The eclipse tunnel opening between the lunar and solar eclipses of September 2025 is not a flat stretch of time but a shifting corridor, alive with subtle alterations in tone and emphasis as the planets move against one another. The period from the 9th to the 20th is marked by a sense of cleansing, of stripping down to essentials, a necessary release before the charged new beginning of the solar eclipse on the 21st. The signature is unmistakably emotional, woven from the interplay of Moon transits, the languid pressure of retrograde outer planets, and the gnawing tension of the nodal axis strung tight between Leo and Aquarius.

At the start of the tunnel, the Moon’s contact with Saturn and Neptune in Pisces draws a veil across collective consciousness. Saturn retrograde lends weight, as though every feeling must first be tested against some karmic rubric, while Neptune retrograde dissolves boundaries, allowing old griefs and disillusions to seep through. This is the “heavy water” stage of the tunnel: the sensation of wading through ancestral memory and collective sorrow. Nations already burdened by water crises or institutional breakdowns — South Asia during monsoon season, island states grappling with climate-linked inundation — are especially likely to feel the mirrored weight of this Piscean emphasis. On the personal level, the task is to allow the tides to wash away false certainties without rushing to replace them.

As the days progress, the Moon moves on to encounter Mars in Virgo, sharpening emotional responses into critique, precision, and sometimes irritability. The tunnel here takes on a forensic quality: flaws and inefficiencies are exposed, both within personal lives and within public structures. We may expect heightened discourse around healthcare, logistics, and the small mechanisms by which societies either function smoothly or grind down. In Europe, with its bureaucratic intricacies and recent strains on supply chains, this passage may coincide with further arguments over systems of management, echoing Mars’ relentless insistence on detail. For individuals, it is the moment to trim, to edit, to discard the excess that clutters both mind and daily routine.

Midway through, the Moon’s sweep across Aries and Taurus stirs the latent power of Uranus retrograde. Here the tunnel takes on its crackling, unstable quality: emotions lurch, freedoms are craved, disruptions slip through cracks. Retrograde Uranus is not the open revolution but the rehearsal, the draft explosion in the inner world before the outer detonation. Collectively, this can play out in technological uncertainty and unexpected reversals of progress, especially in regions tied to rapid innovation — the United States and East Asia may feel this jolt in their economic or digital sectors. The key lesson is that stability is a façade; within the tunnel, we are asked to embrace the instability as a sign that outdated structures are ready to be shed.

Towards the close of the tunnel, the Moon conjoins Jupiter in Gemini. This is the restless, swollen stage: optimism brims but lacks containment. Ideas multiply, words spill out, promises balloon larger than the means to fulfil them. Here the square to the Leo Sun still active in the nodal zone sharpens the tension — belief against fact, inspiration against pride. It can be a time of misjudgement on the world stage, when leaders may overstate or overreach. Watch for regions with fragile political coalitions — Latin America, parts of Africa — where rhetoric may climb beyond pragmatic capacity. Yet on the personal plane, this same aspect can offer a glimpse of the broader horizon that awaits on the other side of the solar eclipse, provided one does not take the inflation too literally.

Throughout the entire tunnel, the drag of Pluto retrograde in Capricorn and Saturn retrograde in Pisces provides the shadow undertow. These are not days for launching grand schemes, but for purging — the political scandals, the financial reckonings, the personal decisions to abandon roles that no longer fit. The tunnel functions as a crucible in which the unnecessary, the redundant, the false is burnt off. It is emotional, yes, but not chaotic for its own sake; the purpose is purification, so that when the solar eclipse arrives, we can step into the new chapter unencumbered.

The global mood during these days will be one of intensity and reckoning. Where water, institutions, and identity are already fragile, pressure will build most visibly. Where personal pride and collective necessity are at odds, expect tension. And where outdated forms cling to life, the eclipse tunnel demands their release. It is not a comfortable passage, but it is a clarifying one. By the 20th, if the work has been done, much of the rubbish — both emotional and structural — will have been stripped away, leaving a sharper edge for the solar eclipse to cut cleanly into what must come next.