This Week's Horoscope

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20)

With the sun and Venus getting chummy in your sign, you can expect to not only have a little more emotional slack room and warmth in your love life, but to experience a few vicarious thrills as well. In fact, you should consider your birthday season the ideal time to let your imagination go wild with out-there fantasies about love?or hey, just sex. (Mine would be an invitation to a threesome with actor Luke Wilson and Alias' Michael Vartan.) Your dream scenarios are so not going to come true, but the ripe sexual kundalini vibe they stir up could get you into some other hot water that's at least as good, maybe better.

Aries (March 21-April 19)

As the most traditionally masculine sign of the zodiac, you may have had some problems integrating a feminine side into your life?even if you're a chick. Still, for both men and women there are some great examples of how to achieve that gorgeous confluence between femininity and action, on tv, even?look to Sarah Michelle's Buffy, Jessica Alba's Max (Dark Angel) and especially Jennifer Garner's Sydney (Alias) for examples. And hey, if you're a guy, you're about to discover how showing off your feminine side is going to get you laid that much more?just try knitting a scarf where people can see you. I predict you won't get halfway through before you get taken someplace hot, where things like scarves are absolutely unnecessary.

Taurus (April 20-May 20)

You know those "iffy" desires you sent to hibernate for the winter, like bears? Unfortunately, bears don't actually hibernate?and neither do your cravings. They may hunker down in cold weather and survive on stored fat, but eventually they'll emerge from their caves, cranky, stinking and hungry. What to do? You can't simply let them go on a rampage, wreaking havoc with your life, eating the people you're closest to. Nor can you happily kill them, confine them to a zoo for people to gawk at or dress them up and make them ride unicycles to accordion music for loose change. Your mistake has been to try to keep that desire (which is perfectly natural, like a bear's) in chains. Set it free. I bet it will either run away before it gets you in trouble or find a happy place in the natural order of your life.

Gemini (May 21-June 20)

What would it take to hold your interest, Gemini? Should your lover develop multiple-personality disorder to keep you entertained, or take up employment as a secret agent, circus performer or mad scientist just so you're never bored with him or her? Is the secret to keeping you around running away from you, but not so fast that you can't keep up? Hell if I know. But I'm sure of one thing: once you figure out the answers to these questions, the odds go way up that someone else might actually get them, too.

Cancer (June 21-July 22)

Don't focus on the rare occasions when people have complained of having to walk on eggshells around you. Of course, when the full moon runs in perfectionist Virgo, like this week, you're much more likely than usual to give them reason to feel that way. So, for your own sake and theirs, focus on your incomparable compassion. I've never seen you reject someone for his or her weaknesses, flaws or vulnerabilities. Although it's unfair that anyone should cite your sensitivity as cause for wariness, let it go. What people need from you right now is openheartedness. If it helps you get to that place, know this: most of the time when people criticize others, they're actually talking about themselves.

Leo (July 23-Aug. 22)

Nearly every major religion attaches some importance to hair. Whether you should cut it and how, when and why. Many believe it a source of power, a repository of history or a link to your essential nature. No wonder your tribe makes such a big deal about it. Whether it's curled under a turban, wrapped around a voodoo doll or braving the lustful eye of wicked Delilahs, cropped short or flowing, your hair is a source of power. It can be used to seduce, convince, intimidate and distract or attract attention. This week, you should get a chance to do all of those things at least once, and probably quite a few I haven't mentioned. You've got the power, baby. Now use it.

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sept. 22)

I have to hand it to you; you've handled critique and unfair assessment with even more grace than Canadian ice skaters Pelletier and Sale. But, like them, you've been judged wrongly, or at least inaccurately. Don't stand for it. When Han Van Meegeren, a 20th-century painter, was written off by critics, he set about successfully forging paintings by a 17th-century Dutch artist, Jan Vermeer, which were subsequently acclaimed as Vermeer's masterpieces. Sometimes?like this week?you have to slide your brilliance under the ridiculous radar of those who refuse to notice it, coming from you.

Libra (Sept. 23-Oct. 22)

Your ruling planet's vacation in the realm of dreamy Pisceans hasn't helped your ability to make your mind up. Despite the lack of astrological empowerment of your decisionmaking process, I urge you not to revert to you old bad habit of letting things be determined by the default option. If you can see your way clear to being as strong-minded and opinionated as your average Leo, for example?you'll claim more attention than any of them this week. And unlike those spotlight-squandering Lions, once you have the floor, you know what to do with it.

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 21)

You've heard of the Botox craze. These are people injecting muscle-paralyzing botulism into their faces to erase wrinkles, or wrinkle-inducing facial expressions. While I find the whole thing fascinatingly abhorrent, it does fall right in line with this week's message: Sometimes people need a little poison. All use of bee stings to combat arthritis aside, I have more mundane examples: I'm just not right until I've had my cup of coffee, for instance, and occasionally good times come in cocktail form. You've resisted delivering even a mild dose of your venom, despite the fact that some are begging for it, because of your admirable intention to not hurt anyone. Reconsider that stance. Even though it might not be "good" for them in the strictest sense, some of your poison (but not too much) might be just what they need.

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 21)

In your eagerness to shirk definitions?even the expansive ones accompanying your Sagittarianism?you've recently missed out on opportunities that could only spring from concrete self-knowledge. You know, it's not such a bad idea to occasionally nail down what you're all about?it gives you an idea of what you have left to transcend. Whether you read up on your astrological birthright, your enneagrammatical placement or your four-letter personality type, this week attach a definition to what you're supposed to be about. Then and only then can you get a loose grip on who you actually are.

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)

Winter's chill has forced me to exercise my nostalgia muscles. The result? When I can temporarily shove my cynicism aside, really sappy romance. For instance, this morning I used 15 whole minutes on an extended slow-dance fantasy?one I would be extremely resistant to in real life. But that's the point of fantasy, isn't it? I've noticed a disturbing trend in your dream life lately?limiting it to things you would or could do in reality. Stretch your imagination, Cap. If you can live out some wild or far-fetched scenes in your mind (with no intention of ever making them come true), the possibilities available to you in real life will be expanded a little, too.

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 18)

Just because you're sort of a heathen doesn't mean you have to give up meaningful spiritual practice. You should absolutely feel free to become a first class co-opter. Despite my conclusively non-Christian nature, I'm doing my own version of Lent (from February's new moon to the full moon at the end of March). This week, borrow what you need from anything and everything you encounter, whether it be church, self-help literature or that porno you saw last night.