The 78 Cards
Two of Cups
Minor Arcana, the suit of Cups, the Two. Element: water.
Two hearts meeting as equals.
The picture
Two young people stand facing each other, each holding a golden cup, and reach towards one another as if to exchange them or make a toast. The woman wears a laurel wreath and a pale blue mantle. The young man wears a garland of red flowers and a patterned tunic. Between their cups rises a staff with two serpents twined around it, and above it floats a lion's head with red wings. Behind them a house sits on a green hill.
Upright
Two is the number of choice, balance and partnership. In Cups, it is the partnership of the heart.
This is the card of two people choosing each other. It can be new love. It can just as easily be a friendship that clicks, a reconciliation, or a working relationship where both sides care about more than the money.
Look at the hands. Each person gives and each person receives in the same moment. Neither one kneels and neither one looks down on the other. That is the whole teaching of this card: a connection where the cups are the same size.
The staff with the two serpents is the caduceus, the wand of Hermes the messenger, and it stands for a fair exchange between two people. I read it as a quiet promise. When two people meet like this, something passes between them that both of them needed.
Reversed
Reversed, the cups tip away from each other. I read it first as blocked: the feeling is there on both sides and something is getting in the way. A misunderstanding, a silence that has gone on too long, a pride neither person will put down.
It can also be too much or too little, where one cup is being poured into far more than the other. One person reaching, one person holding back.
To tell which, ask who is still reaching. If you both are and it keeps missing, it is blocked, and a plain conversation often clears it. If only you are, the balance has tipped, and that deserves a look before you pour any more.
When it turns up
Where in your life are you giving and receiving in equal measure, and where has that slipped out of step?
If you would like the cards read against your own chart, my readings are here.
Related pages
The Number 2
The 78 Cards
Every card in the deck, upright and reversed.
See every page and post in the Contents.
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