September 8, 2010 - 11:47pm — Seed
Sometimes there is no one here at all, and I sit in the darkness of the fog. The land has changed; it's foggy and cold, black where I touch it... and luminously grey in all other distances. I write fragments of poems to pass the time, and doodle familliar pictograms in the dust.
It's interesting; even if I don't see someone often, the fact that I could, if luck favors me, gives me a strength of heart; they feel close. Now, I worry about the people I cannot see, about Scape and Dag and Nevilly, so close and so far away.
I slept and had a dream.
And in this vision, I was walking in yet another foreign world, not the forest, but a garden. Sweet roses grew all along the garden's walls, trying to escape and fly over the fence, out into the world I know far better. And there I came upon a painting that showed looming dangers; there was violence, a red stag with grand antlers, but inside very small and frightened, with eyes too withered to see; and there was Greed of the heart, a skinny doe who tried to hold all close and let all seep away. And there was Lust -- not the deer, Lust, but the dream, Lust -- who looked to me so alien I could not know her nature. I thought she had a gleam in her eye I misliked.
I turned my head and saw my host there. My host was a beautiful creature, not wholly deer; far more delicate of limb and soft of eye, with long lashes and a sweet smile. She had with her her handmaidens, Despair and Joy, who walked in her shadow, and could do good or evil. But she herself was benevolence itself; she herself was only Love.
"Come and walk with me, sweet disciple," she said. I have never refused her, and so took to walk the garden beside her. We walked down the path and saw all manner of pretty flowers. Until at last we came upon a white rose, lovelier to me than all flowers in the garden. It was a joyous rose, but it trembled shyly in the wind, and the stem turned towards me before darting away. In the dream, I knew I loved this rose, and wanted no other.
"Aah, you see something you like? A pity. My sister, Lust, is coming here tommorow, and she has her eyes on this."
I felt great alarm and asked my fair host,
"How would I preserve this rose, then, and keep it dear to me?"
Love nodded and said,
"You must, then, seek to keep it in my garden, where you are always welcome; if it is taken to the garden of Lust, you will find that the gate is barred to you.
For this, I might make a few suggestions. Watch the rose carefully; let it always know that growing here, by you, is an option. Bask in its bloom. Offer it your light and your water, more than ever before, that it could know the sweetness of growing in my garden.
When the doubt is too great, and the fear too strong, confide your worries -- perhaps in the rose, so that it knows it may well wound you -- but, when at its peak, you must seek out Friendship and give him all your troubles.
Sweet Words will be your sword, and Forgiveness your shield in this fight; use them both well."
I nodded and found the words of Love wise.
"And, more than all else, Trust will preserve your rose. Trust will preserve it where Fear, which is naturally lurking nearby, will drive it into the reach of Lust. Trust that your rose will choose to remain here... Because if Lust plucks this rose, you know full well: you have no choice but to let it go where it grows happiest, and brightest white."
"Even if it hurts?"
"Good deer... Pain is my companion, who remains behind where I cannot stay. Have faith."
I smiled upon my rose and knew that I will do my best to preserve it in Love's Garden...I believed it would stay there, and grow well there, even if Lust touched it... As long as I heeded Love and served it well.
The gate opened for Lust and her enterage...
And then I awoke, and the real world became real again.
I will keep in mind the words said in it; I fear I may have need of them.
I noticed another deer asleep there, but instead curled up and went to sleep.
I awakened to find another deer awake. I recognized his pictogram, but don't know what to call him in text. Like the fog, he was mainly white; unlike the fog, I have hope he'll know I speak of him. We were very relieved for company, laughing in countersong to the slow twanging of distant, alien instruments coming from the twin statues. We mainly sat and rested there. We sleep side by side, and dream in circles around each other.
((Soo...someone has been reading too many Medieval French poetry. Can you guess who?))
This made me smile. I love
This definitely is one of