A full moon occurs when the earth comes between the Sun and the Moon. In astrology, a Full Moon signifies the closing or culmination of a cycle. This is because lunations — particularly New & Full Moons — work in pairs. The cycle goes like this: you set an intention on a new moon in a particular sign, and six months later, your intention should manifest on or around the full moon of that same sign.
Today, the moon is full in cardinal air sign Libra, the sign of partnerships, balance, beauty, and love. This lunation is closing the 6-month long cycle that began on the Libra New Moon in September.
September was a long time ago. That was before Covid-19 blanketed the globe in panic, before we all had to hole away at home and worry about their health and safety and futures, and before face masks and toilet paper became the world’s most sought-after items. Indeed, September’s Libra New Moon seems like centuries ago, yet I remember it vividly, as though the events of that night were tattooed onto my brain…
It was September 28, the Aries and I were sharing one of our usual before-bed conversations. Like the silky September sky, with its blanket of stars glittering softly behind wisps of clouds, I felt calm and serene. This was largely because of the ongoing planetary transits.
Venus and Jupiter united that day, making the sixth-harmonic aspect: the sextile. This celestial union sent particles of playful passion through space; down they fell through the atmosphere — the clouds, the sky — and finally, through my bedroom window, straight into my heart. The fortuitous meeting of the two celestial bodies was blessed even more by the New Moon. Both she and the Sun were stationed in Libra, so the divine masculine (the Sun) and the divine feminine (the Moon) were in perfect harmony. All seemed beautiful and perfect.
I laid in my soft and warm bed, fit to burst with warm and happy feelings as the Aries and I talked about the first kiss we shared just a few days before.
“I had to kiss you,” the Aries said. I pictured him, the swarthy-skinned, brown-eyed, tattooed hunk, laying in his dark bedroom just as I did, staring up at the ceiling, daydreaming before bed. “For the same reason I told you I love you,” he continued, “I felt it so strongly in my heart, I just had to share it with you.”
I too had pressing feelings that needed to be shared.
“I love you,” I said, smiling as I rolled onto my back. “I love you, and I should’ve told you I loved you when you told me you loved me. I should’ve–”
“Baby, why are you apologizing?” he interrupted. He sounded just as moonstruck as I felt. “I didn’t tell you that I love you because I wanted to hear it back, I told you because–”
“You’re an Aries, and Aries always have to be the first one to do something?” I giggled.
The Aries laughed. It was a husky chuckle that made me burn to see his handsome face, how it crinkles his big brown eyes when he smiles.
“True,” he said, “but mostly I told you because I’ve never felt like this before, I’ve never felt so drawn to another person. I’m certain you’re my Twin Flame.”
Slivers of starlight shimmered through the blinds of my bedroom window. My glass-less vision blurred the soft speckles, creating a mini Milky Way on my ceiling.
“Twin Flame?” I repeated, trying to sound unaffected. “You know those aren’t real, right?”
“Oh, they’re very real,” he said, still sounding moonstruck. “I’m talking to mine right now.”
It was my turn to laugh. Then I rolled onto my side, away from the mini Milky Way.
“Listen to us talking about love and twin flames,” I scoffed. “Damn Libra New Moon.”
“What about it is so damning?”
“The Sun and Moon and Venus and Jupiter– oh, it’s too much to whisper into the phone.”
“Do you know what’s not too much to whisper?” the Aries said, his voice soft and low. “How much I love you.”
“You already said that,” I said, smiling to myself.
“That’s because I mean it.” He sounded like he was smiling, too. “I love you.”
“I’m full of so much right now,” I said, giggling again. “I’m– well, I don’t know what I am.”
“You’re in love,” the Aries said. “It’s beautiful. Like you, my gorgeous Gemini goddess.”
A warming sensation came over me. It swirled through every particle in my body.
“I really do love you,” I said, my voice as soft as the starlight. “It’s not the Libra New Moon, or Venus or Jupiter… It’s you. I love you. And I do believe we’re Twin Flames! Do you believe me?” I rested my hand on my heart and closed my eyes. “I’m sending you this energy. Can you feel it?”
“Yes,” he said emphatically. “I can feel it. Just like I felt you the other day. And it’s beautiful. Babe, I want to fall in love with you.”
“Um, isn’t that what we’re already doing?”
“I mean, I… want to fall in love and never stop falling. I want to love you forever.”
I felt like I was soaring through the heavens; yet I remained quite still and comfortable in my bed, wrapped in the plush blanket, the firm-yet-fluffy pillows cradling my neck.
“You know, this is a very magical lunation. I think we should set an intention!” I said.
“Together?”
“Yes! New Moons are perfect for setting intentions,” I whispered. “Whatever is in your heart– right now, let’s focus on it with all our might, and then release it into the universe. Ok?”
“Yes, my love,” he said.
“On the count of three. One — two — three–”
I closed my eyes even tighter than before, and held my breath as I focused on my intention, which was to feel this way forever, to share moments like these with the Aries again and again. I rolled onto my stomach once more, and opened my eyes, blinking away the bright spots that added to the galaxy on my ceiling.
“Do you want to know what my intention was?” the Aries asked.
“Of course!”
“My intention was for Union between you and I. I want us to be together forever. I want us to fall in love and never stop falling.”
I was once told by a respected astrologer that when the New Moon is sextile natal Mars, a love relationship can begin, because there is energy and dynamism towards a love interest. When the moon is also sextile natal Jupiter, relationships expand and move forward, and it’s the night to make a wish that is guaranteed to come true.
As fate would have it, that Libra New Moon was making all of those aspects to all those planets in my chart. That night, those planets united, as did the Aries and I.
But that unity didn’t last. Venus and Jupiter moved into other signs, as did the Moon. And all the aspects those planets made to the planets in my chart faded away, taking the Aries with them. He broke up with me, prematurely ending the six-month-long cycle we started on that Libra New Moon.
The Aries and I spoke about forever as though it was within our grasp, as though it was a very real thing. But as a Gemini, I have an instinctive distrust of forever. How can something like love exist always and for all time? Love, like my Sun sign, is mutable, inconstant and always changing. All the planets and luminaries in our galaxy know this to be an irrefutable truth. But perhaps no luminary knows this more than the Moon. She shifts and changes every month, waxing and waning through her phases, swelling in size and visibility. To the Moon, forever is a chimeric dream. And that’s how the Aries will forever seem to me.
Originally published in The Fear Journal
Feature photo by Brantley Neal on Unsplash
