◇ Category · Oracles
Four systems that tell you something rather than describe something: the ogham fews, the geomantic figures, the tattvas, and the alchemical work. Each answers a different kind of question — what the trees say, what the sand says, what the subtle elements are, and what the work does to them.
The Irish tree alphabet, in its four aicmi of five. The tree is the few's own; the element, planet and zodiac are modern esoteric readings rather than part of the medieval record.
A beginning, a clearing, the first thing done. Reversed: a start that was never finished.
Protection and second sight, the flame in the berry. Reversed: a warning ignored.
The alder, the shield and the oracle; a choice that has to be made. Reversed: a decision deferred.
The willow and the moon: intuition, water, the dreaming mind. Reversed: a dream unheeded.
The whitethorn, a barrier and a purifier: a hard thing that cleans. Reversed: unnecessary obstacles.
The oak and the doorway: strength, kingship, and the door between worlds. Reversed: a strength misused.
Holly, the midwinter twin: balance, justice, and the heat inside the cold. Reversed: a balance tipped.
The hazel of the nine nuts: wisdom, poetry, the salmon's knowledge. Reversed: knowledge withheld.
Ivy, which climbs by holding on: a slow growth and a search that turns. Reversed: growth at another's expense.
The reed and the broom: cleansing, the setting in order that follows an illness. Reversed: a mess left standing.
The blackthorn, the sloe and the winter: hardship that cannot be avoided and the change it forces. Reversed: suffering without use.
The elder, the tree of the last things: an ending already under way. Reversed: an ending refused.
Furze, which flowers in the cold: love and gathering, abundance in a hard season. Reversed: a gathering that scatters.
Heather, the ground itself: healing, generosity, the common land. Reversed: a giving that empties.
The aspen, which trembles and does not break: endurance and the facing of a fear. Reversed: fear allowed to rule.
The yew, the oldest tree in the graveyard: death and the long rebirth, age as a station. Reversed: a death refused.
A figure is cast from marks in sand or on paper and read in a chart of twelve houses, the same way a horoscope is. Each has an element, a planet and a sign.
A road, and a thing already moving. Slow change, water, the moon; a matter that will not stay still.
The exit. The matter ends, and usually not as hoped; do not begin here.
A boy with a sword: energy without judgment, courage, quarrels, and things done too fast.
Fortune coming from outside and moving fast. Help that arrives, and does not stay long.
A girl at her mirror: harmony, beauty, agreement, and the peace that comes from liking.
Loss, freely given or taken; the open hand. What goes, goes, and it is usually outward.
A ring, a chain, a cell: a matter bound up, delayed, or held. Sometimes the restraint is the answer.
Two things meeting, or a lost thing found again. Union, agreement, and recovery after loss.
Gain, profit, an increase that comes to the asker. The open hand receiving.
Red: anger, blood, passion, and a mess being made. Powerful, and not clean.
Joy and health, a thing that lifts. The figure of a good outcome arriving in good temper.
Sorrow, and with it stability: the sadness that is also the ground you are standing on.
The entrance. A door opening, a beginning, and the luck that comes with a threshold.
White: peace, counsel, clarity, and a matter that can be settled by talking.
A crowd: many people, no single answer, and a matter carried by numbers rather than by will.
Great fortune from within: strength, stability, and a good outcome that the asker holds up themselves.
The five subtle elements of tantra, and the five qualities sensed through them — the pair is what the Western element tables were trying to name.
The three primes are what everything is made of; the seven operations are what the work does to them, in order.
4 collections, 67 entries. Every one of them is in the index, where each entry has its own page and shows what it points at and what points back at it.