Aug 2017
Behind the Moon
For a while now, astrologers have been looking at the transits of late summer 2017 with mixed emotions: some with dread and some with awe, but all with great respect.
Uncle Sam singled out
The Great American Eclipse, so called because its path of totality highlights the USA from coast to coast, coincides with the New Moon of August 21st. This tells us that it’s a beginning. But it’s a super-charged beginning — one that colors not only the whole month, but the rest of this calendar year at least.
Moreover, it’s the first time in 99 years that an eclipse has hit the continent with a direct trajectory of visibility. The fact that the country is experiencing a rare astrological event right now won’t come as a surprise to anyone attuned to current events.
The intensity of the political climate in the USA (see my blogs since early 2016) is not the least bit arbitrary. Cosmically speaking, the bizarre dramas unfolding in Washington have clear correlations in what the sky is doing. These are spelled out on multiple levels:
by the transits to the USA chart (this year and upcoming),- by the natal chart of the sociopathic doofus America has elected as president,
- and by the extraordinary karmic links between the charts of this man and the nation he represents.
All of these are heating up this month, continuing into the fall. This month’s Eclipse represents their boiling point.
Rare glimpse
If you’re geographically situated (1) so as to visually experience the Sun completely covering the Moon, you’ll have the chance to receive the full clout of this transit, on a total sensory level.
But if we’re psychically tuned in, even if we don’t see the eclipse with our eyes its impact will be palpable.
To access this power, we need to understand the symbolism involved. Throughout the ages, these events – their profundity signaled by their rarity – have augured the revelation of mysteries which, under normal circumstances, are kept invisible for a reason.
Eclipses like this render esoteric truths exoteric: we 
glimpse something that’s usually kept covered.
The reason eclipses have been historically approached with foreboding is because of the shock of this disparity. It was believed that the general public might misconstrue the stripping of the veil off of great truths.
This is why the Goddess created priests and priestesses, astrologers and other interpreters of divine symbols. Powerful knowledge was reserved for the initiates who had been carefully prepared to receive it.
Personal and spiritual implications
Forget about the superstitions you’ve heard about. The only thing that determines the quality of your experience is the degree of understanding you bring to it.
If your chart contains planets in the last couple degrees of Leo, the Eclipse has your name on it. Less directly but also strongly singled-out: people with natal planets in late degrees of the other fixed signs (Aquarius, Taurus and Scorpio).
Identify the part of your chart where late Leo falls, and the aspects made to it by your other planets.
This is where you have the chance to view something about yourself that is new and revelatory; something that promises to put you more in touch with your heart and with life (Leo).
The meaning of this Eclipse may not be immediately obvious to you. The retrograde planets in the sky right now (among them: Mercury, Saturn, Chiron, Uranus Neptune and Pluto) add to the subtlety and darkness of the event, by directing our attention within.
It is in the deeper recesses of our being that the message will germinate.
As with any other seed-planting, be patient. When the Sun disappears behind the Moon in the summer sky, stay open and still — the better to see what arises out of the darkness.
Note
1) You probably already know whether your locality lies in the swatch of totality; spare rooms in your neighborhood will have booked up months ago. Oregon, Idaho and eastwards through South Carolina will witness 100% coverage, with western Kentucky receiving darkness for the longest duration; parts of Northern California and Maryland will witness 80% coverage.