Seven Of Cups

so day breaks
the curtain opens
and what do you see here?
is it raining, is there sunlight?
what's for breakfast?
who is there?
(Is this a stage?)
Where does the light shine?
(Or is it yet still dark?)
Is that the limelight in your chalice,
and is it mine?
Where do I walk to find the sun?
(And how does the leading lady like her morning tea?)
Can I take a sip of everything?
Make a rainbow?
(Where's the chorus?)
Or shall I close the curtain,
and return to bed?


The Seven of Cups is usually framed as being about choosing; each chalice as a possible option, some pleasant, some poisoned. The sheer obviousness of the poison implies that the chooser doesn't know what they're getting, but can only be guided by instinct and dreams. Be careful what you wish for is always a watchword here.

Sevens, in general, are odd. It seems to be the number where It All Goes Wrong - whatever project the element is part of suddenly comes into question, often with a cry of 'why?' So why water? What's it for - what's inside it? To where does it flow, and do we even want to get there?

I've been slow at writing this one because I'm not sure what's going on with this particular image. A cup of sunshine in the air, sure enough, but the other six are just stacked at the bottom, and the streams that run from top to bottom here look less like water than like...cloth. So I'm seeing a curtain opening - it could be morning, or it could be Act I, Scene I. Are you really in for this whole water stuff, or is it just a role you're playing? What do you do when the curtain falls? Do you get that cup of sunshine, or is it way offstage, outside of all the roles and scenery?

Do you ever get to choose, or are you following the script?

Much confusion ;_;

[Edit: six months later, and I finally realise that this image is a simple, straightforward vulva. Fuck, I'm slow.]


Images of the Seven of Cups:

The Scapini card takes after the RWS; seven cups full of choices, and a central figure who seems to be dreaming.

In the Osho Zen we've got Projections - two people facing each other, but far from communicating naturally, each is putting out a projected image, and it is the two projections that seem to touch, not the real people. I admit I just looked that up right now, but maybe I had it in my head when I saw the swirls of cloth in the Intuitive card, and wondered if we were on the stage.

Psyche asks Aphrodite for help here in the Mythic deck. This is a fiddly moment on account of it being Psyche who screwed up, and the two of them not being best of friends in the first place, but Aphrodite says she can have her husband back...but it won't be easy. I think this is about not just choices but access to choice itself; Psyche's trying to find the way, and rather than being able to simply take a sip of whatever she likes, she's having to look for help in unlikely places to overcome the hurdles between herself and what she needs.