Everywhere on Earth, the Moon is lighting up the night skies, visible against even the brightest cityscape, reflected in oceans, seas and lakes, and making its presence known in our consciousness. So palpable is the Full Moon that a recent scientific study has proved the observation of many astrologers — that ‘normal’ sleep patterns change during this phase of the Moon’s cycle, and people tend to stay up at night.
This lunation, exact Thursday at 7:21 am EDT (in effect, overnight Wednesday to Thursday in most of our readers’ time zones), has many unusual attributes. The Moon has a special resonance with Pisces, since it has a profound influence on the tides.
This Full Moon is in the last sign of the zodiac, and taking place at the end of a mutable sign (the Sun is in late Virgo, another mutable sign). It’s the last Full Moon of Northern Hemisphere summer (autumn in the south). As such, it heralds the change of season, which takes place just three days later. This is the week that day and night finally balance out, as the Sun has been moving in a southerly direction along the horizon (toward the equator) since June 21.
The Full Moon is exactly square the Galactic Core. That is, the Sun and the Moon align at a 90-degree angle to the heart of our galaxy, which is in late Sagittarius. This may give the week a mystical feeling, as the Sun is already well within range of the GC, picking up its ‘behind everything’ sensation. The Galactic Core can be elusive; in a sense, it’s the essence of cosmic mystery, fitting nicely with the Pisces theme.
There’s one last attribute of this event that’s pretty special: the Full Moon is conjunct a newly-discovered planet called Salacia. By new I mean discovered this time of year in 2004, orbiting our Sun just a bit beyond Pluto. Salacia was the Roman goddess of the calm sea. She’s associated with the salt in ocean waters, and was a nymph with whom the god Neptune fell in love. But she eluded his desire, for a while, anyway, until he sent a dolphin to go get her — and then they were married and she became the Roman goddess of the sea.