New Moon in Leo: Inspiration for the Fires of Lughnasadh

'Lughnasadh' by Danu Forest

New Moon in Leo: Inspiration for the Fires of Lughnasadh

Moon conjunct Sun- 7/31/19 @ 10:11pm CDT

This New Moon, the beginning of the Grain Moon cycle, initiates a new season we celebrate with fire festivals. The Four Fire Festivals that celebrate our seasons are Imbolc (Winter becoming Spring), Beltane (Spring becoming Summer), Lughnasadh (Summer becoming Fall), and Samhain (Fall becoming Winter). In the Northern Hemisphere, we enter the Fall (firing up the beginnings of Harvest)...while in the Southern Hemisphere, they enter the Spring (firing up the beginnings of Renewal). No matter where we are on Earth, this is a time of giving and receiving gratitude for what has transformed throughout the past season. Our friends in the Southern Hemisphere have endured the Long Nights and we in the North have endured the Strong Sun. This doesn’t mean we don’t see the effects of the cold or the heat at these times. But this is the promise of the new phase entering our awareness. That is what we celebrate when we connect to these Earthly cycles.

Lughnasadh art by Paul Sims

Many of my ancestors knew this Festival of the First Harvest as Lughnasadh, a celebration of the Sun King, Lugh. In honor of this festival my family and I celebrate from sunset of July 31^st to sunset of August 7^th, I call the lunar cycle in August the Grain Moon. In the homelands of my Earthwalk in this body of mine...this Moon has names like Green Corn Moon or Dog Days Moon (referring to the days when Sirius, the Dog Star, amplifies the Sun’s radiance). These names resonate as well, in relation to what I learn from Earth and Sky where I live.

In the Grain Moon cycle, we begin to harvest the fruits of our labor under the fixed fire of the Sun in mid-Leo. On August 7^th, Sun reaches 15 degrees of Leo...which is Celestial Lughnasadh. This is why the Kavi family celebrates this festival of fire for the first week of August, rather than just one calendar day.

This Lughhasadh (pronounced LU-na-sa, and often spelled ‘Lunasa’ too), my husband and I are embarking on a ‘Wagons West’ road trip with our kids to visit family in Oregon. This is also a 10 year anniversary trip, where we’ll be returning to one of the destinations of our Honeymoon road trip down the West Coast. Our kids haven’t been there with us yet, so they’ll be celebrating an initiatory journey with us as their guides. As we camp under the stars each night along our journey to Oregon, we’ll be sharing gratitude for the blessings of the season.

While we are all entering this New Moon in different ways, each experience brings something to celebrate. In light of the Solar sign of Leo, I encourage you to tap into inspired creativity and joyful self-expression.

Mercury stations Direct several minutes after Moon conjuncts Sun, and invites the Collective Mind to take pause before re-directing our thoughts forward in new ways. Here, we are focused on the message in Cancer 24 that was first activated on June 20^th. Now we see it in a new light, quieting our minds around it and allowing it to sink in. This wisdom we received in our Mercury Retrograde loop back from Leo to Cancer (between July 7^th and August 31^st) now plays out through the next two weeks to integrate the ideas from June 20^th to July 7^th that needed revision.

'Message in a Bottle' by Astrid Reiger

In our Leo New Moon/Cancer Mercury Station focus (as July becomes August), we reflect upon how we grew in heart-centered wisdom this past season (which included powerful eclipses of the Sun and Moon). We’ll have much to discuss with our loved ones, but it is also wise to hold space for the mind to find stillness. In this meditative pause, we are receiving a powerful message from the Universe. Whatever your piece of the message, in the coming weeks you will be bringing it forward into the rewards (or renewal) of this season.

Two symbols are prevalent at this time, that of our luminaries in Leo 9 and that of Mercury stationed in Cancer 24. Below, the Sabian Symbols of these degrees are illuminated...but there are other cosmic vibrations in play at this time as well.

Venus in Leo 5 is conjunct this New Moon, bringing to this lunar cycle a new way of relating with what we love and value as our Collective Feminine transforms behind the Sun. This fiery Leo stellium of Moon-Sun-Venus is in a fire trine to Chiron Retrograde in Aries 6, connecting a harmonious channel for healing with Self-Love.

The Leo Stellium is also in a fixed square to Uranus in Taurus 7. This is the degree Uranus is slowly pausing in now to eventually station retrograde on August 11^th. In its higher vibrations, this activation of Uranus with Venus and the New Moon can bring enlightening revelations about the spiritual source of the power within our earthly bodies. Earth (Taurus) and Fire (Leo) activates what inspires us to move and create in the world around us. This square challenges us to put such inspiration into physical manifestation. Lower vibrations of this fixed square can involve stubborn resistance to necessary change squaring off with a restless dissatisfaction with how things are...a recipe for volatility. But, ultimately, this is a highly creative and innovative vibration. It is best used in ways that inspire us to do what needs done throughout the Grain Moon.

Moon and Sun in Leo 9

Installation art by Dale Chihuly at Omaha's Joslyn Art Museum

The Sabian Symbol for this New Moon is ‘glass blowers’. This is a symbol of bringing inspiration into new form. Glass blowers take the physical remains of the past (sand), heat it the activating fires of transformation, and shape it into a new form with the breath of life force energy.

This artistic process originated with the Syrians around the 1^st century BCE and has inspired many cultures to create beautiful (as well as useful) glassware.

Photo of Mason Overbey at work
by Kaylyn Hoskins at Fire in the Flatlands

This degree symbol suggests that we use our skills and the tools available to breathe life into whatever project we are initiating in this Grain Moon cycle. Whether we are taking grains of sand to create glass, grains of the first harvest to create bread, or grains of ideas to create something new in our lives...allow yourself to be inspired.

I have had the pleasure of watching a friend create beautiful pieces of glass, and what was most apparent was the focus it took to bring this process to a finished product. A whole festival was moving and sounding off around him, yet he was able to focus in on his craft with expert concentration. Focus is a Latin word which means ‘hearth’...which again brings up the fire of inspiration. Focus is also exactly what Mercury brings us when stationing to re-direct.

Mercury in Cancer 24

The Sabian Symbol for this degree is ‘a woman and two men, castaways on a small island in the South Seas’. In this pause, we are contemplating the road ahead. We have some options to consider. We may feel pressed for immediate response, but there is need for this reflective pause. In order to move forward, we will be integrating the emotional, mental, and spiritual parts of our minds toward an inter-dependent resolution.

For those feeling this Mercury station strongest...there may be some triangulation dynamics to understand, or some decision looming that is as weighty as choosing between two equally dear, but individually different, lovers. As the Interior Conjunction of Sun and Mercury on the 21st illuminated, the purpose of this Mercury revisit is to see a different perspective as we weigh our options. Moving forward, in the epilogue portion of Mercury’s retrograde journey, we will be integrating these lessons as Mercury starts regaining forward movement.  First we must quiet the mind and sync in to its medicine.

Love and Gratitude,

Felina Lune Kavi