On the Erotic Ecliptic for May 2025
Putting the Power of the Erotic to Good Use
May 2025 Dates to Note
May 2nd: Venus conjunct Neptune in Aries at 01°08 (1:07 pm ET)
May 4th PLUTO STATIONS RETROGRADE at 03°49’ Aquarius (11:27 am ET)
May 5th: Mercury in Aries sextiles Jupiter in Gemini (1:21 pm ET), CINCO DE MAYO
May 6th: Venus in Aries sextile Pluto in Aquarius (5:31 pm ET), Mercury conjunct Chiron in Aries 24°25’ (9:48 PM ET)
MAY 10th: Mercury enters Taurus (8:15 am ET)
May 11th: MOTHER’S DAY
May 12th: FULL MOON IN SCORPIO at 22°12’ (12:56 pm ET), Mercury in Taurus square Pluto in Aquarius (1:23 pm ET)
May 17th: URANUS CAZIMI/Sun conjunct Uranus in 27°17’ Taurus (7:32 pm ET)
May 18th: Mercury in Taurus square Mars in Leo (12:36 am ET)
May 22nd: Venus in Aries trine Mars in Leo (3:42 am ET)
May 20th: SUN ENTERS GEMINI (2:55 pm ET)
May 24th: Mercury in Taurus conjunct Uranus at 27 degrees (7:15 pm ET), SATURN ENTERS ARIES (11:35 pm ET)
May 25th: JUPITER IN GEMINI SQUARES THE NODES IN VIRGO AND PISCES
May 25th: MERCURY ENTERS GEMINI (8:59 pm ET)
May 26th: NEW MOON IN GEMINI at 06°05’ (03:02 pm ET), Mercury in Gemini sextile Neptune in Aries (4:37 pm ET), MEMORIAL DAY
May 27th: Mercury in Gemini trine Pluto in Aquarius (1:56 pm ET)
May 30th: MERCURY CAZIMI/Sun conjunct Mercury at 09°01’ Gemini (12:13 am ET)
Apologies for posting the forecast a few days late! I blame the interminable exhaustion that is fascism intersecting with my cycle. I’ve been in cramp hell the last few days, and I am hearing from a lot of folks with uteruses that their periods and/or perimenopause symptoms have worsened inexorably during the last 100 or so days. Gee, I wonder why?
May arrives bearing much-needed gifts. March and April were two of the most challenging months of 2025 (you don’t need me to tell you, you lived it) but we’re about to get something of a reprieve for about two months. As I write this, Venus is nestled with Neptune at 1 degree of Aries. Over these last difficult months, we’ve been cleansed by fire, with planets entering, leaving, and reentering Aries, the zodiac’s firestarter and the sign I consider the most sexual of all. (My theory on this is in my book Sex and Your Stars). Thus, I can’t stop thinking about the brilliant Audre Lorde’s Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power.
We might think of a connection to eroticism as frivolous, or merely fun, or as something we reach for only when we’ve finished our work. But what if connecting to the erotic was the work we were meant to do, especially as we fight fascism?
I love these lines from her essay: “The erotic is a measure between the beginnings of our sense of self and the chaos of our strongest feelings. It is an internal sense of satisfaction to which, once we have experienced it, we know we can aspire. For having experienced the fullness of this depth of feeling and recognizing its power, in honor and self-respect we can require no less of ourselves.”
And these lines: “In touch with the erotic, I become less willing to accept powerlessness, or those other supplied states of being which are not native to me, such as resignation, despair, self-effacement, depression, self-denial.”
More and more I believe that choosing courage in our fight against fascism is fucking SEXY and arousing. Whether we’re aroused by someone else’s choice to join the fight or turned on by our own courage as it begins to grow, this, to me, is an aphrodisiac. Like when Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel marched with MLK Jr. from Selma to Montgomery and later said, “I prayed with my feet,” I want everyone to experience what I’ve always felt while marching with my brothers and sisters for justice across the years: wildly turned on by the very idea that together, our bodies moved in unison to create a better world for all. One might call it an orgy of justice (and you know the Christian Nationalists would hate that.)
Neptune in Aries, as a generational planetary narrative, could mean a war of ideals. But what if the planet of the oceanic, as a higher octave of Venus, really wanted us to dance with our lust for life? Later this month, somber Saturn also enters Aries for the first time since 1999. More than anything else, Saturn wants to be of use. This reminds me of a poem by Marge Piercy, one of my favorite poet/novelists.
To be of use
By Marge Piercy
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.
This tension of erosion (Neptune) and construction/constriction (Saturn) will be co-present in the Aries house of our charts in a very noticeable way during the next few months, as Saturn dips a toe into this sign before both planets return briefly to Pisces this fall. This might feel like trying to light a fire with wet wood, rubbing rocks together until our hands are raw, then giving up in frustration. For some, it will mean hiding out in what feels like “normal life” — and that will be easier for those with money. But for the rest of us, which is to say most of us, we’ll have to figure out how and where to fight; how to be of use. I’ll come back to Neptune and Saturn and their co-presence later in the year, and as they wind up to their exact conjunction early in 2026. If you want to know more right now, read the Saturn/Neptune section from my 2025 forecast.
Pluto stations retrograde at 3 degrees of Aqaurius on the 4th, closing a heavy curtain and putting itself to sleep in a more recessed corner of our consciousness until the fall. Some of the relentlessness of this transit might lessen in the coming months, but ignore Pluto’s churning in the background at your own peril. The AI of it all will get very loud again in July, when Uranus moves into Gemini and joins the chat.
Mercury in Aries moves into a sextile with Jupiter in Gemini on Cinco De Mayo (a sweet moment) and conjoins Chiron the next day, letting us express out loud some of the healing we need to be doing. Mercury enters Taurus on the 10th, joining the fixed sign extravaganza.
The full moon in Scorpio is always hard (the moon is fallen here) but the lunation we experience on the 12th is somewhat uncomplicated. However, Mercury squares Pluto within an hour of the full moon, and it could make this whole enterprise feel frustrating and edgy. Emotions are intense and everything feels like a crisis when the moon is in Scorpio, and with Mercury and Pluto activated, you might want to scream in someone’s face about it. This has a road rage quality to it, so be careful out there.
The Uranus Cazimi on the 17th is remarkable mostly because it’s the last one that will happen in Taurus for many decades. A form of shock and awe might come to the Taurus-ruled house of your chart, but there is a breakthrough quality as well, as if you’re experiencing a mad scientist level of enlightenment. Note that the edgy quality of this is amplified by Mercury’s square to Mars in Leo the next day.
The 22nd is my hands-down favorite moment of May, as Venus in Aries (now direct and clear of the retrograde shadow) sweetly trines Mars in Leo. Talk about hot to trot, lust for life, and living loud in your connection to the erotic. This is a fire sign fiesta of high-level sexy. The vibes are immaculate (to me, an Aries sex writer with a fire moon). Your mileage may vary, but I recommend taking advantage of this!
The Sun enters Gemini on the 20th, softening the fixed sign square sitch we’ve been living with for the last few weeks. Then, it happens: on the 24th, Saturn enters Aries. It may not feel like a momentous boom that very day, but over the days and weeks ahead, we’ll leave behind some of the murky emo vibes of Saturn’s tour through Pisces. If you’ve struggled with a miasma of depression in the last few months or years, Saturn’s exit from Pisces could help to shift the sensation of being anchored to the seafloor. Saturn is in its fall in Aries, and it’s not going to feel like rainbows and unicorns (that’s Neptune’s territory) but you can begin to figure out how to make yourself useful by finding your inner fire now, without rushing.
The New Moon in Gemini is pretty damn splendid, falling on Memorial Day. Mercury, just after entering the sign of its domicile, moves into a soft sextile to Neptune shortly after the exact lunation. What can you manifest while at the BBQ? The Gemini region of your chart is bubbling over with possibility at this moment and during the next few days, as Mercury makes a sextile with Pluto on the 27th, and enters a Cazimi on the 30th. Cue the lightbulb over your head, Einstein. Write everything down, even the ideas that seem bad.
Thank you again, lovely readers and subscribers, for bearing with me as I reconfigure my offerings here on Substack. I’m working on another book while I cook up something you’ll love here, so watch this space. In the meantime, I have long and juicy sign-by-sign horoscopes up for my WELL+GOOD column, and you can always read my daily horoscopes there as well. HAPPY MAY!