AUTHORS NOTE: In his famous poem, Robert Frost had two roads to choose from. Here I’m proposing four and using reversals to decide which ones should not be taken in favor of a more promising upright signpost pointing the way.

Select a deck that has non-reversible card backs so you can discern orientation without turning the cards face-up. (If you don’t have one – they have been out-of-favor lately – deal all cards face- up but don’t let the foreknowledge affect your judgment.)

Shuffle the deck in a way that introduces random reversals.

Begin dealing the cards face-down into a column of four elemental positions, Fire at the top then Water, Air and Earth in descending order.

If a card in the first four-card pull is reversed, don’t deal any more cards into that position. The reversal shows that it isn’t the best road to take. Do the same for all reversed cards in the rest of the column.

If the first pull includes one or more upright cards, continue dealing cards top-to-bottom into those positions until only one of them contains an upright card. This card will initiate the path to be followed; turn it face-up. (If there are no upright cards among the four, reshuffle and pull again until you get one or more; if it happens twice, defer the reading or choose a different deck or an alternate spread.)

If the stack has four or more cards underlying the face-up card, select the four cards immediately beneath it and lay them face-up in a row to the right of the top card, creating a five-card line. If there are three or less, lay them out as described and then pull enough additional cards from the top of the deck to populate the full five-card set. In all cases, maintain the as-dealt orientation.

Read this line as a story describing the best way to approach the objective.

Here is an example reading to show the process.

The Fire, Water and Earth positions all eventually wound up with a reversed card on top, eliminating them from consideration. Only the Air position retained an upright card when all the rest were reversed. This is the narrative opener.

The hypothetical querent is contemplating an attractive opportunity and wants to know how he should approach it for the greatest chance of success.

The Air position is emphasized, showing that a thoughtful, measured advance will be his best bet. However, the 5 of Cups looks like the proverbial “slippery slope,” One false step could sink him.

The Princess of Cups advises that a gracious, unassuming self-control is the way. The pulse steadies as the instability inherent in the 5 of Cups defers to the patient persistence of the Princess.

The “hinge” position or turning-point holds the Aeon (aka Judgement). I usually interpret this card to mean an “offer that can’t be refused, with no turning back.” The die is cast and the situation will “be what it will be.” It looks like the matter might be taken out of the querent’s hands. (After the Aeon, I had to draw two more cards to fill out the spread.)

Lust (aka Strength) reversed does not offer the same encouragement as its upright expression. It suggests the “First Labor of Hercules” gone wrong, or perhaps the Lion giving Androcles the “cold shoulder” at the crucial moment. The querent will have to be at the top of his game to succeed but he is fighting an uphill battle. It seems that he could be stymied, if not figuratively torn to pieces..

Art (aka Temperance) reversed as the outcome throws off the balance once again, and the Princess of Cups doesn’t have the horsepower or the stamina to hold it together. When reversed, Art strikes me as a card of stoic resignation. The querent may be pondering when he should be motivating toward the goal. Three Fire trumps closing in on the conclusion would normally imply accelerating momentum, but the last two are waylaid and diminished by their upset condition. It reminds me of the Alan Parsons song lyric: “You’re gonna get your fingers burned.” I have my doubts about a favorable denouement,