Page of Swords: Fledgling
It feels right to begin a new year with some Page energy: the youthful learner of new ways.
The tiny bird is ready to take flight. Black as night and shaking with fear, she perches on the edge of her nest, driven by instinct, knowing that it is time to make a change, to begin a new life. Her brothers and sisters look on, silent with anticipation, with fear – what could she be thinking?
Her little head flits this way and that way, her eyes alert to everything – to potential danger, to limitless possibility, but most of all, to her own terrible excitement.
Her first flight is little more than a clumsy flit from one tree to another, her frantic flapping keeping her in the air just about long enough to make it across to another tree. Gravity works with her chubby body to drag her so that she flies not horizontally but in a downhill tumble. It barely counts as flight, but her mad wings do enough work to keep her from hitting the ground: success!
She lands on a new branch, an unknown world. Relief soothes her panic. But … why did she do such a stupid thing? She feels safe, for a couple of seconds, until she realises that this branch is not her new home, that there is no staying here. She hears her worried mother calling her, chirping frantically as if to say, ‘Well done clever girl!’ or ‘How could you be so stupid!’ or both.
But off she goes again, and again. Later that afternoon, she manages a horizontal line; her pathetic downward flits are over.
The next day, she manages the glory of upward flight, making it into the crowns of majestic, high trees, until, eventually, she even makes it into the far-off sky, all the way up into the blue with her siblings. They sway and flow, creating a mysterious performance of feather and bone for no other reason than performance alone.
Page of Swords from Tarot de Marseille-Waite
Page of Swords: Earth of Air, the learner of airy ways. See those little birds up there, in the background of the Rider-Waite-Smith card (and may decks inspired by it)? It’s a metaphor, sure, but the physical reference is amazing, too.
There are fledglings in the trees, fledglings in the sky. There are fledglings in our minds. When one thing is figured out, there is another puzzle to be solved, another idea-bird wanting to exercise, pulled by instinct towards flight. The fledglings in our minds, all of those curiosities, plans for tomorrow and next year; embarrassing memories and joyous recollections try themselves out, moment after moment, day after day. It’s our nature, how we learned to survive as humans, in the same way as the bird has relied upon its wings for millions of years. That’s just how things are. And so we follow their progress, helping our mind-fledglings along, in a trance, giving them our focus to the detriment of all else. We do not see the fledglings in the trees when we are overly concerned with the fledglings in our minds.
The wee birds in the sky have all the space in the world when they make it up there, and yet they are still limited by energy and their resources. The same is true for the little feathered ones in our minds, trying out new ideas, concepts and remembering things long forgotten. They need rest.
When a hundred birds gather in the sky, we might see a beautiful murmuration, a miracle of nature that stops us in our tracks and reminds us that we are living, for a short time in this human form, in the midst of a wild, psychedelic, bizarre, amazing mystery.
Page of Clouds from the Osho Zen Tarot
When a hundred birds gather together in our mind, frankly, it is a hot mess. This is what the Osho Zen’s Page of Clouds (Swords) is all about.
If you find yourself getting into this mess, which can happen anywhere and everywhere, whilst you are sitting with your tea, riding the train, wherever, you might need to take in some of the fresh air that the real-life fledglings feel beneath their young wings.
Don’t miss the sight of the fledglings next spring (or this spring – right now – if that’s when you happen to read this post) because you are entranced by the fledglings in your mind. The birds out there are real, and this life is not forever. The fledglings inside our minds are illusions, and sometimes, they are stealing our lives away.
That’s all for now, friends. Thank you for being here – and please check out my Therapeutic Tarot Sessions if you’d like us to work together. You can also sign up for the Tarot Blog newsletter (different to my main newsletter) below to receive occasional email updates (roughly monthly) with the latest posts.
Smiles from Scotland,
Stephen
