You can read a Summer Solstice story at: Star of the Bards.
On that more human scale, this Summer Solstice and Cancer new Moon is blessed by the 2nd conjunction of Venus and Mars this year. The first occurred just after Venus turned direct in April at 30 Pisces. Now at 16 Taurus, a power gate of manifestation, Venus and Mars come together in their own Sacred Marriage. They trine Saturn in Virgo, grounding in this new vision of love and compassion into our daily lives and our sense of service. Are you beginning to see how layered the symbolism is this season?
The Sabian symbol for the Venus/Mars conjunction at 30 Pisces, the very last degree of the Zodiac, reads: A majestic rock formation resembling a face is idealized by a boy who takes it as his ideal of greatness. As he grows up, he begins to look like it. This symbolizes a consciousness which knows how to manifest higher symbolic truths, the archetypal man or woman. A spiritual revelation of an immortal ideal. We need to connect to and then protect a new compassionate vision of life.
This is the spiritual vision planted in our cosmos last April 21st. Now, Venus and Mars, Love and Desire, wholeness and separateness, Yin and Yang, want to manifest concretely as they come together at 16 Taurus: An old man is attempting with a degree of success unsuspected by him, to reveal the Mysteries to a motley group. This is a symbol of a natural, earthy wisdom, in which truth is mixed with legends, dreams, superstitions and religious ideas. It appears the group, (the word motley calls up images of hippie flower children, doesn’t it?) GETS IT! That might be a strong intention for any rituals you do at this time. Invoke the idea that people, including yourself, ‘get it’.
The Sabian symbol for the new Moon at 2 Cancer is: A man on a magic carpet observes vast vistas below. This symbol indicates that we have to elevate our consciousness, our view of the world, and our personal standpoint to get the big picture. Can we transcend duality – at least for the moment of the sacred marriage? Can we come away with a clearer vision of what’s going on? It’s time to ‘let go of remote control’ (as Michael Franti puts it) and fly free with our innate ‘magical’ powers of Imagination. John Lennon would say, Imagine! And then take your premonitions and visions seriously. They might be colored by your complexes and you might see through them to a different truth. Or they might be the truth, and then you have to find ways to honor them.
Opposed to this image is Pluto’s degree, 2 Capricorn: Three rose windows in a gothic cathedral, one damaged by war. The rose windows originated from the oculus windows, the round eye, which let light into the church or temple. The Gothic Rose Windows are circular and beautifully colorful. They are Western mandalas, depicting Christ or Mary the Mother in the center, with the saints and angelic powers and earth powers spreading out from the center. The damaged window is an image of collective loss of faith, or the hope for peace and equality brought about by the terrors of war. Perhaps Pluto is showing us that while the patriarchy itself carries the seeds of self-destruction, we can still access the inner wisdom that originally gave rise to the old vision.
We need a new vision of spirit, of divinity, of collective life. That’s what Pluto in Capricorn is facilitating with the destruction of the end game of patriarchy: our modern, capitalistic nation-states and corporations. This Summer Solstice we need to gather with our loved ones and celebrate life, and open ourselves to the creative imagination that can help us transform our lives and our world.
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