Two of Wands.
The whole world in one hand, untested.
Upright, then reversed, as Waite gave them in 1910.
A man on his own battlement, the world in his hand. It is the size of an apple. He looks past it at the bay, one staff loose in his hand, the other bolted to the wall, roses and lilies cut into the stone below.
Everything is on that globe and none of it has been tested. That is why it is so satisfying to hold. Small enough to carry means nothing on it has been tried. You have the plan and the reach, and having them is not the same as having started.
Four things people go to on this card
- the globe
You went to the globe, the whole world in one hand while he looks past it at the water.
This is the plan that is still entirely in your head. It is the right size to hold, everything is on it, and none of it has met weather. A plan at this stage cannot fail, which is the last time it will feel this good.
He is standing on his own wall with a model. The bay he is looking at is real and the globe is painted, and the card is dry about the difference. Ask which of the two your plan has spent more time with.
What part of your plan has never met anything outside your own head?
- the fixed wand
You went to the wand on the right, bracketed to the wall, while the one in his hand is loose.
One is fixed to the building and one can go. The difference between them is the whole decision, and the picture has put them at opposite edges of the frame so you cannot hold both at once.
Nobody makes this choice cleanly. Most people hold the loose one for years while never once unbolting the other. Say which of your two this is, and how long you have been holding it.
Which of the two are you holding, and how long have you been holding it without moving?
- his back
It was his turned back you noticed, his face in profile and everything he is looking at out of the frame.
His attention has already left. He is on his own terrace, with his own view, and he is not in the room with anyone. Whatever he is looking at is not on the card, which is the point: it is not in the house.
That is what ambition looks like from behind, and it is worth being honest about the cost of it. Someone in your life is currently looking at the back of your head, and they can see the globe better than you can.
Who has been looking at the back of your head lately, and does it need saying?
- the roses and lilies
You stopped at the carving on the wall, crossed roses and white lilies cut into the stone below him.
A coat of arms is the list of things already settled and paid for. Desire and purity, arranged in a pattern and fixed to the wall of a place he already owns. It is the only thing on the card that cannot be picked up.
The card is often read as ambition, and the carving argues the other way. He is not hungry. He has the house and the world is a model in his hand, which is a quieter risk than wanting. If your house is already built, that is the risk you are in, and from outside it still looks like ambition.
Is this genuinely a want, or the restlessness of somebody who already has the house?
Its ten degrees
The Golden Dawn gave the Two of Wands 0° to 10° of Aries, ruled by Mars, and Book T calls it the Lord of Dominion. The Sun is in it from 20 March to 30 March. The decan page for this card.
The wheel runs on from here. The decan before this one is Ten of Cups, Mars in Pisces, 10 March to 20 March. The one after is Three of Wands, the Sun in Aries, 30 March to 10 April. All thirty-six, in order.
On the Tree of Life, Book T puts the Two of Wands on Chokmah, wisdom, in Atziluth, the world of fire: every two is Chokmah, in its own suit's world. It is the second place in the Tree of Life spread.
Draw a card, and if this one turns, press whichever of these four you went to and the reading is written from there instead. Pulled it in a spread of your own? Read the whole spread here.
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