The Travelers Tarot Part 4

The Engineer.

Greetings in the name of the pernicious nature of grace, I welcome you to ubiquitous mercy and commit to treating you with that ever more precious commodity, love. We live in a world that seems to treat love as an aside next to the market gains and losses, and while we are all affected by capitalism ( stares at your 401k in slavery) and I understand it has real effects, I continue my quest to be one of the few writers on Substack not writing about writing, or Trump.

This newsletter is committed to seeking out anti-fascist, anti-racist, and anti-colonial esoteric, mystical, magic/kal stories, history, and practicum for practitioners. Does that have real utility in our current climate? Of course, it does. The revolution could use some magic/k, maybe not magic/kal thinking like our friend Bouncy House Karen this weekend, but could be buoyed and bolstered by more practices of oppressed. By hymns of the harried. The rites of those who are denied rights.

We need to re-enchant this world, we need land-based spiritual practice before we run out of air, and yes we need to actively subvert, dismantle, and face the evangelical thesis in our history in the U.S. But this would have been humanity’s call in these times no matter the leader, we just happen to have an overt supervillain in charge of the U.S. which makes the need more obvious.

This is what I wish to add to public ontology and sort of the point of my new book: Black Power and Black Magic/k, forthcoming Llewelyn ‘26.

We continue unveiling my cartomancy system today with The Engineer, and The Map Maker. Here is the first post if you want to start this series from the beginning:

And here is the pre-order link looks like I will start making your decks by the end of May at this rate so keep ordering: Pre-Order

The Engineer stands in between two rush hour trains as they speed in two different directions. He walks the tracks to clear his head in between design and work sessions. The engineer is one of the designers of much of the cosmos, but he remembers none of that. That’s mostly to protect him and us. Now incarnated as one of the voices on this earth he mostly spends his time designing new ways for people, community, and the land to live together. That is why The Engineer doesn't remember their countless incarnations, because they are filling this new one with designs for new worlds, peoples, and futures, and moving creative energy around with the even pace of the smoothing ticking of watch gears, the sight of pistons rising and falling, and the sacred schema they are constantly sketched out on paper, in their head, on their heart, and often on the walls of their small apartment in the heart of every city. If you pull the engineer card have you considered pausing for a while and working out the details? Do you honor your genius? Or is your head filled with former glory, former success? Are you honoring your place in the sacred design? Do you believe you were lovingly fashioned by the universe? Do you believe you are here by mistake? Have you allowed yourself to become obsolete in your life’s design and need to go back to the drawing board?

If with both his witnesses right now is an auspicious time to plan big life things or everything is working exactly as planned. Combined with the proper world you may even see visions of grander designs and blueprints of the cosmos and future cosmos to come.

The Map Maker sits at a crossroads waiting for her lover. She takes this sweet moment of anticipation to do a bit of her sacred work. The Map Maker travels the cosmos and was the first to discover the vehicle and means by which you could travel the worlds and created the first map for the children of the creator to travel the cosmos. She taught them how to use and access the vehicle most beings use to travel to the cosmos, the earth, or some version of it. She taught them how to care for the roads they would travel, good form when they encounter humanity, destiny, and strange messengers like themselves from other worlds. She told them of the empty throne, and her sibling The Herald traveling down the road ahead of them, lighting each lamp so they could see the Landmarks she marked on each of their maps. She then helped each voice slip into incarnation and taught them how to find their two witnesses so they may walk the same roads. Then as the 10 voices present started to celebrate she slowly became the dirt, mud, sand, grit, and rocks of the earthy road they danced on and slipped into the night. Each voice realized the map was a self-portrait of the map maker and walked down the road.

If the map maker comes up in the reading you are surrounded by the sacred and divine feminine. A sacred mother who knows herself, and thus can guide her children like us in the work of self-discovery. A sacred mother draws awe, lust, and life out of us all. You contain whole worlds inside you waiting to be born. The key is getting to know what roads access your inner and essential self. Then you can show those about you where your heart lies. Are you taking the time to take in the whole picture? Are you allowing being a mother, or nurturer to get in the way of your growth? Are you willing to slip into the night and trust your loved ones will be ok for a while?

If with her two witnesses, you have found a point in spacetime where either the Divine Feminine is manifest, or mounting someone near you, or she is present in some other manifestation. Worlds only indicate in what form she arrives.

See you all later this week.

rev/awo lenny duncan