Aquarius III: Otherworlds

Fixed air: hidden worlds, the maternal, erotic fantasies

• Atmosphere: Otherworlds

• Sign: Aquarius

• Plant: Pomegranate

• Planet: Moon + Venus

• Dates: 10 - 18 February

• Tarot: 7 of Swords

I walked out in a summer twilight

searching for my daughter at bed-time.

When she came running I was ready

to make any bargain to keep her.

– Eavan Boland, ‘The Pomegranate’

Aquarius III is lit by the Moon and wrapped in Venusian silks.

This is the sixth consecutive decan of Saturn, and it is softened by these intuitive, erotic, influences.

The combination of underworld themes and erotic fantasies are captured in the symbol of the pomegranate. I can hardly do justice to the lore of this particular plant in this potion but I enjoyed the etymological resonances of the fruit:

The word “garnet” comes from “pomegranate,” as does “grenade,” so named for the way a shrapnel scattering grenade imitates the seed-scattering explosion of a smashed pomegranate.

Not only does this fruit entice, but it also cuts, shreds, divides – the self from the other, the mother from the child, the spring from the winter, the world and the underworld. It is a symbol of the otherworld.

This is the culmination of Aquarius’s visionary journey from exile to crossing to being resident in the otherworld itself. There is no going back from the otherworld; the previous world has been lost. But what is in its place is a new world waiting to be born under the skill and care of the Aquarius III figure.