How Black and Brown Mystical Artists Are Tapping Into Our Ancestral Power
Generational wounds prevented Black and Brown women from using their magic in public. But today, women of color are reclaiming their spaces in mystic arts like tarot and astrology.
The ancestors called on Tatianna Tarot at an early age. She couldn’t have been any older than six or seven when it happened. While browsing a bookstore in Brooklyn with her dad, a deck of tarot cards caught Tatianna’s eye. She wanted to take the cards home with her, but, of course, her dad wouldn’t buy them. What would a child do with a deck of tarot cards anyway? But Tatianna’s juju wasn’t the type to lay low. Once she got to her grandmother’s house, she found a deck of playing cards in the kitchen. They became her entryway into the metaphysical world.
She had a system back then. Hearts meant love. The good luck club, as she calls it, meant just that: Good luck was on the way. And the mighty spades card, a trump in the game of its namesake, indicated something bad was in the works. She used card and palm readings to bargain for ice cream and cookies with the other kids at the lunch table.
Little did the Bed-Stuy-born Afro Latina know that the juju ran deep in her bloodline…
