earth angel + cosmic queen

I’ve been thinking about Venus as a key (as in… keys to the city, or temple). As the Venus star point just occurred in Leo this past Sunday, my mind wanders around the themes of

loyalty * light * honor * identity * connection * power * king/queendom * sovereignty * divinity * righteousness * visibility * generosity * rulership * magnetism * & center stage

Of the essence, where do we find ourselves at this crossing? Anointed & fused across the alchemical threshold of one’s own rising into power, the meeting ground where heaven & earth connect, & reckoning the power that comes with it. The Leo New Moon arrives in sync with the cazimi, riding on an electric square to Uranus in Taurus which accompanies this shift and allows for sudden insights to rise from the depths of what we value, what feeds us, how we embody our own power, and the fuel needed to prepare for the journey ahead.

In the midst of Venus rx in Leo ( & the tension from Uranus) all seems to buzz with frenetic charge. Is it the heat of summer heavy on the skin? The chorus of cicadas making their sojourn from the depths of the soil as the sun sinks beyond sight? The Sun blazes. The air feels heavy… palpable… as if meant to be grasped in the shape of the center of the chest. The heart itself a vessel, radiant & laden with pulse, linking to an unseen sense of timing. Collecting, condensing, and crafting at the turn of the starry wheel.

For those finding these mid summer weeks productive, or fruitful, I bow to you! Slowly, a headwind seems to let up as the days of August steamroll on through the month. The second round of seeds in my garden never took root, yet my garden is full. Surprisingly full of plants that usually don’t survive a winter in our growing zone. Seeds from last summer planted themself at whimsy without worry of the temperate winter months. The seeds that have emerged from last season have done so in precession, as if to announce their importance. Yarrow carpeting the gardens steps. Nicotiana, at the entrance of the grassy hill. Many months of Queen Anne’s Lace reseeding. Wild Beebalm arrived on its own, setting roots down at the edge of the raised bed. Torch flower, a single stalk unfolded its broad leaves at the turn of this Venus retrograde cycle. Tomatoes, everywhere, of every variety, wild roping vines of popping sweetness.

There’s benefit to letting a garden grow a little wild. With some light tending to the weeds, shaping off the paths to keep it clear enough to walk through, the fallow yard became a journey into a world of its own making. It felt risky to interfere as the land churned where once there was only dense red clay pressed with tire marks. Though I turned the soil last season, tucking in hundreds of plants to amended soil beds in hopes of transforming the baron suburban parking mound, this season I let it go. As time took hold, there appeared to be a method to the madness of it all, letting nature do its thing. If I had weeded too soon, that torch flower could have easily been pulled before my eyes could catch the form of its budding leaves. Unassuming, when a plant returns to the garden for another season beyond the sheer will of the gardener, it holds a sweet kind of magic. What shows up when the plan unfolds naturally, fertile without force, feels ripe with meaning.

Graced by garden flowers, old flames, pipe dreams or sweet nothings, Venus Retrograde is the medicine of one chapter closing and another crackling open at the hearth of the Sun. As we approached the day of the cazimi (august 13), the final days mark the dimming aperture of a story that began December of 2021. That cycle amounts to 586 solar days, the formation of a single petal in the flower of Venus’ symmetrical path through the stars as seen from Earth.

There are two kinds of Venus Cazimis’ (when venus meets the sun ~ in the heart of the sun). One, like the one which we had last summer (October 22, 2022), is the direct underworld journey. A conscious surrender, heeding the inner call for integration. Humbled & vulnerable, shadowy truths must be visited through the descent. As told in the myth of Inanna, she passes through the seven gates removing the seven powers, from the crown down, and enters the shadow realm bare & humbled. Hung up, this part of the journey is meant to let parts of ourself that have been rejected or hidden be seen, heard, and acknowledged in order to integrate the shadows.

Then there’s this cazimi, the one we are currently heading towards. The mythical origins of 40 days and 40 nights. The passage of retrograde Venus moving into the heart of the Sun. The turning of a new 586 day cycle. Power shifts & title transfers. Venus goes from the archetype of the mother/lover, to protectress. All is fair in love & war, when we know what is worth fighting for. Love is not only the driving force for birthing & caretaking & intimate partnerships & the pleasures of life, it is also an action. Love in action moves the plot forward (at a rate of 2° to be exact).

Both cazimi’s are passageways, or rites of passage if you will, through the fire of the symbolic heart/source/divine love of the Sun (son). The direct cazimi becoming evening star Venus through the Solar flames, a remembering & reclamation to wholeness, total transmutation.

Retrograde cazimi becoming morning star Venus, a fusing of personal sovereignty to a higher power. Heeding the call to one’s integrity, dignity, and bestowal of grace. In current skies, at the final moments of the evening star phase before the cazimi, their is a sweet humming choir beyond the veil celebrating the culmination of all we have tended to, birthed, cared for, nourished & been nourished by through the reclamation of what matters most. Through Venus, we learn what matters most comes from within. & to empower the fullness of the gift of life, we must seek balance of our inner needs & the natural order of how things change according to integrated truth.

Under the beams of the sun (currently invisible in the sky), Venus + the Sun will infuse that wisdom from the lover to the warrior archetype, the symbol of the one who wields the sword to honor what it loves. Morning Star Venus is righteous, a signifier of a power shift. In the past, I notice the 40 day cycles as breaking points. A rebel with a cause, and just because Venus is love, pleasure, money, and relationships doesn't mean it’s always right to be righteous about the things we love... though it likely seems so in the moment. It’s something to think about as the cycle shifts. What has been through the depths & back again? What parts of the self were integrated & can that survive the alchemy of change required to continue forth? As the season of summer presses on, what seeds will find their way into the fertile soil of self-sovereignty? Can you make it through the dark knowing the power of what you believe after all these months?

I love the way that Venus shapes us. This stars cycle symbolizes the return of power… both to ourselves and to where it rightfully belongs beyond our own control. Venus dips into the darkness, and summons forth the rejected parts into wholeness, and does so with reverence. Venus tips the scales, weighing the sum of the parts back into wholeness. Venus checks in, cares, calls forth, creates,

Venus is about ethical relationships. Earth magic. Reciprocal gains & losses. Fair trades, fertile grounds. Creative ideas taking form in material realms. Embodied in the myth of the queen of heaven & earth, the Venus star cycle offers us a return to wholeness through her magnetic journey, one guided by intuition and the ability to understand there is a timing to the expression of beauty and power. It is not that we are becoming one thing over a lifetime, we are one thing expressed through infinite forms. With Venus, we are encouraged to embody power just as readily it requires complete stripping of power to return to wholeness. Venus is the power beyond the senses, it is the power of embodied awareness allowing the senses to open doors into other realms of knowing.

Working within this cycle gives context to devotional practices across centuries. The tuning of this cycle provides a blueprint for alignment which supersedes our individual desires. Aligned with this cycle, Venus provides a boon which cultivates greater harmony in life’s endeavors. This is why we look to the stars in reflection. Not to celebrate them as some sort of power over us, but to commemorate our connectedness to the living world. Tuning into rhythms with reverence & observing the patterns + parallels through our lived experience. To move between heaven & earth is to live aligned to a greater plan unfolding. To attune to these cycles is to surrender into a higher state of aliveness, connected to a power greater than what is yours alone. We bloom with the universe, a meta co-regulation within this vast cosmic animal. We lean into earth mother, beating hearts echo in the womb of her cavernous embrace, vibrational frequencies anchor the blood as it moves through the inner rivers like water from the mountain spring, electrical waves transfer their charge through blades of grass into the bellies of the feet so that we might re-member. The land of our bodies, like the earth mother herself, a mirror between worlds, the meeting point of heaven & earth, the meaning of the messages to return to wholeness (holi-ness). We are of this world, and the next. What we do in this world informs the rest.

The word Angel translates to messenger. May you hear the messages intended for you with clarity and understanding. Here’s a message from me, tuning into the Leo New Moon / Venus Star Point in Leo. What messages have awakened for you through this threshold, where have you been called into action?

P.S. When I pressed record, I didn’t realize this would turn out to be the audio file I shared with you all! Forgive my silly intro & some stumbling through the flow. In honor of authenticity, and unedited audio tracks, I welcome imperfection & the irony of a cliche ~ if you will.

Astrological Dates to note through August (& beyond!)

Venus Star Point 20° Leo August 13, 2023

New Moon 23° Leo August 16, 2023 5:38 AM est.

Mercury RX 21° Virgo August 23, 2023 retrograde station

Uranus RX 23° Taurus August 28, 2023 retrograde station

Full Moon 7° Pisces August 30, 2023 9:35 PM est.

+ future things +

Neptune 0° Aries March 25, 2025 ; October 22, 2025 ; January 26, 2026

Xx

alexandria