Five of Swords
Fixed air: self-determination, excommunication, liberation
The Five of Swords asks us to distinguish between the battle and the war – is a minor victory worth it or does it provide an obstacle to your vision?
Four of Pentacles
Cardinal earth: sovereignty, cushioning, crowns
What it might mean to land on the ‘cushioned’ throne – a place where you are living in comfort, but perhaps glossing over what it has taken to get here.
Three of Pentacles
Cardinal earth: history, practicalities, foundations
Pentacles don’t ask for deep emotional dredging like the cups do, but there is a sense in this card that part of the practical is a connection to history, dreams, and simple pleasures.
Ten of Wands
Mutable fire: low sun, bleached trees, the flicker.
The Ten of Wands takes you deep into the woods, and lets you get lost.
There are tall trees in white sunlight, bleached animal skulls, and flickering light.
Nine of Wands
Mutable fire: heat, tenderness, the warrior
The Nine of Wands is the red neon light that glows in the distance, keeping you awake, but also reminding you that you aren’t alone.
Eight of Wands
Mutable fire: the speed of light, arrows, lightning
The Eight of Wands pierces us, makes us feel the prick of the arrow, the scent of blood, the thrill of the hunt. It is immediate and it is alive.
Seven of Cups
Fixed water: hopes + fears, unknown pleasures, the void
The holy and haunted passions of Projections are a type of unknown pleasure – a world that is conjured into being through imagining something new.
Six of Cups
Fixed water: alchemy, memory, distillation
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.’
Five of Cups
Fixed water: loss, appetites, sacrifice
That reminder of loss can be a sharpener to appetite. Time is short. Do you want to be perfect or do you want to be gluttonous for experience, pleasure, and joy?
four of swords
Cardinal air: chaos magic, willpower, telepathy
The aerialist reminds us of the possibilities of this card, just as the telepathic lamb controlling the swords above her head: it is possible to wield mass, force, and energies that feel chaotic in the service of a singular goal.
Three of Swords
Cardinal air: Bonds, Promises, Endurance
This is the engine of storytelling – in any story, there is a winnowing of options, a set of choices that become a single choice. This is what makes the story resonate – we can feel the experience of the characters as they grapple with what we must, every day.
two of swords
Cardinal air: hoodwink, meditation, play.
This scene could be from a play or a photoshoot. The figure could be sitting for a portrait, or waiting for a lover to release them from a game.
ten of pentacles
Mutable earth: Homecoming, mortality, transition
This card feels like a hopeful and homely card to pull - it gives a sense of things being in their rightful place - but the ten gives a sense of the next transition to be to something else, another stage of life. For some of us, that transition is into the realm beyond life, and the spectre of death haunts this card and decan.
Three Tarot Essays
Cardinal Fire: deity, divination, world-yielding
The bridge between deity and humanity isn’t so special, we call it dying
Rain-Sown Wheat
Fixed water: unfinished business, deep emotions, divination
We record this by leaving the work unfinished and unresolved. The absence is a space for grief.
The Moon: Excitement of the Unconscious
Mutable water: the unconscious, hallucinations, psychic plane
Rachel Pollock writes that “in divinatory readings the moon indicates an excitement of the unconscious.”
Year Ahead Spreads
Fixed air: future visioning, collective energies
What happens if you think about your projects not in terms of word counts, but in seasons? Could you be guided by a full seasonal cycle, from solstice to solstice, or Samhain to Samhain? Or could you work with your solar return?