Maya Angelou

Photo Mosaic

Maya Angelou rose again and again, a woman whose whole life was a phoenix act. Born with the Sun in Aries, she carried the archetype of the pioneer-warrior, the double leader, the self-starter who gets back on the saddle no matter what the universe throws down; she cast light and left a lasting mark wherever she went. That Sun burns in the eighth house, the Scorpionic realm of death, rebirth and buried things, and no placement tells her story more truly: a girl who knew too young how cruel humans could be, who fell silent and then found language, who transmuted the deepest darkness into I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings in 1969 and became the phoenix at its healthiest.

Her Moon in Libra was a beautiful, Venusian Moon, drawn to harmony, fairness and the golden rule; it fed the civil rights work she shared with Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, and the exquisite balance of her verse. Sitting in the second house, that Moon tied worth to survival, and she lived it, moving through many hard trades before her words made her value plain. Her Leo Ascendant was the regal mask, the torch-holder with unmistakable presence; in 1993 she stood at Clinton's inauguration and recited On the Pulse of Morning, holding the light for everyone behind her.