THE EMPEROR (Tarot card) & A HOUSE DECLARES (dream narrative) by Roswila

A HOUSE DECLARES

clearly more organized and skilled
than ours a house declares war
against our own, armed with an acre
of fire brands the bellicose threat
at first freezes us in terror
then stirs us into a flurry
of action to keep from becoming
only a memory in flames

we gather all Goddess figurines
and statues from the dusty shelves
and closets of our large old Victorian
style house, placing them as guards
against a secret break in: one
at every door and window they glow
in the dark, ancient sentinels

then we empty all the large boxes
and suitcases in the house,
an impressive hoard, and fill them
with crumpled newspapers
so they'll be light to heft
but maintain their shape

we open all drapes and pile these
puffed up squares in front of each
window where our enemy
can readily see them, handling
them as if each weighs a ton
and will squash anyone flat
beneath it when tossed
through a window

better any day that we bluff
our way out of this soon
to be fiery pit, than that they
burn their way in


[narrative on a dream of 3-25-14. Well, so much for embracing the "cleansing fire" of the breath of those dragons in an earlier dream I posted here. Actually, at a rather too complicated level to explain here, the fire in this dream, too, has a positive aspect. Then there's the implied relationship to the Tarot's Emperor card in this dream. He's often associated with a square or cube, depicted seated on a cube (as opposed to a throne) in some of the oldest decks and his number is IV. Rather than go on about this card I'll go straight to the point, these dream cubes/squares are protection (of a sort) -- one of The Emperor's qualities. I'd better stop here. The narrative is long enough on it's own and I could go on and on about this complicated dream. IMAGE: "The Emperor" in a Tarot deck I've been developing, "The Taiga Tarot" (designing and producing the complete image for each card, including writing the non-traditional tanka).]

PLEASE NOTE: in most browsers you can click on the above image for a larger version. Also, the photo accompanying a post is not necessarily meant to illustrate it, but to reflect some small, even slant aspect of the verse, similar to Japanese haiga (illustrated haiku).

There are many other sorts of posts on this blog. I indicate which are about or influenced by dreams. Some non dream focused posts are book reviews, "regular" poems (some by other writers, as the above is), scifaiku, writing exercises, Tarot haiku, photos, haiga, and so on. However, most of those are in much older posts. There's a listing by month going back to early 2006, at the end of the sidebar.

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until next time, keep dreaming,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
**** If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA'S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA'S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.