Crone Moon Tarot
Last Quarter Moon in Aries
Let’s take our monthly pause to reflect on where we are in our crone journey with a Crone Moon Tarot pull.
Why the Crone Moon? Well, the Crone Moon, aka last quarter moon, falls exactly halfway between the full moon and the new moon. It is half illuminated and half dark. From this liminal space, the light continues its retreat. The crone embraces this time of growing darkness. She knows this is where the real work happens.
New here? The full explainer of moon science, phases, and symbolism and of the crone moon tarot spread lives here.
The Moon in Aries
Aries energy is fiery and intense. It acts first and sometimes doesn’t even ask questions later. The beauty of this is that emotions are direct and transparent with little time or use for grudges or resentment. The Crone Moon calls us to evaluate our current situation, release what no longer serves us, and realign with what does, and Aries energy asks us to approach this release boldly and unapologetically.
What’s coming
New Moon in Cancer — July 14 This new moon is going to amplify feelings. Full stop. The sign of Cancer is ruled by the moon, and both are about feelings. This will be a time to examine your feelings, focus on self-care, family, and home. It is also Bastille Day—maybe this is a sign that it is okay to drown those emotions in tasty pastries?
Full Moon in Aquarius — July 29 Aquarius is community and collective ideas. This full moon is complicated by being in direct opposition to the Sun in Leo. You may feel tension between self-expression and group responsibility. Harmonize what you can and release that which does not serve you.
Next Crone Moon in Virgo — August 5 Virgo wants you to analyze, focus on details, and be of service. Next month, we will focus on how to balance these drives with your crone identity.
A Note on Tarot
Tarot is for entertainment and self-reflection. It does not predict the future or tell your fortune. I invite you to look at the pictures and symbols on the cards and exercise your brain to put them together in a way that is meaningful to you. Skeptics welcome.
The Deck
Today, I am using the Tarot of the Tides Deck by Steven Hutton. I am a sucker for rubber duckies, and this deck delivers. It is the one I wanted to use for you during the Summer Solstice, but the weather thwarted me. It is all about the journey of a duck named Bob. Here is the message from the creator:
“Tarot of Tides tells the tale of a small toy duck called bob who was forgotten at the beach one day. As the Fool of the tarot, Bob sees the world through innocent, unbiased eyes as he navigates the seven seas. The tides carry him to far-flung and varied landscapes, where he encounters a menagerie of fantastic creatures who contribute to the little duck’s epic adventure, shaping his perspective along the way.”
A Note on The Major Arcana:
Today’s pull focuses heavily on Major Arcana cards. I love this for several reasons. One is because Bob the duck is only featured on the Major Arcana cards in this deck—so we get to see his cuteness a lot in this pull. Also, the Major Arcana, as opposed to the Minor Arcana, in the tarot deck highlights major life lessons, milestones, and archetypes. In this Crone Moon cycle we are called to evaluate deeper core truths about ourselves.
Now on to Our Reading
What to Celebrate: The Hanged Man
This card is a reminder to celebrate the light of the last moon cycle. What did it bring that is worth honoring before we retreat further into the darkness of the crone moon?
Our hero, Bob, floats under an old bridge on a cold and snowy day. The bridge is decorated with graffiti and festooned with other items of warmth, sentimental value, and remembrance. Bob is looking up at the bridge, yet all those on the bridge will never notice him amongst the other items. All but one, that is. The teddy bear hanging upside down has a completely different perspective, and the two lock eyes. The bear’s red scarf flows towards Bob, beckoning Bob to join him.
The Hanged Man is just that. A reminder to pause and take on a new perspective. It is in those quiet moments of perspective shifting that we discover some of the most beautiful and meaningful things. But it is also those quiet moments that we are taught to discard as unimportant. If we aren’t busy, we can’t be doing anything important, right?
Business as worthiness is so drilled into us, you may have discounted your moments of stillness over the past month. But now is the time to celebrate this stillness. Did it bring you important realizations, or just some much needed rest? Either way, this is your reminder that stillness is important, necessary, and should be celebrated. In fact, now that we are in an Aries Crone Moon, protect that stillness boldly and unapologetically.
What to Examine: The Devil
Just as the moon reflects the light of the sun and invites us to celebrate our wins, it also reflects to us what we are holding onto and need to set down before we retreat further into the darkness.
Oh no! Bob has been eaten by a Devil Fish! We see him trapped and undigested in the clear bulging stomach. He was swallowed whole in an act of hunger and perhaps greed. Little does the Devil Fish know that Bob’s buoyancy may keep him from getting away from an even bigger danger—the gigantic sharp jaws in the darkness. He may do better long term with what feels like a temporary loss of spitting Bob out.
This Devil Fish asks us to examine where we may be feeling trapped or confined, especially due to attachment to wealth, status, possessions, or excess. But just like the broken chains on the ocean floor beneath the fish, or the fish’s option to spit Bob out, we have the ability to change our circumstances. We are being asked to look at our attachments and fears. Are they really trapping us, or is it our inability to let go that keeps us trapped?
It is time to examine where we are holding ourselves back. Is it old identities, power structures, ideas on self-worth? Aries is here to demand you examine it. It has no patience for denial, and it encourages you to bravely confront what still has a hook in you so it stops running the show from the shadows.
What to Release: Strength
As the reflected light of the sun recedes it becomes more difficult to see, and we need to rely more on our own intuition and guiding light than on what we see around us. The release of the Crone asks us what we need to quietly set down before going further on our crone journey.
Here we see Bob being cuddled by a big sleeping brown bear, much like a child would cuddle a teddy bear. We also see a transparent duck in the tidepool, wings outstretched like it is about to take flight. Is the bear’s comfort allowing Bob to dream of further adventures?
When we think of strength, especially in light of Aries, we think of raw brute strength and power. However, Bob and the bear are asking us to see the other type of strength. Quiet, steady, inner strength.
But wait? This is the release card. Inner strength is what we are supposed to release?
No. We want to release the feeling that we need someone to hold us tight like the mama bear to find our inner strength. We are being asked to remember that we have the power within ourselves to dream and fly off on our own adventures.
Our dreams, just like the translucent duck of Bob’s dreams, are ready to take flight and move on to the next stage of adventure. Inner strength has been with us all along, and we need to release the feeling that we can ONLY access it and succeed if we are dependent on others.
Aries asks us to move forward and boldly release the false belief that we are unable to soar on our own.
The Threshold: The Sun Reversed
The half illumination and half dark of the Crone Moon is a liminal threshold moment. Everything in the cycle has led us here, and now it is our time to decide on how we will proceed.
Do you recognize this card? It is the one I shared with you in the solstice post. It is likely no mistake that it showed up again so we can examine it more closely.
Here we see a winged lion. The guidebook tells us that the line or—threshold—is the international date line and the lion’s head is in the daytime and his body is still in the nighttime. His head is fiery and his back half is silvery like it is still illuminated by the moon. He stands on a rock on the water and the water in the darkness is choppier than the water in the light. We also see Bob in the light with the shadow of a hand reaching up behind him while he stares at the lion.
Ok. We can literally take this as the light melting away, but I think there is a much deeper meaning here, especially as we see the lion in the liminal space, the threshold, between light and dark, just like the prompt for this threshold card.
One thing to note, The Sun is always an auspicious card, even reversed. The alignment with our half-light, half-dark, crone moon echoes our standing at the threshold. Our transition is real, but the reversed nature of the card may mean that it isn’t quite ready to arrive yet, and we need patience for the coming dawn. Also, look at the hand coming for Bob in the shadows. In reverse especially, this tells me that we may fear or be at risk for a negative outcome, but the protection of The Sun will protect us if we heed its advice.
Aries may tell us to rush forward into our threshold moment and intensify our desire for change, but instead, we should take that boldness and transform it into the courage to wait. The restraint may just bring about positive changes.
Intention: Eight of Swords Reversed
In the darkness of the Crone’s Moon, the distraction of the light melts away. It is time to rest, reflect, and recover. Our inner crone whispers to us about our intentions for when the light returns.
This is the only Minor Arcana card in our reading and the only one where we do not see Bob. Instead we see the image from his perspective. A dolphin is swimming in the wreckage of a boat with eight corroded steel stanchions rising around her like sword blades. The boat is tangled in the grassy seabed below. She looks trapped, but the bright blue sky above and the fact that she swam in on her own gives us the hope and reassurance that she can swim back out on her own.
This card is reversed. When upright it speaks to the fact that we may feel trapped in a situation, but we aren’t and we just need to view it from a different perspective. Whenever I see a swords card reversed, it makes me think of the swords sliding right out, like we are already finding our way out of the treacherous situation and the swords are falling away around us.
And what about this being from Bob’s perspective and not us on the outside observing him in the scene? Bob has already learned lessons from his many adventures and he is ready to apply them here. We too are ready to apply the lessons learned from our reflection on the previous cards.
What does this mean for our intention setting during this Crone Moon? We may have been avoiding something. Something that has felt overwhelming. Something we felt like we couldn’t even begin to address. This eight of swords reversed tells us that we are already making progress and that we should set our intentions on this once seemingly overwhelming obstacle.
The fiery Aries energy is here to support you. Now.
Take this opportunity to set an intention to consciously start your progress in this area—you have already laid the groundwork.
The Crone Speaks: The Hierophant
Your inner crone has seen all five Crone Moon cards, and she has something to say about it. Listen up. She doesn’t stutter.
Bob floats above a rock pool unaware of what is going on underneath. But the garden eels see him. They had been listening to the Crab and his authoritative demeanor, holding keys, wearing a big hat that appears to be scavenged from the sea. Perhaps they are symbols of convenience and not true authority? He has the air of a leader. Just like Bob being unaware of what is going on below, the crab is unaware of what is going on above and that his congregation may be noticing something that is changing their worldview. Is there life beyond the rock pool?
The Hierophant card traditionally symbolizes authority, rules, tradition, and denouncing outside beliefs. This fits into our whole Crone life view and what the cards have asked us to do.
We are the ones interpreting our reality. Not those who have come before us. The ones who speak the loudest and most authoritatively in the room.
Here, the crone is asking us to examine where we are on our journey closely. Are we taking the road of viewing the larger world to expand our perspective like the eels? Are we taking the road of the crab and clinging to our beliefs and ignoring what is going on around us? Or are we oblivious to it all like Bob and going about our lives and journey without even pondering these questions?
Aries doesn’t let you float above it all like Bob, unbothered. It wants an answer. The crone demands you consider which one you are right now, and what are you going to do about it.
Putting It All Together:
So, what’s a crone to do?
No matter where we look, we keep landing on the same message. You are stronger and freer than you give yourself credit for. The only thing standing in your way is the old version of you.
Every Aries instinct is saying you shouldn’t allow stillness or celebrate it, but the stillness is a gift. It is what lets us notice the old traps we fall into out of habit. Remember that what feels like a cage may be a door you’ve simply not thought to try.
Remember to stop searching for strength outside of yourself. Release any tendencies to believe you will only succeed if you rely on others and their opinions at this time. The answers are in you, and in a perspective shift. You don’t need permission to break free and make the changes you have been wanting to make.
The Aries Crone Moon teaches us that we don’t need to wait any longer to make a change. In your quiet moments of contemplation, the change has already started. It may take a little longer to fully realize it, but if you choose to listen to the little voice inside you, you may just set positive changes into motion. Ask yourself which doors are truly locked, and which you have just never tested. You may be able to walk into a better situation stronger and more independently than you thought.
Be bold and fearless, fellow crones.
We will touch base again on August 5th’s Crone Moon in Virgo to celebrate all you accomplish this month and use Virgo’s energy for a more in-depth analysis of our crone journey.
Journal Prompts
The crone does not assign homework. But if you want to go deeper, here are some questions worth sitting with.
What have you been holding back on out of fear or because it’s “always been done that way?”
Where have you felt you are trapped or stuck right now? Are you really, or is it that you haven’t taken the time to look at it from a new perspective?
What groundwork have you laid knowingly or not, that will help you change patterns that no longer serve you?
Which card in this reading spoke to you, and why do you think it found you? Tell me in the comments.
The content on Crone Powers is for informational and entertainment purposes only. It does not constitute medical advice. I am a doctor, but I AM NOT YOUR DOCTOR. Always consult your medical and mental health professionals before ADDING—NEVER SUBSTITUTING—spiritual modalities to your care. Remember, woo only works when you do the work.
The views and opinions expressed here are my own and do not represent those of my employer or any institution with which I am affiliated.