tarot card meanings · minor arcana · swords

nine of swords tarot card, original ink-line art

nine of swords — tarot card meaning

The three a.m. sitting; anguish rehearsing tomorrow in the dark.

reversed

The nightmare named and measured; dawn arithmetic.

two philosophical anchors, cited

Suffering in imagination · Seneca, Letters 13 (tr. Gummere)

“We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.”

The unguarded mind · Dhammapada, v.42 (tr. Mueller)

“Whatever a hater may do to a hater, a wrongly-directed mind will do us greater mischief.”

the question we would ask

Of tonight's nine fears, how many existed at noon?

how a reading is composed — and why it ends with a question, not a prediction.