Survivor: An Interview With Joanna C. Valente

JOANNA C. VALENTE IN INTERVIEW WITH LISA MARIE BASILE

LISA MARIE BASILE: Let's talk about your #Survivor Book — it centers on survivors of all sorts, including survivors of body, gender, and physical trauma. It's deeply aligned with all of your work as a writer and, also, as a photographer — so, how, specifically, did this book come to fruition?

It was kind of an accident, to be honest. I was at a residency to work on writing (specifically, my novel Baby Girl and Other Ghosts) at Denniston Hill. On a whim, I brought my camera with me just to have a creative outlet other than writing so as not to burn myself out. I personally like to multitask with my creative projects, because it keeps everything fresh - and keeps me challenged. So, I ended up taking photos every day and began to focus on the energy around me and how that made me reflect on my own body and my own energy. How do those things merge, outside and internal energies? As a witch and tarot reader, I have always been preoccupied by these themes and thoughts, particularly when it comes to healing. A lot of dialogue around and within the survivor community doesn't always focus on healing itself, and often focuses on how it happens, what it looks like. Those are, of course, necessary parts of the process for us to understand.

But my focus is more on the individual and the individual's path to healing and fulfillment. As I took photos of the landscape, I thought about how we have abused that land, how that land soaks up energy from the people who have inhabited it. I sought to do the same with the body, so I began to use myself as a muse, largely focusing on empowering myself as a survivor, while also just trying to capture myself as a survivor in the moment, vulnerable and as I am - without crafting too ornate of a photoshoot that makes it something else entirely. For me, the key element to the project is its authenticity and truthfulness to the land and the body.

Joanna C. Valente

LISA MARIE BASILE: How did you decide to pivot from poetry to photography in this specific text? Also, cnn you talk a little more about the photos you took of yourself? Was this a move toward autonomy?

In this case, I didn't want the editorial gaze and editorialization of poetry, of language. Language is a beautiful spell, a kind of magic - but I wanted to focus on capturing something as it is, in its vulnerability and true form, rather than channeling the energy into something else entirely. In this way, however, the autonomy becomes center to it in a way that it doesn't with writing. Writing, of course, is completely controlled by its author, but a photo is an interesting, intimate collaboration between the artist and its subject, whether human or nature. In some way, it is me giving away control and autonomy to another being, and building trust, but it's also a way to gain empowering autonomy within the very choice of that relationship, and being autonomous in steering the shoot and the artistic direction.

There are captions to the photos, which does bring an element of language to the photos, to give them some context. This context, however, gives to the healing process and gives meaning to that journey. However, it doesn't give context to each survivor's journey, because those details are irrelevant. We are all survivors, and our details don't need to isolate us - however, our being and vulnerability and experience can connect us in ways that are magical. That energy is real and palpable, and we can use it for good. In a way, this book is one big healing spell, hoisting all of this energy in a hopefully positive way for people.

LISA MARIE BASILE: The idea of including an accompanying digital photo series outside of the book is lovely. It gives lots of people a chance to take part. What do you hope the overall message is, and how do you want to change the way we talk about survival and allyship?

I want to make it move beyond gender and sexuality, and those stereotypes and concepts in our head. When we talk about pain, trauma, and struggle, we often talk about it especially in those terms, which are very isolating to the queer communities. If someone, for instance, identifies as nonbinary, where do they fit into that equation? Most times, the conversation tends to focus on certain demographics and I don't think that is always the most helpful approach. I've had countless people tell me how they thought they couldn't tell anyone of their experiences, because they wouldn't be taken seriously because of their gender - or that they would be ostracized or not believed. That's incredibly painful, to feel as if you are being silenced, and then to invariably silence yourself. That creates an entirely different kind of trauma - and having a lack of support is the opposite of what should be happening.

So really, I want to break down barriers. I want people to realize anyone can be a survivor; there is no one person or body that fits the description. If we come from a place of love and empathy and compassion, rather than trying to draw boundaries and pictures of what survivors look or act like, we can unify and work together to create a better support system and community. Isn't that the point, to help each other? I realize it's not always so easy, especially because our own ideas of ethics and justice and safe spaces vary, but it's impossible, in my opinion, to build a truly inclusive and safe space if we aren't welcoming of everyone.

Joanna C. Valente

LISA MARIE BASILE: You obviously work with ritual and magic. Have you ever performed meditation, spellwork or ritual around body/healing/and gender and identity?

I definitely have. I meditate (mostly) every day in some capacity (usually in the morning) and definitely work with rituals and spells when I need to. Being a tarot reader has also been a miraculous journey for me in this regard. People often look at the tarot as being gendered, such as having masculine or feminine traits (such as the Empress or the Emperor cards). While I don't debunk anyone's relationship or reading to the cards, as every reader is a little different and has their own unique approach, looking at tarot as gender-fluid has been freeing for me. We can embody various "traits" while also not embodying one particular gender, for instance - and I use the cards in a way that feels authentic to that. How, for instance, are the cards showing me what my energy levels are like in a particular moment? How are they changing and what does that mean for me, as an entire being on a journey to happiness?

LISA MARIE BASILE: I think a lot about healing — one another, ourselves, the earth — from our daily traumas, generational traumas, and the trauma that humans have done to one another and the earth. I also think a lot about how art itself, and sharing it and including others, is an act of healing.

What are your thoughts on how writing and art can make us better?

I definitely am a huge proponent and believer that art as a whole heals us. It's therapeutic. How could it not be? It can allow you to become more self-aware of your motives, your emotions, your past, and how those things cause you to react. It can help you heal and work through trauma, finding a creative outlet to tunnel and channel your emotions. Channeling emotion is a form of magic; language is actualizing something into reality, and that is a form of magic. That is healing. When other people come into contact with that work, they begin their own relationship around it, and it can help them actualize their own feelings and experiences. The effect is endless, and it creates a spiritual community even if it's not something overtly on the surface. Any time we are connected deeply to ourselves and others, that's spiritual to me. We are channeling and exchanging energies - and that's life-saving. Being isolated is the worst thing that can happen to a human, and for me, art has always been the opposite of that, as a connector.

LISA MARIE BASILE: How can people learn more about your book and the series?

They can go to my website (joannavalente.com) and see photos, engage with the interview series, and get in touch with me if they want to talk about it or get involved. I also post a lot about it on my Twitter and Instagram (Twitter: joannasaid, Instagram: joannacvalente). I'm pretty easy to find these days.

LISA MARIE BASILE: If people want to learn more about you, where can they start?

Also my website! And social media. All of it is, thankfully, just my name, so it makes me easy to find.

Poetry by Jeannine M. Pitas

BY JEANNINE M. PITAS

June 24

Feast of St. John the Baptist

Today my head has been removed,
traded for a jug of wine, a pluck
of the lyre, a young girl's careless
dance. In Orthodox icons I hold
myself on a platter; faithful ones
bend forward to kiss. I never knew
this was the price of living
on locusts and wild honey, for preparing
my cousin the carpenter's way. Today the light 
begins its slow death; I know 
I will rise again. In two thousand years, a girl
who bears my name will dance
around a bonfire, surrounded by old men and women, 
tiniest children, dancers on stilts, young 
girls in white dresses with ivy crowns. 
She will whirl and whirl, dizzyingly dance, 
exalting in her own beauty.
The price will be her head.
A man she thought she loved
will smash her into a wall
and her head will fall off.
She will pick it up, carry it in
a backpack or purse while a replacement
is painted over the space. Years later, again
on my day, she will sit on a bench on Aliki Peninsula
beside the marble ruins of a basilica
made in my cousin's name. 
She will look at the columns and archways, watch 
summer's highest, brightest light fall
on the olive trees. I will come to her,
take her hand. When I wipe away 
the painted face, she will open 
her purse and hold out to me
the torn head she still holds. My cousin
will come to help me. We will lift it, 
place it on her shoulders, suture that wound 
as all the scarved women
lighting candles before Orthodox icons
have done for me. We will help her
to her feet, beckon her to join us
in our search for others 
who've lost their heads.

Wings of Desire

An angel whispers to readers in the library.
He's tired of everyone wanting something different.

A trapeze artist dressed like an angel
doesn't know that real angels are wingless.

I wait for my photo at the machine
and emerge with another face.

This is the world of one-shoed walkers
who shade themselves with borrowed umbrellas,

sign their names with dropped pens,
open doors with lost keys.

Stones come alive. Time can't heal. 
No, time's the illness.

The first strands of grey hair. An old photo album.
The lost storyteller, lost peace. 

The blue ocean, sky. Afternoon coffees. 
Cuban cigars. Dragons. The bed.

The world that shrinks to the size of a room.
The choir of young women who come to sing.

The grass tall enough to hide
or make love in.

The deep river you didn't find hard to cross
because your beloved was waiting on the other side.

An  immortal singer turned organ grinder,
ignored or mocked. 

Abandoned railroad tracks. The other side.
The crucifix hanging from the classroom wall.

The plaid uniform your grandmother starched.
The borders. The country with as many states

as there are citizens. Rags pledged to each morning,
folded each afternoon. Shibboleths.

Barbed wire. Private security guards.
The world in color. Sunsets, lonely rooms.

Cherry cough drops. A nurse's kind face.
Your bed. The lamp turned off. 

Panic 

I met Pan when I was 21. It's said he, god of shepherds, can be found in mountain fields, but I encountered him on my college campus, in a hidden quad behind a stone building with icicles dangling from the roof, tiny daggers. It was winter. He came alone. He struck me with his staff and gave me altitude; my insides crumpled like autumn's last falling leaf, shriveled as a sheet of ice hit my shoulder. I lay there. The snow shone gold; the treetops blazed, but no voice emerged from within them, no all-important “I am.” Just the opposite: “I am not.” This is not me. I shook and saw a strange aura around myself, a halo of gold and green. Rats and mice nipped my toes; the ground opened to reveal sharp rocks waiting to tear me into sinews and blood. Beneath them a blue sea waited to caress me and not let me go, beauty and terror both much too close. At last he turned away. It took a few minutes to trust he wouldn't be back. The mountain flattened; the blazing trees regained their green. In the distance I heard the bells of sheep, their gentle bleating. A blue sky entered my insides. I stood; I could feel the halo still around me. I could still smell the aroma of meadows after winter's melting, of soft trilliums drinking the sun between the branches of skeletal trees; I could taste the first mint leaves. Lush pastures rolled through my stomach; my heart broke into cumulus clouds; pink mimosa flowers sprung from my hands. My lungs were filled with the blueness of early spring.

Jeannine M. Pitas is a poet, teacher, and Spanish-English literary translator. Originally from Buffalo, New York, she has called many places home: Montevideo, Krakow, Managua, Toronto, and most recently Dubuque, Iowa, where she has resided since 2015. She is the author of three poetry chapbooks: Our Lady of the Snow Angels (2012) and A Place to Go (2015), both published by Lyricalmyrical Press in Toronto, and thank you for dreaming (2018), published by Lummox Press in 2018. Her translation for four books by acclaimed Uruguayan poet Marosa di Giorgio was published as I Remember Nightfall by Ugly Duckling Presse and shortlisted for the 2018 National Translation Award. Her first full-length collection of poetry, Things Seen and Unseen, is forthcoming from Oakville, Ontario-based Mosaic Press. She teaches literature, writing, and Spanish at the University of Dubuque.

---

You’re Supposed to Drown Witches by Nikkin Rader

BY NIKKIN RADER

You’re supposed to drown witches

But sometimes their gramarye is too strong
or because they can fructify, you salt their roots
what spells can be mussitated or what cities can be clogged by a nimbus
or aura too bright, why birds ululate in the morning
A daymare rising to breeze as if summerfruit or floral berrying,
slicing thru even the gravid among us, incogitant in its mechanizing ruth
To suffer them a living is a damning offense, before a lashing at wooded phallus
forest infertile in their soil by fire
A terror on gender and sucking into vortex, its evil sighting,
to be marked by deviling mammary ridge
a press for paper to burn

---

Nikkin Rader has degrees in poetry, anthropology, philosophy, gender & sexuality studies, and other humanities and social science. Her works appear in Drunk Monkeys, Coalesce Zine, Perfectly Normal Magazine, the sad bitch chronicles, Silk + Smoke, Recenter Press, Occulum, Pussy Magic, and elsewhere. You can follow her twitter or insta @wecreeptoodeep

Poetry by Danielle Rose

BY DANIELLE ROSE

Variations on Drawing Down the Moon


it is about drawing things in. i want

to be tree-roots / & lightning

striking an open field.

how first i open myself like the face

of the moon / so that i become

the face of the moon.

& into me flows the face of the moon.

goddess / descend into me

through me into the earth.

it is about remaining open like how

i want to be tree-roots / to hold

you both hopeful & ashamed

that i may be unfaithful / i imagine

that i am tree leaves & they

drink in the moonlight

& into me flows the hungry moon.

goddess / projection / demon 

whatever just enter me now.

this is how you drink

divinity / & perhaps why 

tides swell. in both there is dancing.

arms toward the sky / you drink god

then she seeps out again.

this must be how

we can bear to be so empty / so

we can be so full / so we can be tree-root

drawing ourselves into the moon.

On Dancing

these are the skills i never quite understood / the idea of celebration 

like a trip to the dentist / i understand how out of place i am 

awkward everything elbows & shoulders / awful at blowing out candles 

& my wishes were just beads of sweat a sudden dampness 

a stumble / because this was how i was taught to dance 

to step on others’ toes / but i am not awaiting extradition

i am learning how to belong to where i am / because this is the way a sewing needle 

becomes a sword / & how i stitch together myself a dance 

---

Danielle Rose lives in Massachusetts with her partner and their two cats. She is the managing editor of Dovecote Magazine and used to be a boy.

Poetry by Laura Paul

BY LAURA PAUL

Laura Paul is a writer living in Los Angeles. Previously, her work has been published by the Brooklyn Rail, Coffin Bell Journal, Entropy Magazine, FIVE:2:ONE, Shirley Magazine, Soft Cartel, Touring Bird, and featured at the West Hollywood Book Fair and Los Angeles Zine Fair. She is the author of Entropy's monthly astrology column, Stars to Stories, and since June 2018 she's been filming a weekly video series of her poetry at poemvideo.com. She was raised in Sacramento, earned her B.A. from the University of Washington, Seattle, and her Master's from UCLA where she was the recipient of the 2011 Gilbert Cates Fellowship. She can be found on Twitter and Instagram as @laura_n_paul.

Wearing Sylvia Plath’s Lipstick

BY PATRICIA GRISAFI

The dutifully hip girl behind the register at the Chelsea Urban Outfitters was sporting a ravishing shade of reddish, hot pinkish lipstick. 

“That’s a great color,” I said. “Who makes it?” 

“It’s by Revlon. The color is called Cherries in the Snow. You really can’t forget that name, can you?” 

I stopped by Duane Reade on the way home and picked up a tube, knowing full well that the lipstick would end up in the heart-shaped box in the closet where all my other lipsticks went to die. 

You know how some women wear lipstick every day as a matter of routine? They can apply a perfect lip while riding a bike, walking a tightrope, or herding ten unruly toddlers. I’m not talking about beige-y pinks or fleshy nudes, but serious, bright, punch-you-in-the-face colors. 

I’m not one of those women. 

Time and time again I’ve proven incompetent at the simple task of applying a lipstick that isn’t the color of my lip; usually, I look like someone’s grandmother in Fort Lauderdale on her fifth Valium and third Mai Tai. Still, every few months, I’ll give a new color a whirl only to frown in the mirror and return to my trusty mess-proof staple since the 90s: Clinique Black Honey. 

Would Cherries in the Snow convert me? 

I stood in front of the bathroom mirror and carefully drew on a bright, pinkish-red grin. Then I fussed a bit, cleaning up the lines with a Q-tip and some concealer. I cocked my head to the side, bared my teeth like a hyena. I imagined myself tooling around the East Village in white Birkenstocks and large black sunglasses, with a bouquet of bodega peonies in one hand and a coffee in the other. I’d give a breezy, hot pink smile and everyone would think I was quirky and chic. 

By the end of the week, Cherries in the Snow was in the heart-shaped graveyard of lipsticks past. 

The next time I heard of Cherries in the Snow was in a book. Pain, Parties, and Work by Elizabeth Winder details poet Sylvia Plath’s harrowing experience as a guest editor for Mademoiselle in the summer of 1953. Readers will recognize many of the events Plath writes about in The Bell Jar as based on the details of that summer: getting food poisoning, figuring out fashion, suffering from depression. 

There’s one mundane detail that Plath doesn’t include in The Bell Jar: her preferred lipstick: “She wore Revlon’s Cherries in the Snow lipstick on her very full lips,” Winder writers. 

I thought I knew an absurd amount about Sylvia Plath. As one of my earliest and long-standing loves, I’ve read and re-read her poems and fiction, written about her work in my Doctoral thesis, visited her homes in both Massachusetts and London, even touched her hair under the careful eyes of the curators at the Lilly Library, Bloomington. But I had missed this small, seemingly insignificant detail. 

Revlon has manufactured Cherries in the Snow for the past sixty two years; it’s known as one of their “classic” shades, along with another popular color, Fire and Ice. It’s a cult item, a relic from another era when most women wore lipstick faithfully (a fun but gross tidbit from Winder’s book: one 1950s survey revealed that 98 percent of women wore lipstick; 96 percent of women brushed their teeth). The color isn’t exactly the same as it was when Plath wore it because of changes in industry practice, but it’s pretty damn close. 

I scrambled for the heart-shaped lipstick box and sat cross-legged in front of it, fishing around for Cherries in the Snow. I held the shiny black tube in my hand like Indiana Jones held the idol in the beginning scenes of Raiders of the Lost Ark. The lipstick seemed different, changed. Imbued with special meaning. I swiped on a coat, this time imagining how Plath might have applied her makeup, what she might have thought as she looked back in the mirror. Did it change her mood, feel comforting, bestow power? 

People are interested in discovering the mundane habits of their favorite singers, actors, writers, and artists. They might even purchase a product based solely on a celebrity endorsement. I’ve always been interested in finding out what products my favorite dead icons used, as if I can access a part of their lost inner lives by slathering on Erno Laszlo’s Phormula 3-9 (one of Marilyn Monroe’s favorite creams) or spritzing myself with Fracas (Edie Sedgwick’s signature scent). Wearing Cherries in the Snow allowed me to experience a strange intimacy with a writer I admired, even more so than reading the very personal things Plath wrote about — including how satisfying scooping a pesky glob of snot from her nose feels. 

Ultimately, Cherries in the Snow did not become my lipstick, but I gained an appreciation for the shared ritual with and strange connection to Plath that it allowed me to experience. So many of the artists who have influenced our lives are gone; it feels comforting to find a bit of their essence in something as tangible as makeup. 

---

Patricia Grisafi is a New York City-based freelance writer, editor, and former college professor. She received her PhD in English Literature in 2016. She is currently an Associate Editor at Ravishly. Her work has appeared in Salon, Vice, Bitch, The Rumpus, Bustle, The Establishment, and elsewhere. Her short fiction is published in Tragedy Queens (Clash Books). She is passionate about pit bull rescue, cursed objects, and horror movies.

Poetry by Denise Jarrott

BY DENISE JARROTT

Denise Jarrott is the author of a collection of poems called NYMPH (vegetarian alcoholic press) and a chapbook, Nine Elegies (dancing girl press). Her work has appeared in Black Warrior Review, Bombay Gin, The Volta, Poor Claudia, and elsewhere. She was nominated for a 2018 Pushcart Prize and is currently at work on a series of essays in conversation with Roland Barthes' A Lover's Discourse. She lives in Brooklyn.

The Astrolushes Podcast: Skeptics, Cosmic Lessons, & Authenticity

Astrolushes is a podcast at the intersection of astrology and literature, ritual, wellness, pop culture, creativity — and, of course, wine. Expect guests, giveaways, & games — and get ready to go deep with us.

The water-sign hosts are Andi Talarico, poet, book reviewer and Strega (@anditalarico) & Lisa Marie Basile, poet, author of Light Magic for Dark Times, & editor of Luna Luna Magazine (@lisamariebasile + @lunalunamag). You can the astrolushes on Twitter, too, here.

LISA MARIE BASILE: Let’s chat about the birth of AstroLushes! I think it sort of started on a drive we took to Salem, MA, where we witched out for a weekend and visited HausWitch for my Light Magic for Dark Times writing workshop. In the car, I threw celebrity and literary names at you and had you guess their big 3 signs. You were amazingly on point! I'm wondering, besides having fun with it, what do you personally think the 'use' or 'reason' for this astro-knowledge is? I think people are generally fascinated, but we both know there's more to it.

ANDI TALARICO: That road trip and our time in Salem definitely feels like the genesis of this show! It started with us guessing celebrity's charts and now it's just a part of all of our conversations. I feel like now we're constantly wondering about writers and actors and philosophers through the lens of their astrological placements. It's a fun game but I think it also allows for a possibly deeper understanding of the art and culture that we engage with.

And engagement was how I came to astrology. My mother always read our horoscopes from the paper when I was growing up; she's a mystical Pisces who has visited psychics, believes in prophetic dreams, and finds herself fascinated by the moon. I inherited a lot of my curiosity from her. But by age 12 our household had changed considerably and it became a harder place to exist and grow in. So it's no surprise to me, looking back, why that was the time I started studying astrology.

It was a way of making sense of the world. It also gave me an opportunity to talk to people about themselves (and to keep the focus off of myself.) It made me feel like I had some sort of agency, a voice, a new authority. Now, the language of astrology, to me, is less about telling people about themselves and actually, much like my tarot practice, using the themes and ideas as lessons that we can use to fully become our best, most authentic selves. That's where it crosses over into self-care as well.

How do you feel about people who think astrology is bogus, Lisa?

Astrology…much like tarot practice, uses the themes and ideas as lessons that we can use to fully become our best, most authentic selves. That's where it crosses over into self-care as well. — Andi Talarico

LISA MARIE BASILE: I love that you say it's an engagement with everything around us. And that, as a child, it helped you navigate a very difficult world. It truly is a language we learn and then we speak, and that can bring people together in an instant. And it can help us focus on the many characteristics of ourselves. In my life, processing the trauma I've experienced through the filter of the Scorpio has been amazingly beneficial; I now look on it all as transformative, rather than destructive. 

It's also really interesting to give a name to the various inclinations and motivations for people's art or behaviors. Especially when you look at creative people, or really evil people, and you start seeing how many of them fit into a certain astrological sign, or element. It may not be scientifically proven, but that’s the sort of mystery and liminality that we derive meaning from.

I am a scientific person. I believe that reason, empirical evidence, and research is important. I live with a chronic illness, and I'm a health writer as a day job. It's important to me that information is disseminated accurately, or, say, that the injections I take have been proven both effective and safe, and that sometimes, you need medication over meditation, in order to heal.

At the same time — people need to know there’s more to health and wellness than big pharma. And there’s more to this world than what we can see. I think the zodiac allows us to approach the liminal, the intuitive, the subterranean. It does exist outside of 'objective science' and that's okay. It allows us to dive headfirst into the shadows of this world and our lives, and I think that's the key to the feeling whole — straddling both sides. Science has a place, but so does the esoteric. You can't prove love, but we all feel it. So, it's the same thing. Some things we just explore knowing that it may be obscure. I am grateful to be able to take part in the world from both stances. 

What do you think about how people can use the zodiac as a healing tool, or in daily ritual?

There more to this world than what we can see. I think the zodiac allows us to approach the liminal, the intuitive, the subterranean. It exists outside of 'objective science' and that's okay. It allows us to dive headfirst into the shadows of this world and our lives, and I think that's the key to the feeling whole — straddling both sides. Science has a place, but so does the esoteric. You can't prove love, but we all feel it. — LISA MARIE BASILE

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Sunday afternoons at home. 📸 by @michaelsterling

A post shared by Andi Talarico (@anditalarico) on Apr 7, 2019 at 10:18am PDT

ANDI TALARICO: I definitely look through several horoscopes during the morning to see what my day/week might bring me. I mean, the basis of horoscopes are transits, what the movement of the current celestial journey means in my zodiac placements, and I love that about horoscopes — how it's a constant reminder that everything changes, nothing stays still, and how cyclical life can be, for good or bad.

I like to look to the planets/celestial bodies and their assigned western astrological associations for greater personal meeting. Like, what does it mean to be represented, as I am, by the Moon? The Moon shines because it reflects the light that is given to it. I feel the same way, again, for good and bad. I also shine brightest when I'm basking in the the light of stimulating conversation and affection. I turn inward and dark when I'm not given light to work with.

Also, since the Moon transits more often than other bodies, since it's constantly waxing or waning, it serves as a beautiful remind to keep pushing forward, that this moment isn't forever, to enjoy the view and perspective before it changes yet again. It's why I have a little crescent moon tattooed on my finger — my constant reminder that the only constant is change.

How do you feel connected or represented by Pluto, Lisa? Pluto is such a symbolically important planet of creative destruction, I'd love to hear your thoughts on that!

What does it mean to be represented, as I am, by the Moon? The Moon shines because it reflects the light that is given to it. I feel the same way, again, for good and bad. I also shine brightest when I'm basking in the the light of stimulating conversation and affection. I turn inward and dark when I'm not given light to work with. — ANDI TALARICO

LISA MARIE BASILE: Oh, that’s so beautiful! When you say, “I turn inward and dark when I'm not given light to work with,” I feel that in my core! I love the idea of this cosmic duality, how it represents the shadowy quietude and the display of light. It reminds me that we are all just star stuff. It’s why I started Luna Luna! 

It’s funny you mention the tattoo, because I have one that also reminds me that things change; it’s an ampersand. Maybe that’s why you and I are so drawn astrology? That it provides a foundation we can find stability in but the fluidity we need to always be growing.

I think the fact that Pluto has been considered a planet, a not-planet, an exoplanet and whatever else, is very beautiful—a perfect and living representation of Pluto as a symbol: it dies and is reborn, and yet it remains this beautiful archetype of transformation, weathering the storms of idea and rule and order. Could literally anything be more perfect? 

Pluto is my beautiful ruler, and I am indebted to its reminders. I have always been able to die and rise. I lean into the dark and then I die. I go into dark periods of change and emerge. I almost need it more than the light. But I suppose, that is my language. The darkness becomes a kind of light that makes sense. 

I think that’s the beauty of this cosmic story. No matter what you believe or feel skeptical about, astrology’s narrative, symbolism and reminder to explore the grandness of human emotion and circumstance is all splayed out up there. We just need to look up. 

What do you think about people who say they they believe in astrology and make Huge Life Decisions around it? Do you think it’s important to figure astrology into your day to day? Jobs? Dates? Etc? Or do you think it serves its best purpose as a tool for introspection, rather than a rulebook?

No matter what you believe or feel skeptical about, astrology’s narrative, symbolism and reminder to explore the grandness of human emotion and circumstance is all splayed out up there. We just need to look up. — LISA MARIE BASILE

ANDI TALARICO: LOVE this: "...Pluto as a symbol: it dies and is reborn, and yet it remains this beautiful archetype of transformation, weathering the storms of idea and rule and order. "

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wandering the streets, finding magic in Spanish taverns and wooden bars and long conversations and hanging flowers 💐 camera 📷 by either @lifestudies or @anditalarico

A post shared by lisa marie basile (@lisamariebasile) on Apr 15, 2019 at 8:50am PDT

As for me, I don't make huge life decisions based on astrology in the sense, that, say, I won't work with people of certain signs or judge them based on their natal chart. The idea of not dating this sign or that sign is a prejudice to me, and unfair. Even knowing someone's chart information is an act of intimacy — that's private knowledge — and to use it against someone or to think you know everything about a person based on it...hell no. Absolutely not.

Can it help you locate potential challenges? Yes, I believe that. Is is exciting when your synastry is in alignment and looks positive? Of course. But we're all much more than our natal charts. We're our upbringing, we're our ancestors, we're survivors, we're our good days and bad days, we're what we've been allowed to be and what we've rebelled against. Our zodiac signs matter but they don't make or break us.

I WILL make decisions based on transits and the moon's phases, though. Like, new beginnings during the new moon — that just makes sense to my entire being, both my physical and spiritual self. I definitely believe in harnessing the new energy at the start of a new zodiac phase — focus on good communication at the start of Gemini season! Make those spreadsheets in honor of Virgos everywhere! Get real sexy at Scorpio time!

But, would I, say, not send an important email when Mercury's in Retrograde? No, I try not to rely THAT heavily on astrology. I try to use it more as a guide and tool for learning than a strict rulebook. But...I also hate rules and authority in general. I naturally bristle against those who think they have the exact answers, at least in areas that don't involve exactitude and true yes or no areas. I'm a skeptical human, in many ways.

Is is exciting when your synastry is in alignment and looks positive? Of course. But we're all much more than our natal charts. We're our upbringing, we're our ancestors, we're survivors, we're our good days and bad days, we're what we've been allowed to be and what we've rebelled against. Our zodiac signs matter but they don't make or break us. — ANDI TALARICO

FANCY THE COSMOS, WINE, AND A COZY CONVERSATION BETWEEN FRIENDS? LISTEN TO THE ASTROLUSHES PODCAST HERE

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