A woman looks sadly at an opened box from which several ghouls have escaped. She hasn't noticed them though because she is fixated by the opened box in front of her. The ghouls also don't notice the archway behind them which is pinpointed with stars, they seem connected to the box, there is still a fine mist trailing from the box to them like an umbilical cord. In fact, they are all looking at the box rather than at the woman who has set them free.
The image is reminiscent of Pandora. When Prometheus stole fire from heaven, Zeus took vengeance by presenting Pandora to Epimethius, Prometheus' brother. With her, Pandora had a jar which she was not to open under any circumstance. Impelled by her natural curiosity, Pandora opened the jar, and all evil contained escaped and spread over the earth. She hastened to close the lid, but the whole contents of the jar had escaped, except for one thing which lay at the bottom, and that was Hope.
The woman in this picture is trapped by the past, she is looking down at the empty box and doesn't see the open vistas behind her. She looks regretful and full of longing at what has already gone. The past contains her fears, and because she is staring so intently down, she can't see the seven cups that lay at the bottom of the image. She can't see the joy that is so tantalisingly close. She is contained within the four walls that are her mind.
The woman is also staring intently at the box as though she is waiting for something else to come out. Still clings to the Hope that there is more to it than this. I wonder if this refers to waiting for the proverbial sows ear to turn into a silk purse, of missing opportunities because you are so busy waiting for the situation or person to turn into something different. You cling to the hope that what you have before you will change into something else, if you wait long enough or look intently enough, it will somehow change, something else will be there.
If you look closely at the card, the mist not only follows the movement and transfiguration of the ghouls but also follows a fluid movement, joining it to the archway and making a rough lemiscate. It's as though the women is caught in a continuous cycle of dashed hope, longing and regret. The ghouls turn again into a fine mist when they hit the archway but do not fully disappear into the cold, clear, night. They cling to the sides as though still attached to the box.