’s cracking. The myth of America has aged poorly, grown darker instead of brighter, and we’re blindly shaking the foundations to force change. It’s claustrophobia and agoraphobia combining forces to create hell; we need to get out of here, but we have to break the glass to do it, and by breaking the glass we’ll be exposing everything to the air, and once we do that, who the fuck knows what will happen? We’re too terrified of the unknown to try it, so we just keep shaking the globe and hope the flurries of glitter will distract from the fetid atmosphere. It’s all there is left to do.

Breaking the glass in times like these turns into stochastic terrorism very quickly. It’s the same as it ever was. An unhinged person bought a bunch of guns, because you’re allowed to do that here, then they went to a school and did the only thing guns are made for. There isn’t any point to parsing the exclamations of shock, rote religiosity, or baldly partisan punditry regarding such a thing; the American public has heard it all before, in every iteration possible, and there will be treatises on the shooter’s identity, mental health, drugs, SSRI’s, grade school security, autism, birth control, and the raw milk they did or did not drink. Then tariffs will be rescinded or enacted, increased or decreased, and we’ll memory hole what kids look like when they’ve been ripped in half by a high-powered firearm. We’ve done it for an ongoing, live-streamed slaughter of children, and I guarantee we’ll do it for the dead kids in Minneapolis, too, in less time than it takes to say ‘steadily increasing mortality’.

Venus is in Leo right now, the temple of the sun and a place where ostentatious demonstration is the default mode for any visiting planet. Pluto is being his infamous self in the Temple of The Water-Bearer, a foil to the individualism of Leo that mirrors him only in stubbornness and ego. Pluto in Aquarius believes power can be attained through the manipulation of the masses, but Venus in the Temple of The Sun prefers flashy connections that service the individual. We can probably expect both to manifest well into next week.

Mass casualty events like shootings already check the boxes of Pluto’s tendencies in Aquarius - they are by their nature designed to allow an individual to commandeer and manipulate collective action. Venus’ influence is more subtle, though people often use these Plutonian moments to draw attention to themselves or their agenda, such as the predilections of the shooter, the protocol of the school, or the nature of the motive. Villainous frat bro and perfectly named FBI Director Ka$h Patel was quick to categorize the shooting as a hate crime against Catholics, though we have yet to see any indication or proof therein, and the red pill brigade is already cackling gleefully about a transgender person proving mental instability by committing a crime that is overwhelmingly the domain of white, straight dudes. It’s almost like they’d have killed the kids themselves, just to gloat over the headline.

So, we had the planet of connection loudly vying for individual connection, pulling a zip line of tension between herself and the planet of power and corruption, who is mostly concerned with getting as many people as possible to do what he wants. In this instance, it would seem our creepy man Pluto found himself a vessel to screw with us in the places we maintain our most important connections - churches, schools, libraries, festivals, block parties, etc. It was a typical week at the end of American empire, and we keep shaking the snow globe to distract ourselves.

Alecto Chaos will always be free, because The Cranky Astrologer is a filthy marxist who is bad at math. If you or your friends are rich and enjoy cursing, though, I can stick extra profanity in these missives for just $5 a month!

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Why, Goddammit, Why?!

Pluto is a dour fucker, and he moves slowly, savoring every inch of manipulation and control. Venus speeds through transits by comparison, making connections with as many planets as she can along the way, but she’ll remain within five degrees of Hell’s bureaucrat all weekend long. On an individual level that might include the following:

• Difficulty with a partner or relationship, particularly if things have been tense or moving toward severance on their own - this aspect can be the straw to our irritated camel’s back

• Transformation, positive or negative, of stable relationships - Pluto likes to bring things to their point of crisis

• On the ‘glass half full’ side of things, this aspect can also prompt lovers and partners to deepen commitments, including co-habitation or marriage proposals

• Unstable or difficult relationships can experience violence with this fixed opposition, as individuals with poor emotional regulation might double down on bad ideas and violent behavior (Mars is still making messes in Venus’ air temple of Libra, after all)

  In short, this weekend will feel intensely heavy, but individual circumstances will determine if the heaviness is a mark of joy, as in oh, my life is about to change forever and I can’t wait, or a mark of exasperated despair, as in Jesus god either we break up or I will fucking kill you and go to prison. Fixed signs Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius will experience this in stereo sound, considering the aspect’s placement their angular houses. Leo and Aquarius will experience this as spicy relationship fun, whereas Taurus and Scorpio will be walking a tightrope between the domestic and professional realms.

The mundane astrology for this weekend looks fairly similar to our personal astrology, the macro and micro experience getting on the same page for one transformative experience.

In the U.S chart, for instance, Pluto is transiting the house of communication networks, commerce, mass transit, and neighboring nations (so we should obviously be sending Canada thoughts and prayers this weekend). The third house also covers elementary education. Venus is staring Pluto down from the lofty ninth house of this once functional nation, which covers things like religious institutions, universities, and the legal system.

We can look at this in a few ways; first, with the benefit of tragic hindsight, noting that Aquarius, Pluto’s temporary home, deals mostly with groups and the collective, while Leo, the place hosting Venus, is the cheerleader for provocative individuality. This fits as a rough template for our collective experience this week; an individual trashed other peoples’ lives to become the main character in headline news (jokes on them, of course - their infamy will likely last forty-eight hours, tops.) Consequently, a nation of people was forced to face, again, their own existential dilemma, only to turn around and mutter, “Meh. Moving on.” If Pluto is trying to get a rise out of us, he’ll have to try harder to move our ‘oh shit’ needle. Maybe raise the price of gas, or something.

Depressing, Yes…So How Bad Could This Be For Me?!

Wednesday’s stomach-churning violence has a clear connection to this worrying opposition, but our door remains open to echoes and mimicry of the same dynamic due to Pluto’s glacial pace and oblong orbit. The Underworld god’s bullshit lingers, so keep an eye on power dynamics all weekend, especially within rocky relationships. Shock waves between Pluto and Venus will emanate throughout the weekend, but individual charts will determine the areas of life Hades will saturate with his perversions. Below is a handy reference guide for each zodiac sign - remember, Hellenistic astrology uses whole house delineation, so this is most accurate by rising sign, not sun sign. Get outta here with that modern garbage!

Aries

Pluto in the 11th House vs. Venus in the 5th House: Existential dread involving social groups is opposing the saucy individuality of your children and creative endeavors.

Taurus

Pluto in the 10th house v.s. Venus in the 4th House: An unexpected tension or crisis in your career or public reputation opposes a need for individuation in the domestic sphere, possibly involving parental tension.

Gemini

Pluto in the 9th House opposes Venus in the 3rd House: An incident arises in the realm of education or other mind-expanding endeavor that opposes some kind of ostentatious communication, possibly with a sibling.

Cancer

Pluto in the 8th House opposes Venus in the 2nd House: Something karmic and unexpected in the realm of finance and debt occurs in the life of someone close to you, pulling on tension with anything already in the bank and the way you create your wealth.

Leo

Pluto in the 7th House v.s. Venus in the 1st House: Simmering trouble with a partner could threaten to minimize or fully negate gains you’ve made with your self-image and self-esteem.

Virgo

Pluto in the 6th House opposes Venus in the 12th House: It’s possible that an unexpected issue with your health or job, (or a combination thereof, like a work clique coming down with food poisoning) causes tension in the realm of mental health or exposes an embarassing secret.

Libra

Pluto in the 5th House v.s. Venus in the 11th House: Something unforseen and weighty with kids or an art project creates friction with a social group, for example, having to skip an important social obligation in order to nurse a child with the flu.

Scorpio

Pluto in the 4th House opposes Venus in the 10th House: Your parents may spring something on you, or an incident around the home might pull you away from your newly elevated public or professional presence.

Sagittarius

Pluto in the 3rd House v.s. Venus in the 9th House: A falling out or other tense development with neighbors or siblings screws with personal educational plans or travel plans. Something unforseen in the realm of digital communication might also throw a wrench in a school schedule or legal dealings.

Capricorn

Pluto in the 2nd House v.s. Venus in the 8th House: A profound, unplanned development involving your material security could create tension with a partner’s financial situation, or it might prompt a bit of risky, taboo-adjacent behavior.

Aquarius

Pluto in the 1st House opposes Venus in the 10th House: The first in a long line of Plutonian ego deaths could seriously wound your self-esteem, which in turn might affect your increasingly important professional commitments.

Pisces

Pluto in the 12th House v.s. Venus in the 9th House: A profound secret, or subconcious desire, could unexxpectedly pull focus and have major effects on legal and scholastic endeavors, as well as any substantial travel plans.

What happened?!

We’re rapidly cycling through the ‘dog days’ of summer, although we are probably due for a less quaint moniker given what August has become beneath the insufficient shade of global warming. Colorado is on fire and the grass beneath my window looks like it’s been plunged into a fryer, then left beneath a burger lamp for thirty years. It’s the color of bananas and the texture of Rice Krispies, but less delicious than either of those things. I don’t even think the phrase ‘global warming’ does itself justice anymore, because it sounds like something you do gently, and on purpose. Be right in, honey, I just need to warm the globe up with some peppermint tea, first. Anyone else need a warming? Jupiter? Saturn?

Whatever we’re experiencing now is neither gentle nor pepperminty, and we really ought to update our nomenclature to something that more accurately describes a world that will soon be without insects, glaciers, or forests. A global cremating? A deep fry? An oven-ing? None of those seem right, and they certainly don’t account for the deadly flooding that has surged on multiple continents, the volcanic activity along the sparsely populated edge of Russia, or whatever has been happening in Antarctica. Billionaires have cranked the planet’s temperature knob to ‘existential roast’, and if that sounds worrisome, well, it is.

If we set aside our worries for a moment, though, we can enjoy a bit of environmental gallows humor, courtesy of a very Neptune-in-Aries development. According to recent reports, Las Vegas, NV, a dry, cracked, neon hellhole I have been forced to experience on many occasions, now has a mosquito problem. Not just any mosquitos either - these are the big, stripy legged bastards who spread malaria and Dengue fever. Executive mosquitos hopped a red eye from West Africa and decided to stay, I guess, despite Nevada’s lack of moisture. When asked about the impossibility of desert-dwelling mosquitos, ecologists simply say they evolved quickly to take advantage of even minuscule quantities of water for breeding, gestating quickly in bird baths and puddles in order to snack on the queasy denizens of Sin City. In fact, they’ve taken more enthusiastically to The Strip than the African wilderness, and why not? Savannas are nice and all, but they’ve got nothing on hoards of rotund blood sacks who have been slurping $5 margaritas for ten hours straight. Unfortunately, what happens in Vegas definitely won’t stay in Vegas once medical professionals reveal you’ve got malaria in addition to a screaming case of syphilis, thanks to a city where both the dancers AND the insects are now exotic.

“What the fuck, Cranky?!”, you may be thinking. That sounds like more bad news to me. And it would be, if I had any happy memories of Las Vegas or the surgically altered cesspool of The Strip, but I do not. Like many tragic service workers, I remember walking to work one day at 5:30am and passing a woman in the shrubbery outside Caesar’s palace. She was wearing a tulle-infested cocktail dress that had hitched up to her hips and sawing logs in the landscaping by valet parking; mouth agape, plastic cup in one limp hand, hair askew, and eyes raccoon-ringed with flaked mascara. She looked pretty peaceful, now that I think about it, but her presence was a reminder that Las Vegas is the real life version of that gross island in the Pinocchio story where little boys run around breaking things, spitting, stealing, and generally acting like small politicians. It’s a place people go with the express purpose of being their worst selves, and it takes a mean toll on all the industry people and service workers that keep shit running from an abysmal backstage. If any city could claim the mantle of totalitarian America’s soul, it would be Las Vegas, a place built explicitly to service crime, cynicism, and boorishness. If Donald Trump were a metropolis, he would be Las Vegas, so the idea of mega mosquitos from Africa sucking all the blood out of that foul sand trap is good news to me. See, Donald? Migrants really do contribute to our national character. But I digress.

Refer a friend

Last week, Venus and Jupiter had a little date night in Cancer. Normally, a conjunction between these benefic planets is something to celebrate, given their astrological archetypes. Venus rules over our social connectivity, values, aesthetics, and yes, women, while Jupiter rules over our institutions and shared social order - the idea that we are all in contract with each other to keep civilization humming, as it were. Considering the sensitive, lunar temple of Cancer as the location for this tryst, I would have thought we’d get a break from the social animosity and stochastic violence that is embedding itself in modern society, but it was not to be.

If anything, Venusian issues took a more severe beating than previous weeks, and Jupiter simply stood by and allowed his largess to amplify gross attitudes. Consider that this lovey-dovey conjunction perfected on 8.12.25, which was the same day corporate media reported a social post from Secretary of Defense and racist, drunken Ken Doll™ Pete Hegseth, in which his liver-spotted pastor of crazy proclaims that women should not vote, work, or serve in the military. Said pastor’s name is Doug Wilson, and and in the reposted CNN interview he justifies his misogyny by saying, “Women are people that other people come out of, “ and, “It doesn’t take any talent to reproduce biologically.” All very cool, normal things to think, and I’m glad Wilson, who appears to be around eleven months pregnant, is aware of his lack of talent. His incompetence might also be a relief to Muslims, the LGBTQi+ community, and anyone with melanin, because holy shit does this guy have exceptionally ludicrous takes on slavery (good), butt sex (evil), and other religions (fake!).

It was especially disheartening to see Venus so cowed in the world of mundane astrology because the temple she was transiting, Cancer, is extremely femme-friendly, and I had hoped Jupiter would enlarge women and queer people’s issues in a more productive way. Instead, Mars happened. Fucking Mars.

Looking back at the news coverage and my own haphazard notes, it’s clear that movement on the periphery by Mercury, Mars, Saturn, and Neptune probably constricted the innate positivity of a benefic conjunction in Cancer. So let’s take a closer look at what was happening with these compromised planets and the situations, as well as individuals, who manifested their messages here on Earth.

MARS, NEWLY SETTLED IN LIBRA, SABOTAGED OUR VENUSIAN LUCKFEST

Prominent Days: Mars in Libra from 8.6.25 through 9.22.25, Venus conjunct Jupiter in Cancer on 8.12.25

Ares to the ancient Greeks, lover of Venus, annoying little shit to his father, Zeus, and ginger fuckboi to me, Mars rules bloodshed, severence, destruction, and battlefield violence. This planet is our representative in combat, and his placement in a natal chart can say a lot about how someone fights, fucks, negotiates, and deals with resistance. He is unhappily restrained in Libra, though, because of the dominion Venus has in the sign of The Scales. This is her masculine air temple, and Mars doesn’t really know how to behave himself when he’s wedged in a library full of romance novels, statement jewelry, and Pinterest accounts. He prefers his own temples, replete with swords, blowtorches, pistols, poison…normal guy stuff.

In Libra, he has to use things that are meant to be connective and communicative to do what he loves best, which is inflict pain and claim victory. Here, Mars must put on Venusian airs to get what he wants, which will often manifest as bad actors presenting ideas in the name of beauty or justice that are meant to elicit nothing of the sort. Examples of martial meddling from the last fortnight or so include:

Execution of Byron Black - Death row inmate Byron Black had been through numerous legal hoops to try to get his pacemaker turned off before he was killed by lethal injection on 8.5.25, but the government declined to intervene. Pacemakers are designed to shock the heart when it stops unexpectedly, which presents an obvious problem when the state is deliberately halting pulmonary function via injection of phenobarbital. Black’s lawyers pleaded that consistently shocking their client while killing him amounted to cruel and unusual punishment and wanted the device removed before his sentence was carried out, but where did they think they were, Europe?! Witnesses at the execution said Black was writhing in pain for ten minutes before expiring, proving that we are, indeed, in America.

I know this event occurred just before Mars’ ingress into Libra, but it’s so close that I think it applies. The scales of justice are ostensibly what our government is attempting to balance by sentencing people to death, but Mars managed to sneak some cruelty in there by torturing the defendant during an already inhumane procedure.

Harassment of Gerika Mudra - Trans activists and normal, unbothered human beings have long warned that transphobia runs on the same power source as misogyny, and the era of prosecuting women for not performing femininity the way fascists expect them to is trucking right along. Ms. Mudra is not trans, but she also isn’t a pale white girly girl, so a Buffalo Wild Wings employee decided that harassing her mid-piss was a reasonable thing to do, even after Mudra came out of the stall and disclosed what kind of genitals she owned. Apparently the harassment didn’t stop, so she flashed her boobs to get the employee to leave her alone.

Reported in corporate media on 8.12.25, this is textbook Mars in Libra; combativeness cloaked in concern and the shredding of a social norm (pissing in peace) under the false pretext of preserving a social norm (gendered places to piss). Perhaps we should we all start flashing our servers in public establishments so they can feel secure about our no-no special places before we use the restroom, as I imagine an establishment that feeds people vats of something called Saucy Chicken Dippers™ sees quite a bit of toilet traffic.

WarTime Ken Doll™ reposts pork-bellied Jeezus whisperer - We’ve covered this already, but it bears repeating; the man in charge of the world’s largest military follows a pastor who proudly proclaims that slavery was cooler than you think and that women must not be allowed to work, vote, or serve in the armed forces…a place in which 231,741 of those godless hussies are risking their lives on active duty as of 2022. The porcine pastor in question, Doug Wilson, took particular umbrage with naval submarine deployment in the full CNN interview referenced in Hegseth’s post, repeatedly claiming that women on submarines were a disaster because men cannot contain their horniness underwater. Yes, he said that.

Kim Davis asks SCOTUS to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges - Bumpit™ Beulah has apparently spent ten (!) years nursing a grudge against gay people, because media reported on 8.11.25 that her lawyer asked SCOTUS to hear her appeal, which claims she was emotionally traumatized by men who dress better than she does, and when they join forces in matrimony it becomes unfairly fashionable, or something. Supreme Court Justice and porn aficionado Clarence Thomas alluded to revisiting Obergefell when he returned women to their proper place in society as mute wombs, and it looks like he’ll get his wish. Notice again the way Mars dons the costume of a justice-seeker in order to sever people’s rights as well as their social connections, in this case divesting citizens of a civic right based on things they do in the privacy of their bedrooms.

MARS AND SATURN CONTINUED TO STRING OUT THEIR OPPOSITION

Prominent Days: 8.5.25 through 8.12.25

Saturn is Mars’ crusty grandpa, Father Time himself, and when they oppose each other we often experience violence as paralysis or restriction. Ares can’t fully act out under the watchful eye of Kronos, but he isn’t very amiable, either. The last notable opposition between Mars and Saturn occurred right as lockdowns messed with our sense of time in 2020, which makes a sick sort of sense - the catalyst of Saturn’s restriction was disease and death, a variation on martial violence. We were forced to stay home, and the passage of time became very relevant to our anxiety as everyone wondered how long the plague would last, when things might go back to normal, and how they might nab a sourdough starter without breathing on their neighbor. Now it is 2025, and a different kind of militant restriction is being visited on U.S. citizens, one city at a time.

Donald Trump deploys National Guard to Washington D.C. - We all knew this was coming, but it’s still a kick in the crotch for anyone holding on to their fairytale version of the Republic. Claiming rampant crime, homelessness, and chicanery, Donald Trump deployed the National Guard to Washington D.C. on 8.11.25, in order to restore peace and eradicate, “…menacing street crime.” For the record, violent crime in Washington D.C., and most of the country, is down 30% to last year and has been dropping year over year since 1991, excepting a brief pandemic spike in 2020.

It didn’t take long for reporters to piece together the hilarious sequence of events that catalyzed this nonsense, because on 8.3.25, nineteen year-old DOGE staffer and internet menace Edward “Big Balls” Coristine was the victim of an attempted carjacking in D.C.. Donald Trump repeated the claim that Mr. Balls was beaten mercilessly by thugs, who numbered up to a dozen according to a social post by DOGE godfather himself, Elon Musk. A few days later, two fifteen year old children, male and female, were arrested and charged for the attempted carjacking. No word yet on whether Coristine’s nom de plume has been downgraded to “Tiny Balls” or the more phonetically pleasing “Small Balls”, considering he got the shit kicked out of him by a ninth grade girl. My personal suggestion would be for this hero freshman, whoever she is, to serve her time showing Doug Wilson exactly what she would do to his horny sailors if they fucking tried something on his stupid submarine. It could be a learning experience for everyone!

MARS OPPOSED NEPTUNE, ADDED PARANOIA TO THE VIOLENCE

Prominent Days: 8.8.25 through 8.16.25

Neptune, god of the oceans and our own watery, collective subconscious, was already hopped up and angry in Aries, I assume because he’s surrounded by all of Mars’ favorite weapons. When the planet of hidden depths and mental dark spots opposes the god of war, delusion gets the better of people and can result in deeply destructive outcomes.

CDC attacked in Atlanta - RFK’s delusional chickens came home to roost on 8.8.25 when Patrick Joseph White opened fire on CDC headquarters in Atlanta, firing approximately 200 shots before killing a police officer and himself. Corporate media reported that White had suffered from depression and became convinced that the Covid-19 vaccination he received was the cause. I wonder how he came to that conclusion.

It’s difficult to be snarky about this; a young man and a police officer are dead, not only because of irresponsible language by a bear-eating, worm-addled wack job who is muddling through a powerful position for which he is totally unqualified, but because our culture, politics, and government do not care about the mental or physical health of U.S. citizens. For all of the talk about men falling behind, men suffering through loneliness, and men experiencing discrimination, the paragons of masculinity in charge of us all have done absolutely fucking nothing to change things for cis white men, who are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of this kind of stochastic violence. Instead, they seem laser focused on simply reducing the rights of women, queer people, and other minorities.

In fact, health and social services have been slashed by the Trump administration, and mental health services were already hard to come by with private insurance, much less on the abysmal public options. It would take a separate newsletter to detail all the ways V.A. hospitals prevent veterans from receiving mental health care, and a large portion of recent violent acts have been perpetrated by unwell cis, white, male vets.

Unfortunately, Neptune will be in Aries until 2039, and unless we want to remain trapped in our collectively unhinged brain space until then, we must do better at acknowledging and treating people’s pain. Women’s AND men’s. Not Small Balls, though. He’ll be fine.

The Big Picture. Maybe.

I often want to smash things, both in the skies and on the ground. Sometimes readers reach out to me with requests for a bit more of the positive, psychological angles of this strange, divinatory practice, and less of the doomsaying. I’m afraid I can’t turn my back on the obvious horrors of my country in 2025, though, anymore than I can turn my back on Las Vegas and laugh as the city succumbs to malaria.

I hate Las Vegas, but it is a part of the country that made me, and it also happens to be filled with average Americans, many of whom do not deserve the things that our criminal Epstein class is visiting upon them. They don’t deserve to suffer in a global oven-ing, no matter how many bushes they drunkenly sleep in. I may despise Las Vegas, but that dusty broiler of a town is a piece of my country in the same way that slavery, jazz, stupidity, antelope, Prince, BBQ, genocide, freeways, and some idiot named Big Balls are parts of my country, and I can’t just shut my eyes and pretend those parts do not exist. Are we even Americans without our stupidity?

Thanos is not going to show up and snap the people we don’t like into oblivion, and even if he could, what would we be left with? If Jesus country wins, then they get to stay white and tradwifey, but they won’t be able to get a decent cup of coffee because all the snide, blue-haired baristas will be gone. If the progressive degenerates win, we can marry who we want and avoid Gilead, but we’ll be bereft of people to sneer at as well as a solid chunk of church hymns and country music. And I rather like church hymns, the same way I like the rolling hills of rural Michigan, the meaty congeniality of Chicagoans, the wholesale jewelry hawkers in N.Y.C., the burrito joint by my sister’s house in the Treme neighborhood of New Orleans, and the other worldly, mountainous beauty of the Pacific Northwest.

That beauty is currently dehydrated as hell beneath my window, so much so that it’s giving the desert shrubs of Nevada a run for their money. I have to clip my lavender and rosemary back soon, and I have to visit the inlet of Elliot Bay before it gets cold again, or smoky again. I have to keep reading the news and marking the events, no matter how horrible they are, so that I remember how everything happened, how the stars were moving. I have to care about bullshit in D.C., Vegas, and L.A., despite never wanting to be in any of those places again. I have to tell you about my crusty garden, climate change, Mars, and drought, because it’s the terrible parts of the story that set up the denouement. One of these days I’ll be telling you about victories and justice instead, and the glory of green grass, flowers, and insects that pollinate instead of infect, the way they did when America was young, vile, imperfect, and full of possibility. One of these days.

1. The cruelty of the U.S. Justice Department and the murder of Byron Black

2. Neptunian paranoia and conspiracy infusing a CDC shooting on 8.8

3. Saturnian stasis and restriction as it pertains to Texas Democrats and their Scooby run

4. The astrological connection between colonizers in Gaza and colonizers in Washington D.C., and why it bodes poorly for American journalists

5. Muffling the beneficial conjunction between Venus and Jupiter because Mars won’t let us have nice things

6. Six of Wands as the increasing intensity of minority rule

7. Anticipating the final decan of Leo via Seven of Wands, valor + combat

• Personal Mercury stories including SOMETIME’s traffic ticket and Cranky’s wet computer

• The retrograde hilarity of the U.S. jobs data revisions

• Mishaps with the TEA app that bring gender relations into stark relief

• More Epstein stupidity from government officials who were likely Epstein clients

• The cartoonish flight of democratic representatives from TX to prevent a republican gerrymander

• An increase in mass shootings by ex-military personnel as the perfection of the Mars/Saturn opposition approaches perfection

• Trump wanting Sydney Sweeney as his next girlfriend

• Was Kamala Harris the royal agent shown in the Six of Wands?! Or is she a huge corporate tool? What has voting blue actually done for us?

• Will we hear anything about bird flu as Neptune moves backwards in Aries? Also, where did the bird flu go?

• Why this full moon might illuminate dangerous tension between the rulers and the ruled, and how the Seven of Swords can act as a talisman during the next two weeks of the lunation

Follow this link to read more on the positive correlations between smartphones and women’s global empowerment https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2020-06-08-mobile-phones-empower-women-developing-world-oxford-study

What is happening?!

It’s been niiiiiice and sticky in large swaths of the Northern Hemisphere, which is putting everyone in a really uplifting mood this side of the equator. My people cannot agree on issues of gender, race, religion, wealth distribution, or democracy, but by god does the global north uniformly hate humidity. Hatred is rather trendy at the moment, and anytime people start rubbing each other the wrong way, we can bet that Mars, God of War, sluttiness, and assholery is about to take up all the attention in the sky. He’s a jerk that no one likes, and he’s here to tell us about ourselves.

Mornings are overcast lately in Seattle, which means a giant, gray sky quilt blocks disinfectant sunbeams until at least noon, trapping us in a stuffy, urban greenhouse. The air is weighted but windless, which ensures that even mildly elevated temperatures produce a whole body oil slick - perfect for sticking clothing to skin in the manner of limp medical tape. It’s also claustrophobic, seeing the clouds so low, and it leads one to duck upon leaving the house in order to avoid a moist pat on the head from the heavens. This does not put people in mellow, pleasant moods.

We’re showing skin but not tanning, we lack sun but are not in total darkness, and we lack rain but feel just as slippery as if we didn’t. Layer the filthiness of our social and geopolitical landscape on top of this misery, and the result is what I imagine living in some high schooler’s Petri dish would feel like, glistening with a generous application of agar agar and inner cheek slime. Yum. Germy fascists are attacking healthy cells and turning our microbiome into a heinous experiment; how long do we think it will take for the system to simply give in and decay?

Just as they did under Mr. Lambert’s microscopic in tenth grade bio, the native bacteria are somehow both apathetic and combative. Everyone is angry, but no one is doing anything. I am forlorn each morning and evening as I try to mark correlations in time between astrology and modern civilization; recording natural disasters that have proliferated since Neptune’s ingress into Aries, technological and electrical breakdowns courtesy of Uranus in Gemini, disturbing proto-fascist billionaires pushing Pluto’s perverse take on Aquarian collectivity, and Saturn’s…well, Saturn. Cranky-ass, melancholic Saturn doing anything, honestly, is usually cause for despair.

I do this every morning with a cup of something caffeinated and bitter*, reviewing every item from the previous day’s news for relevance. I don’t do it in the evenings because by then I am already spiritually flattened; were I to collate atrocities at the dark end of the day, I would lay down and sink permanently into the carpet like a stain, praying for death, an end to skeletal children, and a moratorium on reincarnation. (I am searching in earnest for a metaphysical ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ charm that will convince the powers that be to just destroy my soul and end the game, because Jesus Christ, I do not want to come back here.)

So I imbibe horrors before my brain is fully alert, and before the window closes on possible positive developments, when there may still be something to look forward to. I’ve been sitting in a chair by the window, and when the slightest breeze does miraculously manifest, I watch it shake the drooped heads of my flowers, animating the lament of Earth and my species hand in it’s current state. They’re not mad, I think, as I scribble a reminder in the margins of my daily bummer notes to add more fertilizer to their water ration. They’re just disappointed.

That disappointment is also collective, growing more intense over the course of a summer that I would characterize as ‘straight out of hell’ if I didn’t know what was coming next summer, and the summer after that, and the summer after that. We turned an oven on ourselves when we embraced fossil fuel in the Industrial Age, and, in our hubris, ripped off the knob that regulates temperature. It only goes up from here, but the shareholders we’ve made our jailers could care less, and they’ve built escape yachts to prove it. The planets, like my garden flora, watch woefully and continue to spin, daring us to take in our true reflection. We would see it, if only we tilted our heads.

*No, I do not drink my own blood. I prefer Cafe du Monde or a nice, squishy virgin.

Why, Goddammit, Why?!

The impending astrology has been a source of anxiety for the more ‘woo’ among us because it involves planets in configurations that have historically marked tipping points and apex moments in human history. Of course, plenty such moments are coming fast and furious in this early, hothouse August, whether one believes in a celestial tether or not.

Mercury is winding down an absolute doozy of a retrograde in Leo, one that packs extra, violent punches thanks to the presence of wily Uranus in Mercury’s masculine, airy domicile of Gemini. The most recent developments in communication, travel, and commerce snafus include:

• A hilarious turnabout statement regarding the state of capitalism in the U.S., which confirmed what most of us in the real world already knew, but which sent the grifters of the Epstein class into performative hysterics

• Admission by a ham-fisted genocidal maniac that his goal has always been a murderous land grab

• This session of the Texas Legislature has transformed into an episode of the Keystone Kops, all the way down to an accelerated, cartoonish escape of the democratic reps to liberal sanctuaries of Illinois and New York, among others

• No one on the internet can shut up about something called a Sydney Sweeney

• It continues to be a spicy time for airlines, who are still experiencing outages, dangerous turbulence, and random catastrophes

This was all excessively dramatic because Leo is one big playhouse that requires planets to be their most fabulous, most conceited, and most xxx-tra selves as they reflect our experience here on Earth. As Leo transits wind down, though, the focus is shifting from willfully passionate fire to the clinical detachment of air, and everyone but the benefic planets has a speaking role. Expect oppositional tension all weekend and well into next week between these elemental archetypes, which is likely to cause friction in small, personal ways as well as loud, collective ones.

Leading the charge into this uncomfortable space is Mars, whose recent ingress into Libra epitomizes the fire/air tension of the moment. Aphrodite’s dickhead boyfriend represents the heat, violence, ego, and passion of fire, which makes for an uncomfortable stay in a whole sign house like Libra because those qualities are antithetical to Libra’s ruler, Venus.

Venus’ masculine domicile is a place of communication and connection, whereas Mars is a planet of action and severance; the temple of Libra is a place of exile for Ares, which weakens and annoys him. The temple of Venus isn’t like his own bachelor pad - there are no swords or destructive bonfires for him to use, but there are plenty of writing implements, telephones, and scales laying around, so Mars has to use these things as weapons instead.

In the Golden Dawn tradition of tarot, Mars in Libra is represented by the Seven of Swords, which often depicts a lone, smirking figure as he sneaks across town with several swords. It’s an apt illustration of the way martial forces cloak themselves (when they must) in a veneer of fairness and connectivity while working to thwart such things.

Recent examples in the zeitgeist include U.S. politicians and press framing a piece of legislation as beneficial to the working class by naming it ‘The Big Beautiful Bill’ when in reality that legislation will transfer more wealth from the labor class to the Epstein class than any other law in modern history. All things ‘beautiful’ fall under the purview of Venus and the word was obviously a disguise for lawmakers’ true intentions; to formalize an exploited underclass and kill three million Americans by denying them medical care. Plus, “The Blown out Butthole Bill” was already taken*.

Another infuriating example of martial forces cloaking their intentions in Venusian language would be in the flurry of anti-abortion legislation being passed in various state legislatures that use phrases like ‘Protect Women’ or ‘Teen Protection’ in their titles and amendments when they actually result in more dead women and teenagers, not less.

Mars, much like the Jeezus freaks in The Heritage Foundation and The Alliance Defending Freedom group, is a strategic, self-righteous fuck, and he will disguise himself as an ally to Venusian causes as a way to further his own aggressive ends. It behooves us to remain vigilant about language and hidden agendas starting this weekend and continuing into next month, especially when they involve the polarity between masculine-coded aggression and feminine-coded equanimity.

Mars is the axis point for every outer planet this weekend, casting this tension of opposites as the mainframe for all immediate outer planet circuitry; language will be subtly deceptive, ideas will take precedence over emotions, and violence might be more tempting for many than diplomacy. Let’s see what this spicy little shit has in store for us!

*I think that one passed during the Clinton years.

MARS OPPOSES SATURN, EXPOSES SOCIETY AS BOTH ENRAGED AND IMPOTENT

Prominent Days: Thursday, 8.7, thru Monday, 8.11

Mars in Libra: Violent bully who loved death metal as a youngster, transitioned to law school, shit-posting, and incendiary podcasts…now able to hurt more people using larger words

Saturn in Aries: Military grandpa, reinvigorated and nostalgic for combat, spends his days teaching martial arts to young whippersnappers, yelling at clouds, fools, and solicitors

THE LIGHT - The best thing we can say about these two is that they often clarify our circumstances whenever they get together. Mars always infuses us with energy, but Saturn often dampens it, and as a result of their grandson/grandpa dynamic, we get a feel for balance by experiencing both extremes.

We may be dying to take action on something that external circumstances keep blocking or delaying, and there are usually sour feelings, especially when the blockage comes in the form of people. Mars does not enjoy being told no, and Saturn, because he is an old, miserly man who rations individual Werthers, loves nothing more than telling whippersnappers no. At best, this dynamic forces us to work diligently and slowly toward our goals, boxing in our worst impulses and encouraging a mature approach over an excitable one. This can be a good thing when our aspirations are noble but foolhardy, like planning to run for President on a platform of free money for all. Unfortunately, this aspect can also clear a path for ignoble aims by making bad actors sneakier, duplicitous, and more effective than usual. Speaking of which…

THE SHADOW - The above archetypes might both have questionable methods, but when their goals are altruistic, Grandpa Kronos and Ares The Annoying come off more artless than devious. True villains can benefit enormously from Mars in Libra, though, by hiding brutality behind a subterfuge of reason and compromise, Like Dolores Umbridge, or, say, the modern era S.C.O.T.U.S.

Collectively, this was the aspect that kicked off major pandemic lockdowns in 2020, which is an uncomfortable reminder that the violence of Mars can take many forms, including acute illness. Other Ares bullshit to look out for would be fires, war rumblings and saber rattling, accidents (I would be extra cautious with travel, considering the imminent station of that fiend, Mercury), shootings, stabbings, and anything else involving heat. Keep an eye out for wild fires and other climate catastrophes.

MARS TRINES URANUS AND MAKES US DARING, FREAKY, OPEN TO VIOLENCE

Prominent Days: Thursday, 8.7 thru Monday, 8.11

Mars in Libra: Violent bully who loved death metal as a youngster, transitioned to law school, shit-posting, and incendiary podcasts…now able to hurt more people using larger words

Uranus in Gemini: Ornery tech eccentric working in government I.T. by day, coked-up anarchist working to bring about the Dark Enlightenment by night

THE LIGHT - Very strange ideas that are nonetheless brimming with potential might get serious consideration beneath this aspect, because Uranus encourages everyone to operate outside the boundaries of tradition, so pitch that wacky shit while you have the chance! As we might surmise from the above archetypal characterizations, the lighter side of a helpful trine between these two can be like Marty McFly and Doc from Back to the Future. The zest of Mars combined with the singularity of Uranus often yields oddball innovations and mind-blowing inventions when utilized creatively; between 1942 and 1949, when Uranus was last in Gemini, the world welcomed the first computer, the first commercial tape recorder, and the first split atom. In fact, the planet Uranus itself was discovered via telescope by William Herschel in 1781 when he spied a faint, slow moving object in the distant constellation of - wait for it - Gemini.

THE SHADOW - When these guys are evil, they are frighteningly, maddeningly adept at creating chaos and doom. Even when Uranian acolytes aren’t explicitly bad people, the consequences of their jiggly moral centers can result in horror, just as one J. Oppenheimer discovered on August 6th, 1945, when the United States used his brainiac discovery to level mountains and melt the faces off of children in Hiroshima, Japan. The existential gore of late summer in 1945 was a disturbing omen for our future; Uranus is a planet fueled by smarts, daring, and eccentricity, but his complete lack of conscience makes him a formidable weapon in the hands of slutty, war-mongering assholes. Eighty years of progress and a vast new array of fearsome, Uranian technology like AI, smart phones, and drones hasn’t changed anything for the better; if anything, it feels like an echo of the nuclear lesson we failed to learn, which is that technology without morality is nothing but a collective death sentence.

MARS OPPOSES NEPTUNE AND GOOSES OUR CAPACITY FOR ESCAPISM

Prominent Days: Thursday, 8.7 thru Tuesday, 8.12

Mars in Libra: Violent bully who loved death metal as a youngster, transitioned to law school, shit-posting, and incendiary podcasts…now able to hurt more people using larger words

Neptune in Aries: Esoteric, geriatric painter in the middle of his third wind because his weed was spiked with coke, hides knives in his clothes

THE LIGHT - Mars gets a boost of intellectual prowess when he’s stuck in airy Libra, so we might have an easier time processing complex issues and transmuting them into shrewd creative projects, especially when he’s trying to outshine poetic Neptune. Oppositions create the most tension of any aspect, but tension doesn’t need to be wholly detrimental. Murky Neptune will be following the war god’s lead because he’s speaking his gibberish from the martial domicile of Aries, so we are likely to experience a boost of action and energy in our subconscious yearnings. We may be driven to manifest bits of unrealized fantasy, dreams, and creative visions in our physical lives under this aspect. If you’ve always wanted to ride a horse, take a watercolor class, or write an elaborate letter to a crush, this could be a moment to pursue such things, and the collective may be privy to lush offerings from artists, musicians, and writers that initiate during this period.

THE SHADOW - In mellow times, these two would just do drugs behind the bar one evening and harmlessly part ways at last call, never to meet again. In times of volatility, poor Neptune is succumbing to flashbacks and conspiracy theories, which little, red, Nick Fuentes-style Mars is more than happy to stoke to a paranoid, delusional wildfire. Mars is most like a bombastic podcaster in Libra, persuading people and assuaging their fears by stoking the flames of preconceived notions, so it’s possible that we’ll notice an uptick in conspiratorial thinking and paranoid mass delusion during this aspect. We’ve already had a taste of such things from Neptune in Aries, but now he’s got Mars in a communicative sign, stoked to spread any wacky message that gets him what he wants. If you didn’t think it could get crazier than presidential candidates spreading rumors of pet-eating or politicians controlling the weather, I’m sorry to say that it absolutely can.

MARS TRINES PLUTO FOR A SHOT OF MANIPULATIVE, DARK CONFIDENCE

Prominent Days: Thursday, 8.7 thru Wednesday, 8.13

Mars in Libra: Violent bully who loved death metal as a youngster, transitioned to law school, shit-posting, and incendiary podcasts…now able to hurt more people using larger words

Pluto in Aquarius: Master of disguise, brilliant criminal in the vein of Kaiser Soze, has a bone to pick with authority, keeps dirt on everyone, basically a sociopath

THE LIGHT - This combination is diabolically effective, positioning Mars as the guy who can spread Pluto’s devious power and message to a large audience for maximum saturation and efficiency. For those of us who are not unrepentant villains, this can actually be very productive; our speech will be persuasive, our intellect will be sharp, and our desire to get to the bottom of shady dealings will be unstoppable. Pluto infuses everything he touches with gravitas, and if we can resist the temptation to abuse it, we’ll make huge headway getting others on our side of an issue by alternately charming and intimidating them. This aspect places us squarely in the role of a mafia boss who curls his arm around the patsy and convinces him that no harm will befall him, he’ll be treated like family, etc.

THE SHADOW - Anytime we’re dealing with an air trine, we run the risk of loosing any emotional tethers that keep us from inflicting cruelty on other people or situations. Given what we’ve covered about Mars’ less than honest approach in Libra, this aspect may reflect hidden pitfalls in areas of social justice, power consolidation, and tense, geo-political conversations. If agencies like the CIA or Mossad were an astrological aspect, they would be this one. Hades is a shadowy bastard and Mars enjoys leveraging his authority to enact violence and victory, so when they are helping each other get things done in a fluid air trine, mean-spirited kompromat is likely.

Individually, these planets might indicate disparate enemies who join forces to spread gossip or undermine our goals, like a meat head ex-boyfriend joining forces with your ambitious co-worker to spread AI-generated revenge porn around the office. Pfffft. As if you would ever have gotten naked in front of Stephen from I.T. He fucking wishes.

LAST, BUT NOT LEAST, A FULL MOON IN CHILLY, SPACEY AQUARIUS

Prominent Days: Saturday, 8.9 thru Saturday, 8.23

Sun in Leo: Class president turned politician who wins ‘best hair’ award throughout entire life, annoyingly confident about future success, ability to fuck supermodels

Moon in Aquarius: Brilliant Professor of Women’s Studies and the ultimate sapiosexual, earned a doctorate in sociology to bend others to her will

THE LIGHT - Full moons are great for shining light on places that we’ve become stuck, inadvertently or otherwise, as we try to achieve the goals set two weeks ago with the new moon in Leo. New moons are a little more ‘one note’ than full, only because they are initiatory; we can’t fully comprehend the complexity of a journey before we’ve walked the path for a bit and encountered some issues. A conjunction between the luminaries in Leo often reflects overconfidence on our part, or overpromising things to ourselves and others that couldn’t possibly be as easy to achieve as we assumed. One benefit of this full moon is that it encourages a more rational, detached approach to difficulties than the Leo moon, which leaned heavily into our emotional, passionate selves in order to spark action. Consider the full moon as a needed status report; it allows for a bloodless examination of our progress that could yield cerebral solutions to any hiccups we’ve encountered, thanks to the big-brained approach typical of the sign of The Water-Bearer. Expect illuminating, Eureka! type moments to befall some of us, both collectively and personally.

THE SHADOW - Extreme opposites can help push us into compromise that solves problems, sure…but they can also cause frustration, volatility, and harsh backlash when we’re in an unhealthy mindset. The above archetypes are so fundamentally different that conflicts and frustration are common; the moon represents our embodied selves, lofty and logical in the temple of Aquarius. The sun opposes such an approach in Leo, emphasizing instead the confidence, verve, and passion of ideal leaders and authorities.

Much like the tension between Aries and Libra, where an oppositional Mars and Saturn are testing our resolve, this full moon is stress testing the balance between individuals and groups, the ‘me’ v.s. the ‘we’. It is likely that this will manifest in our collective realm as friction between minority and majority desires, or perhaps between the will of an authority and that of the people.

Leo and Aquarius are both fixed, masculine signs, which means we are unlikely to reach any kind of immediate compromise due to the stubborn nature of this lunation, but the jarring disagreements will become impossible to ignore. People with fixed rising signs will feel this friction most acutely between topics like selfhood v.s. relationships, home v.s. career, and autonomy v.s. collaboration, as will nations who have, or whose current leaders have fixed rising signs. Watch for signs of geo-political tension that pit isolationism against globalism, active combat against passive strategy, or saber-rattling against shrewd diplomacy.