Cosmic Tribe Tarot
TEN OF SWORDS
Delusion
The curtain of illusion has fallen and there you are on stage. The audience sees through you. They're laughing, sneering, booing, pointing at you, and throwing things. A line snaps and the clothes rip from your body. More laughing and sneering. It's over. The jig's up. Your worst fear has been exposed to the cruel eyes of the world. There is nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.In the card a naked figure is run through with ten swords as the blood-red curtain of denial falls away, abandoning him. This is the kind of "death" that happens when our most cherished illusions are shorn from us. Nobody is buying the ruse anymore and the mind slowly awakens to the tricks of its owner. It turns to pierce denial and get at the truth. The ten swords of harsh reality gore the figure and the mask drops, exposing a tender layer of skin to the light for the first time. In the hellish background, his nightmares run rampant. He reels and faints, and floats in a netherworld of fear and loss. But soon he will realize that this too is simply a nightmare and that it is the duty of the swords to prick our vanity, even if the experience is painful. The resulting clarity will allow him to begin the difficult process of healing the wounds he has concealed behind fanciful illusions.