Our intense weekend continues unabated thanks to Pluto exerting his significant charm and challenge from the swishing tail end of Capricornia. Today Pluto squares off with Merc as prelude to his rebirth tomorrow, giving us all a great deal to muse upon.

Hang on to your horns / hats darklings, as our two galactic power players challenge each other to more than a duelling solo. Under these clanging stars arrives a weekend fairly crackling with baptism by fire in the lashing tail end of Aries. The Sun squaring Pluto always makes for interesting conversation.

As the first planet to outrun the Aries stellium, Venus' sashay into Taurus today grounds our freshest initiations in the body by reconnecting us deeply to our senses. Here what we feel inside translates the wisdom etched on our bones as sentient beings and relegates heady conclusions back to their place. Venus' home state is the realm of the sensualist and the ardent pursuit of the pleasure principle as guide to life. 

The notion of “shadow work” had been clouded for me by the overuse of the phrase. Kerrie helped me to redefine what shadow work needed to be for me… a reuniting of all the parts of myself I had denied or cut off as a survival response to pain and trauma.

Hot on the flaming heels of the new moon in Aries, Uncle Pluto is making his presence felt again. This week he claims the frame, drawing our attention backwards and forwards - and possibly sideways - to see what has changed. And what hasn't.

The Aries new moon resets the worlds that spin around us, inviting a fresh initiation sequence. Start from where you are, with all you have left and won, carrying nought more than what you can hold, trusting the flint within. A firestarter that arrives determined, the new moon is part of a stellium of planets in Aries, all of whom are willing us to begin again.

In much the same way that every full moon has a unique flavour and influence, not all dark moons are created equal either. Some initiatory months they are akin to a frenzied pop up of shadows and snark factors, misdemeanor and redirection. Insight and learning curves masquerading as what-the-fuckery, playing hard to get in the dark.

It isn't really an encounter. More like a spell cast of yearning, thoughtlessly tossed into the wind by a changing mind and a shifting heart. Mars in his twin skin and out of bounds. Venus in Aries taking her leave from the world of men. Their sextile a long distance conversation without voices. Their mutual reception a sleepover at each other's houses while the other is away.

Though you may not know it, see it or feel it yet, this week is golden. Hidden within the waning folds of the moon, lurking in dark corners we have not noticed before, tucked beneath the masks and mayhem of life as we knew it. Once upon a terrible time, nevermore.

Haul the megaphone from the watery depths darklings and raise your Titian head. Moving from Pisces to Aries, Mercury now crosses the threshold of this powerful point in the zodiac and our marvellous minds poise for welcome change.

dryad dancing today in an old friend forest, found again.

One sunny Aries day in 1983 in Kansas City, an astrologer called John Sandback was sitting in his parked car. In the space of four hours that afternoon he channelled 360 distinct images, each one symbolic of a particular degree of the zodiac. Evocative symbols that held keys and clues hinting at deeper celestial information, and the Chandra symbols were born.

Next cab off the head in the clouds rank is Mercury and Neptune meeting in Pisces, connecting through a veil of smoke and mirrors, secrets and lies. Except in this climate they are as well hidden as a baby elephant behind a telegraph pole. Motive is no longer cloaked in the emperor's new clothes. We can all see your bits now.

Vulnerability is the most likely hangover of the dreamy Libran full moon. She who invited us to a fresh union of opposites, in order to come into right relationship with all that lives outside of us. Of course that is a tall order when, like most all living through this post post-modern revolution, we are still working on internal reconciliation.

Each full moon is a revelation all of its own, casting an unrelenting light that bathes our rebirthing earth unequivocally. Little can be hidden for long from her blazing gaze. Making her presence felt well before her peak, this month's full moon in Libra is a sweet soporific conjuring beauty and balance from even the most unlikely corners.

Today Venus passes through the sun in Aries, her cazimi a total eclipse of the heart. This is an initiation into a new relationship with your generative centrepoint and too an ignition point designed to set your heart aflame. Beyond who we love and why, Venus has much to do with what we love and how.

Venus cazimi dances behind the sun and out of sight until she rises again as the evening star in May. Her superior conjunction announces her departure and disappearing act from our skies into the dark beyond. Welcome repose in the heart's sacred underworld that holds all of our stories holy. Venus' seven week journey back into our night sight can initiate us into the next season of our lives.

Hump day lands with more than a smidge of niggle and snark trailing. Even as Venus prepares for her meeting and rebirth through the heart of the sun. Even as the fresh fire of Aries dries up all the rain, if not the tears. Even as the Leo moon bolsters hearts and tosses manes. Grumpy doesn't begin to describe it. Lingering irritation, frustrating limits and finally tumbling out hard truths could all make their needling presence felt today, as Merc and Mars square off from their corners of the zodiac.