While most people generally accept that the meaning of the Death card in tarot is not actual death but a symbolic death - an ending - that precedes transformation, the way the Death card is depicted in most decks still makes it unnerving to see in a reading. Death is usually a skeletal being, sometimes riding a horse, sometimes holding a sword, always a little bit creepy. Not only does this imagery make the Death card difficult for many to accept in a reading, but Death is often frightening to those who are afraid to face their shadow selves and have distanced themselves from it. The transformation that Death offers is therefore often elusive.

Death, The Fey Tarot

Lately I've been using the Fey Tarot to do readings for myself. The primary way to read with these cards is a triple-card spread with a card each for Desire, Joy and Magic. Desire represents that which we want or hope for, Joy represents what it is that we have to be happy for, and Magic represents the work we need to do. This morning the Death card turned up in the Joy position. One might think that Death is hardly a joyful card, but if you consider the card's meaning, especially the meaning of the Fey Death, it's not so farfetched to accept Death as something to be happy about.

When we reach this Death, she has a kind face, welcoming us. She has eyes of two different colors. One indicates hope, and shines with light, where any other kind of light would not show. The other shines with a more ominous light, because she is the great consoler from whom you cannot flee. She gazes at us with a friendly smile, patient and at the same time sad because of the fear she knows she inspires. She rests her head in her hand, waiting for the last move to be made.

In death there is a passage from one place in life to another. It is the end of a moment, now past, that has become the beginning of a future moment, now our present. Death gives us the chance for metamorphosis and for many this can be a welcome and wondrous thing.

The Fey Death wears around her neck a medal that represents an eclipse. As an eclipse hides the Sun's light, Death describes all the times in which we emerge from the dark only to be immersed in another light. It is not an end, but a beginning. In the world of the Fey nothing can really die because the spirit is immortal. Yet even for us humans, Death doesn't have to be an end. It can be an opportunity, fixed as we are to that idea of opportunity being the thing that brings something new and worthy into our lives.

Posted by Angela-Eloise at 7:09 PM