Wendy Davis: Black Moon Lilith in Cancer in Action, Protecting Abortion Rights

Wendy Davis on the Texas Senate floor June 25.

Photo: Eric Gay/AP

Last night, as Jupiter ingressed Cancer and conjuncted Black Moon Lilith, Texas Democrat senator Wendy Davis was Black Moon Lilith in action.

Davis successfully talked for 11 straight hours on the floor of the U.S. Senate June 25 to stop an anti-abortion bill from reaching Republican Governor Rick Perry's desk. This is a move called filibustering.

As Davis spoke and the midnight deadline of the Senate special session passed, the bill was officially dead - for now.

Through her actions, Davis is drawing attention to the ongoing attack on women's reproductive rights in the United States. Abortion is an issue that often has difficult emotions associated - shame, guilt, sadness, fear, anger. Perfect Black Moon Lilith territory. Abortion is often kept in murky, unspoken territory in our patriarchal societies. Davis standing up on this issue in such a dramatic way - supported by men and women around the world - helps move abortion out of the shadows and into place as a basic, human health issue - where it belongs.

The anti-abortion bill Davis filibustered would have banned abortion past 20 weeks of gestation, limited abortion-inducing drugs, and required that abortions be provided at ambulatory surgical centres by physicians who had admitting privileges at hospitals within 30 miles. This requirement would have closed 37 of the 42 abortion clinics in Texas, severely limiting access to abortions, especially for rural women who do not live near a hospital.

You may recall that Rick Perry is the Texas Governor who passed the forced sonogram laws in 2012, which required women to have a transvaginal sonogram before they could have an abortion. The laws, which were passed in four states - Texas, Arizona, Florida, and North Carolina - required doctors to basically attempt to talk women out of having abortions right at the abortion clinic itself.

Jupiter Enters Cancer at Lunar Apogee: The Wisdom of Our Pitch Blackest Emotional Experiences

Tonight at 8:40 p.m. CST, Jupiter moves from the sign of its detriment (Gemini) to the sign of its exaltation (Cancer) for a one-year stay. As Jupiter makes the ingress, it is at lunar apogee, conjunct the astrological symbol Black Moon Lilith, and this energy colours the entire year-long Jupiter transit.

The wisdom gleaned from our pitch blackest emotional experiences fills our bones like marrow. This becomes our lantern in the darkness, a year-long guiding light through the often horrifying themes and circumstances of the Pluto in Capricorn era.

We draw on the simple, nourishing wisdom of our mothers, our grandmothers, our roots, our families, our clans, our homes, our emotions, and our souls to get through this one. We draw on the wisdom of our early upbringings, particularly the difficult experiences. But we use it to advance, not to fall back. We're hurtling into Aquarius, and there's no going home again, no matter what the Cancerian nostalgia is telling you...

Black Moon Lilith is a symbol of the dark, denied feminine experience. In the cultural stories, Lilith was Adam's first wife. She refused to be his wifely subordinate and was kicked out of the Garden of Eden, exiled, because of it. Adam hooked up with Eve, who was content to be just a rib, just an offshoot of her man. And Lilith discovered that comfy, cosy society would prefer her 'out of sight, out of mind.' Truth be told, it would prefer her dead so that it didn't have to look at what she reflected, represented.

There has been a whole lot of post-post-modern mythologizing about Black Moon Lilith. To the point that it has been swaddled and stifled by the psychological takes.

You have to remember that the myths in astrology exist primarily so that we can get a handle on the energy of the points or bodies. It's about putting them into context so we can properly apply them in our lives and in our selves.

So stripping down all the myth and the layered language: Black Moon Lilith is raw, raging, volatile, marginalized, vilified. It's a caged animal screaming "fuck you" to whoever put it there. It's a trigger point with a deep reach into longstanding issues, grudges, resentments. It touches the historical mistreatment of women and the historical downplaying of feminine knowledge on this planet, in general.

It's also a point of our deepest power, creativity, and hard-won feminine know-how. It's a point where we're willing to stand alone, in our power, in our righteousness, in our marginalized understanding of things. If we tap this point correctly, harnessing the raw and wild energy surging up from its depths, it is source. It is Kali destroying maya, ripping down blinders, yanking heads out of sand, tearing phony constructs asunder. It is Kali forcing us to see, to understand, to know how it really is on this planet and how it really has been.

The state of women on this planet is abysmal. The state of the soulful on this planet is abysmal. Emotional health is in the tank in many, many respects. Our institutions and power hierarchies reinforce this, and Black Moon Lilith transiting Cancer isn't going to let us forget it.

This Black Moon Lilith point, with all its discomfort, alienation, and disturbance, is a primary source of guiding wisdom over the next year. It's our lucky horseshoe. Acknowledging its dark and often disturbing wisdom, accepting it, validating it, drawing it into the whole - this is how we fully capitalize on the blessings Jupiter would now like to bestow.

The cultural wisdom and the cultural myths have mostly been written by men, from the male point-of-view. During the transit of Jupiter in Cancer, women's wisdom and stories are in the spotlight.

Some long-denied issues are coming to the forefront this year, particularly related to mothers, mothering, nurturing, supporting, food, cooking, the nuclear family unit, home life, femininity, emotion, and soul. If we work to bring these issues into the mainstream whole, we can experience both emotional resolution and rapid expansion during Jupiter's transit of Cancer.

Saturn Turns Direct in Scorpio: Watch the Offloading of Dreaded Responsibilities

Saturn is currently stationing in Scorpio and will go direct just after midnight on July 8. As it drags its heels to a stop in the zodiac, it permeates the overall astro scene with its themes - its dreaded, depressing, arduous, isn't-that-a-bummer themes.

Saturn is the planet that (eventually) leads us to position, advancement, success, prestige, and recognition in the public realm. It spurs us to reach our grandest potential in these human forms. But it rides our asses like a rented mule in the process.

Since entering Scorpio in October 2012, Saturn has been doing a slow dredge within the structural set-ups of our lives and of our societies, at large. It has drawn out into our concrete realities certain emotional and psychological truths that have up until now been submerged or semi-submerged. We are now aware of the deep, dark, disturbing subtext in ways we weren't before. Our awareness of underlying energy dynamics has increased. We've honed and utilized our X-Ray vision. Whip-smart, razor-sharp.

And for those who already skillfully traipsed around in the Scorpionic nether-realms, new position, advancement, stability, and validation have come with this transit.

We've had a period of waiting, restructuring, and sober second thought as Saturn went retrograde over the first leg of Scorpio February 18 to July 8, 2013, particularly related to career. This period now draws to a close.

Saturn is now stationing direct, about to move full speed ahead into the ongoing process of structural metamorphosis underway on this planet and in our lives.

Career progress that has been stalled but still percolating beneath the surface can now unfold in earnest. Steps people have been mulling over to cement advancement and position can now start to be taken.

There is a more overt jockeying for position and power underway as of July 8. A new pecking order formulating. Be aware of this.

At the same time, Saturn in Scorpio in mutual reception to Pluto in Capricorn indicates that the structures as they exist (Saturn/Capricorn) have become hell (Scorpio/Pluto). People's responsibilities within those structures have become hell - though this is often kept hidden, contained. Obligations within these past-their-prime Pluto in Capricorn-era structures have become enervating traps to the point that people will gnaw their own legs off to get out of them. The more people deny the underlying situations, the more desperate and disturbed they become, until they'll do pretty much anything to hand it off to someone else.

This direct station increases the pressure and makes it difficult for people to pretend. If inherent problems are being ignored, keeping up the shiny, happy public face will be challenging, to say the least. Some will crumble under the pressure. At its extreme, this station will have people wishing for sweet, sweet death rather than face the lack of passion, interest, or integrity in their careers and in the structures in which they participate. Keep an eye on mental and emotional health, and take the pressure off others (if deserving) when you can.

One of the things to watch out for during the entire transit of Saturn through Scorpio (October 2012 to September 2015) is the offloading of responsibilities as the structures continue their slow collapse.

People will be trying with all their stealthy, wily, and crafty might to get out from under energetic obligations that are draining them.

From now into mid-July particularly, as Saturn stations and the drudgery and bullshit become intolerable, people will be attempting to offload their dreaded responsibilities onto you, and they'll be willing to pull some pretty underhanded moves to get you to bite.

These aren't just concrete responsibilities. They're also heavy loads of the emotional, psychological, or psychic variety. A weight people can no longer sustain. Secrets people can no longer contain.

People are going to be pulling some pretty desperate and funky manoeuvres to pass the buck. However, the passing of the buck is the last thing we need. The passing of the buck has gotten us into the mess we're in on this planet today.

There's the lazy way to deal with the Saturn in Scorpio restructuring themes, and there's the right way.

The right way involves confronting the dynamics head-on, treating them as if they are real (they are), addressing them but also getting yourself out of their reach whenever possible.

Responsibly transforming the current structures and power hierarchies into something different, into something that works better for all involved, takes time and effort. Rather than committing that time and effort, people will simply try to plop the whole kit and caboodle onto you. They'll try to slide out from under the weight of their obligations, dropping them on your lap.

Again, these are responsibilities and obligations (Saturn) that have become enervating hell (Scorpio). Unless you want to start a stack of new responsibilities from a point of "enervating hell," it is not advisable to put yourself under this weight. Pluto in Scorpios, this is particularly directed to you right now.

Don't allow people to offload on you, and if you are trying to offload on others, stop. It isn't going to work.

The full psychological, emotional, and energetic weight of the responsibilities being offloaded are unbearable. They cannot by borne. By anyone.

Saturn in Scorpio indicates a time of restricted energy - especially emotional or psychological support energy. The hidden glue that holds everything together. There is not enough energy to continue to prop up and sustain the current structures or the way things are being done. These things are corrupt to the point of inherent dysfunction and toxicity. We've been pushed to a point of multi-level crisis, to the end of the road for the current way of things, and offloading the current situations onto other people will only create breakdowns.

No one can step into the current structures and responsibilities and maintain them. We are living during the Pluto in Capricorn years, and the structures themselves need to change - dramatically and from the inside out.

There is a leveling of hierarchy required here, a sharing of rewards and profits, a redistribution of responsibility, recognition, prestige, power. There are changes required here that must be triggered by people getting down to brass tacks. We have to get down to how we really feel about things, how we've really felt, perhaps, for years or decades now, and we have to allow the accessing of these suppressed feelings to fuel the ongoing process of structural metamorphosis experienced during the Saturn-Pluto mutual reception.

The Pluto in Leos are looking to retire or at the very least, to be unburdened of their heavy loads.

But their structural reality does not translate to other generations.

We don't simply step into the shoes of the Pluto in Leos. We morph the structures, the responsibilities, the power, and the rules so that they're alive, adaptable, and responsive to us and to our needs.

This is one of the primary failures of the structures as they currently exist: the needs of the human beings within those structures have not been taken fully into account.

There is next-to-no emotional or psychological support for people within the current structures, even as those people are eroded terribly by structural dysfunction, corruption, and illegitimacy. There is no allowance for emotional, mental, psychic, or soul health within these rigid, top-down business and governmental set-ups.

And this is where things are breaking down - at the hidden emotional, psychological, psychic, and soul levels. At the energetic level. People can no longer suppress and carry on, as they've been trained to do. We're hitting the brick wall on multiple fronts, on most fronts, and it is going on all over this planet.

It's crucially important during Saturn in Scorpio that you take on only the responsibilities that feel right in your soul to take on. Don't fall for the little tricks of Scorpionic persuasion, attempting to lure you into taking on too much. Don't allow people to unburden themselves on you, unless you know it's the right thing to do.

Take on the burden for another person against your ultimate will, and watch yourself falter and crumble under its weight. Watch yourself fail, as you've been set up to fail.

Alternatively, there are many people scrambling for footing and position during Saturn's transit of Scorpio. Often, these are people who have not been fully responsible with Scorpio energy in the past.

From a previous post:

"Under Saturn's thumb over the next years, misuses and abuses of power will be put in check. The results of underlying dynamics we've been (even unknowingly) furthering will start to surface. Issues falsely believed long-resolved will be stirred, like hot spots after a brush fire re-igniting. We'll be confronted with our misunderstandings of the way energy really works. We'll come into contact with the consequences of the way we've been living our lives - for good or ill."

People are trying to advance themselves using your energy, your talent, your hard work, and your position. Understand this. Keep a wary eye on this. And withdraw your energy and support from these misguided souls wherever possible.

All in all, the Saturn direct station July 8 looks fairly blessed, occurring as it does within Grand Water Trine with Jupiter in Cancer and Neptune in Pisces. All three bodies are in early water, and there is a freshness, an innocence, and an exuberance to this configuration that is lovely, indeed. We are being lovingly assisted by the universe with the very complex challenges with which we are currently faced.

If we keep an eye on the thorny Saturn in Scorpio issues, as well as on an emotionally manipulative/vicious tendency with Black Moon Lilith conjunct Jupiter in early Cancer, this one should be fairly smooth.


All Saturn in Scorpio-related articles: Saturn in Scorpio

A pay-for article from Willow's Web: Saturn in Scorpio

Ceres Enters Leo After Kicking Butt on GMO Food Issues Around the World

Ceres enters Leo June 22 after an extended transit of Cancer, and the things that nourish us most deeply shift from Cancerian things (home, family, roots, familiarity, food, comfort) to Leonine things (fun, play, style, art, drama, kids).

How much do we need this shift? A whole lot, I'd say.

Ceres is the dwarf planet related to agriculture, grains, and the fertility of the Earth, and during its transit of Cancer, Ceres took part in an extremely hardcore cardinal t-square with Uranus in Aries and Pluto in Capricorn, just as Uranus and Pluto formed their third exact square May 20.

I'm not a predictive astrologer, but I did correctly predict, with the strong Ceres influence, that food and agriculture issues - particularly GMO issues - would be huge, at the make-or-break point, by planting time this spring.

From a November 8, 2012 article:

"Agriculture-related dwarf planet Ceres stationed retrograde at 3 degrees Cancer on October 31 within a cardinal Grand Cross with Venus in Libra, Uranus in Aries, and Pluto in Capricorn.

This configuration brings food and agriculture issues to prominence, particularly as they relate to increased corporate globalization (Pluto in Capricorn) and the direction into biotechnology (Uranus in Aries).

Ceres maintains its strong influence into mid-2013, forming a cardinal t-square May 5-7 that will still be within orb during the third Uranus in Aries - Pluto in Capricorn square May 20, 2013.

These are high stakes times for the future of food and, correspondingly, for life on this planet.

And nowhere are those high stakes more visible than in the realm of natural versus genetically modified seeds and foods."

These are some of the extremely high stakes GMO-related events that took place with Ceres in Cancer within cardinal t-square this spring:

- It was recently announced by the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network that, despite widespread public opposition, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has approved a variety of Monsanto's RoundUp Ready GM alfalfa for commercial sale and growth in Canada.

Monsanto's genetically modified alfalfa was first released in January 2011 in the United States by a pro-Monsanto FDA and Department of Agriculture. It was scheduled to be commercially sold in Ontario and Quebec, Canada, by Wisconsin-based Forage Genetics as early as spring of 2013, under the Ceres-Uranus-Pluto t-square. All that was required was a rubber stamp approval of the GM seeds by the Canadian government - which it has now reportedly received.

This means it is now legal to sell and grow untested, unproven genetically modified alfalfa seed commercially in Canada. Forage Genetics and others have the green light.

It is also impossible to know if other varieties of GM alfalfa have been or will be approved, as the approval process is kept secret from the public.

Currently, Canada's alfalfa crop is GMO-free and mostly unsprayed. Since alfalfa is a feral perennial, cross-pollination by GM alfalfa would be impossible to contain, and contamination of the natural crop would be absolutely devastating. Because alfalfa is used primarily as animal feed, the spread of GM alfalfa could potentially contaminate all meat and animal products. But because alfalfa is used as a fertilizer and foundational building block of the entire organic agricultural system, contamination by GM alfalfa could mean the literal end of any certified organic food at all.

Juno Stations Retrograde in Aquarius, Black Moon Lilith Enters Cancer

Soul mate asteroid Juno turns retrograde on June 14 at 19 degrees Aquarius, in the sign of the new astrological era. This begins a three-month retrograde period that will have our lady Juno squaring off with heavy hitter Saturn in Scorpio.

The mean calculation for Black Moon Lilith, the lunar apogee, shifts into Cancer June 9 where it will stay until March 13, 2014. The dark side of mothers, mothering, caring, emotional support, femininity, apple pie Americana, and the family unit become prominent themes. As BML in Cancer opposes Pluto in Capricorn, we see the false security people are grasping to, maintained by the military and police forces of the state, and nowhere is this more apparent than in Cancer Sun nations Canada and the United States.

I've written about both these transits, as well as the Venus retrograde in Capricorn at the end of this year, in a 2013 paid article you can find here:

Venus, Juno, and Pluto: the Reconfiguring and Renegotiation of Marriage and Commitment in 2013

The article is just over 5,300 words and costs $20.

Please note: This article was released in January, 2013.