Little Baron
Musings on the '8', '9' and '10' of Swords
Yesterday, I learnt a thing or two. I learned to look at a tarot card from more than one perspective. In fact, I viewed it from three - that of the Victorian Romantic, The Fantastic Menagerie and the Tarot of Prague.
But reflection, it seemed, came at night, when I was least aware - in my dreams.
In some decks, a message can be slightly diluted by what is going on in the scenic variation of a certain card. But what I noticed yesterday, within the Menagerie, was how well it conveyed the pure feelings of pain, anxiety and closure through it's cards. Solutions did not always seem available. It's cards held within them, this snap-shot of the mind, often in chaos, as I made my way from the 'Ten of Swords' to the 'Eight'.
I have argued with myself about swords for many years now; especially in the days of using a Marseille. Should swords really convey obstacles and complications? Or should they just represent the mind in all of it's guises, and not just pain?
In the three cards I studied yesterday, I encountered imprisonment and contraint, anxiety and fear, and death, in it's fatal closing hour. The Prague and Romantic offered glimmers of light, but the Menagerie brought that pain to me in a way that I could really feel it. And I was surprised by how effective it was at doing this.
I didn't begin to feel the pain I had met in the cards, until I went to sleep. And it turned up as a nightmare.
It is always hard to remember a nightmare or dream, and as the day has begun and the sun is shining, it has become more distant [thank God]. But I do remember that it revolved around a man - a man that I had just met. He was a potential love interest; and through love, his interest in me became some kind of unhealthy obsession.
As my dream continued, I recognised the signs that all was not well and I tried to distance myself from this young man. I made excuses and tried to let him down gently. But each time, he became more distressed. Eventually, I had to break away from him, worrying about what this dramatic departure would provoke.
What continued was nothing short of a horror film synopsis. My ex-lover played a show-stopping lead role in this psychotic performance, to the point where I was running for my life for the remainder of my nightmare. During it, I felt everything that I had encountered in my study of those difficult sword cards. There was literally nowhere to run as he found me in every hiding place or moment of naively expected safety. From behind a bathroom door, he pulled a cord around my neck, strangling me from behind until I said I would take him back. When I tried to call the police for help, he had somehow managed to intercept my phone and was on the line, telling me he loved me.
I woke up several times during the night, in panic. My heart was beating and I was afraid to go back to sleep. Each time, I eventually did. And each time, he was waiting. When I was with my mother, he jumped from a door with a saw and began to cut her arm. I tried to pull him off, but had no strength to stop it from happening. When I got to the safe haven of my best friend’s home, he was there, waiting for me on her bed. Every look he gave told me that I had to tolerate him for their safety. Only once in the dream did I lash out, my hand swinging into his face, giving him the best right-hander I could ever imagine giving. Of course, it only made things worse.
So in my nightmare, I felt the pain of the sword. I felt the trappings of the ‘Eight of Swords’ – knowing not which way to move next, as all available roads were blocked by him. I felt the sheer panic and distress of seeing my loved ones in danger – not unlike the horror on the faces of the birds in the Menagerie ‘Nine of Swords’, whose baby had fallen into the path of a huntsman. And in the last throws of my dream, I ran from where I had tried to hide to the road outside, where I could be seen and I could see everything. I called for him to come and get me, for I could take no more. In this, I was admitting total defeat and accepting closure. I was too tired to run anymore and planned, in my mental confusion and anxiety, to close down and die with him, like the characters of the ‘Ten of Swords’.
I only hope he is not waiting tonight.
LB
Yesterday, I learnt a thing or two. I learned to look at a tarot card from more than one perspective. In fact, I viewed it from three - that of the Victorian Romantic, The Fantastic Menagerie and the Tarot of Prague.
But reflection, it seemed, came at night, when I was least aware - in my dreams.
In some decks, a message can be slightly diluted by what is going on in the scenic variation of a certain card. But what I noticed yesterday, within the Menagerie, was how well it conveyed the pure feelings of pain, anxiety and closure through it's cards. Solutions did not always seem available. It's cards held within them, this snap-shot of the mind, often in chaos, as I made my way from the 'Ten of Swords' to the 'Eight'.
I have argued with myself about swords for many years now; especially in the days of using a Marseille. Should swords really convey obstacles and complications? Or should they just represent the mind in all of it's guises, and not just pain?
In the three cards I studied yesterday, I encountered imprisonment and contraint, anxiety and fear, and death, in it's fatal closing hour. The Prague and Romantic offered glimmers of light, but the Menagerie brought that pain to me in a way that I could really feel it. And I was surprised by how effective it was at doing this.
I didn't begin to feel the pain I had met in the cards, until I went to sleep. And it turned up as a nightmare.
It is always hard to remember a nightmare or dream, and as the day has begun and the sun is shining, it has become more distant [thank God]. But I do remember that it revolved around a man - a man that I had just met. He was a potential love interest; and through love, his interest in me became some kind of unhealthy obsession.
As my dream continued, I recognised the signs that all was not well and I tried to distance myself from this young man. I made excuses and tried to let him down gently. But each time, he became more distressed. Eventually, I had to break away from him, worrying about what this dramatic departure would provoke.
What continued was nothing short of a horror film synopsis. My ex-lover played a show-stopping lead role in this psychotic performance, to the point where I was running for my life for the remainder of my nightmare. During it, I felt everything that I had encountered in my study of those difficult sword cards. There was literally nowhere to run as he found me in every hiding place or moment of naively expected safety. From behind a bathroom door, he pulled a cord around my neck, strangling me from behind until I said I would take him back. When I tried to call the police for help, he had somehow managed to intercept my phone and was on the line, telling me he loved me.
I woke up several times during the night, in panic. My heart was beating and I was afraid to go back to sleep. Each time, I eventually did. And each time, he was waiting. When I was with my mother, he jumped from a door with a saw and began to cut her arm. I tried to pull him off, but had no strength to stop it from happening. When I got to the safe haven of my best friend’s home, he was there, waiting for me on her bed. Every look he gave told me that I had to tolerate him for their safety. Only once in the dream did I lash out, my hand swinging into his face, giving him the best right-hander I could ever imagine giving. Of course, it only made things worse.
So in my nightmare, I felt the pain of the sword. I felt the trappings of the ‘Eight of Swords’ – knowing not which way to move next, as all available roads were blocked by him. I felt the sheer panic and distress of seeing my loved ones in danger – not unlike the horror on the faces of the birds in the Menagerie ‘Nine of Swords’, whose baby had fallen into the path of a huntsman. And in the last throws of my dream, I ran from where I had tried to hide to the road outside, where I could be seen and I could see everything. I called for him to come and get me, for I could take no more. In this, I was admitting total defeat and accepting closure. I was too tired to run anymore and planned, in my mental confusion and anxiety, to close down and die with him, like the characters of the ‘Ten of Swords’.
I only hope he is not waiting tonight.
LB
