Full Moon in Virgo February 27 2021 1:17 am MST
The February full moon was known as the Snow Moon, and by some North American Indigenous tribes as the Hunger Moon or Storm Moon.
(Side note: Many of these ancient names for the seasonal moons were the same across much of the Northern Hemisphere, including both Europe and North America. Reinforcing the way these cultures were probably much more connected than some ideologies—white supremacy—would like us to consider.)
The full moon sits at 8º of Virgo and opposes the sun in the opposite sign of Pisces (full moons are always oppositions between the sun and moon). Venus joins the sun in Pisces (where she is exalted), bringing blessings and a connective, relational-oriented feel to this moon. All in all, this full moon is a lovely bit of sky I think we could all use right now.
Virgo is the sign of details, of the minutiae, of organizing, sorting, and clearing; the sun is in Virgo during late fall and points to the season of harvest, of sorting the wheat from the chaff, and storing and planning for the long winter ahead. Virgo is also the sign of the Virgin—a word historically related to dedication to the goddess, to spirituality, and to a sense of wholeness, of choosing self and relationship to divinity, and nothing whatever to do with whether someone has had sex or not.
The sign of the Virgin is one of devotion. Of the daily practices and rituals that commit us to and enact our devotion to something larger than ourselves—to our larger place in the universe and to our grander visions and goals.
Pisces, on the other hand—where the sun currently sits and Venus floats nearby—is that larger, grander vision. Pisces, the fish, encapsulates the expansive ocean of the subconscious, the great cosmic soup from whence we all came and to which we’ll all return—and to which we remain in contact during our life on earth through our dreams, poetry, visions, and music.
The balance the Virgo-Pisces axis asks us to strike is between the micro and the macro, the mundane and the sacred.
The challenge here is to neither lose the forest for the trees (as Virgo can be wont to do) nor to drift so far into the cosmic waters that we forget to keep schedules, meet deadlines, exercise, even eat (Pisces)!
This axis reminds me of a quote from Rumi: “You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.”
This is the Virgo-Pisces paradox, in the vastness of our smallness, and the tininess of our grandiosity. It asks us to hold both giant cosmic awareness, and the mundane tasks of taking out the garbage and making to do lists, in our mind’s eye, at once. And to value both with love and honor.
The gift these signs offer us, when we work with their guidance and use them well, is the ability to use Virgo’s rituals, practices, and the beauty of daily routines and details to connect with, empower, and bring to earth the creative and healing power of Pisces’ waters.
The sun in Pisces and moon in Virgo invite us to remember the pleasure of practice, of finding joy and nourishment in the small daily acts of care for ourselves, our work, and our larger goals and dreams.
If Pisces is the ocean of our largest visions and our divine beingness, Virgo focuses on the daily drops that ultimately build into that fullness. The ocean is made up of those tiny drops; it does not exist without them.
Nature is the best model for this—there is as much beauty, as much attention and care, in the whorl of the tiniest flower petal as there is in the grandeur of the tallest mountain. It is in the smallest details, the most mundane of our moments, that we find the divine.
My February Rant…
For me, February is always a difficult month. It’s deep winter. It contains both my mother’s deathday and also her and my grandma’s birthdays, so it’s also a big month of generational and ancestral moods and messages. Sometimes, especially when I’m not paying attention to it and working with it, it arrives in the form depression. Or anxiety. Or my favorite, the two-for-one special.
But when I do pay attention to it, to the emotions and sensations rising up in my body during this month, allow space for them, recognize them—it can add a dreamy, ethereal, otherworldly quality to my life, my thinking, and my art.
It can be hard to meet deadlines, but fantastic for witnessing and moving toward healing with personal and generational wounds. And a powerful time for daydreaming and dreaming about new creative visions, and new worlds.
This year, well… this year. This year February felt like my pandemic bonk month. And I know I’m not alone. I just kept going and going and finally, just, bonked. Just hit the fucking wall. Just couldn’t keep producing and pretending and trying to live and work in normalcy. I am exhausted at pretending.
I read a tweet from Benjamin Perry (@FaithfullyBP) that said: Never feel bad for not being “productive” when you read about 500,000 people dying. Soul anguish is what happens when grieving rituals are replaced by normalcy rituals. Don’t “power through” the heart of your humanity.
And wow, that hit.
I’m exhausted by our government and the $2000, now $1400, checks they haven’t sent, the $15 minimum wage they won’t pass. Children are still being kept in cages. Black people are still being murdered by police and police are still not being held accountable. Privatized utilities left millions without power. Over 500,000 people have died. Just… When you stop and let it hit you. It hits you hard.
I am trying to find rituals for the soul anguish.
I have spent much of the month cocooned in a blanket of music—the most Piscean art. There are many times when I need silence in my life, but this month, I’ve needed to bathe in music, almost constantly. Sometimes to dance and feel better, sometimes to wallow and cry, and sometimes just to lie there, eyes closed, and just drift in sensation and feeling.
And that can be wonderful, but I can also get lost in that—I, as a fellow water sign, can be very adept at losing myself into emotional fogs that can merge quite quickly from nurturance into indulgence, avoiding reality, and ultimately, more depression.
This Virgo moon supports us to get grounded (Virgo is an earth element sign) in the details and the practices that keep us tethered, even while we float in Pisces’ waters.
Ritual and Writing Prompts for the Full Moon
Full Moon in Virgo Ritual
The ritual, then, for the Full Moon in Virgo, focuses on centering daily Virgoan practices and routines that focus on the pleasure, and nourishment, and creative impulse of Pisces.
1. Create a daily practice that nurtures the emotions of Pisces through the mundane acts and organization of Virgo.
Here is mine, for example: Wake up. Let the puppy outside. Go back to bed, meditate in the warmth of the covers. Get up. Light incense and/or a candle for the earth spirits and the ancestors, put water and offerings on the altar. Drink coffee in a comfy chair while looking out the window. Write, for as long as feels good or until someone interrupts you or you begin to worry about the “other” “real” work—write the novel or anything else, but write. Stretch, walk, dance, do qi gong, or move. Then, begin the day.
2. Commit to this practice for the next two weeks. (I always find it easier to stick to something when I know there’s an end in sight. If it becomes comfortable and nourishing though, you can always stick with it.)
Writing Prompts for the Full Moon
Journal Writing Prompt
- What are the small practices and tasks that help keep me grounded and connected to myself and my larger sense of creative purpose? (Virgo)
- What lessons have I been learning lately through my emotions, my visions and goals for the future, and my dreams (literal and metaphorical)? (Pisces)
Fiction Writing Exercise—The Rules of Magic
Use this Virgoan energy to explore and solidify the rules of your world with this exercise.
Jeff VanderMeer talks about how fantasy worlds need to have a “consistent and coherent logic.” “Even Alice in Wonderland—especially Alice and Wonderland—has a kind of perfect or absurd logic to its setting: It adheres to internal rules and doesn’t break them,” he says.
This rule applies equally to the technology or science of sci-fi and the magic or fantastic of magical realism and fabulism.
1. Give one of your characters a magical ability, skill, superpower or object; this could also be a highly advanced technology that doesn’t exist in “our” world. Consider briefly what the power is and what the “rules” that govern it are—what can and can’t it do? what are its limits?
2. Now write a scene in which we see this power or tool in action, in use. Resist explaining how it works, to either the reader or another character, but do your best to convey what it is, how it works, and what some of its limitations are—through showing in the scene. How do characters around react to it? Is it commonplace in the world or surprising?
3. After writing the scene, make a list of “rules” for the magic of this character/object, and for the world in general (these may need to be two different lists).
4. Consider after: what are the implications of this on the world, is this an isolated occurrence or part of the world, and what more do you (or we as readers) learn about the world from this aspect of it? Also, what are the implications of this power on the individual level, for this character? Is it actually a magical or super power, or a liability/vulnerability (or… how is it both)? How does it affect (and/or describe) the power dynamics of the world on both the social and personal levels?
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash