Marseilles Seekers Thread (Fifth Exercise)

[EnriqueEnriquez]

Dear all,

In this week’s essay I mention Japanese poet Matsuo Basho, who is literally regarded as the Saint of Haiku. There is one technique in haiku-making that I find very useful for crafting metaphors. It basically consist on seeing, or thinking, of something, and then find three sentences to describe it. For a long time Western scholars have thought that Japanese poets employ no metaphors in their haiku, when in truth, they simply have a different way to create metaphors. For us, a metaphors creates meaning by establishing a relationship between two terms. Each term must be significant by itself. The capacity a metaphor has to create meaning depends on having us perceiving a relationship between these two components.

In a haiku meaning is created as if we were drawing with words. The haiku present us with three different strokes to complete a metaphor. Take for example this haiku from Basho:

roadside rose
of sharon: devoured
by my horse

Here, Basho is creating meaning by giving us three images: a rose, eaten, by a horse. What is powerful about this is that he uses very specific images to have us completing a whole event which is small/specific enough to elicit all kinds of sensations. One can listen to the powerful jaws of a huge horse chewing these tender petals. The experience becomes a full sensory spectrum one.

Haikus have very specific technical requirements (a first line composed by 5 sounds, a second line composed by7 sounds, a third line composed by 5 sounds). Leaving aside that, I would like that you, this week, looking at the cards not to write haiku but to ‘think haiku’. In other words, I would like for you to place three or four cards in a row and define a whole idea by describing each card using one single sentence.

For example:

Lets say we have THE FOV, THE CHARIOT, V DE BATONS, ACE DE COUPPES

Then I would say:

THE FOV: a man walking

THE CHARIOT: takes a lift

V DE BATONS: and get derailed

ACE DE COUPPES: from his objective


“A man walking takes a lift and get lost from his objective”

This would be the faster way to get a message from the cards. We create one whole, specific, idea by assigning very specific, LITERAL, ideas to each card in a sequence (try not to get symbolic here, but very literal: The Fool is a man walking, just that. The V de Batons a bunch of interwoven roads, things like that). The work we have done at seeing analogies in the pips (Exercise Number Three) and the work we have done at creating whole narratives from shape (Exercise Number Four) should make this exercise very simple.

Please, do this exercise at least three times. This is, draw at least three sequences of three or four cards, and proceed in the way I did on the example above. Those of you who may want to do more are welcome to do so. (The way I used to practice was by drawing three cards, seeing a message in this way, then I would draw three more cards, see another message, and so on until I went through the whole deck, day after day.)

As usual, questions and comments are welcome.

Best,

EE

[Hooked on TdM]

This sounds very interesting! I will work on this as soon as I get the cups done for the second part of the third exercise.. I'm a bit behind!

Hooked

[Hooked on TdM]

I did two attempts this evening.

My first: I drew temperance, 9 wands, and the Devil. It reads: An angel pours matured foundations leading chained slaves.

My second: I drew 5 cups, the Star, 9 swords, and 3 wands. It reads: Meeting of shared hearts woman replenishes stream, misused ideals spinning in directions.

Hooked

[Satori]

Le Monde
A statue and four workers
8 Deniers
a wagon
Cavalier De Deniers
A boy plays Polo


Four workers moving a large statue, come upon a wagon and a boy playing polo.

Now, of course in my mind, these workers are going to ask for help moving the statue, I can see what will happen next, should we put that in the sentence? Also, of course I'm dying to actually write a haiku!!!

[mosaica]

Originally Posted by EnriqueEnriquez

I went through the whole deck, day after day.

Now I'm feeling really lame that I can't find the time to do a simple 3-card reading every day, when you went through the whole deck day after day! But this is inspiring because I'm realizing how simple these exercises can be. I've been trying to connect the cards that I draw each day with my own daily life -- which means I end up waiting for life to happen, and then life intervenes and time with the cards doesn't happen. You've repeatedly emphasized looking for messages before meaning. I'm still in fortune-telling mode, when I need to be in story-telling, metaphor finding, and poetry writing mode. Which is exactly where I wanted to be when I first picked up tarot three years ago, before I got sidetracked by pop tarot. Wow, this is fun (the TdM, Basho, and haiku)!

[Phine]

Hello everybody


I was quite astonished when I read this exercise... The day before yesterday I was thinking about making sentences by simply pulling three cards at a time - and here it is !


So I shuffled the deck and will go through it completely.

I already made a few haikus of it - and want to share these:

1.) 10 cups ~ LA LUNE ~ LE DIABLE (many emptied glasses; hounds howling in the night; a person walking two others on a lead)
===> Drunk dogs disturb the peace at night and were walked on the lead back home.

2.) 10 swords ~ 8 swords ~ 7 coins (two knitting needles in a ball of wool; a fabric; money/hardcash)
===> With knitting needles and yarn a purse was made.


Ok, I´ll continue "haikuing" ...



Best wishes,
Phine

[Satori]

Roy De Deniers, VII Wands, Le Soleil

To know a thing you must visualize a thing.
To know a thing, you must center your thoughts.
To know a thing, all external stimuli are secondary.

(Hey Dune fans, doesn't this sound like something out of the Mentat workbook???)

This man's vision depends upon being centered, regardless of external stimuli.

So we haven't discussed how to treat the Courts or the Majors, but knowing Professore he has a reason for having us do this before his discussion of the People in the deck. What happens for me when a person is in the spread now, is that suddenly they are like a glass of cool water thrown in my face....I have focused on pips to such an extent that now seeing the people I suddenly see them completely differently, with new eyes.

This King seems to be visualizing the coin in his hand. So he holds what he needs to manifest, once he can clearly See it in front of him, he can acheive it. This is like me with the pip cards. Regardless of external stimuli, if I can stay focused, stay centered, I will see what I need to see.

The heat of the sun is the external stimuli. Here again, I am not ascribing importance or value to the Majors or to the court other than looking for a human figure. I am not thinking, the Sun is the most important card in the spread, rather, it is just that I see the action up on the figures of the other cards, lending emotion, tension and adjectives or verbs to the sentence.

I admit that I am also asking myself to do this quickly, rather than sitting and gathering wool trying to think what things might mean. I find that sometimes I will sit a bit longer, but mostly I give myself no more than a minute to read the sequence.

[Satori]

II Deniers, La Roue De Fortune, V Coupes

Two seeds sprout, spinning
a season of monkey games
into harvest time


9 Deniers, L'hermite, 8 Deniers, 9 Batons

Shrouded mystery
cradle your hunger, belly
still cries for reason

Here, the 9 reduces to the 8 coins, as if the Hermit has taken a bite out of the 9, trying to feed his hunger. We see that it isn't really the belly he has fed, but his mind. The red in the wands, the 9 Wands shows he is still hungry for more knowledge, there may never be enough to satisfy this need.

[frelkins]

With the Noblet:

A person who can't commit feels Change staring him in the face and hears the call for more balance in his life.

Lovers | Death | Judgement | Temperance

[Bernice]

Noblet (Flornoy)

10 - Batons = A fenced-in enclosure
09 - Cups = Small animals in little huts
X1 - La Force = Lady hurting an animal

Lift aside the wattle fencing, see little creatures sectioned off in cages. Owner examining them one-by-one, practical lady, but callous and uncaring of the creatures. Battery farm ?

Bee