Say My Name . . .

With the Great Barrier Reef at risk of damage by mining operations, I have been thinking about how much  we have already lost . . . 

I wrote the following story about the loss of the sacred in the everyday. It appeared in The Abacot Journal in 2007.

Say My Name

Like a soft, orange sari, the first light of the sun slipped over the horizon, a promise of clear skies and warm breezes.

An old man stood on a bridge spanning the River Hooghly, his gnarled hands clasping the rail. Dressed only in a ragged longhi, he sniffed the air and squinted at the City of Palaces. The first breath of morning carried the smell of the city: incense and frangipani, cow dung and the rancid odour of clarified butter. Yet soon the air would fill with fumes from the thousands of cars, motorbikes and buses thronging the streets of Kolkata.

A sound of flute music rode the breeze. The old man turned his head to listen. A single tear rolled down his papery cheek. When the music stopped, he shuffled off the bridge.

Making his way slowly through the traffic, slipping easily between people and cows, he passed by the market. Palm-leafed roofs covered the stalls. Baskets overflowed with red carrots, mangoes, gourds, white radish, pumpkin, and greens. The old man no longer expected gifts of fruit or vegetables; nor did the stallholders offer any. In the old days, they would have welcomed the chance to give food to a sadhu, but that was before. Now the children had forgotten that sadhus were holy men; they called them “beggars”, and tossed pebbles and insults at the saffron robes. They forgot the names of the Gods.

In the streets beyond the market, workers hurried to their jobs, mothers shepherded their children to school. That, at least, was the same as it had always been.

The old man walked past the India Coffee House, where intelligentsia and nostalgia rubbed shoulders. The patrons laughed and threw scraps to the dogs, making them snarl and snap like wolves. Children watched from the footpath, eyes big with hunger. Ignoring dogs and children, the old man entered lanes that meandered between high walls topped with sharp teeth of broken glass. A crow flapped noisily, chased from a rubbish pile by rats.

Near the river, the old man saw a child sitting on the front step of her house, playing with a scraggly, ginger kitten. The girl’s hair gleamed in the morning light, reminding him of black-haired maidens, and long, lapis-lazuli nights of delight. He shook his head sadly. No more goat-girls for him. No more girls at all.

He walked all day, and into the night. When his legs buckled under him, he slept beneath a Banyan, sheltered by the sacred tree. He rose before the dogs, and continued his pilgrimage. The sun set and rose again before he saw the domes of the Kali temple glowing pink in the morning light. For a moment, he imagined rainbow-clad devotees pushing in through the gateways. He could almost hear them, chanting and laughing. He hurried towards the gate, hoping to find someone who remembered his name. It had been so long since he had heard it spoken, in song or prayer.

He entered through the eastern gate, feet barely touching the ground. The temple was deserted, but for dogs and monkeys. He wondered if they, too, were waiting for the devotees who no longer came. He walked slowly through the ruins, lured by the cool green of a giant Banyan. Older than the oldest story, the tree sheltered the temple beneath its spreading branches. Long, pink aerial roots moved gently in the breeze. The old man lowered himself to the ground next to a discarded bundle of rags.

“What are you doing here, old man?” asked the bundle of rags, in a voice like pebbles in a dry riverbed.

“Resting,” said the old man, turning his back on the beggar-woman.

“Not here, you old fool,” said the beggar-woman. “Here. On Earth. Here.”  

The old man went very still. The beggar-woman’s voice had softened, like water flowing, cool and sweet, from the mountains. He wanted to turn back and look at her, but his longing had played tricks on him before. He closed his eyes and sighed.

The beggar woman moved to sit before him. He opened his eyes to see a beautiful face, golden skin, just like…

“Parvati?“   

“Who do you think it is? Of course it’s me!” The rags fell away to reveal the Goddess in all her glory: luminous eyes, black hair cascading around her voluptuous body, henna-painted nails…

The old man began to cry.

“I know. I know,” said Parvati, voice soft as swanskin. She stroked his face. “They have  forgotten us.”

“I thought I was the last,” said the old man. “I thought you had gone.”

“You were the last,” said Parvati. “I missed you. We all missed you. I came back to find you.”

“Say my name,” said the old man. “Let me hear it again.”

Parvati laughed. “Which name shall I say? There are so many! Adbhutah? Danavendra? Gyaneshwar? Sudarshana?”

And the old man remembered what it was to be a God. He straightened his back and took a deep breath.

“Say my name,” he said, eyes twinkling.

“Krishna,” she said, and handed him a flute.

He played a note, pure and light. The stallholders at the market stopped counting their money, and gave food to the poor. A gentle breeze lifted the spirits of the workers. Mothers walked with swaying hips and a secret smile on their lips. The child on the doorstep left her kitten to dance, moving to a rhythm as old as time. Even the dogs pricked their ears and stopped fighting over scraps.

“Come,” said Parvati. “The others are waiting.”

The God and Goddess left together, dissolving in the old way, like mist in the morning sun. 

Hibiscus and other ephemera . . .

The woman moved, slow and languid like a python in the sun. Warm air whispered against her back, a lover’s breath  reminding her of long, lapis-lazuli nights of delight, pleasures given and received.

She sighed, her own breath moving in time with her heartbeat, the steady rhythm measuring her moments in time. Her eyes moved with a seagull soaring on an updraft. I have been like that, she thought; carried in the belly of the wind to seek life, to find love . . .  

"Where is love now?" she whispered.

Does it live in the heart? Red centre of life, beating its own incessant tattoo. Incessant, that is, until it stops, she reminded herself. Dear heart, pumping ruby-red blood to all the cells of the body, and the spaces between the cells. So many spaces . . .

                                                                              . . .the space between the first hello and the last goodbye. The space between midnight and dawn in a night filled with pain. Or pleasure. The space between Earth and the blue, blue sky above. The space between sunrise and sunset on a long, turquoise day of leisure.

How many heartbeats are there in a lifetime? Someone had probably worked it out, but she had no real desire to know. Some things, she believed, should stay a mystery. 

"Where is love?" she asked again.

Does it live in the belly? Round, soft place, rising and falling with the breath. Full, rich place, etched with life-lines and the signs of long, larghetto lunches.

"Where is love?"

Does it live lower still, in the soft folds of mysterious sex, the exquisite places of pleasure? Petals of flesh, flower of a thousand names, ripe with colour and fragrance, nectar and ambrosia. Lips above, lips below; perfect harmony in the shape of a woman,

"Where is love?" the woman asked one last time.

Does it live out there in the space between I and thou? Third body of infinite possibility, forming even as we meet, even as we speak . . .even as we touch; a living thing, sending up shoots like an exotic plant in the hothouse of our exchanges.

The woman stretched, one hand coming to rest in the sand below her sun-lounge. Her fingers lightly rolled the beads of grit left in swirls by tiny crabs delving in the under-world. Tracks in the huge expanse of life, like the paintings of the Dreamtime, drawn in dots and circles.

She stretched again, rolling onto her back, long hair spilling over the edge, brown arm reaching for the shade of an old, straw hat. The movement attracted the wandering beach-traders, like fish swimming to investigate a ripple . . .

"Sarong? You need sarong?" chirped the first voice.

A sleepy shake of her head.

"Massage? You want massage? I give good massage."

Another shake of her head, smiling now at the abundance on offer. So much attention just for reaching for a hat!

"What do you seek?" asked another voice, deep and soft.

The woman peered into the golden light to find the velvet voice. Standing perfectly still, a man smiled down at her like a statue of Shiva, sunlight blurring the edges of his lean body.

"Love," she said. "Peace. Tranqulity."

He smiled and sat, folding gracefully to sit cross-legged in the sand. 

"How much for tranquility?" she asked mischievously.

"Ah, very cheap today," he said, eyes sparkling. "Special price for you."

"How much?" she asked, engaging the process that would end in a purchase.

"All your thoughts, dark and light," he answered, pointing to the black and white fabric tied around the shrine at the edge of the sand, reminder of good and evil.

"Mmmmm." She liked her thoughts, the rippling, air-born arrivals of words and images, stories full of tarradiddle and history. Could she pay the price?

"And all your feelings, happy and sad," he added, watching her.

"Mmmmm." Feelings, those clotted strands of anguish and delight that flavoured the blandest days and nights. Would her life lose all taste without them?

"And all your opinions of yourself. Big and small," he said. "And all the opinion others have of you."

She sighed. How would it be to fly free of the judgements and sentiments, letting them fall away like the grains of sand she was dusting from her fingers?

"It's a deal."  

"Come," he said. "The ocean will wash it all away."

The woman sat up slowly and followed him to the sea, their reflections shimmering in the sheen left by the ebb-tide.She laughed as the first waves broke around her legs, water bubbling up to her thighs. They walked further, waves breaking around her hips, splashing up to her chin. She stopped, spinning in circles, hands flat against the water, a Dervish, whirling and whirling to find the point of stillness.

She walked deeper, the tide tugging at her legs, as if someone called from the depths. Her guide’s hand held her steady as the waves surged in, breaking with bubbling foam and gentle thunder.

When the water reached her breasts, he moved behind and stood close. Hands on her hips, he turned her back to face the sand. They stood, looking back the way they had come, the breakers rolling past, iced with white froth.Suddenly he lifted her and, with a thrust, sent her gliding to shore on the crest of the next swell. She flew, riding the peak, thoughts, feelings, and opinions streaming behind . . .

Washed clean, she coasted to the shallows.  Sliding gently to rest, she lay on her back, arms and legs spread, letting the current bounce her back and forth. The sky looked very big.

He waited, standing in the surf, until she sat up. When she looked for him, he walked in and offered her his hand. She stood, body tingling, and together they walked back up the beach.

They sat for some time, her on her lounge, him behind, cross-legged in the sand, as the setting sun made shadow puppets of the children playing in the shallows. She turned to thank him, but he had gone, leaving as silently as he had come.

There, where he had been sitting, was a ruby-red hibiscus, petals dancing flamenco in the breeze. She picked up the flower, so light in her hands. Hibiscus. Flowering for a day, then dropping, raining all the colours of the sunset down to Earth.

Is that where love lives? Is that life? A brilliant flower, blossoming for a moment in time and falling when the time is done . . .

She smiled tranquilly, aglow with the last light of the sun.    

BROTHER WOLF: A story from Nature

The huge, shaggy wolf waited alone for the first light of dawn. The sky covered the mountain peaks in a vast darkness, but the wolf could smell the Sun rising towards the day.

In the valley below, fireflies ceased their nocturnal blinking, winking out one by one. A lone eagle rode the breeze, gliding in spirals down the slopes. The old wolf sniffed the air and licked his lips. The breeze promised clear skies.

The wolf settled slowly onto his belly and lowered his head onto his paws. He dreamed of hunting like a shadow, chasing lovers from midnight trysts, frightening children on forest paths. He could dream, but his body ached and his eyes no longer saw the stars at night or the mice scurrying in the grass. Even the 

moon did not stir him as it once had.

The wolf growled, a low rumble in his belly. The wind brought warning of the pious monk who walked the mountain trails to speak with the animals. Small and fine-boned, the monk came where he was not wanted, venturing further than others dared.

“Brother Wolf,” called the monk. "Hear me, Brother. The people accuse you and curse you. But I come to make peace between you and the people. You no longer need to terrorise the children. No more do you need to steal the cows and goats.”

The wolf could have told the monk that his desire to evoke terror was all but gone, but the holy man barely paused for breath. 

“The women will cook you a pot of oatmeal every morning. The children will gather eggs for your evening meal. The dogs will stop chasing you, and the men will stop shooting at you. Consider this well, Brother.”    

The wolf howled, a sound that had once paralysed goats and sent children scurrying home to their mothers.

The monk knelt on the mountain path to pray, his tonsured head glowing in the sunlight.

The wolf turned away. 

  

The monk finished his prayers and walked back down the trail.

  

The wolf followed, padding softly in the man’s footsteps. Halfway down, he settled  behind a large boulder. Butterflies flitted around his head, tickling his ears, and birds told stories from the treetops. The wolf dozed,  dreams moving through his body in remembered leaps and bounds.

The sun settled into the west, and the monk returned, singing as he walked. "Brother Sun, Sister Moon . . ."

Brother this! Sister that! Didn’t the little man have a family of his own? Quiet as a shadow, the wolf stepped into the  monk’s path. The singing stopped. 

“Brother Wolf! Just the one I was coming to see,” said the monk, smiling benevolently.

The wolf curled his lip.

"I have come to make you an offer,” said the monk.

“I know. Oatmeal, eggs, and no shooting.”

“All things considered, a generous offer,” said the monk.

The wolf sighed deeply. “Tell me more of the people who make these promises. Do they watch in awe as Sun rises each day? Do they hear the stories riding on Wind? Do they drink deeply of Water sprung from Earth that is our Mother?”

“Come, Brother, the townsfolk are waiting for you,” said the monk, looking away.

The wolf moved closer. “You call me Brother, yet you do not meet my eyes. Do these people of yours no longer look to Sun and Wind, no longer call Earth their Mother?”

“It is a time of change,” said the monk.

“Do you not sing of the lilies of the field?” asked the wolf. “Have the people not heard your songs?”

The monk shuffled his bare feet. “I sing of the lilies, but not all understand my words.”

The wolf sighed again. “I am tired. I will come down with you. Perhaps they will tell the story of the monk and the wolf when we are both gone.”

“Perhaps they will,” said the monk.

 They walked slowly down the mountain together, the huge, old wolf and the diminutive monk.

At the last bend in the trail, the wolf stopped. The hair along his neck rose in warning, and he braced to run.

But it was too late, and he was too slow.

The men of the town cast a net woven by the women with hatred in their hearts. They pulled the wolf, struggling and biting, into the town square. The children threw stones, and the young men stabbed with sharp sticks. Finally they hauled him, net and all, onto a pyre. Battered and broken, he lifted his shaggy head to look at the monk.

“Why?” he asked. “Brother.”

“Because a beast is always a beast,” said the monk. “And beasts cannot know Spirit.”  He threw a burning brand onto the pyre.

The wolf closed his wise, yellow eyes and howled.

The mournful cry echoed through the forest and across the mountains. The sound lingered at the edge of memory, haunting the dreams of the townsfolk, stalking the cobblestone lanes and mighty cathedrals of faraway cities. It resounded for seven generations, stirring nightmares.

Some say it lingers still in the mountain passes, riding the wind, entering the dreams of men who no longer watch in awe as the sun rises, disturbing the sleep of women who no longer listen for the stories in the air, stealing the innocence of children who no longer drink deeply of the water that springs from the earth. It resonates like a warning from the places where wolves no longer wait for the dawn.

Have you heard it?

THE ORIGINAL DREAM OF THE EARTH

"What became of the people of Earth?” the traveller asked the storyteller. 

“What happened to them?”

“Ah,” the storyteller sighed. “They lost their stories, so they died."

__________________________________

We are alive in interesting times.

That aphorism has been attributed to an ancient Chinese curse.[i] Apparently there never was such a curse; the exotic story of its origins is a myth.[ii] The world abounds with myths, stories told personally and collectively to explain human experience.

Stories link us to our past and to our future. It is through story that human beings weave the threads of experience into a tapestry of meaning. Stories come in many forms. Fiction is a literary work based on the imagination and not necessarily on fact. A legend or fable is a story about mythical or supernatural beings or events. An allegory or parable is a short, moral story. Myth -- a traditional story often accepted as history -- serves to explain the world view of a people.

What, then, is the story we know as history? Clearly, it is something that belongs to the past. Is it an adventure story, a mystery, or a romance? Is it legend or myth? And how does it affect us in the twenty-first Century?

As an Australian child born in the fifties, I knew of at least one institutional home for Aboriginal children. If I thought of it at all, it was with a fizzy benevolence that the children were being provided for. It never occurred to me -- or the adults in my life -- to wonder why the children might need a home. Where were their parents?

I now know that their parents were powerless to prevent the children being stolen from their families to be raised in institutions. I call that story a tragedy. What of other stories from our past?

While it may be possible to collect the facts of an event from our own lifetime -- although, even that can be uncertain -- it is almost impossible to be sure of the stories that have come down to us through millennia. Our current consensus reality is in part determined by stories that began thousands of years ago, their origins long forgotten.

Nowhere is this more obvious than in the conservation and environment debate. In the last fifty years there has been a gradual recognition of the serious environmental issues threatening human survival, yet there is still widespread ignorance of the underlying attitudes to Nature that contribute to the problem. In the modern world, Nature is regarded as separate from human beings rather than as the matrix of which we are a part.

Anthropological studies have suggested that the identification of women with nature and males with culture is both ancient and widespread. This cultural pattern itself expresses a monopolozing of the definition of culture by males. The very word 'nature' in this formula is part of the problem, because it defines nature as a reality below and separated from 'man', rather than one nexus in which humanity itself is inseparably embedded. It is, in fact, human beings who cannot live apart from the rest of nat ure as our life-sustaining context, while the community of plants and animal both can and, for billions of years, did exist without humans. The concept of humans outside of nature is a cultural reversal of natural reality. How did this reversal take place in our cultural consciousness? Rosemary Radford Ruether [iii]

Over the next weeks, I will be posting stories I have written about our relationship with Nature.If you have stories to share, please post a comment with a link to your stories or poems or musings . . .

---

[i] http://www.noblenet.org/reference/inter.htm  In a speech in Cape Town, South Africa, on June 7, 1966, Robert F. Kennedy said, "There is a Chinese curse which says, "May he live in interesting times." Like it or not, we live in interesting times..." Journalists picked up the phrase and it has become a commonplace. It might be related to the Chinese proverb, "It's better to be a dog in a peaceful time than be a man in a chaotic period."

[ii] http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=33750

[iii] http://www.spunk.org/texts/pubs/openeye/sp000943.txt

Rosemary Radford Ruether is a writer and active campaigner for women's spirituality. She authored the first ecofeminist book, New Woman/ New Earth: Sexist Ideologies and Human Liberation in 1975. Her most recent book is Gaia and God: An Ecofeminist Theology of Earth Healing. (Send stamped S.A.E. if you would like notes and excised mid-section.) The Women's Environmental Network runs a number of green campaigns and also organises occasional talks by prominent ecofeminists: WEN, Aberdeen Studios, 22 Highbury Grove, London, N5 2EA (Tel. 071 354 8823).