Mars entered the cardinal earth of Capricorn today, sign of its traditional exaltation.

In Mars’ yang home of Aries, the red planet finds ease of forward movement when tempered.  In Mars’ yin home of Scorpio, Mars finds a magnetic ease of digging below.  In Mars’ exaltation of Capricorn, Mars finds a cool disposition towards vertical ascent.

In Mars’ fall of Cancer, opposite its exaltation of Capricorn, the red planet might encounter that “raging against the insufficiency of care,” as Diana Rose Harper so powerfully put it.  When guesting in Venus’ domiciles of Taurus and Libra, opposite its yin and yang homes of Scorpio and Aries, Mars might be tempted to ‘bring knives to the banquet’ as the saying goes.

While Mercury maintains an 88-day orbit around the Sun and Venus a ~224-day one, the red planet’s chaotic loop around our star, tattooed on my right shoulder, is one lasting ~686 days.  It promises a retrograde every 26 months, the most recent having carved up the last several weeks of 2022, contributing to Mars’ long stint in Gemini from August ’22 through March ’23.

Today’s emergence of Mars from the brilliant yet peregrine pulse of Sagittarius and into the authoritative grafting of Capricorn holds its own wintry bouquet of goodness.  It’s likely that one will feel a bit more consistent momentum in the externalization of the willpower for this stretch, as Mars traverses Capricorn from January 4th to February 13th.

This period is in the spirit of ‘resolutions’ / progress far more than any vibe the past few weeks, as 2023 rounded out with a retrograde Mercury, still in its debility of Sagittarius, squaring Neptune the second of three times, and a passing Venus square to Saturn from Sagittarius to Pisces respectively.  With Mercury now direct (01/01/2024) and Mars in the sign of its greatest traditional dignity, much of November and December’s angst is melting away, or momentary merriments reconfiguring — before January later brings its own dynamic set of challenges.

Let’s look back on our recent experiences of Mars in Sagittarius, and the emotional tenor this transit may have brought to tables both metaphoric and material.

Mars in Sagittarius, Jupiter’s diurnal or ‘yang’ home, might seem like extra juice on paper, but extra juice isn’t always what Mars needs.  A planet of momentum in a place of further fire can be unyielding.  Mars in Jupiter’s yang home of Sagittarius ‘goes to 11’ — perhaps an attractive velocity, but equally an attraction of trouble — if not equally spirited contradiction.  The wanton word spoken too soon is the other side of just one coin in Jupiter’s gleeful gambit.

Compared with the tempered trot of Mars in Capricorn, Mars in Sagittarius can run roughshod over the other with hyper-positivity.  The ‘road to hell is paved with good intentions’ surely describes the most tyrannical yet charismatic of despotism’s well documented fire sign placements.  A blaze of spirited philosophy and hyper-affirmation of the inner vision, Mars in Sagittarius can risk running roughshod over other opinions, thought-forms… even belief systems, cultures and peoples, with scorched earth left behind.  It blazes forward not always examining its wake, so fervent are the blinders of the Idea.

Think hard about how much of the last three months, say since October 7th, saw Mars in Sagittarius as the context for the implicit violence that can be wrought by zealous belief.  Impassioned convictions can be quite good, but those which literalize the land to which we all belong scarify, raze, render beyond barren.

With Mars now in its exaltation of Capricorn, we temper what was that feverish arrow of philosophical and visionary brilliance, with all the fuel it brings yet chaotic cost to the temperament… the arrow which soars must come down, and we are faced with potentially manic depths at our failures, at targets not quite hit; our own violences, and the violence of others, perhaps even those born of the unrelenting vehemence of an idea or conviction.

More medicine would be to remind that brazen declaration of one’s character flaws does not make it acceptable to keep embodying them.  Mars in Sagittarius is a place of mythic movement itself, yet the talk can far outpace the walk… its spout is one of visionary suchness, of truth outside external time.  Mars in Capricorn walks, it scales, it embodies step after step, fiery edges soothed by soils at the mountain’s foot.

Mars in Jupiter’s yang home is capable of both fierce ideological warfare, and excessive escapism from the fervency of its convictions… both extremes are dangerous.  Even while moving in alignment with one’s purpose and convictions, simply to be in control of oneself can be a feat for Mars in Sagittarius.  Mars in Capricorn helps contextualize the fervency of our minds and hearts, scaling to survey from heights maintained far longer than the soaring arrow.

To extract an egoic pride from ‘knowing the way’ or ‘knowing better’, yet to choose in spite of this knowing… is ‘diabolis’ — root of the word diabolical — opposite of symbolis…  to divide from the symbol, to move away from the perfect image or inner vision you were delivered in your heart-mind.

Mars in Capricorn here will help us further walk our talk.  Mars in Sagittarius makes strides of shimmering integrity, but can falter at the doorstep of the consistent effort we need right now.  Whatever arena of one’s life… one’s hopes, dreams, or wishes for the world… find those strong footholds, and make the ascent.

Swim well stargazers ~

—A.B.