The north and south nodes of the moon are often associated with a dragon motif. According to Vitali, the north node is called Caput Draconis while the south node is called Cauda Draconis.
I’ve seen the north node compared to the mouth of the dragon and the south node compared to the tail of the dragon. In this analogy, it’s often said that the north node is where you eat, what you feed on, what nourishes you, and what you should look for to keep you going. On the other hand, since the south node is the ass of your chart, it represents where you release and eliminate things. For example, a person with north node in Sagittarius and south node in Gemini might feel fed by politics and release bad or good feelings by writing them down or talking them out.
In another dragon analogy, the north and south nodes are compared with the ouroboros symbol, which features not one but two dragons biting each other in the ass. The dragons represent the northern and southern hemispheres of the earth and the nodes the place where the moon’s path crosses over. Thus, the nodes are the places where the dragons are biting one another. Sometimes, the dragons are gendered as well but, most of the time, the symbol is just about how we get to the north node through the south node and to the south node through the north node. It means that the oppositional nodes are really talking about the same thing, but pointing in opposite directions. For example, for someone with nodes in Cancer/Capricorn, both nodes are concerned with achieving security with control. Cancer just tries to achieve security by controlling the internal—how you feel, where you go, who you let in—while Capricorn tries to achieve security by controlling the outside—other people, your public image, how you project.
Abu Ma’shar and Ali al-Qabī'sī say that Cauda Draconis, or the south node, diminishes the strength of all the other planets, benefics and malefics included while Caput Draconis, or the north node, increases the strength of all the other planets, benefics and malefics included. This goes against the modern astrological interpretation of the nodes, which assumes that the south node represents our most toxic behaviors while the north node represents our most evolved behaviors. Too often, modern astrologers tell clients that going towards north node automatically means more success. I’ve been guilty of doing this too. The association between north node and positivity and south node with negativity is particularly weird when you consider the realities of global north hegemony.
But what do benefics and malefics actually mean? I’m going to write about this more in my upcoming book but the benefics, Venus and Jupiter, are associated with state power. In contrast, the malefics (Saturn and Mars) are associated with enemies and rivals to that power. Since the north node increases the influences of the benefics and malefics, it increases your confrontation with power.
What does this have to do with Draco Malfoy? Vitali writes that Sagittarius and Gemini obey Draconis. The north node is actually considered to be dignified in Gemini. Is it really a coincidence that Draco Malfoy just happens to be a Gemini sun? I believe that, by looking at Draco’s storyline in Harry Potter, we see a lot of the themes that often show up when working with our nodal axis.
In Harry Potter, Draco begins as an annoyingly elitist little kid who comes from an aristocratic family. Throughout the story, we see the Malfoys as the quintessential pureblood family with all the biases and bigotry that purebloods are said to have. It’s often pointed out that the Malfoys are not Voldemort’s most loyal followers, as Draco first attempts to befriend Harry Potter in his first year. It’s obvious that what the Malfoys are after is pretty much just power, regardless of whatever ideology that power comes out of. However, the story of the Malfoys in their ever increasing attempt to acquire more power is really a story of them gradually losing more and more power. In the end, when they see the Voldemort will lose to the Gryffindors, they betray him and run away. Supposedly, this saves them from being tried as Death Eaters to the end and we see Draco picking up his kid with all the other people in the epilogue.
What does this story about a kid who loses power the more he tries to acquire power teach us about the nodal axis? Is the moral of the story a quaint point about how we should not try to achieve any power and rest satisfied about the status quo as it stands? That seems a bit bourgeois, doesn’t it?
As much as I’m sure that JK Rowling meant for her books to have this kind of bourgeois moral, I believe that these characters exist in the imagination of all of us. In fandom, Draco is often portrayed with a redemption arc. This is why the Draco/Hermione ship is so popular. The idea is that, Draco as a little kid grew up in a position of huge socioeconomic privilege but when he fully embraced his far-right ideology and supposed source of that power, he began to lose his power. The choice, for Draco, is not to avoid any discussion or confrontations with power but to redefine it. We want to redeem Draco because we wish that Dumbledore had reached out to him more, that Dumbledore didn’t hate all Slytherins so much, that the institution of Hogwarts didn’t isolate while validating the stereotypes and ideologies around the Slytherins. We want him to understand power differently, not through his far right ideology but through something like compassion, not to deny its existence altogether. In order for Draco to do this, we recognize that the institutions he lived in needed to change. Draco has his north node in Leo, just like Harry, meaning that Draco, as Harry’s character foil, is showing us something about Harry’s own power confrontation through redefining heroism.
The north node is not some kind of magic pill that automatically makes you successful. If Draco were getting a consultation for his natal chart, the last thing that an astrologer would want to tell him is to embrace the type of heroism that he is already hungry for, as a north node in Leo. Draco gets a push towards his north node in Half Blood Prince, when he is sent on what he sees as a heroic mission to kill Dumbledore. However, what his north node in Leo means in this scenario is not that he achieves what he sets out to do but that this push towards his north node forces him to confront the power and privileges that he’s simply taken for granted ever since he was born. It forces him to re-evaluate his south node in Aquarius or how he defines his social network and, assumingly, Draco isn’t as keen on befriending former Death Eaters at the end of his journey as he was in the beginning.
Just like Draco’s heroic mission brought out the more ruthless aspects of the life that Draco had always taken for granted, our north nodes represents things that we can be rather ruthless about (ambientastrology also writes about this). That’s exactly what happens when the benefics and malefics are magnified. We start taking our privileges for granted and, simultaneously, start to feel like we will never win if we engage in authentic struggle. Harry Potter, who shares Draco’s north and south nodes, is always wary of the fame and heroism that other people read in him. Similarly, we might be afraid of what our north nodes represent. There’s a good reason for this. As Harry was instinctively aware, the north node represents something that we could potentially excel at (heroism, for Harry) but our south nodes, like our conscience, hold us back (friendships represent this for Harry Potter).
South Node in Aries/North Node in Libra and South Node in Libra/North Node in Aries
This nodal axis is about identity, or more specifically about defining yourself through your friends or defining yourself through your enemies. It’s about defining who you are based on what is around you (Libra) or against what is around you (Aries).
A lot of the time, south node in Aries people have this kind of nihilistic punk mentality where they assume that they will never find the recognition or support that they need to fully achieve their goals. This is often not reinforced in their actual lives since their north node in Libra will make them very popular in whatever scene they put themselves into. It’s just that they often achieve this popularity by understanding themselves through a kind of underdog image and, in doing so, are afraid to embody the images that they might have of positive success. These people are able to gain popularity ruthlessly, creating social niches that feel like they are constantly trapped against society. These social niches can start to carry toxic social norms of their own, allowing violence to carry on within the group because at least it’s a social underdog. Think rapey behaviors in punk scenes where men think that they’re different than mainstream rape culture or expressing rebellion by behaving in gross ways.
North node in Libra/south node in Aries people are here to confront what power is generated through social cohesion and standards of what is normal. They’re not meant to relax their Aries selves and try to fit in better or something. They’re supposed to challenge everything that we associate with normalcy by being their punk selves. Only when they realize that there are people out there who can relate to their struggle can they overcome any self trapping antisocial elements.
People with the opposite nodal axis, north node in Aries/south node in Libra, often have the opposite conundrum. They can be really comfortable with people pleasing behaviors and automatically fall into a position where they’re forced to mediate between two enemies. They might try to achieve popularity by agreeing with the group. The north node in Aries (ruled by a malefic) means that this doesn’t work for them. When Libra south node people refuse to take a stance, they alienate more people than they intend. Instead of gaining approval, more people actually distrust them because they don’t take a direct stance. The funny thing is, Libra south node people actually do very well in situations of conflict. They’re able to create a sense of martyrdom out of their own alienation and use this to justify their own resistance to change.
North node in Aries people are here, again, to confront power and they’re meant to do this through conflict. Because they have a fear of isolation due to their north node in Aries, they must overcome this fear of isolation in order to do their mission, which is complicating the idea that one person can only stand for one thing or inhabit one distinct identity. Only when they are okay with isolation (Aries), can they define their community (Libra).
South Node in Taurus/North Node in Scorpio and South Node in Taurus/North Node in Scorpio
This nodal axis is about power. People with nodes in Taurus and Scorpio often have issues around withholding or giving their time or emotions to those people who are close to them in order to keep their sense of power. Taurus is about ownership and Scorpio is about influence.
Those with south node in Taurus are extremely practiced at withholding their emotions. They can draw a rather harsh line around what is theirs and what isn’t, seeing what isn’t theirs as a threat (Scorpio, ruled by Mars) and what is through the lens of possession (Taurus). They might understand exactly the ways in which other people fetishize them and get comfortable with perpetuating an image which reinforces that fetishization. By allowing themselves to become symbols that other people find pleasurable, they withhold their own needs. The Scorpio north node means that this pattern of withholding can give south node in Taurus people a sense of power over others. They can be very good at retaining power without giving themselves away. They might seek to prosper without giving any part of themselves away.
Scorpio north node people confront power when they really start to care about someone. The south node in Taurus means that these people have all the tools that they need to truly confound the ways in which the people around them desire things. When they become dependent on someone, as we are all meant to be when we care for people, for attention, for love, for income, for stability, Scorpio north nodes can freak out a little. They might start to feel economically or emotionally poor. The confrontation with power within intimacy is supposed to force these people to redefine what wealthy means for themselves and their communities, to find ways of building trust through building wealth.
In contrast, north node in Taurus people are afraid of money in general. They might feel like they’re not allowed to gain anything for their work or like they shouldn’t make a profit for their labor if this labor is to remain authentic. They’re always afraid of selling out even when (and I’m sorry to say it) they’re not in positions where that is even really possible. They might have grown up expected to constantly give to everyone around them freely. While north node in Scorpio people seek to control their own resources by controlling other people, north node in Taurus people might seek to control other people by controlling communal resources. Since the north node in Taurus means that they’re used to surviving on scarcity and are good at controlling money, they might justify much of their behaviors due to practical concerns. They might even feel like the role of a provider is the only thing that they’re good for.
Taurus north node people are supposed to confront power through their relationships with money. Their fear around selling out comes from their ability to sense all the power that is present in money. They have to learn how to develop a sense of self esteem so that they feel like they’re deserving of their work and that the people they work for are deserving of them. When they learn this, they can do extraordinary work by choosing who they empower by giving resources. When they don’t learn to deserve their mission, they feel as if no one, themselves included, deserves anything and either becomes resentful in their giving style or learn to withhold without reason.
South Node in Gemini/North Node in Sagittarius and South Node in Sagittarius/North Node in Gemini
This nodal axis is about defining reality. People with the lunar nodes in Gemini and Sagittarius often grow up in families where they were made to feel ideologically wrong in some way, whether this means that they were not allowed to voice their opinions, were not allowed to win arguments, or were pressured to fit into some kind of institution.
North node in Sagittarius people can be ruthless when obtaining roles within institutions, including academia or religious places. They can quickly learn the language around a certain ideology, mimic all the correct behaviors within that ideology, and become a thought leader. This ability to learn almost anything and everything can stem from a childhood anxiety that they do not think like everyone else, that their voice doesn’t need to be heard, or that there is no one able to hear their voice. This is why north node in Sagittarius people are able to write essays that argue two completely separate viewpoints or learn to constantly argue their case around issues personal to them—because they haven’t learned to believe themselves and feel the need to constantly justify their thinking to an outside person.
Sagittarius north node people often put themselves in institutions to confront power. They’re meant to clash with power inside institutions so that they face the challenging task of believing in their own experiences. Often, these people are easily gaslit because they’re taught from an early age that other people’s experiences are somehow more real than their own. When they confront power, learn to validate their perspectives, and learn that they don’t need to justify what they experience to be real, they are able to shape their own narratives and voices in a more specific way according to their own mission.
Gemini north node people, on the other hand, can be stuck in their own dogma. They might constantly seek to do real community work but have trouble with separating themselves around some kind of ideological framework and end up occupying almost a missionary-like position. They have a hard time allowing themselves to just exist as part of the community they seek learning from and are more comfortable in a more elevated position. What might be hard for observers to understand is that this doesn’t happen because they believe in their own superiority but because they’re scared that real life events can corrupt some kind of ideological purity. Think of the marxist who prefer to wait for the revolution forever rather than allowing folks whose imaginations are tethered to commercialism to exercise any kind of protest. Gemini north node people can actually be very naive even though they excel in criticality, constantly sharpening their intellectualism through critique, when they hold onto that pure idealism.
Community is the place where Gemini north node people confront power—and I mean community as in the actual people they surround themselves with and not the abstract community within marxism or Christianity. These people have to figure out how to reinspire themselves even when they’re disappointed by the bro-y marxists who don’t give a fuck about gender stuff or neoliberal feminists who attempt to seek power in the status quo that they’re surrounded by. When north node in Gemini people realize that ideas mean nothing unless they can actually be understood by people, then they start to get a lot more interesting.
South Node in Cancer/North Node in Capricorn and South Node in Capricorn/North Node in Cancer
This nodal axis is about security. People who have the nodes in Cancer and Capricorn often have issues around control. They might have grown up feeling unfairly controlled by other people or with expectations that forced them to grow up early and develop control over things that they could not control.
Capricorn north nodes are very good at business but they don’t want to believe this about themselves. They prefer to see themselves as overly tender and naive babies. They don’t want to see themselves as people who have control over their own lives and can often find ways to blame their own choices on larger structures. And they will be right, because systemic oppression does create inequalities, but they might do this blaming in a way that makes them self sabotage. Because these people may have felt like they grew up without being given a sense of control over their surroundings, or that they were controlled by other people, they’ve learned how to control invisibly. They might frame themselves as a perpetual victim, refuse to let new people in, or only go to three places in their city. Because these people are actually so good at controlling their narrative and people, being spectacular at reading people, they can be rather relentless business people. But they’ll never admit it.
Authority is where Capricorn north node people confront power. Because they seek to have control without defining what their authority looks and feels like, they think that they can escape blame if their plans fail. They prefer to work under the surface or to give their plans to other people. When Capricorn north node people own their authority and take authorship over both their failures and their successes, they regain a sense of responsibility. When they realize that they do have control and authority over other people, and that this means they have responsibility over these people, they can stop trying to control people in a reactionary way.
Cancer north node people are often burdened with responsibilities and expectations from a young age. They might develop a sense of resentment towards those who are under their care because they feel like they’re the only ones holding the family together. Because they feel like they can’t belong anywhere without earning it, they try to force community where there isn’t the capacity for any to grow. This is the person who has highly organized dinner parties where they say that they just want everyone to enjoy themselves but there are so many rules at the event that it feels like a work function. Cancer north nodes work themselves to the bone for other people because they think that, if they do, then no one can leave them. They might be big names within community spaces that just seem to do so much work for everyone else that it seems like the community could not exist if they relaxed a bit or left.
Family is where Cancer north nodes confront power. They have to confront things that their nurturing background made them believe and try to understand why the people who raised them behaved the way they did. Was their own mother orphaned at a young age and, thus, tried to steal affection from her children by pitting them against each other? Did a lack of money make their parents prioritize children with certain gender presentations? When they understand their own emotional backgrounds, Cancer north nodes will be able to understand what they need from other people, not just what other people need from them. They will be able to understand themselves from a position of needing and ask trusted people to baby them a bit.
South Node in Leo/North Node in Aquarius and South Node in Aquarius/North Node in Leo
This nodal axis is about visibility and exceptionalism. People with nodes in Leo and Aquarius either feel overly visible in their families or communities or not visible enough. They often have issues around social approval (Leo) and alienation (Aquarius).
Often, Aquarius north node people grow up as the golden child in some capacity. Maybe they presented an image of being a good girl that they knew their favorite grandma wanted to see. Maybe they excelled in school, more so than any of their siblings. Maybe they acted “badly” but earned their parents’ affection because their parents approved of a little rebelliousness. Aquarius north nodes are trapped in a label of exceptionalism, believing that they must constantly strive to achieve things that no one else from their background could. Often, they easily fulfill certain stereotypes around the word genius.
However, the stereotypes we have around the genius concept are also where Aquarius north nodes confront power. We often think of genius as different than everyone else, better, and not needing intellectual inspiration from anyone else in the community. We think of genius as someone who has ideas out of the blue and alienated from the rest of the world. Aquarius north nodes crave social approval and this tension between constructed alienation and the real need for acceptance haunts them. They can distrust the people who inspire them because they’ve been under so much pressure to prove that they’re exceptional from a young age. Aquarius north nodes must confront power within peer relationships. They must recognize that originality is always an illusion and that, when people share your ideas, that there are ways to work in support of one another. The only way for Aquarius north nodes to appreciate their own ingenuity and receive authentic applause for their creativity is to work with other people. Part of this struggle means letting go of the idea that your pain is singular and realizing that your story is impactful precisely because so many other people see themselves in it.
Leo north nodes, on the other hand are more comfortable feeling completely alienated from the world. They might have experienced certain forms of social ostracization when younger or are the black sheep of their family. They might think that the only role they’re able to perform within a group is one of being the scapegoat, or the person who everyone blames for everything. Because of this, they could be reluctant to participate in group activities or identify themselves with other people. However, they really do want attention and love just like anyone else. Since they learned that they only deserve bad attention, they might represent themselves in intentionally disturbing ways and in ways that contrast with their authentic self presentation. They’re likely to get a lot of attention this way. Think Paris Hilton who played this figure of pessimistic femininity and says that the Paris she played wasn’t really her. Somehow, she felt safer embodying a cultural archetype that she knew everyone hated as long as it wasn’t the real her. Paris happens to be born on the Leo full moon eclipse with north node in Leo.
Leo north nodes confront power through self representation. In order to represent themselves authentically, they have to release a lot of ideas that they might have around heroism and anti-heroism. They’re meant to reconfigure what being bad and being good actually means and decide which communities they are loyal to. Only when they let go of their own fears around attention can they find the friends who they want to remain faithful to—people who know and see them so well that visibility starts to feel good again.
South Node in Virgo/North Node in Pisces and South Node in Pisces/North Node in Virgo
This nodal axis is about martyrdom. People with the nodes in Virgo and Pisces often feel like they’re meant to give up something big for other people. They might have been raised being told that they must be prepared to sacrifice or that they’re here because so many people sacrificed for them. This creates a huge emotional burden in which these people might have trouble valuing their own lives for its own sake.
North node in Pisces people come from backgrounds that taught them that the only state of existence they deserve is one of work. Everything feels like work for these people—friendships, love relationships, parties, etc. They might feel like they have to do a lot for the people around them, even people they don’t really like, in order to deserve life. They’re people who are constantly putting things together, remembering details about coworkers or friends, bringing a good friend’s favorite snack to the movie theater, and making things for their partners. What north node in Pisces want to achieve is self acceptance. Because they were taught that they must earn their existence, they try to earn self acceptance by working for acceptance from other people.
Relationships are often where Pisces north node people confront power. Pisces north node people often excel in terms of relationships, making themselves into the perfect partner or the perfect friend who is always there for other people, knows how to throw a good party, and never leaves someone on read. This means that Pisces in north nodes can feel unrecognized for their labor when people do not know how to return the effort they give to every relationship. They can also become frustrated when they are always put in the position of being a caretaker, feeling invisible and unrecognized. When Pisces north node people define what self acceptance means to them and allow themselves to accept themselves as imperfect lovers, friends, and workers they’re able to put their labor into better use and not channel it into people or industries that will never appreciate them. When they let themselves forgive themselves for the ways in which they’ve failed, they can move on.
Virgo north nodes deal with feelings of not wanting to really live their actual lives. They might have been marginalized in some way when they were younger and reacted to this marginalization by living in their head rather than in their real life. Because Virgo north nodes feel fundamentally misunderstood by the world around them, they don’t want to engage with the world or see what it has to offer for them. They might keep themselves from experiencing failures by identifying themselves as failures and attribute such an identity to an ego that is attached to the idea that they are more pure than the people around them. In reality, Virgo north node people are tremendously capable. They don’t want to consider themselves as capable because this would mean admitting to losing certain opportunities to build the life they want to live because they were more comfortable with romanticizing their own failures. Sometimes, Virgo north node people identify themselves faithfully to ideologies that encourage them to disengage from life in order to excuse a mindset that thinks that there is no meaning in anything anyways.
Work can be one arena where Virgo north node people must confront power. The power that they must confront and not deny is their own power. When they stop fetishizing the idea of sacrificing themselves for the sake of inspiring pity, they’re able to realize imperfect actions are still worthwhile and shift their ideas around romanticism away from self sabotage and towards something more constructive. When they discover, by engaging with people and life, that they’re not any more or less pure than anyone else, they can let overwhelming ideologies that encourage disengagement go and find ones that seek their involvement and constructive criticism. Virgo north nodes are here to shift what we might perceive to be healthy or unhealthy behavior since their life experience will teach them that health cults are often toxic and that deviance can often be strengthening.
