This Friday, March 14th, spring eclipse season begins with a lunar eclipse in Virgo near the south node. Mercury also stations retrograde on Friday, March 14th, until Monday, April 7th, joining Venus, who will be retrograde until Saturday, April 12th. This contributes to the complex astrology of the moment, which is why astrologers have been watching this month as some of the most potentially intriguing and intense astrology of the year.
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The second eclipse will occur in Aries near the north node on Saturday, March 29th. Every year, there are two eclipse seasons: portals, possibilities for change, and celestial magic. The south node is a place of release and letting go, while the north node is where we move toward and to, a calling, a tug at the heart and the soul.
Eclipses are moments of karmic path-changing, surrender, re-alignment, and departure. From Latin eclipsis and Greek ekleipsis, an eclipse is an abandonment, literally "a failing, forsaking," from ekleipein to forsake a usual place. And so, eclipses speak to change. They arrive as an omen, prayer, blessing, and illumination.
Virgo is a mutable earth sign (mutable means it arrives at the end of the season). With its earthy nature and its skilled perception of details, Virgo is interested in how everything connects. So with this first eclipse, something is being released from the area of your chart ruled by Virgo; something is changing in your relationship to this perception and attention to detail. Get curious, and be open to this mystery of a new beginning.
According to NASA, "The oldest recorded eclipse in human history may have been on Nov. 30, 3340 B.C.E. A series of spiral-shaped and circular petroglyphs was found at the Loughcrew Megalithic Monument in County Meath, Ireland. Petroglyphs are rock carvings made by pecking into stone. Immediately in front of a carving that shows overlapping concentric circles, archaeologists found the charred remains of nearly 50 individuals. Scholars continue to research and discuss the meaning of the petroglyphs. Around 1200 B.C.E., scribes in Anyang, China, recorded eclipses on oxen shoulder blades and tortoise shells, called oracle bones. In these eclipse records, the scribes said, ‘The Sun has been eaten.’”
These eclipse happenings are ancient, modern, felt by humans, and the more-than-human-world. Turning to the wisdom of our kin, Orb-weaving Spiders take down their webs during solar eclipses. And in tests, they could tell the difference between moonlight and light manufactured for testing purposes, which can be a guide for how we work with eclipse season, too. Pause your weaving, change your plans, and rest in the stillness between making.
During eclipse season, I often return to these words from Anne Carson. In Totality: The Color of Eclipse, Anne Carson writes, “The sun quits us, we are forsaken by light. Yet people who experience total eclipse are moved to such strong description of its vacancy and void that this itself begins to take on color. What after all is a color? Something not no color. Can you make a double negative of light? Would that be like waking from a dream in the wrong direction and finding yourself on the back side of your own mind? There is a moment of reversal within totality." These are words to consider and explore as the season unfolds.
Writing Prompts for the Lunar Eclipse in Virgo
In Joy Harjo’s poem Don’t Bother the Earth Spirit (full poem found here) she writes, “Don’t bother the earth spirit who lives here. She is working on a story. It is the oldest story in the world and it is delicate, changing. If she sees you watching she will invite you in for coffee, give you warm bread, and you will be obligated to stay and listen.” In response, and to honor Virgo's wise and earthy nature, create your poem or prose about this Earth Spirit. What do you know about her? What does she tell you or teach you? If you need a starting point, begin with, “Listening, I heard the Earth Spirit on the other side of the door…”
Inspired by the Orb-Weaving Spiders, read more about the creatures that observe eclipses. I found a good article for you here. Pick the story of one of these more-than-human kin, and write about the lessons that you learn from their reaction to this phenomenon.
Consider how Anne Carson speaks about a solar eclipse, think about the texture and the color of a lunar eclipse. How would you talk about it? What questions might you ask? Create a piece of writing entirely made up of questions that you might ask this lunar eclipse or eclipse season.