The Cocoon
Daily Draw August 17th, 2008
I drew a card from my new Tarot Lenormand, and then for comparison, put it with the cards from my three other Lenormand Oracles.
10 OF PENTACLES
This corresponds to the DOG card #18 in the conventional Lenormand Oracle.
There is a nice, homely sort of safety and security with this card. One’s home is one’s castle and I am safe by the hearth with a faithful dog for companionship and friendship.
I’m having a quiet day as we can’t go anywhere because of car troubles. So I am reading and catching up on blogs and eating home grown vegetables and herbs from the garden. It’s Sunday so we are watching antique shows and home decorating shows on television, surrounded by our two big dogs.
Kind of a silent, lounging day.
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Behind the Mask
Daily Draw August 9th, 2008
Time to myself. The spouse has gone to a friend’s cottage with the dogs. I am supposed to go but because of my random food allergies (I never know when they will strike) and asthma and allergy problems that kept me awake for hours last night, I’m staying home.
I have the delicious feeling of playing hooky and lounging about in my nightie with the cats all fed and away to sleep. What fantastically exciting mischief can I get up to? Well, I spent most of the night parked in the living room chair with a blanket, a pillow against my back to sit me as upright as possible, and a book, trying to breathe. I am rereading Watchmen by Alan Moore in anticipation of the movie next year, so I’ll finish that.
I’m also sewing two Wonder Wallets for my sisters, or planning too. I really just feel so fatigued that I want to read and sleep all day.
I brought The Answer Deck down to use. I’m going to use 3 cards, one to represent me and the other two flanking me with insights.
JEALOUSY (representing me)
FAIR/GRAY HAIRED WOMAN
MISTAKE
The nicely dressed woman with the jewellery removes her mask to reveal a partly desiccated skull. Underneath the smile she seethes with jealousy.
I never think of myself as being jealous. It comes from the Greek “zelos” and is a doublet of “zeal” meaning enthusiastic. Not quite our current meaning of jealousy in the root word. Jealousy can mean guarding in some way too, and coupled with the image here it might mean guarding my identity, protecting myself with a mask with too much enthusiasm perhaps? Jealousy can have a connection to trust of course, but this seems to indicate lack of trust in oneself.
My insight on the left is a fair/grey haired woman–also me I suspect, looking young and well-dressed, casually cool. Flanking on the right is another insight showing a broken tea cup indicating a mistake.
In youth I started the path that led to this horrible old screaming woman with the mask. It was a mistake, like a cup shattered. To close off so completely that you have nothing behind a mask; trapped behind windows in a dark room.
Yes, I often feel like this, airless, trapped, nearly dead. So this is my cheery insight for the day: I am jealous of the freedom of others yet unwilling to let my guard down to escape this house. Musing on the path I took, I realize it was a mistake, and I’ve lost years of my life, trapped looking out at the light.
I often wonder if I could develop agoraphobia, perhaps this insight is more sharp than I first thought, it’s more like a warning. Oh to be out and about in a nice pair of slacks and a turtleneck, hair down and flowing.
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Ride Captain, Ride
Daily Draw August 7th, 2008
I ordered the Mona Lisa Tarot today, and then got to thinking about the artist, who also did the artwork in the Universal Fantasy Tarot. So I got that deck and was browsing and I saw this card and kept thinking of the song that says “Ride Captain, ride, upon your mystery ship.”
I had to look that song up, and I got to thinking about dreams. Last night I dreamed I was in a car with the lady who owned the tarot shop I used to go to, and she was part of an art colony in the dream and there were artists and writers and I felt gawky and terribly un-hip.
3 OF WANDS
I don’t journey at all lately, and I must say that the feeling of wind and air and anticipation I get from this card is alluring. I am doped up on antihistamines and wonky and out of it, so wouldn’t mind somewhere to go. I was also working on my web site last night and got down.
This card reminds me of another dream I had where I was riding my bike through a city and when I got to a corner I went straight on instead of turning and zoomed right off the highway. When I looked down the landscape was much like a topographical map, much like the landscape in this card, I was so high up and I was falling and going to die. I felt myself panicking and then just let go because there was nothing I could do about it.
This chap looks to be in command of the situation, no falling for him. The rudder looks like a male dancer’s legs in tights; he is dancing on air.
“Ride, captain ride upon your mystery ship
Be amazed at the friends you have here on your trip
Ride captain ride upon your mystery ship
On your way to a world that others might have missed”
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Let’s Do Nigel Jackson
Daily Draw August 1st, 2008
Oh yes, let’s do Nige, especially since we dropped the cards all over the basement floor. The slippery little critters have been comingling with those long lost ivory-coloured beads on the floor.
FOUR OF SWORDS
Oh, that’s a lovely card, this deck is so different from other things I have. I am back to my summer sabbatical again, resting under the stars in my tent with my sword and helmet and gold cup and pitcher of liquid laid outside with the tent pegs.
Excellent, excellent card. Always one of my favourites, and it comes up fairly often for me as I’m a hermit-like person a lot of the time.
And to go with it, read The Tent Peg by Aritha van Herk.
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Cormorant Barks at the Moon
Daily Draw July 28th, 2008
I’m going to use a set of postcards I got related to the Sandman comics. They have such interesting artwork and they came in a ribboned box with 40 different cards–very nice.
This card was originally from a set of Vertigo trading cards and the artist is Teddy Kristiansen.
It’s the Sandman, but what strikes me is the moon in the shape of a penannular bracelet. Very old, very ancient, steeped in history. His coat tail looks a bit like a cormorant spreading its wings and raising its eyes to the penannular moon.
A mysterious image, reminds me of ritual under ancient skies and the shimmer of intuition dredged up from the ancient brain at the base of the human skull.
Cormorants symbolize a touch of vampire traits. In heraldry “The Cormorants have been used as symbols of nobility, indulgence, and in more modern times a totem for fishermen and a bountiful catch.” The great cormorant is a deep black colour with a huge wingspan and looks very ancient, and frightening, very unusual. On an online dream dictionary, I found that cormorants mean “Intellectual ideas that have the power to dig deep and bring up unconscious wisdom. Because the cormorant is used to dive and catch fish, it suggests you are practising some form of introspection or self examination.”
So perhaps a day for biological intuition? I shall skulk naked through the long grass and woods under the moon tonight letting my primitive brain wreak havoc on the fish in the pond. Oh well, maybe not, but a day for primitive, emotive thought and reflection, pondering under the light of mystery and psychic knowing.
Intuitive connection, bathing in the light of Moon, black, black wings.
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Plum Blossoms Reach
Daily Draw July 27th, 2008
This comes from a set of 30 postcards by Kate T. Williamson from her book A Year in Japan. I love this illustrative style, it’s what I aspire to with pen, ink, and watercolour.
PLUM BLOSSOMS
I like this: growth, flowering, the change of seasons and lightening of the human heart. A lot of artists draw plum blossoms but this is one of my favourites because I just like the style of her art.
In east Asia this tree blossoms around February or late January, so it’s a true sign of spring, and often referred to in Japanese poetry. It is also thought of as a protective charm against evil. The fruit isn’t a true plum as we know it in the west, but more like an apricot and used to make plum wine, pickles, sauce, paste, vinegar. They are also depicted on Japanese Hanafuda cards. I meant to buy a hanafuda deck for my collection, but the cards they make to day are very plain compared to antique ones, so I never did.
by Kyogoku Tamekane (1254-1332)
On an evening
set aglow with the crimson
of plum blossoms,
the willow boughs sway softly;
and the spring rain falls.
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Sweep
Daily Draw July 26th, 2008
Back to Lenormand, and inspired by someone else’s blog, I pick two cards to go together.
#14 - Fox
#11 - Broom & Whip
The vigilant fox is looking toward the broom and whip and seeing secret acts and hidden intentions. The broom tells him he is boxing at shadows and will quarrel for something silly. The whip says not to beat people up about it or himself.
How true this is. I was contemplating a friend who hasn’t been writing much and when she does it seems to be all about her. It was making me irritated and I thought I wouldn’t write her for a while. Silly really, you have to allow for circumstances unknown in the lives of other people. Misunderstandings are so easy in e-mails.
My family doesn’t reply to my e-mails either which gets me on a slow burn. They are busy, everybody’s busy, so don’t see conspiracy because people are simply busy, don’t take it personally. Instead of whipping people, or self-flagellating yourself, sweep it all out with the broom and freshen your mind.
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Random Deck and Poetry Day
Daily Blog July 25th, 2008
Every year I buy a few books of poetry for my collection. This year I bought some poetry in translation to English from other countries in anthologies. One of them is called World Poetry : An Anthology of Verse from Antiquity To Our Time. I chose a poem randomly:
TO THE GERMAN PEOPLE
by Robert Bly
Do not jeer at the child, when with a whip and spur
On a horse of wood he thinks himself mighty and great,
For you Germans, you are also
Poor at acting, and good at dreaming
Or am I wrong, like lightning out of clouds, will acts come
From daydreams? Will books spring to life?
Lock me up if that happens, my dear ones,
Make me pay for this blasphemy!
Robert Bly is very interested in translating poetry, which is what I like in poets and writers. I only know him from his Iron John book, which I thought was terrible, as I thought his friend Clarissa Pinkola Estés’ book Women Who Run With the Wolves was awful, but he might be interesting to read about. He’s got a translation of Rilke that I’m interested in comparing to the Rilke translation I have by Stephen Mitchell. Neither one of them actually speaks German. Translators are often vilified for this, but sometimes it allows a detachment necessary for translation without improvisation or rewriting. I suppose that depends on the translator.
Daydreams can be catalytic, from the soaring musical dreams of Richard Wagner to Hitler’s dangerous Mein Kampf and the acts of the Nazi regime. Having just finished a book on the French Revolution, I see that history holds many like-minded regimes of terror, and all spring from the dreams of people. Like lightning out of clouds, blitzkrieg.
Humans are so good at dreaming, at inspiring and creating wonderful things. And so good at skewing dreams into terrible reality.
Today’s random deck is the Osho Transformation deck, from which I pluck:
#53 - PLAY
This looks like Krishna and Arjuna, and yes, I see by the book that it is. The mind plays indefinitely, like a dream in an empty room.
Let your mind frolic, even let the bad thoughts come without guilt. If you have a great thought that you think can transform humanity, don’t let your ego into it, don’t feel that you have to become great. This is a tough one–even in war when people are killed or you are killing them, don’t worry about the end result, just play in the moment. Even though things are serious and people are dying, Krishna says we must play and not get worried about the result, because the result is in the hands of the Divine. Don’t think about results.
There’s a fine line between the play of daydreams and the action of a dream that kills. This seems irreconcilable to me.
Osho can be a bit of a crock in interpretation sometimes, this is not about play and frolicking.
I think Krishna was addressing that one’s duty sometimes requires one to fight after trying all means to bring peace. Arjuna is told he has a right to his actions but to surrender the results to God. Face the reality of life, you cannot escape it, and sometimes the reality of life is that people do indecent things, and it is our duty to fight them if we cannot negotiate peace. Krishna referred to it as play-acting, killing or dying is like a drama, a play. Spirituality rejects both violence and non-violence, it accepts the immortality of the soul, and no one is actually killed. This spirituality turns even war into play because no one ever dies. And you cannot escape war, nor can you be non-violent, because as long as the ego exists, non-violence is next to impossible. Accept what is facing you, and what is facing you is war. You have to plunge into it, and then you can only be a player, an actor.
So, it’s all kind of interesting to meditate on these subtleties, but always question, my dear ones.
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The Perfect Risotto
Daily Draw July 22,2008
I’ve been having a very gentle day after the allergic meltdown I had yesterday. I’m now on the proper medication again but still getting over fatigue and nerve pain induced by sneezing uncontrollably and wheezing.
We are a bit short of food in the house so I had to get creative when making lunch. I can’t eat bread as I’ve encountered an allergy to that, and so I foraged and produced a bag of Thai short grain rice, the kind of rice you make puddings or risotto with. I have no idea how to make risotto so I put 2:1 water and rice and added spoonfuls of chopped tomato and Romano beans from cans, plus some oregano.
Slowly brought to the boil and simmered for 30 minutes, it turned out perfectly, nice and creamy and flavourful. I had a bowl of that for lunch, and no worries about pain and allergic reaction.
I fed all the pets and saw a bright green frog in the grass when I took the dogs out. Just a nice, gentle day where I read my book on the French Revolution and felt content and rested.
I was going to use playing cards today, but when I went to get them I saw a new Lenormand deck I bought a few weeks ago, so I picked a card from that.
#17 - STORK
I love storks, I bought a watercolour painting by a local artist that had Spanish houses with a stork nest on one of the rooftops. They are large birds but seem mysterious to me, like fabled familiars, roosting on the roofs of humans.
The Stork means birth and encounter with friends or relatives. I got an e-mail from someone that I never hear from, so maybe that’s the encounter. I encountered a bright, green frog friend too. Perhaps friends are fabled familiars, larger than life, roosting on the roof of your house, making you feel chosen and safe?
There is something noble about birds who choose to nest in your garden, they return every year, bringing birth and joy, and a feeling of comfort and continuation. The stork against the limitless sky, a symbol of continuation and birth.
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The Inspiring Mr. Liszt
Daily Draw July 21st, 2008
I have 4 tarot decks down here but they’re all in order as I use them for various write-ups, so I can’t pick a card from there. I’ve decided I’ve done enough art postcards for a bit, so what to work with? I could go upstairs to root around for something, but I think I’ll go into my database and just randomly click on something and then get it from upstairs.
So, I got the History category and randomly clicked on the Classical and Romantic Composers playing cards by US Games. Not terribly thrilling but I’ll grab them and see what comes up.
FRANZ LISZT - 10 OF SPADES
They mention his Hungarian Rhapsody #15 and #2. I used to play #2 and make a little marionette puppet of a horse dance and bow and move around to all the elements of the music. Great fun, his name was Charlie Sugarfoot and I still have him. He also used to dance to Aaron Copeland’s Grand Canyon Suite, as you might expect a horse to do. I sat on a stool as if I was straddling a horse and Charlie would accompany me as we rode.
The card also mentions Liebestraum (A Dream of Love) and La Campanella (The Bell Tower) transcribed from the Paganini violin solo. Paganini played with lots of dipsy doodles and odd tricks to produce odd sounds on an odd violin with odd stringing techniques, fingerings and bowings–it must be quite a listening experience to hear that on piano, or even think to transcribe it.
Ah, an interesting thing about Liszt, he reinvented himself many times, even studying and taking minor holy orders. He was a charismatic man as well as a womanizer, and inspired and taught many piano players for free, passing on his gifts with generosity. His music was original and fresh, but he did withdraw occasionally when going through changes and then came up with something new or a new direction. I feel I’m doing that right now, I’m isolated and trapped in a bell tower until it sorts itself out and I know which way to go.
I like people that inspire and lead, and during my summer of withdrawal it might do me good to read about someone like this. Thank you Franz Liszt!
Oh, and in the Personal Prophesy method of reading playing cards, the 10 of Spades means a journey. There is no emotion related to the card, it just means going on or coming off a physical journey. Well, I’m not going anywhere physically but I am definitely on a journey this summer, and today I shall journey into the land of Liszt too.
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