She stands with a mirror in her left hand, surrounded by swirls of smoke from a cauldron behind her. She isn’t looking into the mirror, she’s looking out at me. My face is in the mirror.

The Summer Queen, reminding me of days in Dixie. Lemonade with the meat of the lemon. Honey. Playing dominoes and cards… there is a chessboard behind her.

Her cup is the cauldron, brewing behind her. She is everything I am: compelling and terrifying. Everything I want to be… everything I’m afraid to be… everything I was… everything I am. A dark sister who tempts me with the most forbidden fruit, we tempt each other, but only because we know we’ll refuse. Maybe one day, we’ll call the bluff.

Queen of the Southern Wind, her crown is emerald and gold, but its set aside; she’s too modest to wear it. At least, that’s what she’d like us to see. Because behind her is another mirror. And another to her left. Another to her right. She’s surrounded by them, making us wonder which is real and which is reflection. We’re not sure if what we’re looking at is real… if anything. She’s crafted that very well… sometimes too well. I know this because one of the faces in the mirror is mine.

Clad in Summer’s colors from head to toe, but the clothes cling where they should. She lets us see what she wants us to see and her smile is demure and inviting. She is long, hot afternoons. The night is so far away… but the summer nights are just as warm… The moon is heavy in the sky, almost too heavy for the sky to carry. And in her eyes are the kind of promises that are only made on long, warm summer nights.

The is the Queen of the South. The second Queen in my Tarot. The Queen of Secrets. Subtle and full of whispers, she reminds me that her rules are my rules. She plays games but only by her own rules. On the chessboard behind her, the Queen has the King in check. His only valid move is to move toward her. Closer to the capture. The Fire of the East is forgotten for the long, slow burning coals it left behind. The cooking heat that only coals make, boiling what’s in her cauldron. The Queen of Summer. Honey wine is in her cup, and I drink it with my eyes closed and my tongue awake, ready to sip the intoxicating sweetness it contains.

Queen of emerald and gold, she is my Circe. She keeps secrets that we share, speaking in a tongue that only we understand. And for that, I bow before her and beg her mercy that I might pay her proper tribute. She smiles, and bids me to rise. But she does not give me the cup… I have to take it for myself. And there we are. One unwilling to take and the other unwilling to give.

Her words are always whispers. She has no battle cry. She says to me, through the mirror, “I am here.”

And my reply is always the same. “So am I.”