Let Yourself Be Silently Drawn

Dark Goddess Tarot ~ Ellen Lorenzi-Prince

This draw feels intimately relevant and resonant to my journey right now. I drew this pair a couple of days ago and didn't have time to work with them until just a little bit ago. The Dark Goddess Tarot is proving to be a wonderful companion during this season. One or two cards suffice as there is so much teaching and wisdom to be gleaned from a single goddess. Both of these cards slipped from the deck as I was shuffling and I bowed to their proffered presence.

Sedna ~ Eight of Water ~ Dark Goddess Tarot

Here we see Sedna, Eight of Water (Cups). She is the Inuit Goddess of the Ocean, Mother of the animals of the sea and Queen of the Underworld. She holds multitudes in her tangled hair and her reign is located beyond breath, in the dark, arctic seas. She created this queendom by leaving her life behind her. A sobering and challenging reality. The phrase that came to me for this card was, unfold your own myth.

While out on the ocean with her father Sedna falls into the water and her father, in an effort to save himself, hits and/or chops off her fingers to free his kayak from her grip. Echoes of The Handless Maiden here.

She dies at the hands of the one she trusted to care for her, a chilling realization. But her amputated fingers become the creatures of the ocean as seen in this card. In the depths her mutilation is transformed. Dismemberment does not break her, it multiplies her. Such power in this statement and one to take to heart when journeying into the shadow realms to retrieve those lost parts of the self.

The LWB suggests caring for the inner child, the one who has been betrayed, who feels alone. Listen to her stories, tell her some stories, tuck her in. These are all such wise offerings to make to the young aspects of the soul wanting integration. And I anticipate some intentional time spent in the presence of this young self, time in which to see what old wounds are operating below the surface of the manifest...those areas of irritation, compulsion, aversion that are actually a way of asking for attention. Even a change in awareness becomes a pathway to healing the deeper wound though the path may take us thick into the forests of the night before coming out the other side.

The Black Madonna ~ The Empress ~ Dark Goddess Tarot

And here She is, the one whose embrace my Sedna-self is swimming towards. The Empress as embodied by the Black Madonna whose darkness is womb-rooted. My relationship with this goddess goes back several decades and she continues to inform my journey. In Europe she is sometimes called The Mother of Miracles, venerated more for her magical power than her spiritual blessing.

She embodies the primacy of darkness and inspires one to look beyond the surface of things to accept the full glory of that multi-contextual reality. The author suggests in relation to this card to assess things with an open heart and not allow our definition of 'best' limit the outcome for good.

Whenever I interface with the Black Madonna even if it's just a glance at a passing image of Her, I'm reminded of the power of the shadow body, of the redemptive grace inherent in its wisdom when reclaimed with love and awareness. She is there, a warm, dark, knowing receptivity to be enfolded into.

The two cards together brought forth a phrase from one of Rumi's poems...Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray. I feel these words as Hecate's torches shining their light upon the pitch and ebon darkness of the unknown path I'm treading, feeling my way step by step...hand over hand...breath by breath.