Bonus Content: Poetry and the Major Arcana

Entry posted by lyredragon in Poetry and the Tarot March 23

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https://www.thetarotforum.com/blogs/entry/251-bonus-content-poetry-and-the-major-arcana/

Did you ever have one of those inspirations that kept you up all night? When I was starting into the Major arcana, this was the sort of kickoff to doing it that I came up with. I wanted to save it for a much later post, but after bogging people down with the first entry, maybe a little coolness is in order. Call it a thank you for sticking around.

Its a poem. But its also in a matrix. but it's also the whole major arcana for the five element deck. and it works out so that you can read it front ways, sideways, back ways even diagonally. Composing it helped my confidence about knowing whether or not I was on the right track. One final point to make before I let it be. The deck is called the Travail. Its minor arcana is called the Trials and the Major Arcana is called the Tribulation. And that sounds ominous but it really is not. I promise.

#	Travail Element	Tarot Element	Travail’s Tribulation	Tarot’s Trump	Song of The Universe	Song of The Garden	Song of Life	Song of Man
I	Fire	Air	The Victim	The Magician	From the source; the inspiration	A place to cultivate, to speak and to listen	I Am, the Universe observing itself	Before I could understand I was accused
II	Water	Water	The Pythia	The High Priestess	Piercing potential, shattering, twisting	Above the headwaters, creation rests	I seek, through mystery and darkness	led to ruin by one I trusted
III	Air	Earth	Hestia	The Empress	Creating Motion, assembling Chaos	Beneath the shade trees, Knowledge and Life	The witness of that which cannot be seen	I am but the product of my environment
IV	Earth	Fire	The Steward	The Emperor	Existence forged but without purpose	Casting projection between each dancing leaf	I strive to make my works pleasing; in sacrifice through great labor	Still, they claim I have done wrong
V	Quintessence	Earth	The Omicron Gate	The Hierophant	Turning again to look behind, illuminating the spiraling legacy	In Light and Shadow, connection and separation	I discover that the test comes before the lesson	I am simple in creation. I am what I am and I am what I am becoming
VI	Air	Air	The Lovers	The Lovers	Inhalation, exhalation, observation. in Elation and in Bliss and in Dread	Creation from creation, before and behind	I exist and I fail and by chance to rise	The charges levelled against me are steep; I am fallen
VII	Water	Water	The Chariot	The Chariot	Life stares back, moving, ravenous through the waters	In but one small refuge, refuge, a harbor against injustice	I ponder in wonder of fate and fortune	For the price of existing I am branded a criminal
VIII	Earth	Air	The Lawyer	Justice	Now It ventures on the Earth in temporal conquest	The best of all things, microcosm of microscosms	I learn the price of communication	So they accuse me of daring to reach beyond my lot
IX	Fire	Earth	The Mendicant	The Hermit	Glittering eyes in the dark, Shining sparks in the firmament	But lonely, that place, behind walls that kept out the World	Created with will I was thrown behind Creation	Is it not human nature to transcend the natural order?
X	Quintessence	Fire	Wheel of Fate	Wheel of Fortune	An end to a beginning and a beginning to an end	Where were laid down the roots pulled from the earth to face the sky	Forced to work only upon what I have grasped	powerless, I could only witness
XI	Water	Fire	Courage	Strength	Life, spiraling and observing, changing nothing and everything	In awareness the walls become a prison	Though I did my best with what I had	In time, I began to despair in silence
XII	Earth	Water	The Stargazer	The Hanged Man	It consumes in bias and overcomes fate	The wild things there did not thrive among the cultivated	I seek justification	My name is chewed at meals which I was forbidden
XIII	Fire	Water	Love	Death	They prosper in their kind, surviving, expanding	Despoiled, this Paradise with a longing for those wilds	Dauntless I strive, ever dreaming, at once in stillness and in motion	my jailers promised death in conviction
XIV	Air	Fire	The Marshal	Temprance	thriving even in the barren, dry places	No tree ever stood that was not tested	In waiting and in conquest, privation and plenty	I cry over the audacity that I should be accused

XV	Quintessence	Earth	The Devil’s Gate	The Devil	Such virulence, if allowed, would consume the heavens	No beast ever runs when it is not goaded	In Observation, my purpose, and perseverance my design	the prosecutor rattles my chains
XVI	Earth	Fire	The Rocket	The Tower	Life was constrained in Mortality	No stream makes a garden unless it is channeled	I am Forced to contend with all things as I contend with Myself	Over the evidence of a paradise despoiled
XVII	Fire	Air	The Star	The Star	Cursed to consume itself in its passions	Their course was set from their inception	How shall I prove myself worthy?	my accusers are my only witnesses
XVIII	Air	Water	The Moon	The Moon	And to be degraded by its physical limitations	Now, a mystery of enlightenment incarnates	Barred the heavens I wander cyclically	In calumny my deeds stand against me
XIX	Water	Fire	The Sun	The Sun	Making Transcendence a great work rather than a natural course	They are cast to endure the spiral of ages	I exist in pain, and in torment, and in raucous silence	My adversaries speak and my allies are silent
XX	Quintessence	Fire	The Judgement Gate	Judgement	So that they rise only in sagacious wisdom	Forever Closed stand the gates	I, the convicted, am damned	Why must I be made to stand alone?

The Five Element Approach

Bonus Content: Poetry and the Major Arcana

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