As I unwrap these silken portents
cloaked in mystery
I begin to wonder at their significance
throughout history
Did Napoleon consult the dark cards
in the night
before Waterloo revealed all his
future without foresight
Was a lightning-struck tower held
in a gypsy’s hand
and did the little Corporal ignore it
when he gave the command
The lovers sit in front of me and I
can only wonder
how many couples this card brought hope
before fate struck them asunder
they never noticed how often the
card was reversed
they never knew that such a reading
reveals a love cursed
Now did Nietsche ever observe, not
that he believed
in such things, the hermit, lover of
wisdom and all things conceived
Surely when Zarathustra came down
and spake
he knew his words would shatter the
heavens like a quake
Did the hanged man turn up time
and again
in the south with a black man
locked in a chain
I doubt it brought very much
hope to see
the promise of a flimsy card is
little guaranteee
And as for death, that strange
harbinger
in this pack of cardboard, it
looms larger
It is not a death of blood but
of possilbity
and withstanding the change is
a sign of nobility
How can any trust a seer in
a dark shroud
of a thousand different paths
spoken aloud