“New Moon Renewal,” chalk pastel by Maria Theresa Maggi
Welcome to Maria’s StarGarden, my friends! As we begin, I ask that the forces of love and light surround us and bless our communication.
The moon is new at 20 degrees Pisces of the tropical zodiac at 1:00 AM Pacific Standard Time on March 10, 2024.
This lunar cycle we begin at the “end,” in Pisces, the last sign of the tropical zodiac. As the last sign, Pisces also is the last water sign, and the last of mutable signs—those signs that help us adapt to the energies of the other signs. It’s symbol is the two fish: one fighting upstream, the other floating downstream with the current. In Pisces we have the culmination and the expiation of all the energy of the zodiac. Astrologers have called it both the “dust bin” and the “treasure chest” of the zodiac, which are handy ways of embodying its paradox, if only briefly in an image. Because truly, Pisces is the opposite of embodiment: it is the arena where all forms shift, elude and dissolve, always on their way to becoming one with the energy of All That Is. Pisces is ruled by the planet Neptune, the “dissolver,” and together they show us that profound compassion is the only energy that can unite all the opposites within us and in our world.
Unlike Aries, the first sign of the zodiac, ruling the dawn and bursting onto the scene with a singular instinctual purpose, Pisces rules those hours before the dawn when night unravels and the day has not yet broken. So it contains the potential of new beginning within that unraveling even though we can’t yet see the sun break the horizon. A new moon in Pisces emphasizes this illusive mystery, because all new moons, which are the literal intersection of the moon with the sun as they cross paths in orbit, make the moon itself invisible, because it is absorbed by the light of the sun. By the time we can see a new crescent in the early evening sky, the beginning of the lunar cycle has already happened.
This new moon might well find us grappling with a powerful or sorrowful ending that seems so immense or life changing we are unsure how to negotiate it. Perhaps we are wise enough to know we have to surrender to it. If you find yourself in such a situation at this time, know that wrapped within the loss or the end is a powerful new beginning already taking shape, one that cannot manifest unless it arises from the ending that now feels so fresh and raw.