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| Raven's Prophecy Tarot |
This was another morning where the deck itself chose me rather than me consciously deciding to work with it. As such the reading took flight in a way that was stunning in its poetic accuracy as though intuition came winging its darkly feathered way into my heart, silently, abruptly, expansively. This deck, The Raven's Prophecy Tarot by Maggie Stiefvater, is a new acquisition and the first thing I set about doing when it arrived was to trim the edges. The original has orange borders which initially had me passing it by but I saw a trimmed version online and was smitten. The deck shines now, as though the raven medicine and wisdom was released with the trimming. The morning after I trimmed it my walk on the ridge was full of crows and ravens circling, gathering, cawing and grockling.
I drew these cards in the early morning and sat a while with them. The deck is non-traditional and yet the cards hold true to the RWS in a nuanced way. Looking at this spread for awhile and feeling into it my mind was at work. A little too much effort, came the inner voice. So I sat back and asked the Ravens what they wished to share with me in this spread. Immediately came the phrase,
Creating space for the Name to live. It was direct, unequivocal and brilliant.
As I looked at the spread as a whole that phrase seemed stunningly on point. But where had I heard it? A little later while making breakfast I realized it was the Aramaic translation of the second line of the Lord's Prayer,
Hallowed be thy name. The Aramaic is,
Nethqadash shmakh...pronounced
nit-kawdish shamook. I pulled out my copy of Prayers of the Cosmos by Neil Douglas-Klotz to explore more. Little did I know the Ravens would take me into the heart of one of Jesus's central teachings, a prayer that I find inaccessible in English but that comes alive for me in its original Aramaic. The cards led the way...
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| Ten of Swords ~ Raven's Prophecy Tarot |
This is such a refined Ten of Swords and yet it gets straight to the heart of things. All has been stripped bare, nothing is left but the bones. Life as we identified with it is over, what's left is an imprint of what was. I often think of this card with the phrase,
Die before death. Says Rumi in his opus, The Masnavi...
Remove the veils and tell the naked truth
Who sleeps in carnal embrace with their clothes?!
This card gives the feeling of an outbreath, a sense of spaciousness, of the essential. What do I need to pare down to move forwards? What will my next unadorned and rebirthed gesture be as I move into a new unknown?
The negative space around the bones lets their blunt, architectural truth shine. They underpin the soft animal of our bodies with their hard, resilient grace. Surrendering to this kind of stark refuge feels like a necessary step on the path with this card.
How to create this holy place within, what do I need to do? Some letting go is necessary for if the space is filled with clutter there's no place for an altar to unfold, let alone the eyes to see it. Silence, prayer, meditation, these are all forms of surrender, of letting go, of release. Neil Douglas-Klotz expands upon this second line of the prayer...
Help us let go, clear the space inside
of busy forgetfulness: so the
Name comes to live.
The Sufis have a practice called
zikr which roughly translates as
the remembrance of perfection and the perfection of remembrance. This card is getting at that in an utterly unadorned way, surrender not as an outward act or as something done, it's too late for that here in the Ten of Swords. It is Over. Instead it's pointing towards the recognition of an inner receptivity, the eros of soul and body refinding themselves conjoined in what at times might feel like a
danse macabre but in reality is 'clearing us out for some new delight'. The Sufis have a practice...remembrance and perfection, lover and beloved.
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| Three of Wands ~ Raven's Prophecy Tarot |
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This Three of Wands continues the journey, invites the eye deep into the glowing embers in the foreground. A fire pit has been created outdoors with three branches surrounding it. Silhouetted against the Moon a raven perches on one of them, calling attention to her gifts, her magic, her mystery.
With the space cleared now there is an opportunity for the creative fire to live...for
Thy kingdom come. In Aramaic this is
Teytey malkuthak prounounced, teetay malk
oo-tuk. I love what Neil has to say here about this line...
Create your reign of unity now--
through our fiery hearts
and willing hands.
Let your counsel rule our lives,
clearing our intention
for co-creation.
He talks about the roots of the Aramaic words, a language that is grounded in the body, the earth, the sound, with one syllable having multiple unfoldings.
Teytey speaks to the holy space within being used as a workshop to envision and prepare for new creation. And here
Malkuthakh is rooted in the image of a
fruitful arm poised to create, that which says I can and is open to take a new direction. I like this image of a fruitful arm in relation to the skeletal hand in the preceding card. Rebirth is in the gesture.
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| Six of Cups ~ Raven's Prophecy Tarot |
This sweet little raven looks longingly at the bubbles above him. His wings gleam in a subtle rainbow of light, his beak and eyes shine. This deck doesn't have ravens throughout it so when they do show up it feels like they're choosing to bless me with their presence.
This card is traditionally one of nostalgia, childhood memories,
Storge as I like to think of it. Love is present in this card echoing key number six in the Majors, The Lovers. Again Neil's words ring out here, this time in the fourth line of the prayer...
Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. The Aramaic being,
Nehwey tzevyanach aykanna d'bwashmaya aph b'arha. Here we go with the transliteration attempt...
nech-way t-svyannach eye-kawna d-bawsh-maya awff b-arr-ha. The words are so beautiful when sung or spoken in Aramaic hence my attempts to share them. Neil describes this as...
Help us love beyond our ideals
and sprout acts of compassion
for all creatures.
As we find your love in ours
let heaven and nature form
a new creation.
Loving beyond our ideals is a profound meditation and one to drop deeply into. The Ravens are asking a lot of me in this
reading, taking me places I did not anticipate. But it feels so spot on in light of my preparations for the
Thirty Days of Hecate journey I'm embarking on. My altar has been made over and my office tidied so I can offer myself more
fully to this journey in which dying before death, paring down, discarding nostalgic or outworn views, and ultimately
rebirth all feel like a key themes to embody with Hecate as guide and refuge, light and holy darkness.
