love poem
~ Linda Pastan

I want to write you
a love poem as headlong
as our creek
after a thaw
when we stand
on its dangerous
banks and watch it carry
with it every twig
every dry leaf and branch
in its path
every scruple
when we see it
so swollen
with runoff
that even as we watch
we must grab
each other
and step back
we must grab each
other or
get our shoes
soaked we must
grab each other

Saturday started much too early, but it was worth getting up for the second day of the 2018 UK Tarot Conference! (If you haven’t already, you can read about Friday’s program and events in this post.) In addition to all the wonderful people who attended Friday, several joined us for Saturday, including the lovely Louise of Priestess Tarot, another friend I’ve not seen since the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI) conference many years ago!

Benebell Wen opened with “Tarot and the Four Pillars: Divining for Self-Empowerment.” As with Friday’s presentation, this was a guided journey through a complex Tarot reading based on the Four Pillars: To Do, To Dare, To Know, and To Keep Silent. 

Cards were drawn and aligned with selected Major Arcana cards, adding a richness to the reading and once again giving me so much to think about—especially so early in the morning!

There followed a break with much-needed caffeine and a treat (the cutest miniature pastries—also delicious!). Thus refreshed, we returned for a talk by Cilla Conway, creator of the Intuitive Tarot:

Cilla spoke on quantum consciousness, which was fascinating. Cilla had us do a spread to help us open our minds to new levels of awareness. My final card was the Page of Swords, which Sue, my reading partner, suggested as “the beginner’s mind”—try to abandon preconceptions and see things in a new way. Excellent advice, and yes, that’s more than a bit of a challenge when approaching Tarot, something I’ve been doing almost my entire life!

I retreated to my hotel room over the lunch break to meditate and process the energies and ideas from the morning sessions. Jet lag and insomnia are a wicked combination, and I really needed that time to sort myself out so I could focus during the afternoon sessions. Sadly, it meant missing the presentation by Linda MacLean on Hermetic Kabalah in the middle of the break, but overall, it was the right thing to do in order to ensure I would make it through the afternoon in one piece.

After lunch, Jo Watkins spoke on “The Oracle Within Tarot”—that is, you, as the reader, are the oracle for the oracle. Jo had us examine a series of the Major Arcana cards to discover qualities within those cards that are already within ourselves, and to consider how to develop those qualities to strengthen those qualities and develop as readers.

Another break for tea (yay, caffeine!) and treats, and then Rachel Pollack rounded out the day with “What Do You Do If You Ask for a Vision of Your Soul and You Get the Devil?” The Devil is the power of desire, which is necessary for life (very basic—if you don’t desire food, you won’t eat, and you would die of starvation); the problem is when desire is indulged to excess (you desire food, you eat too much, and you develop health problems). The Rider-Waite-Smith Devil is often interpreted as addiction, or an inability to change; however, Rachel asked us to consider the question, “Are you really trapped, or are you trapped only by your unwillingness to change?” when the Devil comes up in a reading. Framed that way, it may help the client find perspective on the situation—or they may go into denial. Sometimes, the client isn’t ready to hear the message, no matter how loudly the cards speak.

Rachel also led us through an exercise in contemplating what the secret of each card is. If you have trouble with a particular card—for example, the Tower card—shuffle the deck and pull a card to help you understand the secret of the troublesome card. In this exercise, we drew the Three of Pentacles:

The message comes across that, while you may work hard and do your part, there is much beyond your control that will also affect the situation; do your best, and understand that it still may not work out. That doesn’t mean you failed, or did badly; it simply means that the things you couldn’t control had more effect than the things you could control.

And, suddenly, it was 5:30 PM, and the day and the conference were done! Kim did the closing honors, and offered lovely thanks and compliments all around, and then we were off to the four winds, headed back to whence we had come—or, in my case, off to dinner with Rachel for a chance to catch up!

The next UK Tarot Conference London will be October 11 – October 12, 2019, and feature (among others) Mary K. Greer and Caitlin Matthews —mark your calendar!

Missing You
~ Felix Cheong

I miss you
dawn, dream and dusk,
whenever my words run out
and crawl, toothless and silent at last
to the kennel of your heart.

I miss you
in the privacy of pain,
a cry tucked beneath sheets,
a kiss unfinished
over distances.

And I shall miss you
when I’m neither here nor there,
neither a ghost nor a shadow,
more than love can endure,
more than time will allow.

November Night
~ Adelaide Crapsey

Listen. . .
With faint dry sound,
Like steps of passing ghosts,
The leaves, frost-crisp’d, break from the trees
And fall.

So, I’m a bit late posting this, but life has been non-stop since the conference!

I was fortunate that my day job travels took me to London in time for the 2018 UK Tarot Conference. I used to attend regularly, but there’s a conference I go to for my day job that usually overlaps, so I miss the Tarot conference. This year, however, the dates aligned, and I was able to attend! Being the fifteenth year of the conference, the theme was The Devil card—an enticing topic, indeed!

I said good morning to the charming Kim Arnold, organizer of the conference, who was her usual wonderful self. I collected my badge and goodie bag, and chose a spot at a mostly empty table near the center of the room. I marked the place, and wandered off to find coffee. When I returned, a few people had also settled at the table, including my friend Sue, who I have not seen since the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI) conference in 2008! That was a lovely surprise, and a wonderful start to the weekend. I also ran into the delightful Mary Collin, and several of the TABI folk and others I’d met at prior UK conferences.

Rachel Pollack was there, with several of her amazing necklaces. This one is made of garnet (my birthstone) and citrine, and is called “The Star” (my astrological Birth Card). How could it not be mine? (Spoiler alert: it is now mine.)

Star Necklace by Rachel Pollack

I then spied the stunningly talented Benebell Wen across the room, and introduced myself. We were both wryly amused that we live 15 minutes apart (no, really), and yet, this is the first time we’d met in person. I picked up my copy of the Spirit Keeper’s Tarot.

Spirit Keeper’s Tarot – Image by Benebell Wen

Tempted as I was to open it and dive in, I put it away to look at later so I could focus on the conference. Such discipline! I’ll post a separate review of it later.

After a few remarks from Kim, Rachel took the stage for a lively discussion of The Devil and the Magician. Rachel raised some interesting points of consideration:
More alike than either of them care to admit, they pretend to be opposites in order to define their identities.
Pride transforms the Magician into the Devil.
The Devil is card 15, which is 1 and 5, the Magician and the Hierophant; consider the possibility that the Magician subverts the Hierophant and becomes the Devil.

Rachel concluded the workshop by leading us in a group reading of a spread examining the relationship between the Magician and the Devil.

After a break for lunch, Tero Hynenen took the stage. He opened his presentation with a slide show of historical depictions of devils and demons, with some wonderful images.This was one of my favorites:

He traced the progress of the Devil as moving from the personification of evil, through the idea of Lucifer as the Bringer of Light, and onto the 19th century, where the Devil was re-imagined by the Romantics as the outcast angel, wrongfully banished from Heaven. This theme is prevalent in much of the literature of the time, especially in the works of Charles Baudelaire. He discussed Lilith, Adam’s first wife in the Garden of Eden, and also Lilas, the wife of Satan—the Devil’s playhouse is not just a boys’ club! Lilith also featured in the spread he created for the conference.

Then a necessary break for tea and biscuits and to clear our minds a bit, and then back to it with Benebell Wen for “Tarot and Katabasis”. She led us through a guided journey to do the Tarot reading. “Katabasis” is a Greek word meaning “descent”, and the journey was a descent into the Underworld in search of understanding and for healing. A complex reading with 11 cards mapped to selected Major Arcana, it gave me plenty to think about at the time, and even now, when I revisit it, I have new realizations.

We then had a longish break for dinner and a bit of rest, and then the social began! Geraldine Beskin of Atlantis Bookshop did a fascinating presentation on Pamela Colman Smith, and had some wonderful images to share. The evening concluded with a prize raffle, and an auction of special items. (Tarot Media Company contributed a copy of Rachel Pollack’s “Soul Forest” to the auction, as well as a set of David Palladini‘s “Journal of An Artist” and “Painting the Soul: The Tarot Art of David Palladini“.) The auction raises money for the following year’s conference scholarship fund to allow attendance by people who might not be able to participate otherwise, so it’s definitely a good cause!

Then, somehow, it was after 10:00 PM, and time to sleep, so we would be ready for the Saturday program!