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Six of Swords
The Six of Swords is a card of transition. It shows leaving a hard situation behind and heading somewhere quieter — not always joyfully, but with the sense that the worst is in the past. It can describe a literal journey, or a change of mind that carries a person out of a troubled time.
The image
A ferryman poles a boat across the water. In it sit a cloaked woman and a child, huddled, with six swords standing upright in the boat. The water is rippled on one side and smooth on the other, and a far shore lies ahead. The swords are usually read as the worries that travel with them, and the calmer water as the gentler place they are moving towards.
Upright
Transition, recovery, travel, leaving trouble behind, accepting help to get through. Waite gives "journey by water, route, way". Its tone is quiet: things are getting easier, even if sadness is still on board.
Reversed
Waite reads the reversal as declaration, confession or publicity. Modern readers often see a journey delayed, resistance to moving on, or carrying old problems into a new place. Some readers do not use reversals.
Correspondences
Minor Arcana, the Six of the suit of Swords, element Air. In the Golden Dawn system, which most English-language decks follow, it is Mercury in the second decan of Aquarius, 10°–20°, in Tiphareth, the sixth sephirah. The Order called it "Earned Success".
In a reading
In the past it often marks a move or a recovery already under way; as advice, letting someone help you across. As an outcome, a calmer chapter. After the Five of Swords, it shows the dispute being left behind.
In astrology
The Golden Dawn's correspondences, which most English-language decks follow (French, Marseille-based tradition differs for some Major Arcana).
Decan: Mercury in Aquarius, 10°–20°
Element: Air — the element of Gemini, Libra and Aquarius
Mode: Fixed — Aquarius is a fixed sign