The New Moon in Libra exacted on Saturday, October 10th, 2026, at 11:50am ET, ruled by Venus retrograde in Scorpio which is in a rather sticky square to Mars in Leo.  Bound up with the Sun, both luminaries are just several degrees past opposition to a decidedly fallen Saturn in Aries.

With the Sun and Moon dispatched by Venus hovering at 7° through its desire-hungry detriment of Scorpio, and in an inferior square to Mars in Leo ruling it, the ‘pride and prejudice’ fire-water and power struggles of these two planets color the Scales’ concern with equilibrium.

While the second decan of Libra is called ‘Sorrow’ in the Book of Thoth, this day has seen Luna wax into its third decan called ‘Truce.’  Yet as ever, some pronounced events along the worldly landscape seem to hold anything but, and as it goes with any archetypal complex, familiar Libra buzzwords such as balance, fairness, justice and peace do not guarantee such results — but rather the question of them.

It bears repeating that any given quality associated with a sign does not imply its unwavering presence, in a person born under the sign or a time in which any given planet might move through it, but rather that the ‘question of’ such a quality might present itself as archetypally relevant.

As with Libra… there is no such thing as a perfect peace, and so we see the Scales make their adjustments as more is revealed in the descent of the year, Libra the beginning of autumn’s wistful exhalation… as more events come to bare the character of the actors in the stories moving through them.

Coercion on a college campus — retrospective regret, or insidious violence?  A botched execution — spare the victim, or double down on the guilty?  Death by firing squad, America’s first military execution since 1961 — different because the penalty was decided by court-martial, or dangerous because the Defense Secretary recommended the means and announced it will be live-streamed... another harrowing precedent in the United States’ increasing desensitization, like a frog in boiling water perhaps?

Last weekend saw an opposition of Mars in Leo to Pluto in Aquarius, still quite resonant, with Pluto more enduringly square to Venus as Mars moves past their early degree entanglement.

Mars is the blade, the bullet, the hot-knife, the incision, the exit wound, the carnal dimension of any act… and in Leo — pride, dignity, visibility, witness… whether proper light is cast on something.

Pluto is the unseen, the psychic debris, the gutter, the taboo, the suppressed, the shadow, the underwater pressure cooker… that which might burst forth if it goes unintegrated, if for too long it is pushed from the edges of the conscious mind… in Aquarius — rebel, iconoclast, pariah, outcast, periphery… and a sign well associated with both thought and technology, mental health and broadcast alike.

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While Venus finds its yin home in Taurus, where beauty is experienced more in earthen pleasure and aesthetics, Venus’ yang home is Libra, where beauty expresses itself as a principle of harmony, with an emphasis on thoughtful evaluation.

Saturn, the Roman god of harvest, the Greek ‘Kronos’ or Father Time, exalts in Libra.  That the planet of melancholy, death, grief, and rebuilding from disaster is traditionally exalted in Libra’s considering eye, its equilibrating gaze… surely this says something about there being no beauty without structure, no fulfillment without loss, and the balance found in the inevitable finality we all reach.  So too can perceived justice not be carried out without human err.

Permeating everything from interpersonal relationships to the most political of worldly concerns, no matter the desire, allure or ardor; the deed, gravity or fallout; the judgement, penalty or price; we see how wires can be crossed with Venus, Mars and Pluto so entangled in the cauldron of this New Moon in Libra.

The Sun and Saturn, fallen in the signs of each other’s exaltation, swap executive agency and the beauty of holding oneself with dignity amidst bombardment.  With so many planets in debility, the Moon renewed yet soon waxing into Scorpio, it’s a fitting weekend to lay low and bide one’s power across the year’s sighing descent.

As it goes… swim well stargazers.


—A.B.