Venus now in Libra

Venus has moved back into Libra, retrograde, and stands at its last degree. Libra is Venus's own sign, where the old tradition holds that a planet acts more strongly. Retrograde, that strength turns to review: people and matters from the past tend to return, and what one wants from a relationship gets a second look. Venus rules both ends of this fortnight, which closes today, from the New Moon in Libra that opened it to tomorrow's Full Moon in Taurus. It also stands in a T-square with Chiron in Aries and Pluto in Aquarius, so the review reaches old hurts and presses for change.

The Sun in Scorpio forms a second T-square with Chiron and Pluto, and both figures drive their pressure into Pluto. Across the oppositions, Venus seeks to relate as an equal while Chiron in Aries marks where acting alone has hurt. The Sun's square to Pluto, the closest leg in either figure, is within a degree and tightening. If it runs on pride or control, it tends to start conflicts of one's own making. Turned on one's own compulsions, it gives the nerve to face them, and Astrocábala reads Pluto's collapse and rebuilding as one work. The leg the figures share, Pluto square Chiron, leaves orb after 30 October, and both figures end with it.

Chiron is within a degree of a sextile to the North Node in Aquarius, now easing, and Venus is moving into trine with that Node, which Astrocábala reads as what is still outstanding. With Mercury newly retrograde in Scorpio, the sky keeps turning back to unfinished business between people. Chiron in Aries brings old failures up for review and opens the way to reconciling. If an old break resurfaces, Venus retrograde favours weighing hopes carefully before acting on them.

Two quincunxes, an aspect modern practice counts and the classical tradition does not, are within a degree. The Sun's, to Neptune in Aries, strains will against blur. If purpose keeps dissolving into doubt, small adjustments work better than force, and commitments can wait for clarity. Uranus in Gemini makes the other, to Black Moon Lilith in Capricorn, setting the urge to break a pattern against an unmet wish. Neptune's generational sextile to Pluto, also within a degree, is easing.

The Moon in Aries is within a degree of a trine to Jupiter in Leo, adding warmth and generosity. Its risk is promising more than one can carry.