Full Moon in Virgo: Tapestry

Tuesday morning at 10:53 am EST, the Full Moon in Virgo reaches it’s exact culmination. This means we will, if we’re lucky, see this largest and brightest Full Moon of the year two nights in a row, tonight and tomorrow.

Taken at face value, this should be a fairly calm Full Moon. Virgo may be fussy, but is far more quiet than many of the energies that have roiled the cosmos lately.

The fact that this Full Moon is as intense, in its own Virgoan way, as any of the other recent events in the skies above is a textbook example of why it’s worth looking at the whole chart and not just one or two things in it.

What Virgo doesn’t love a good textbook?

First, the Supermoon thing. Some astrologers ignore these, disliking the implied hype of the name. Yet astrology grew directly from observations of the skies above, especially at night. This Full Moon is closer to Earth and will appear larger in the sky than any other Full Moon this year.

This gives a presence to this Moon, the feel of being right here. Tides are stronger at New and Full Moons. When the Moon is at perigee, closest to us, during a Full Moon, we get the strongest tides, the perigean spring tides.

Surely ancient and not-so-ancient peoples notice this.

The Moon rules emotions. The tides of feeling, stronger at Full Moons, are stronger yet this time around. The cosmos reflects itself in fractal patterns.

---

Rising Moon Astrology is now a PODCAST on iTunes. Please listen, subscribe, and leave a review.

---

Next, this Full Moon happens at zero degrees. The Moon is at 0 Virgo, the Sun at 0 Pisces. Our attention is drawn to this moment of transition, the moment of leaving one sign behind and entering another. We notice there are other thresholds.

Chiron the wounded healer has left Pisces and entered Aries, a decisive renewal of an entire cycle of healing. Of course we look to where our own Chiron is in our birth chart to indicate our personal cycle of healing. Yet this change is significant.

The world has reached the end of a long journey through all the signs to return to the beginning, the Aries point, where new things enter. Now the wounded healer is a warrior, even as Chiron was mentor and teacher to warriors.

Does the world need to heal how we handle conflict? No doubt. What about how we act, how we take action, the kinds of actions we valorize? That too. Aries, ruled by Mars, holds the masculine part of each of us. Healing needed here? Yes. There is an edgy inconjunct aspect between Chiron and the Moon.

Meanwhile, Uranus remains poised at the very end of Aries, another transition point, where he trines the Full Moon and sextiles the Sun.

It feels significant that Uranus and Chiron, two figures of great change and great healing are, at this Full Moon, spanning the same sign, the place where we are renewed and from which we take action in the world.

Uranus will soon enter Taurus, where we find Mars. At 3 Taurus, he trines the Full Moon while sextiling the Sun, another way our attention is drawn to Mars, Aries, action, conflict, drive, and the masculine.

Virgo and Pisces, where we find the Moon and Sun, are both feminine, yin signs. Feminine and masculine, yin and yang, can and must work together, flow into and through each other in endless patterns. We have lost our way here. We are called to pay attention.

We’re also offered guidance on how to pay attention. Mercury is just past his conjunction with Neptune, both is Pisces. Venus is just past her conjunction with Saturn, both in Capricorn. These two pairs are sextiling each other, sharing information in energized ways.

Mercury and Neptune together are dreamy, lyrical, intuitive, deep, and sometimes lost, confused and deluded. Venus and Saturn together value hard work, results, pragmatism, and can be cold and unfeeling.

The Full Moon draws our attention here too. Do we tend to emphasize dreams over reality? Do we discount feelings in the pursuit of pragmatic goals? To get through our current crises, we need both ends of this spectrum. We need the full range of responses and the skill to choose the best to apply in different circumstances.

Virgo is a practical, yet humble earth sign. This is the sign of the hedge witch, the healer, the weaver, the mender of what is frayed. Virgo wants everyone to be fed, housed, and safe, and is dedicated to the small but necessary steps to get there.

At this Full Moon, we are shown those steps, those threads. We have the chance to see clearly where the fabric of the world has broken, where our own fabric is worn, torn, and in need of repair.

We probably won’t see all the answers at this Full Moon. Another thread to consider is that Mercury, who will retrograde while in Pisces, enters his shadow on the day of the Full Moon. He will arrive at the place he will return to when the retrograde is over.

We are on our way into a time of deep dreaming, intuitive insights, spiritual exploration, and potentially doubt, confusion, illusion, and strong emotions.

This Full Moon shines its light on our selves, our families and communities, and our world. If we take the time to look, we can see more clearly exactly what needs to be mended, stitched up, rewoven.

This focus on detail and practical steps are the gifts of Virgo and Capricorn.

The Pisces Sun, and Mercury and Neptune in Pisces, pull us up to show us the whole tapestry. Also at this Full Moon, if we look, we can catch a glimpse of the beauty and majesty of the great weaving of which we are a part.

Oh yes, one more note: The Full Moon is conjunct the star Regulus, once one of the brightest in the sky, one of the four Watchers of the ancient Persians, the heart of the Lion and the star of kings.

This star connotes both greatness and its downfall. Regulus moved into Virgo in 2011, after thousands of years in Leo, and now aligns with this particular Full Moon.

Will we be illuminated about matters relating to world rulers? Perhaps so, but in these times that is hardly remarkable.

Regulus here reminds us that greatness is not confined to kings, or queens, or heads of state. Great and necessary work is done by the humble, by those who cook, clean, mend, build, plant, reap, and make.

Kings may have the power and resources to acquire tapestries and display them in their palaces, but they cannot make them, not on their own.

To create and maintain the weaving of the world, we all are needed. Each of us is a spinner, a weaver, a mender, a healer. Through us all, the tapestry is made.