New Moon at 20 degrees of Pisces: Hope in Hell
The New Moon exacts on Sunday morning at 11 a.m Cyprus time in the last decan of the last sign before the astrological new year. In this lunar darkness and underground place, the Moon finds itself where as Elizabeth Barret Browning says 'here fantastic fishes duskly float, using the calm for waters, while their fires throb out quick rhythms along the shallow air'.
The last decan of Pisces has a decisive energy to it even as it wades the endless whereby water and fire intermix into that place of no end or beginning. With a parade of planets moving through Pisces at this time, there is a rise for the need for clarity as we parse out much para-emotional and mental material that arises out of the conflict of our emotional world and our sensitivities. Our awareness is being primed to hold the cognitive dissonance between the ideals we hold with urgency and the world we actually inhabit. This New Moon refreshes our intentions around the quest of our ideals, what are we willing to stand on as to give shape to the vibrancy of what we inwardly feel to be possible within the chaos of this material reality. How much inner decisiveness can we muster in believing the formless can have power over the manifested chaos.
Pisces is a bi-corporeal sign, placing duality at the core of its function. One fish swimming upstream, one swimming down living in a dream. Our energies must not be scattered inverting divinity by rejecting its presence in our values and lives, but our attention must be focused in concentrating the inner subtle soul life into a weapon of power, as the thing that can never be stolen, alienated or destroyed from anything outside of ourselves. The thing that remains untouched in the midst of physical destruction, the part of us that becomes victorious over death.
The dead are in the air at the moment, this was the time they were honoured prior to the astrological New Year in antiquity in celebrations honouring Ceres, Dionysus and Persephone. See lineup for the carnival; an ancient Dionysian practice. Piscean energy can often become an astral carrier for the dead and the wind may pass onto us the demands of the many newly passed souls. Whispers of liberation, of real sacrifice and martyrdom, of pain, grief and loss of precious life are to be heard. The amount of recently departed souls that have left our earth too soon are in the thousands. We honour their lives and apologise that their deaths have been the opening of eyes.
This Pisces moon is not one of day-dreams and poeticisms, of softness and drifting. The Moon itself is in the bounds of Mars and Mars has just moved on from a square to electric Uranus lending the air a live-wire jitter. There is a brewing urgency around asserting a vision of freedom while the possibility of sudden disruptions and aggression are also co-present. This energy can be as disruptive and invasive as it is defiant and revolutionary in the breaking of bonds that previously felt unconquerable.
The image of the last decan of Pisces where this Moon falls is the Cup of Blood- an image whose story speaks of the quest for an ideal and all that goes into its materialisation. The decisions peopled by sacrifice and judgements around what must be given to attain one's desire.It is the place of emotional richness rather than material success and symbolises the soul's desire to meet its substance in the pursuit of its ideals. It is the place of heightened ecstasy and agony where we wrestle with the emotional realities of that which our soul sings for. To spare repeated disappointments, discrimination must be used but the decan also speaks of sometimes even the most discriminating will see some dreams shatter and some sacrifices rendered vain.
However, in this decan, resides the daimon Elpis or Hope. Pandora was given an urn and told to never open it. Upon giving in to her curiosity, she releases malicious spirits onto the world: Old Age, Sorrow, Death and other mortal tortures. Mankind is exposed and the host of horrors move through the world. Just one spirit remained in the urn, Elpis, who points to the possibility of beauty and love even in an incarnation peopled by mortal tortures. She is there accompanying the perseverance towards real happiness but is also there when one is faced with broken dreams and failed martyrdom. She is the vanquisher of doom but if she becomes misplaced, she will fall victim to the dark arguments of doom.
This reminds me of the scene in Sandman where the King of Dreams faces Lucifer in an attempt to retrieve back his regalia and recoup his actionability and power within his realm. The challenge is a direct battle of the imagination with Lucifer with Morpheu's''' sovereignty or impending servitude to him on the line. It is a game of transformation whereby contenders become the very thing they are able to speak from their imaginations. Moves in the game begin with"I am...". Lucifer moves first saying "I am a dire wolf, prey-stalking, lethal prowler". Morpheus retorts "I am a hunter, horse-mounted, wolf-stabbing". The game builds on the metamorphosis of the other until final dominion is established. At one point Lucifer becomes a butcher bacterium, warm-life destroying bringing Orpheus to his knees. Orpheus retorts " I am a world, space-floating, life-nurturing". Lucifer then becomes a "star nova, all exploding, planet-cremating" and the game becomes close to taking Orpheus out. As everything burns around him, he says
"I am a universe, all things encompassing, all life embracing". Lucifer hits with his final blow saying " I am anti-life, the beast of judgement, the dark at the end of everything". The darkness and cold cover Orpheus as his breath becomes difficult.Lucifer towers over him glowing with victory.What can survive the anti-life? Orpheus musters strength and says " I am hope, indestructible".
What is it that kills hope?
In that Orpheus is given back his regalia and with that his full powers. Hope is the undying fuel of our ideals and can be invoked even within hell but is a valuable resource whose power to direct us is significant and should not be underestimated. The survival of the soul through the destruction of its dreams. The world must be made worthy of its children and our hope is the light of possibility that fights the anti-life. Even within the depths of death and the destruction of all, new life is promised - this imagery speaks deeply to the transitional energies of this last decan into the sprout of life in Aries.
On the day of this New Moon, all eyes must turn to Rafah as talks of a ceasefire have been rejected and Nyahu wants to proceed with his military invasion of the area where 2 million displaced people are living- we have here the possibility of the largest massacre of the century. May we concentrate our attentions on the safety of all war-struck peoples, may we use our imaginations for the nourishment and peace in the hearts of children, may our emotions ring to the heavens in the remembrance that we are all one. May we also produce real action and make decisions or sacrifices that take us out of our egoic survival. Remember this Moon is in the bounds of Mars, we all depend on each other as real agents of action in this world and the way we wield our assertion and our ability to act on the materialisation of our ideals for they do not come easy. How do we fight for the survival of our hope, Mars is the entry-way of the Piscean subtlety into the world. Your ideals don't mean much, if they have never made you challenge the world.
The Moon's closest aspect is a sextile to Uranus, his sacred disruptiveness is needed as the dead sing songs of redemption. An old world crumbles over and over. May we stay awake in the dreaming.
Eyes and hearts on Rafah.
