Friday’s new moon signaled the start of the current lunar cycle. Our closest neighbor in space is now moving east, away from the sun in its orbit around Earth. A thin crescent moon can be seen tonight 15 degrees above the western horizon, 45 minutes after sunset. It will sit 10 degrees to the left of Gemini’s two brightest stars, Castor and Pollux.

The crescent moon will track through the ecliptic and the zodiac constellations as it moves higher in the western sky and farther away from the sunset this week. Wednesday night, the crescent moon will sit in Cancer, 4 degrees below the Beehive star cluster. The waxing crescent will move into Leo by Thursday evening and sit 5 degrees below Regulus. Your three middle fingers held straight out at arm’s length toward the horizon equals about 5 degrees of the sky. By Saturday evening, the moon will have waxed to first-quarter phase and will sit 2 degrees to the left of dazzling bright Jupiter.

First Published: June 7, 2016, 4:00 a.m.