Overnight Friday, we enter the Balsamic phase. Typically a quiet time, the Moon loses her light as we approach the New Moon. This Moon, in early Gemini, will struggle to find that quiet calm.
The Moon has joined Barbault’s Basket: conjunct Uranus and Mars, sextile Jupiter, trine Pluto, and sextile Neptune. She’s right in the midst of big changes happening at speed, struggling to keep up.
This Moon is also out of bounds, traversing the ether in search of her own way, her best path.
If we struggle to focus, find ourselves flooded with too much information, and long for a bit of peace, we’re feeling the Moon spinning through a complicated space.
Luckily, the Moon has another aspect: She’s squaring Venus at the beginning of Virgo.
Virgo is not a strong place for Venus, yet the square brings the Moon into another, intriguing set of relationships.
Venus is conjunct the South Node of the Moon, the place of letting go. This means the Moon is also squaring the Nodes. She is at the bendings, connected to both North and South, where we’re going and where we’ve been.
This is the perfect focus for a Balsamic Moon, who prepares for the New Moon by releasing everything that is complete or no longer needed.
Mercury, retrograde in Cancer, will reach their conjunction with the during this phase. We’re deep in our review, on the threshold of illumination.
Virgo, mutable Earth, carries a certain set of skills, magical skills associated with making and mending. This is a place of spinners and weavers. So many cultures associate spinning and weaving with protection, there are too many to mention. Textile patterns, embroidery, and even mending can be done with design and intention to protect the wearer.
Venus in Virgo, conjunct the South Node, opposite the North, square the Moon and trine Chiron has spells to weave, spinning us threads we can weave together to help us through.
This Moon, linked both to the outer planets and their big change agenda, and to quiet Venus in Virgo connected to the Nodes and Chiron, can invoke the Fates as well. We’re also in the presence of the three wyrd sisters, of ancient Greece and Rome, the Norns of Norse tradition, the Celtic Matres, and triple goddesses everywhere.
To use the Greek names, the Fates are Clotho the spinner, Lachesis who alots the right amount of thread to each, and Atropos, who cuts the thread of each life. If I were to link these three to the outer planets, I’d choose Neptune the dreamer as the spinner. Uranus, the bright Promethean creator as Lachesis. Atropos naturally aligns with Pluto.
The Balsamic chart weaves our stories into the great changes of our times. The Moon links to the outer planets and Jupiter in their Basket, and to Venus and the Nodes.
Our individual patterns are woven into a much larger tapestry. At this Balsamic Moon, we choose which threads to let go of, and which to spin out into new patterns.
Title image from a photo by Josh Frenette on Unsplash
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