Between tiredness, two naps, a rose hibiscus solar infusion that goes from pink to red, a green LEE halterneck, cold matcha swirls, two drops of green hair oil for my calves, a gifted Venus in Aries retrograde coded book on rebel spirits, I finally lay down on the black leather couch with a furry cushion on my chest, wondering when my strength left me, wondering how I’ve ended up in another 12H moment, Pluto right on my Moon, in the midst of Venus’ disappearance from our skies.

Here are so many points of separation, apart and away. A tear that wells up and falls, another wave that rises and drops. Under an exalted Moon in Taurus ruled by an exiled Venus, I reach still toward connection - my body wrapped in the lapping waters, the sun hot on my face, my sister at arms length.

My mother keeps asking: what sea is this?

The Bass Strait, I reply. But first and foremost - the waters that first held us.

On the second consecutive warm day, I decide on coffee and pistachio gelato, two scoops of Venus by the sea.

꩜

I wonder how we get up and go when we don’t feel like it, when our mood ebbs and recedes at low tide and your beach is left with islands of sand, speckled with seagulls waiting for penguins to waddle back to their burrows.

I cannot tell you again what my tears are saying today, if in this now moment, are they saying something different? Most likely, always. My therapist asks me what my heart might need from me now. I place my hands over my heart, and in two moments the tears arrive.

I am surprised by how I am still surprised by the simplicity of this work, of how directly asking our body-mind-heart yields exactly the answer for this moment.

Lately I have been thinking about Venus in Aries as the direct ask. Me - whose natal Venus sits opposite in Libra - can waffle on in many polite indirect ways to get to the point. I relish the lyricism of dancing with desire and yet, the sexiness of a speedy Mars-ruled Venus is how we subvert social niceties to cut to the chase, to get to the bedroom, to slice through all the made up rules.

The Venus that doesn’t always behave in what we deem socially acceptable, the rebel that does what we wish we had the guts to do first, the fighter that lets anger move us towards a loving resolution.

Getting in touch with the core of our desires first - often under a murky swamp of shoulds, have-to’s, obligations, expectations, responsibilities, rules.

With a subversive smile - Venus in Aries says, fuck that.

What are you saying fuck that to?

꩜

While Venus is moving backwards in my 12H of solitude, exile, secrets, retreat, subconscious - I feel guilt still when I lie down for a nap, after days of swimming at sea, the rhetoric of my cousin complaining about lazy people ringing in my ears, now bouncing off the part of me raring to go, coming to a still. In the state between awake and asleep, I see you walking out of the barren underworld alive.