There’s nothing like a full moon in Taurus to remind us that while Taurus and Scorpio are signs in opposition, they have more in common than not. Taurus and Scorpio are both fixed signs, both represented by creatures that move over the Earth with incredible patience. Cattle collect sustenance in their multiple stomachs, grazing slowly with the assurance that they could survive for a couple of months without food. Scorpions, on the other hand, wait for their food to come to them and are capable of slowing down their metabolic rate to a pace that allows a meal of one insect to sustain them for an entire year.
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Cattle are also methodical, working a field slowly and strategically down to the dirt. But, anyone who has spent time with free-roaming cattle knows: They are not humble. They sense a greener pasture ahead, and they demand access to it. Scorpions are methodical in a different way; they save their energy not only by waiting for their meals, but also by breaking down their prey with enzymes before consuming it. It is estimated that in their lifetime, which often spans about six years, scorpions enjoy about 24 meals. For both of these creatures, consuming and consummation is a sacred pleasure — and such things are worth waiting for.
Patience, then, is a powerful force for both these signs. Patience is what Taurus whispers to themselves as they work their way toward a world with which they can fall in love, a world where beauty (Venus) is valued and nurtured. Patience is what Scorpio meditates on, waiting strategically in the fertile dark for death to offer up a new beginning.
And here we are, under a full moon in Taurus, a lunar eclipse right beside the north node in Gemini. Venus, who presides over Taurus, sparkles in Capricorn, and makes a trine to Uranus in Taurus. Meanwhile, our days are suffused with Scorpio energy. Mercury, who presides over Gemini, is right beside the Sun and in Scorpio. Mars is in Scorpio too, where it is unnervingly at home.
There’s a story here if you’re looking for one. A story about holding on and letting go. A story about the way our experience of life, of each other, expands and contracts in relation to what we believe about ourselves. And, it’s not an easy story, not a feel-good moment where we perform an acceptable vulnerability and are rewarded with intimacy and forgiveness. The Taurus lunar eclipse is a magnification of Taurus values and so a Taurus lunar eclipse rejects fragility and demands fortitude — courage that exists not in spite of fear, but in relationship to it. Here, between these two clusters of stars, their magnitude, the veil is thin and we wear it in ceremony. We honor what has died, within us and without us, so that we might consume the full moon’s light. We marry the Earth, its pleasures, its grief; we renew our vows.