Laura Joyce Laura Joyce

Three Tarot Essays

Cardinal Fire: deity, divination, world-yielding

The bridge between deity and humanity isn’t so special, we call it dying

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Laura Joyce Laura Joyce

Distilling the Themes of a Story

Cardinal fire: prismatic storytelling, intensity, wholeness

The film is formally beautiful. Long, slow takes. The drama of light through a circular window. The harrowing beauty of autumn leaves against a whitewashed exterior. Mortality is conjured in the changes of seasons, and the gradations of light.

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Laura Joyce Laura Joyce

A Match is Struck: on Writing the Present

Cardinal fire: immediacy, fire, creativity.

Unlike the click of a lighter, a match creates a suspended moment in time. The weight in the hand, the sound of the strike, the little fire glowing, and the curl of extinguished smoke.

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Laura Joyce Laura Joyce

Two of Wands: Writing Sabbaticals

Fixed air: portals, balance, opposition

How do you build rest into your writing practice? When do you let the field lay fallow, and when do you let it grow wild?

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Tarot for Writers Laura Joyce Tarot for Writers Laura Joyce

The Tower

Cardinal fire: heat, fire opals, intensity

A story is about the moment of unstoppable inevitability of knowledge or action: think of Greek tragedies, folk tales, revolutions, mysteries. Humans are wired to be hungry for these kinds of stories, because they help us to understand a chaotic and sometimes brutal world.

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Tarot for Writers Laura Joyce Tarot for Writers Laura Joyce

Four of Wands

Fixed earth: homecoming, celebration, safety

Fours tend to represent stability and support, in the Modern Witch deck, the four wands have been made into a shelter, gateway, or portal decked with festive foliage.

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