Program note

Thomas Shapcott's Charms and Prophecies for a Tarot Pack is a sequence of short poems, one for each of the cards of the major Arcana numbered One to Twenty-one of a Tarot pack. Old Tom's Numerical Prophecies is a setting of four of these poems.

No. 1  The Juggler
Beginning is like the sun
controlling and directing power,
sure of itself: the master player.

Beginning is like the sun
tossing its staff of light to earth
half-playful, half-imperious.

Beware of the number ONE -
it juggles lives like boxes
and turns your insights into circles
beginning like the sun.

No. 4  The Emperor of Loss
Magic like an inheritor
draws out the light from sun,
draws in the gust of fire,

magic like an inheritor
drains water up to clouds
then spins them all away.

Beware. Beware the number FOUR,
maker of air, of loss,
of what the mysteries are:
magic, like an inheritor.

No. 13  Death
Clap your hands and feet and dance
that the marriage be begun
and the union be achieved.

Clap your hands and feet and dance
spilling and sharing the precious wine
eager to serve and to be served.

Rejoice in the number THIRTEEN:
each cell in your body dies and is replaced,
nothing is wasted, nothing is lost.
Clap your hands and feet and dance.

No. 17  The Star
You will watch the stars
their light is heat
and unendurably cold;

you will watch the stars
that may be dead
years before years.

Beware the number SEVENTEEN:
you will wake in sweat from dreams
you will open the door,
you will watch the stars.

Performances, etc

• Contemporary Performers' and Composers' Fellowship workshop and concert, Old Darlington School, University of Sydney, 4th April 1992; choir: The Contemporary Singers.
• "Horizons" Festival of Contemporary Australian Choral Music, organised by Sydney Philharmonia, Eugene Goossens Hall, ABC Centre Ultimo, Sydney, 20th September 1992; choir: The Contemporary Singers; synthesisers: OHM.

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© Gordon Monro 2004.       Last modified: December 23, 2004.
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