Two of Swords

Minor Arcana · Swords · number 2 · Due di Spade

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The Two of Swords is a blindfolded woman sitting by the sea, two swords crossed over her chest: balance, but an armed balance. Waite speaks of concord in a state of arms, courage, friendship, and in another reading tenderness and intimacy. If these days you feel in a truce, with your partner, a colleague, yourself, and fear that a breath could break it, it is no accident. Waite warns that Swords rarely bring pure blessings. The practical advice: take off the blindfold. Face the matter you are keeping in suspense, and choose, because a balance that holds only with closed eyes does not last.

Source: Arthur Edward Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910) · read the original passage

«Conformity and the equipoise which it suggests, courage, friendship, concord in a state of arms; another reading gives tenderness, affection, intimacy. The suggestion of harmony and other favourable readings must be considered in a qualified manner, as Swords generally are not symbolical of beneficent forces in human affairs.»

Reversed

Reversed, the Two of Swords lets the blades fall and uncovers the deception: imposture, falsehood, duplicity, disloyalty. The truce was fake, and someone was taking advantage of your blindfold. If these days you discover that a person said one thing and did another, in love or in business, it is no accident: the card shows you what you did not want to see. Watch yourself too, those small convenient lies that keep a false peace standing. It is not a sentence: it is truth arriving. The practical advice: do not take revenge, but close the door calmly and do not reopen it without proof.

Source: Arthur Edward Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910) · read the original passage

«Imposture, falsehood, duplicity, disloyalty.»

Source

Arthur Edward Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910) Part III, § 2, The Lesser Arcana, Two of Swords https://archive.org/details/a.-e.-waite-the-pictorial-key-to-the-tarot