10/2 The Empress #3
TEMPLE artefact #15
#3 The Empress final version, art by Rian Hughes
III. THE EMPRESS
KEY WORDS – HARMONY, BEAUTY, NATURE, INTUITION, MOTHERHOOD, FEMALE POWER
The Empress is Trump 3 of the Major Arcana.
The Empress is described as the embodiment of feminine power and represents the fertility and abundance of the natural world. She is the nurturing maternal force, Gaia or Mother Earth.
Our version of this card shows the Empress from just below her navel to the magnificent horned and imperial ‘crown’ on her head.
She is a proud and beautiful woman, voluptuously Beyoncé-esque/Kim Kardashian.
Her dress is of ROSE and GREEN – colours are pale, pastel-ish, yet natural, spring and summer hues. A halter-neck style with a plain circular necklace.
Her expression is direct, sure of herself, experienced – she is sister, mother, lover, ruler, seer. A hint of a smile. Her eyes shift to with a knowing glance to her LEFT, our RIGHT, in the direction of the dove (when we do the alchemically matched Emperor card, he’ll be looking to his right, so that when placed together, the two figures will be checking one another out appreciatively).
On her brow is the symbol for VENUS – the circle and cross which contains in its simple lines the plan of the whole Tree of Life.
From her head, growing like the 12 branches of a tree through her skull to make a kind of spherical halo is her crown - a fractal structure that is part living thing, part machine. The 12 branches stand for the 12 planets, 12 zodiac signs and 12 months of the year, among other things.
At the tip of each branch is a circular SILVER PLATE or button, like a leaf on the end of each twig, but perfectly circular. A techno-tree at the tips showing how from its roots Nature has produced a species driven to technologically enhance its surroundings.
BEES buzz around the crown’s many branches, pollinating the strange techno ‘flowers’.
On her left shoulder sits a chirping exuberant SPARROW, on her right a contemplative DOVE (see above)
Her arms are arranged roughly in the circular ‘Mater Triumphans’ or Isis Rejoicing posture used in Crowleyan Thelemic magic.
Her right hand holds a scaled-down PELICAN CROSSING traffic light pole as though it were a flower – the RED light is momentarily lit. As if overflowing from the red lamp, thin trails of blood spill down the pole onto the Empress’ fingers.
The shape of the pole is suggestive of male generative power, which the Empress controls and directs into manifestation. It is also female, directly hinting at the alchemical image of the pelican which feeds its young with blood from its own breast as both Christ and the ever-giving maternal power of the Empress.
Her cupped left hand is empty. Her palm contains the void.
Our Empress of Nature and the archetypal Feminine sits on a throne made of water and fire – blue gas jet flames rear up behind her to make the horn-like uprights of her chair. Combined with the circumference of her halo of her these horns are evocative of the so-called Crown of Isis (you can look it up online for the traditional shape).
The arms of the throne are made of WATER curling into wavelike armrests. Little fish and tiny submarines can be seen swimming INSIDE the throne.
At her navel is a white rose with an image of a MITOCHONDRIAL CELL at its heart - the distinctive ‘segmented’ pattern of mitochondria (this first ‘mother cell’ impelled to divide and divide again and exponentially again 3 and a half billion years ago is still continuing its cloning process – I have often considered the presence within us of mitochondrial cells – immortal, eternal, – to be the physical basis for the concept of the soul).
The rose has jet plane wings either side like a parachute regiment badge. Specifically, the wings of a McDonnellF-15 Eagle.
Behind the Empress, the ‘GATES OF HEAVEN’ are opening to release an awe-inspiring radiance. The Hebrew letter associated with this card and this figure is DALETH, signifying a DOOR. The metaphorical door into and out of material life. The vulva and the grave.
The Empress is Ultimate Mother. She connects matter to highest spirit.
TRUE STORY :
• Washington D.C. is a GRID.
• On 9/11/2001 at around 1pm , the Pentagon officially closed for Business and sent ALL its employees Home for The Duration ( of whatever this WAS -- )
• At 13:01 2000 car-loads of pentagon employees turned onto the freeway, drive 50 yards and then got gridlocked there -- for over NINE HOURS .
ANECDOTAL :
• EVEN THOUGH, all those people were reacting to (what they THOUGHT was) an ATTACK on EVERYTHING, in those 9 hrs, not ONE white U.S. Government Employee disobeyed a red-light traffic signal, and not ONE of them drove across The Grass on The Mall in front of The U.S. Capitol.
• “ALL” The Black employees drove over The Grass to “get The F**k Home”.
AS IT HAS BEEN EXPLAINED TO ME :
• This means : that “White People” will obey Traffic Lights EVEN WHEN They •THINK• it’s The End of The World -- and whatever else you may THINK about that Reasoning, I FEEL that this is almost CERTAINLY True.