les essenes

i dreamed i was at my mother's house. we had guests, and there was a sort of banquet going on. it was night. there were all sorts of people. some family. i was looking out the window, hearing a noise like a rush of wings. a flock of birds had landed in the great tree just outside. i could make out their dark shapes against the night sky, like leaves, they filled the great tree. i was tinking about looking at them, and suddenly i was outside, floating about between the tree and the house. i saw that the birds were actually figures, shapes of men in the tree. in my mind, i was told they were essenes. i marvelled at them, dressed in rags, or skins. on the rooftop hundreds of candles had been lit, little tealights, flickering in the darkness. i felt wonder and anticipation and peacefulness, the way a child feels on christmas eve.

i am dark but i am comely

“I am dark but I am comely..”

3.2.08

babysitting, apparently. thinking about freedom, and experience. wondering if babies were examples. marveling at a toddler running around, naked. it seemed to need no supervision beyond observation and provisions. lying down on a thick chenille rug with Pauline Nadler! kissing her mouth and nipples, her slim ribcage and long waist. the image of her caramel chocolate skin stretching out in front of me suddenly, like a painting by egon schiele. very beautiful. i was aware of having made the painting, and it was half finished, (her torso,) that is, it only went as far as i had kissed her.

thought about the unfinished work of humankind. the development of civilization, the body and the bride of Christ, myth and the cosmos. what do we bring into being by naming? what is dark matter? i tried to remember something about quantum physics..

waking, i regarded the cats, their contemplative nature and instant access to their own ground of being.. contemplating freedom and the multiple states of being. in my office, i turned on the computer, opened the mail. thought about babies. the concept of manifested being and principle being. wondered if pregnancies that are terminated represent principial or contingent manifestations of being. contemplated the national and private debate over abortion and “rights”. the phrase no rights without freedom, no freedom without rights crept into my mind. but i knew it was off. the usual phrase is no rights without duties, no duties without rights. i pondered the difference, if any between these two axioms.

looked to the bookshelf to my right and let my hand pull out guenon’s the multiple states of being, opened to a random page: Page 127, necessity and contingence, chapter 17. i read through chapter 18, the metaphysical idea of being. stunning.

finger of god

finger of god

December 4/5 .06

i was with my parents, in a place i did not recognize. it seemed similar to the inside of a great building, but perhaps a hall way or a small chamber, anteroom. perhaps it was a church. my father was there, and my mother. this is the first dream i have ever had where my mother was with my father and wholesome and kind. my father was speaking words i could not keep, but i wrote them in gold thread upon a tapestry, cut like a page in a book. on another page, i embroidered light into a picture of many people leaning over a gallery wall, looking at the scene in the center, which i had the impression was the nativity of Christ. the golden thread was the shine in their hair, the edges of structures in the surround, the lining in clouds above, and the sheen in their garments. it was beautiful.

i stopped to show them my handiwork, and they both admired it with pleasure, seeing that it would be a suitable gift. i read again the page of my father’s words and still i could not translate them into my conscious mind. i knew they would elude me upon waking.

then i wrote again, as my parents watched. i was showing them a new tool. it was like a quill, and i wrote in golden calligraphy. the letters laid down a finely wrought and perfectly smooth and polished gold. it was as though the ink were molten gold, which hardened upon contact, and the words then gleamed as though perfectly filed and polished.

again, i do not remember what i wrote, but at the bottom of the page, i wrote the word Christ. we were happy.

later, i was with rob and justice, in a new place, i had not been before. it was a neighbourhood. the homes were quite unusual, and i marveled at their construction. we were visiting a new friend of justice’s home. it was built in the woods, and had a hallway that spanned a ravine like a bridge! it was beautiful, and they had company. we were all getting ready to go somewhere enjoyable. they were very nice people.

then there was a portion of the dream where i had auditioned for the lead part in a strange sort of musical play. i had been given the other part instead, because of my haircolour. the part i had wanted was dark haired, a jewess, but the part i got was reddish haired, and a gentile. the director had given us our parts in a sealed envelope, which was opened almost like an award ceremony.

i was excited to be in the production, regardless. i wondered if i would be able to memorize lines again, it had been so long, but i really looked forward to singing..

then there was a portion which included traveling, and i was making my way through a city, which seemed populous, like manhattan, but geographically contained, like bloomington. i was walking the same distance and tract as Kirkwood, from the square to the library, but it was named something else, and looked like something else, and there were many people. all of this seemed to exist in a strange sort of superimposition over the lay of the land that i am familiar with, as though bloomington as i know it in my conscious life, were somehow underneath it..

anyway, on my way i was looking for a christmas stocking to give as a gift to st. nicholas, santa claus- i wanted it to be embroidered with gold thread. i found one in a strange shop that was like a bar and a gift shop all in one. there were all kinds of people there. and cash registers all along the bar, where people lined up as though to get a drink, but really were purchasing these little odds and ends. there were old fashioned Christmas lights strung along the ceiling. it was odd. there were tables on an upper level, like a diner, and merchandise along the walls and on shelves. i found a stocking that would do, it was long, and red, with gold embroidery all over it. i took it to the cashier. it was crowded, and i was jostled this way and that by the number of customers.

i made my way out into the cold, and the dark. there were people all along the sidewalk. i waved to barbara streisand by the library. she had a body guard with her that pushed me away from her, off the sidewalk and into the bushes!

apparently, we lived next door to the people i mentioned before, in a new house. once inside, i noticed that i had a baby, and it was daytime. the baby was asleep in my arms, and i was sucking its thumb. it was a boy. i thought it was justice, - it looked like justice did when he was a baby. but justice was there with me, and his same age, eleven.

i was upstairs, and looking out the window at a hill which rose beside the house. in fact, the house seemed to be built into the hill. i saw neighbours outside on the grass, suddenly looking to the sky and pointing in fear, and running! i looked too. there was a long thin tornado coming toward where we were! it was big! the sky was brightly lit, the clouds puffy and white like a summer day in july, but this one dark swirling tunnel of wind was just spinning along like a tall top. i ran downstairs crying out! it’s a tornado! there’s a tornado coming straight at us! there was no time to do much. rob went outside to start the car, just as calmly as he would to cut the grass, or take out the trash!

the baby’s diaper was wet, and i remember thinking i would need his diaper bag. i ran upstairs to get it, and all the while, marveled at the stupidity of such a thing! returning to the living room in a flash, i told justice there was no time, and to get down, behind the couch or something heavy. i dashed for cover with the baby. all of this happened very fast. i looked out the windows, and saw the tornade, which i now knew was the “finger of god” go darting around our house in a circle, and then passing back into the horizon.

i knew we were safe. i stood up and the baby was still asleep in my arms. rob came in carrying a beautiful flowering vine, covered with white blossoms, which he held high to keep from trailing on the floor. i knew that spring was coming,

in my dream, i recalled the minister’s sermon last sunday for advent; looking for leaves on the trees, and christ’s admonishment that when you see the leaves, you know that summer is coming.

i felt happy, and peaceful. i felt that god was setting forth, his mighty finger terrifyingly destructive, but i was not afraid.

later this morning, i was looking up information about the robes that priest’s wear, and came upon this phrase, coincidentally

¹⁸ He gave to Moses, when he finished speaking with him on Mount Sinai, the two tablets of the testimony, stone tablets, written with God's finger.

Miriam's Declaration

...is forthright and candid:

"I had a vision of the Teacher.."

She is not troubled or agitated by this vision, which again is a sign of the inner peace that governs her emotional and psychic powers. This vision is niether a dream, a fantasy, a trance, nor one of those cataleptic states brought about by techniques current in those times (in those days there were numerous schools of prophecy, not unlike our contemporary schools of channeling and mediumship) .
Miriam remains undisturbed, like Teresa of Avila and other later visionaries, she speaks directly to the teacher:

"Lord, I see you now in this vision."

She addresses what she sees, and what she sees addresses her. Thus there is no opposition of word and vision. Just as He did in his mortal existence, the Teacher responds to Miriam's thirst for truth and knowledge:

"You are blessed, for the sight of me does not disturb you."

This is what was written on the page that I happened to open to, in taking this book down from the shelf. It is from The Gospel of Mary Magdalene, by Jean Yves LeLoup, and includes the text with commentary.

"May God become the all in All."

To know the ledge.. one needs go to the edge..

the lady and the tramp

i was at a friend's house. it was christmas, in side.i touched him and was filled with joy. his children came to greet me. his wife, too. other things.

i was at another house, i didn't recognize it but i recognized the things in it. i was in the kitchen, a large room with a large worktable in the center, a long rectangular room with doors on each end, or rather entry. no actual doors. portals. you know. between these was a very large fireplace set into the adjoining wall with the dining room. i was with a friend, maybe janet, and chatting happily, setting a long rectangular table for a dinner party. the guests were to arrive soon. we were discussing tablecloths, and chose a long printed table cloth, asking her if she remembered walt disney, i think it was lady and the tramp. the print was all in greys and whites, with accentuating reds and blues, and the pattern was images from lady and the tramp. cartoon dogs of every stripe, jim darling and his wife, their baby. i set a blue candle surrounded with holly leaves that bore a blue fruit and glossy silvery blue leaf. i thought it was interesting that christmas colours were blue as well the usual green and red. huh. the candle was blue.

then the guests were there, and a fire was crackling in the big hearth, and i was hanging artifacts from the mantle like ornaments. the mantle was covered as well, with art and artifacts from my numerous years of collecting. everyone was well.

then i was at another house, it seemed to be mine, but for my mother. it was different than i have ever seen. it was new to her. i seemed to have quarters upstairs. there was a long rectangular living room, very sleek, with wood floors that seemed like cedar or cherry. the walls too, were richly panelled, with the same wood. it seemed very crisp , and almost scandinavian in design. modern. the end of the room was raised, two steps made a stair across the breadth, and on this portion was the door. at the other end of the room, the rest of the house extended off to the left. along one of the walls were windows, and up on the raised entryway were a couple more windows.
my mother was very proud of her curtains. i was helping her open them. they were beautiful, deep crimson silk with neatly cropped silk tasseled fringe, threaded with a golden ochre. i noticed they were becoming so threadbare that opening them risked tearing them. i thught i would look into having them replaced for her, and began to count the drapes. i had counted eleven windows in all, twenty two draperies. she was excited ab out this prospect. she sat down on a couch the room was sparsely furnished, and guests were arriving. a number of women were now milling about, with little plates and tea. it was evening. i was looking outside the windows, contemplating a hedge of arborvitae i had planted there for privacy. i noticed i was naked. i walked around the other side wall to the staircase, and noticed a telephone table, on which my mother kept a bible and some of my own writing on paper, next to the phone. i was touched, that she would save my writing like that. i decided i had better go upstairs and put some clothes on so my mother's guests did not become uncomfortable. however, no one seemed to mind, including myself, that i had no clothing on.

it occurs to me now, that i had had another dream a while back, where i had told a friend that i couldn't get out of the car, because i had no pants on. in fact, i was wearing pink underwear and a black cami that i had actually worn to bed! in that dream, i knew that. last night, it was hot, and i just slept naked. funny.


i was outside, on a sidewalk, it seemed like rogers and third street, but the buildings were different, and there was an overpass where college crosses third. it reminded me a little bit of rutgers campus. the sky was darkening and full of stacks of clouds. to my right, the western sky was lightest, as though it were late afternoon. there was a rumbling , like thunder, and the clouds were flashing with some lightning. off to the southwest, a long streak of lightning was igniting in the darkest part of the sky. deep clouds. it caught my attention, besides the sound of the rising of thunder, because it behaved unlike any lightning i have ever seen.

at this point, i was no longer aware that i was dreaming. my heartbeat began to speed up a little.
the lightning was moving down to the earth like a sparkler, but it was moving along its own streak like a zipper. i could hear it making a loud crackling as it rent the very fabric of the sky, and finally it approached the ground. i became apprehensive, sort of, and the first thing i did was check to see if i was dreaming. i was not dreaming. then i began to feel a kind of intense anticipation, as i watched this clearly supernatural event unfolding in the sky! i began to pray. where the lightning came down to the horizon, maybe a mile off, there were tall pines which exploded into fire and i could hear far-off sounds of screaming as what appeared to be a whole city block went up in flames. this created a small glow against the surround of dense clouds, but it illuminated them with its glow. i prayed for those people, and while i was praying, i saw a strange shape rising up over the horizon to my left and to my right. i really kept checking to see if i was dreaming. i kept asking myself, am i dreaming? and i couldn't find any evidence of being in a dream. except that the sky was unzipping with a sparkling fire, and something huge was coming up over the horizon. you can imagine the physical sensation of believing that this was actually happening, and feeling entirely there.

i cannot describe the state i was now in, as i truly was all there, and quite alive. to me, at this time, everything was as real as it seems right now, at this time, while i am typing this dream. i was not surprised, i was all the more amazed. to the right and left of me on the horizon rose what seemed to be two snow capped dome shaped mountains, rising and rising above city. soon i could see that they were the foreheads of two women, both with grey-white hair. their great heads rose still above the horizon, and they were crying, their lovely eyes wet and tears streaming down their cheeks. they were so worried, and they were calling, calling. one had a kleenex, and was wiping her eyes and her nose, and she was callilng and calling to her grandson, come home, come home right now! the sky was darkening with a big storm, and soon, a man, joined her, calling for his grandson. the other grandma was also calling for her grandson. i was so amazed, and very concerned for them, and for their grandsons, but all of this was also happening rather quickly. then as the sky grew darker, the western sky was growing lighter, and i was also growing lighter, it seemed ,with a weird kind of joy and anticipation! i was looking at another dome shape that was now rising between these giant grandmas' heads, and now, everything was noisy, a sound of rushing winds the sound itself everywhere all at once, but there was no wind. the only thing i can compare this to is the sound that one hears when one is fainting.

it is true, my heart was pounding, and i was stillasking myself if this was real! since it seemed absolutely real, i was overjoyed. i had been waiting all my life, and i was so excited and happy, and i could only marvel. i had only thoughts for what was happening. i could see the dome now was a head and it rose gigantic over the earth, it was a statue of jesus, with arms outstretched, its halo was the first thing i could see, then its face, which looked so much like the face on the statue of liberty i had to wait to see if the arms were holding up a torch, but no, they were outstretched as if to hug the whole earth. it was jesus!

the great statue rose and began to tilt toward the earth, and i began to shout"jesus is coming! jesus is coming!" i felt such incredible joy. i could see that i was going to smash the street and the overpass, so i ran to get out of the way, but i knew that i would not make it in time, but i didn't care, and i just asked myself, ready? ready? and then my body disintegrated! i was a yellow energy, like a floating shallow pool! i skimmed along under the overpass and everything began to disintegrate, to fall away like fairy dust, and i thought to keep my mind free of interpretations, and to just think of god.

then everything went black, and i could hear nothing but my own thoughts, the sounds of the rushing winds had reached a crescendo in these previous moments, very much like when you faint, and my heart had pounded. but now, there was just stillness, and silence, except for my own thoughts, and i waited to see what would happen next, thinking i should not panic. i did not feel like panicking, but i did acknowledge a sense of dread, that i might have only the voice of my thoughts, that i might be a lone consciousness adrift in a sea of void. i decided i knew alot of songs, and thought i would sing, then, if that were the case. somehow this comforted me. still i bent my mind on god, and began to pray, and was now in a hallway, still without bodily form, floating down this hallway. to my left were studios. to my right were doorways into other studios. i saw into one, and there was a guy at a small mixing board with headphones on, he looked like jake. i began to hear sounds as though i were in a recording booth, and i heard an electric guitar string, like someone bumped it, and an old black guy talking about a blues song.

i knew then that i was going to wake up in a body, and wondered honestly, what that would be like. if it would be this one. i thought as i was waking up, which included a moment of static sound, like white noise and nothingness, that it was possible that i might be waking into a different version of the same life. i thought about the nature of dimensions that sit in bundles, and i thought about the concept of time, groundhog's day, and also, the last temptation of christ by nikos kazantzakis..

then i woke up. i had been so elated when i found that jesus was coming and saw his outstretched arms in the sky, and i had been so very sad when i saw the grandmothers crying for their grandsons to come in from the storm. i pondered the nature of the statue, and the clear indication of echelons that the grandmothers seemed to display, the staircase, the spiral staircase i had had in a different dream recently, other stair cases i had seen in dreams. i thought about jacob's ladder, masonry, and lastly, i thought about m.c. escher, whose name is very similar to echelon. and i thought of this verse, because of the great stone statue of jesus that was falling upon the earth..

"whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken, but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind them to powder. " luke 20:18

screwtape

so many dreams, so little time.

lately i have been besieged with cares, and i have lost a certain focus. this has rendered my dream recall less effective. i have snippets and fragments. memories of being in places, little ability to string the words together that were spoken, but words are spoken, and i listen.

last night, and this morning, i dreamed a few dreams, the last of which is fading fast, but i will put down the images.

familiar town, seeming to represent bloomington. been here before, in dreams.
alleyways and cafes that seem to be near or around 6th and 5th and washington or lincoln.
speaking with a professor friend in a cafe with others. he was ruminating on a topic of which we had asked him. i put a pot of coffee on for us all, but it ended up being served to others. he was talking about something to do with discerning good and evil, and then mentioned c.s. lewis, and the screwtape letters, a book i have never read.

we left, deciding to get coffee while we strolled.

before this, i was at a house, and it was something like thanksgiving, although it was not thanksgiving day. however, we were having an open house of sorts, and the reason was for thanksgiving, that is, a feast for the giving of thanks. my neighbours were there, michael and april, maybe their kids were around somewhere. i had the impression that the families of the others were around. michael and i were sitting by the fire in the living room, which had white sand instead of carpet. i had put on dark skin, and we were comparing our skin colours, like kids compare their tans. my skin was dark as michael's, although his skin was a shade lighter than usual. this may have been because of the nature and brightness of the light, which was a natural light, but wierdly bright in that it seemed to illuminate things from within themselves as well as from without. anyway,we thought my knees needed to be alittle bit darker if they were to match. we were laughing in an enjoyable way about this.

there was a halltree piled with coats, and i was aware that lots of my family were there. people were milling about and eating food. i got up to use the bathroom, and noticed the trash can in the bathroom was overflowing. i decided i should empty it before any other guests came in, but noticed that my dad's favourite beachtowel was wadded up on top. it was all worn and tattered, and it said coca cola, bearing the classic coke trademark. i figured he wouldn't mind, since he had passed away, and wouldn't be using it here anymore.

i passed down the hallway, and peeked into the master bedroom, where my mom and justice were asleep, sprawled out across a very large bed among some more coats. justice was about the size of a four year old, and barefoot.

i met my dad in the hallway, and he had put on a uniform that resembled a post man. he wore shorts and a mail man or bus driver type shirt, blue, that had a patch on the left breast that said "metro" and i kept thinking, metropolitan. i thought my dad had a job with some kind of angel city. judy and i think, the girls, kathy and cindy, and some others were getting into cars to go somewhere. my dad was going to drive them. we stood in the doorway, and he gave me a hug, i was sooo happy to see him, and we gave each other a little kiss, but the funny thing was, when we did so, both of us had peaches in our mouths, and we kind of tapped them, like a toast. the peach tasted fresh and juicy and sweet. i was thinking of the meaning of the peaches as i was dreaming, and the fruits of labour, and the angel city for whom my father apparently worked as a driver. my dad seemed contented and bemused by these things.

later i was back at the town part, with the group i had been at the cafe with. or maybe that was all after the house with the sandy hearth part. anyway, we were walking down a tight hallway, and talking about good and evil. evil is the word live spelled backward. in this hallway were two doors, very plain, very regular. we were following some sort of guide.

the one door, door number one, opened onto the good. the other, door number two, opened onto the evil. at the beginning of the hallway, or the entrance to the hallway, there was a little area with booths like one would find at a roadside restaurant. as we stood between the two doors, it was explained to us, about their nature. i was talking to a friend beside me, i think it was chris dickenson, (!), about having seen evil, and knowing that i had not even seen the worst of it, but that it was so reprehensible as to cause one to wish to flee from it always, when the door to the evil room opened, and someone came out, "excuse me" and brushed past us toward the little dining hall.

it was odd that no one came out of door number one, but people did come out of door number two. there might have been some information about this, but i do not now remember. i wondered about going forward and reverse, about progression and regression, about the word live and evil, in general.

we backed up, as there was no where to go but through one of the two doors, or back into the dining hall. we were in a place that was in between places. we could not go into door number one until we were done living in the physical world, where our bodies were. i seemed to understand that i was here in a dream, and not in any other capacity. it is like being inside a message or a map. anyway, we took a booth and sat down. soon, door number two opened again, and a few people came out with a rolling cart laden with tools. they were pushing it down the aisle between the two sides of the booths, right by us. i was sitting on the outside by the aisle, and i remember covering my face, and saying, "yuck, don't look" because i had glimpsed the cart's contents, and i knew they were instruments for the torture of souls. someone was talking about china.

then we were back outside on the street. i was pondering and questioning the sequences of events, and the meaning of the screwtape letters my friend the professor had mentioned. i was thinking thoughts that i do not remember now, but at the time i was marveling a little bit, at their clarity, even in my dream state. then, an owl flew across my vision, backward, and i turned to see it. it paused in the sky, looking at me, and the western sun, beginning to set, was shining upon it. i squinted to see it more clearly, was it really and owl? i thought of minerva.

it had big eyes in a golden shimmering head over light green wings that glistened like gossamer! they trailed silken crystal threads like long strands of hair or filaments from their tips, a good six feet beneath it! it was talking to me! i was straining to hear what it said..

then the wind rose, and it vanished and was replaced by a golden mask, filled with a living wind, and the face was speaking to me, in rhyme. it said something about them having to tell us, before actually coming, but that the heavenly host would be coming soon, and to prepare, and something about trying to hear the sound, or, if you wish to hear the sound, light a feather to the ground.

i was trying to decipher the words, the wind was a little noisy, and it was hard to hear them, but i knew that i heard every one of them, and i was picturing lighting a feather like a match and sticking it in the ground like a candle...

calamity

this dream was right before the cyclones devastated myanmar.
when i read about it the next day, i thought of the odds, that i would dream about a miniature twister in the front yard.

in the dream, i was getting rid of stuff, clutter, with janet. we were driving somewhere to get something, and she said " oh let's just stop now, on our way home." and i said, - no, i can't, i don't have any pants on. hehe. i was wearing in the dream what i had actually worn to bed, just underwear and a tank shirt. but i thought, hey, that's ok, i'll just wait in the car! and i told her so.

on the way back, we stopped at a red light. i noticed a house for sale on the corner, a very nice bungalo, well appointed and landscaped. i was curious because it was empty, and you could see through the windows. on had been left open, and these vultures were going inside! eew! they were walking around on the beautiful hardwood floors, leaving droppings and looking rather dumbly, in that clueless way some birds can have, and i remember thinking, " oh man, somebody's going to have a mess to clean up. " we drove on.

then when we were back i was getting things in order on the front porch. the house was a large brick double with a long shared porch on the front. at the other end of the porch, there was a nice big corner hearth fireplace, i liked it very much. it had a little brazier in the hearth where you could take out coals from the larger fire and keep them on top to cook with and to keep food warm. i thought this was brilliant. it pleased me much.

other things: i was aware that there was a garden bed behind the garage out back with dark rich compost. while i was out front, a twister appeared in the sky. it was small, a little funnel cloud that came out of the bigger clouds and down to the area where we were. or rather, it sort of downsized as it passed from the sky to the ground, moving across the street and toward the yard like a sprite. it stopped int hte front yard and looked kind of like a birdbath there.. it has a wide dish like top from which its funnel extended down like a stem or a pedestal. it was about the size of a birdbath. some neighbours were rushing over to eye it curiously, and i said " don't get too close! it looks small but it hides its power." indeed, it suddenly estended up like a slinky and became bigger than the house! it swiped them up in its tail like a fist, carrying them over the treetops and dumping them unceremoniously in the garden behind the garage!

i ran to the back to see if they were alright, calling to the rest to come and help. they were fine, b ut they had crushed much of the garden in their fall.

the garden had sprung up!!! everything that had been planted in the rich compost was already as tall as my knees! i marvelled. i noticed that it ;looked water-logged though, and gooshy. i gently pressed a pepper between my fingers and it oozed into mush, its stems somewhat gelatinoue!eew!

the others pulled at some of theplants and they came out easily of the soil, the roots well developed, but the soul so marshy and wet that they could not resist being challenged in that way, and were easily uprooted.i noticed then, that inthe soil were millions of tiny eggs, like grains of sand, and this broke my heart. i felt a grreat sadness in my chest as i saw that little worm caterpillars were hatching out of the eggs in the soil. it grossed me out. eew! i withdrew, and one had gotten on my thumb! eew! it stuck like an oozy slug! i flicked it off and there was another on, bigger, on the back porch! it was about six inches long, and like a cross between a worm and a slug. it grew quickly into a smal bracchiosaurus! a little dinosaur on the back porch!! it was about a foot long and tall, and it seemed mutated, as it had two necks atop each of which was an eye! three other eyes were on its body, in odd places, like one in its shoulder, one in its side, one on its back hip.. they were blinking and watching me.. eew! it did not seem especially malicious, but i kn ew it was dangerous, and hid its power.

i went to the front porch and saw my mom, and said eew!you wouldn't believe what i found! or something like that. she went to go look and i said, no! don't go back there!! it's not safe!

the little dinosaur had grown to the size of a large dog, and was coming up the driveway!! my mom stepped away and up onto the porch with me, and then a number of things happened: it was suddenly dusk, and night was falling fast. a vulture like the one i had seen earlier with coloured wings was swoopeing down from about the same region of sky that had spawned the twister, and was wrestling with a guy. i felt it was someone i knew, like a neighbour or friend. anyway, he and the big bird wrestled, and rolled around and about, finally wrestling up into the tree next door!~ i went for tools, and everybody had gathered in the driveway and was calling out encouragements to the guy, as he made his way down the tree and across the drive to us, with the bird.
i gave another guy, wierdly, tom cruise, a pair of pruning shears, and he gave them to the bird wrestler to cut the bird off of his hand, which had chomped upon it with his beak like a snapping turtle. i wondered whether the bird wrestler would have to cut off part of his hand, or if the bird could be cut off from his hand... no matter, he managed to snip the bird off his hand, and then he asked me for another tool, my lighter.

i had this lighter wand, like you use to light tall candles and fireplaces. i had four tools, altogether, a lighter wand, a pair of pruning shears, a pair of kitchen shears and a little saw. he began to burn the bird, which was flattened out now, like a piece of fabric and folded up in a plastic bag. but it was still the bird, and it was conscious and trapped in there, in the plastic. he applied the flame to the feathers by its jaw/beak. i said- " what are you doing!!!" he said "i'm burning it , just a little... it BIT me! "
i told him he could burn it no more than that, and he stopped.

wierd.

"Let us not enter into your Promise alone, but bring us God, along with all those for whom we pray, into the Mercy of your Hiding Place, beneath your Robe soaked in Blood."

Before sleeping, I wrote this prayer, based upon readings from another prayer book I like to read at the end of the day. Yesterday, I read a great deal about the prophecies of Revelations, the concepts of tribulation, armageddon, the seven seals. The symbolic content of said prophecies, which have fascinated me since childhood, and the potential interpretations of them. Some believe the end times are here. Some feel they are indicative of a spiritual evolution, a transcendence that is to take place on a multi-dimensional plane. Some are able to embrace an awareness of both literal and figurative representations of the revelations themselves.

I am a poet, musician and artist. While I cannot dismiss the prophecies of the Revelations, I believe that God is one for whom all things are possible, and I believe that God can do as God pleases. I am most affected by the knowlege of God as Infinite Love and of Christ as Merciful Saviour.

Once, my mother and I were cleaning her house. She said, "It's dusty as Hell in here!" and then chuckled at her speech, unusual for her. She queried, "do you think Hell is dusty place?"
I automatically responded, I mean, it was a natural reflexive soul response, " Yes, I do. "
"Why's that?" To which I responded that I hoped Hell would be an empty place, because of Our Lord's Mercy. It just came out of me. My mom burst into tears and held me so closely, giving thanks to God for a daughter who would or could say such a thing.

Have I told this story before?
Please excuse me if so. The concept of Divine Mercy is greatly on my mind. This began in the beginning of this new millenium when I came across the writing of Thielard de Chardin.
Is it the work of souls to be revealed in it?

the other night, I was left with this observation from a dream.

"If we refuse the apex, how can we calculate the foundation?"

update

It has been a few weeks since i have been able to resume the practice of morning writing. I have, however, continued with much study, reading and contemplation, and have tried to jot down what remembrances of my dreams remain by morning. Of late, i have kept a notebook beside the bed, and have written some things in the dark in the night. It has been the case that i have awoken suddenly in the wee hours before dawn with specific thoughts. These i try to cull and retain, and they are often brief, one sentence or two, after which i fall immediately back into deep sleep and then dreaming. This is nothing new, and a practice I have utilized off and on over the years, since i was about twenty.
IT should be stated here that i would not dream of obsessing over these events, nor would i tend to brood over significance. I feel compelled only to report, as i have found the content of these dreams to be striking, meaningful in numerous ways, and most importantly, educational to me personally. The uncanny rapidity with which these dreams are referenced the next day is enough to connect my conscious thoughts to the stream of communication taking place between my own sub and unconscious thought processes, and the use of the realm of images that the unconscious mind makes of the provinces of the subconscious are sufficient for me to notice in detail and to give my attention to consciously. I remain prayerful, turning my face always toward God. I have asked God for lessons, training and teaching in both sleeping and waking hours. I have actively requested the participation of spiritual teachers and guides. The extent of information that has flowed into my hands and mind has been greater than i am able to write down. These entries here, as well as some on My Secret Religion and the Cosmic Jitters, were begun in order to serve mainly as exercises so that i might prepare myself for writing full time, in hopes that i would be able to compose the book i have been researching these past three and a half years. However, they also are a log, an honest accounting of the different streams of thought bordering on revelation that occupy part of my many thoughts.
Many of the things I have studied and applied myself to over the years are beginning to coalesce into a greater and seemingly seamless understanding. It is as though I were being brought further back, and the view is one of proportion and perspective. I trust in prayer and humility, and have a natural distrust for my own understanding, that is, a natural skepticism that tends toward testing. However, I find that it is most efficacious to simply bear witness herein to the beauty of potential being revealed to me, a simple wayfarer. I feel as though I am becoming less and less active here in the world, while emerging more and more into a distance beyond its view.
Suffice to say, much of what I perceive will not here be contained. May the Lord of Lords suggest Himself to you through His Holy Spirit in what way He sees fit.
For myself, I am content to marvel and scribe.

The Golden Man

Fitst of all, I awoke before dawn singing "For the Beauty of the Earth.." One momment I was asleep and aware of nothing, and the next I was awake, and filled withthis song. Only I was stumped on a verse, and so was making it up as it went along..

For the Beauty of each hour, for the Sun and for the Moon,
for the blossom of each flow'r, for the Ocean's tide and swoon,
Lord of All to Thee we raise
this our Hymn of grateful Praise.."

I Love this song, and have always sung it, since I was a child.

There is music in my head all of the time. Every day. There is always music.
I used to marvel when I was about twenty, as I could choose entire works and listen to them in my mind. I thought this was like pressing the play button on a tape machine. Nowadays, it is very much like an iPod with its files and files of music. I used to play a game with myself on the train from Brooklyn to Manhattan, and listen to albums in my head.

Some days, I play a game with the music in my head still. I just jot down all of the songs that pop in throughout the day. Alot of them are hymns. I always loved hymns. They comfort and assure me.

My husband came in and kissed me good-bye, he had an early srtat today. I went back to sleep.


Later, I awoke with vague running recollections like flashcards of a dream I was in.

Iwas looking out the window of a studio apartment and realised that I did not recognise the street below! I went to another window and looked out. This vantage point looked out over a hillside, which lowered in steps, like little terraces. On the first one I saw the shape of a large dinosaur down among the trees, which were a little taller than eye level, from where i was standing in my apartment, looking out the window. The sun was filtering through the leaves, and it was a very beautiful day. Soon I could make out the actual shape of the dinosaur, and saw that it was a sculpture made of pressed sheet metal that was stamped with a grid pattern like you see on those big silver tool boxes welded to the backs of Ford trucks! It was bronze coloured. As I looked more closely, I could see that its feet were actually wheel wells, and its horns on top were foglamps! Its snout was the front cab of a hollowed out truck! Then, to my amazement, a man came around and got into the driver's seat. He was wearing a hard hat, and he was completely gold! It was as though he were made of shimmering golden sand! He was like a moving particle sculpture! He started the truck and looked as though he was going to drive, but I had turned and run to the doorway!

I rushed to the hallway and down the stairs to the outside: it had changed again! I rounded the corner of the building, and it had changed again! I was now inside a convenience store/gas station! I went outside into the parking lot and looked out over the hill where I had seen the golden man. There were a number of men working there now, with shovels and rakes and wheelbarrows. They were landscaping tarraces.

I stood, dumbfounded. People were coming and going, and it was just like being at the Marathon station down any street. Then I was stricken with a kind of panic, and suddenly remembered that my baby had been napping upstairs! I raced around to the doorway I had come out of, and nearly ran into an Asian man holding two babies, and I touched their little backs, patted them as I went by. I then began to panic, because the door was already gone, and the side of the building had turned into a boarded up and graffiti'd warehouse, along which the street I had been standing beside had turned into an alley in a city that went under a raised train track.

I looked up at the windows, trying to recognise my little studio. Then I saw a series of images like looking at a roll of film negatives from a movie. It fastforwarded, leaving choppy impressions in my mind's eye, like the staggered speed of animation. Eventually it landed on a woman and a man asleep in a bed. She had a sort, modern haircut. It was all back in time, but it was monochromatic, in sepia tones.

Cubby

Again looking for space to work. Living in an apartment and wondering if my roomates would mind if Irearanged the furniture to accomodate an easel. Eyeing the walls for shelving space.
walking outside with Fred, down the sidewalk, Iremember saying, "We've gone too far- it's a few blocks back. " We were in some sort of chinatown full of slot machines on the sidewalks, everything gleaming with neon and adverts. In the slot machines were vegetables and food. People were gambling for different kinds of food. beautiful mushrooms, chickens, peppers. it was weird. Fred began to stand on my feet, making it hard to walk. I remember thinking " i am dreaming. i am dreaming..."
Then waking up.

Decided to build a platform in the closet of my office and put the bed in there, like a medieval bed, in the wall like a cupboard. I can store a few things underneath it, and make it cozy with big pillows to lean up against the wall and lounge; keep the curtain on the door. It will be a real cubby! Then I will have a few more feet of space in here..

Springtime

I dreamed that I was at my grandparents' house, as I have before. It strongly resembles the original structure next to the Masonic Lodge in Broad Ripple where my father grew up, but in dreams, it expands, and has secret stairways leading to many rooms, and a favourite secret spiral staircase to a lovely turret. There was some sort of banquet going on, with many guests roaming about the decidedly late-victorian settings. The furnishings were made of marble and carved wood in deep cherry hues, with lovely textiles of tapestry and heavy draperies, intricate wallpapers, leafy vine patterns woven into wool carpeting, all much like the actual characteristics of my grandparents' home.

There was much bustling, and I was to perform at seven o'clock with John Mellencamp and his band, outside in a bandshell on the premises. For some reason, I had to wait for Rob, who showed up late, and apologized for making me lose my job. It was ten after seven and I had been informed that my presence was no longer desired. I was unperturbed, however, and put a pair of John's gloves and a scarf into a ziplock bag, attaching it to the back bumper of a large flatbed truck with chairs on it that was to be part of a parade for his fans. Apparently, they were to be allowed to reach out and touch the ziplock which contained the gloves that once contained his hands. I remember that this niether impressed me nor bothered me. It was more like the way one feels when cutting the grass. It was just something that was to be done.

Then I went inside and up a hidden staircase to a room in which my father was lying in a bed, propped up on pillows, with the windows open and a fine breeze blowing through. My mother was there at the foot of the bed on a divan, relaxing with something, sewing? a book? A few others were there, but I only had eyes for my dad, so I could only see them peripherally. We were just hanging out, my dad and I, and talking. He was content, casually supping on a shallow dish of ruby red pomegranate seeds in a sweet jewel red sauce over a dark bread-like cake. He handed the dish to me, did I want a taste?- and I noticed the dish was piece from the English Porcelain given to Rob and I for our wedding. The bedcover was also red, a dusky rose red silk, and the walls were papered in a similar pinkish red brocade.
I thought of myself thinking of Persephone, and awoke.

Mercy Sunday

"He who refuses to pass through the door of My mercy must pass through the door of My justice. (Diary 1146)."

Just the other day, after posting Fever, I came across this quote, which I found to be categorically, mystically pertinent. I call these coincidences and serendipities Consolations, as I am upheld and encouraged daily in my heart and soul by such appearances in the seemingly random and even mundane. Never do these occurrences take place without acknowledgment and thanks given immediately in prayer. Prayer takes place throughout the day, pulling the soul toward the Spirit like a needle is pulled to the north.

In looking further into this quotation, I discovered that this Sunday is Mercy Sunday, the first Sunday after Easter, a timely notification after a timely recollection.

I had never heard of St. Faustina, nor had I heard of the chaplet of Divine Mercy, or Mercy Sunday. However, I felt as t hough I had received a clue in January, when I was drawn to the prayer card at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. I now know that it was a depiction of the image St. Faustina had been commanded to have painted, that of Christ in His Divine Mercy, with two rays emanating from his Heart, one scarlet, the other white, representing the cleansing power of God's Love through His Passion. At the bottom an inscription: Jesus I Trust In You. A simple instruction, and simple prescription for the maladies which burden the soul, from the heart's own true doctor, the likes of whom Asclepius himself was a mere shadow..

I encourage anyone to read about St. Faustina and her obedient diary, her quiet resolve, her predictions of the "spark from Poland" Pope John Paul II, and her brief life beginning in 1905.

http://www.faustina.ch/index_en.htm

May God's Grace be upon you, upon us all, and may you be specifically blessed with acceptance of His Divine Mercy this coming Sunday, and all Sundays.

Fever

In 1998, I was stricken with a virulent form of encephalitis, a brain fever from which it took many weeks to recover. During that time, I could neither move nor eat without violent nausea, as my brain was swelling inside my skull, impacting my equilibrium and major nerve bundles. I could only lie flat in a darkened room, as my optic nerves were overly sensitive to light and even motion. My parents took me in, and tended me with spoonfuls of water and broth. There was little that could be done but wait and pray.

I drifted in and out of sleep for days on end, occasionally opening my eyes to find them standing there, together, gazing down at me in the room I had slept in during high school. I remember thinking one day that I might be dying. I could see it in their faces. I fell back to sleep, and dreamed.

I was in an ancient tower, made of stone, in a room at the top. Parts of the walls were crumbling, and seemed decrepit, but the floor was solid and smoothed by many years of foot traffic. There were windows, through which I could see the blue sky, and a beautiful green landscape in the distance, and I desparately wanted out. I was frightened in a nervous sort of way, and seemed aware of an impending doom. Something terrible was approaching, something unspeakable and horrendous, and I feared for all mankind. I felt a great knot of sorrow in my chest, and began to cry, surveying the perimeter for a way out.

The way to the top was a wide smooth ramp, which opened onto the spacious room
I was in, but I feared to go that way down, as what I dreaded was approaching from there. The windows were simple gothic arches cut into the stone, without panes, open to the outside, but too high up to jump from. There was a doorway also set in the stone, but it gave me a sense of foreboding. The sense of Terror approaching drove me to it. I crossed the room in an eyeblink, and flung open the door.

I was assailed with a shock of horror and disgust. From the doorway, a tunnel led downward, the walls of which were made of tongues, millions of tongues lining every inch, dripping a gooey thick saliva which reeked of something foul. The air was full of a buzzing sound, and I saw that it came from countless large black flies. I slammed the door shut, and stood shaking in a kind of traumatized still panic. My heart felt like it was breaking in my chest.

I went back to the center of the room, and prayed, weeping with sadness, for mercy. Divine Mercy. I prayed to God Almighty, pleading with him for the mercy of His Holy Son Jesus. I prayed for Jesus to save us all from this terrible dread. Everything was very still. Dusty. I felt as though I were in crypt. I knew that Jesus would not come if people did not have faith, and I wondered if my faith could be enough. I asked myself, in the still of that moment, where the dust had settled long ago, if I truly had faith.

I looked up and saw a simple golden crown hanging from a nail in the wall, high out of reach. It was dusty, as though it had been waiting there for centuries. I knew that the crown was somehow the key, and that by restoring it, all would be made well. I knew that I was alone there, and it fell to me to do it. I couldn't reach it. I jumped, I scrambled. I tried to shinny up by toes and fingernails. I searched around for a table or a chair, frantic. My heart was pounding, and I felt that time was running out! I begged Jesus to come, come and not to let this terrible thing come to pass.

This is when I began to fear that the emptiness there was real, that there was no more faith. I wanted to believe, even if I was the only one who would. I began to hear a rasping, a halting step coming up the ramp now, closer and closer. I waited, unable to breathe.

To my shock and amazement, there came into view a lion, tall and stately, walking like a man. He was emaciate, and his coat was thin and worn away in spots, bald patches where his skin showed through. His mane hung down, forlorn and matted and his left leg was paralyzed and dried like jerky. My heart burst as it seemed to recognize this lion, so slowly progressing toward the wall. Jesus. His eyes were full of compassion and sorrow, and I cried and cried.

Time was running out, as He scraped toward the wall. I realized what He had come for, He had come to get the crown for me. He couldn't reach it. I thought I would die of sorrow for Him. I loved Him, and believed that He could perform a Miracle, that He could do anything, that the crown would come to His hand.

I felt that we were almost out of time, and He looked at me, as though He knew that was so. And then He reached down and broke off his own leg, the one that was paralyzed and stiff, and standing on the other leg, held it up like a staff or a stick, and tipped the crown onto it, at which point I awoke with tears puddled in my ears as I lay still, on my back, the sheets wet beneath my head.

lavender and violets

Last night, I dreamed I had an apartment in Chicago. It was a place I was excited about, as it was all my own, and I could use the whole thing as a private studio. I could set up work stations for writing and painting, and I longed to go there. The problem was of course, that it was so far away!

I was thinking this over, figuring the cost of gas to get there and back, and whether I could spend weekends there. This seemed feasible, as my family could get along without me quite easily, and I needed a few days at a time to concentrate. But, being in another state, it still seemed prohibitive. Apparently, I was thinking about this while riding up to Chicago in the back of a pick-up truck, in the pouring rain. This bothered me, so I hopped out, and headed back to square one. I think I had a blue rain poncho on.

The problem of trying to work in a space where others were also living, and the problem of thus feeling suffocated by proximity were at issue, as well as the lack of finances to extend an independent facility to myself. I found these issues slightly annoying, and pondered them disinterestedly. These were not things I could concentrate on, while thinking about the work that was calling me. I wondered at what point in life I had succumbed to the notion that I could not or did not have what I needed, and how it had escaped me, but I knew that I knew the answer.

The last thing I remember was rolling tobacco with dried lavender and violets, and looking at my hands.

Looking at one's hands while dreaming is a technique for developing a level of communication with the unconscious used in the practice of lucid dreaming.

11.14.07

last night, i dreamed a lucid dream. it was strangely two dimensional, and seemed to impart to me something that was mathematical. i have dreampt math before, specifically geometry. in this dream, i went inward into space, and was being led by a familiar presence, who stayed behind me, in a golden light. a voice appeared in my mind, and said akashic records. i was shown pictures like etchings, and i can’t say what was on the first series, but eventually they became drawings of the cosmos, and the formation of the earth. it was a kind of turning inside out. they were like line drawings in red ink, on a field of white. they moved, like animation. so beautiful. there were clouds, circling above a chunky surface forming underneath them by some sort of precipitation which pooled beneath them and then piled up in a series of peaks, a like an island of mountains. the more it grew, the heavier it seemed, and began to sink further below the cloudy wreath above it. it seemed as though the clouds were communicating with the mountains through a kind of inner lightning. the mountains too, seemed to thunder back, almost desperately reaching up, like the outstretched arms of a child. the flashing increased between the mountains and the clouds, and the mountains drew power from the clouds, which began to sort of, settle downward upon them, until they were wreathed in this ink-drawn mist. the cloud bank above was not diminished by this, continued to be moving and glowing from within.

the mountainous area began to spread out, and take three dimensional form. then things began to speed up rapidly, and as the mountainous island took on three dimensional form, so also came colour and motion, and the former field of white upon which the drawings were shown became inky black within which began to swirl the island in the clouds. this swirling shaped it into a ball which began to resemble the planet earth inside a kind of cloudy tattered cocoon. as this was my impression, it became the point at which i began to have difficulty staying asleep. that is, the point that my conscious mind began to intrude, no longer be able to contain its wonder and surprise in its need to interpret what it beheld: i had realized i was dreaming before that, but it’s like trying not to let the rest of me know, because then, i will wake up. i try not to, but i usually do. if i am sleepy, i can often go back to sleep without coming fully out of the dream, but for some reason, i awoke abruptly, elated, mystified. as i was waking, i felt myself receding rapidly, like i was being drawn up and away by the scruff of my neck, backward, and i saw this cloudy kind earth nest within a greater sort of nebula receding from me so fast, growing ever distant with a strange suddenness, but i spied the galaxy in its swirl, ever tinier, just before i awoke.

nice.

Dinner Party

I've forgotten already, most of what i dreamed last night. I do remember the tail end of the last dream. I was at a dinner party outside among a number of gazebos on a lawn. There were lots of folks there. Winding through the tables and chairs was a little track, like the kind you see at the county fair. Upon the track was a little seven or eight car train, also like the kind you see at the fair, with no roof on top. Sweet. it was taking the guests for rides, and everyone was smiling and laughing, enjoying themselves. As it came by where I was sitting, I spied Geri Kay, whom I haven't seen in years. I looked intently at her, passing by, and whispered her name. The train slowed its rambling to a near stop, and I said her name again. She turned and smiled, and we leaned toward each other and embraced. Our eyes were wet with happy emotion, and a little sadness that so much time had gone by until now.

Tag

I was traveling in a city that is familiar to me in dreams. It is like a combination of cities, metropolitan areas laid out on a grid, and resembles New York city, but is larger, and somewhat like Boston and another city which consists of elements i have not witnessed in this life. It seems to be a hub of sorts, and I am typically there looking for friends. It is always a bit difficult to navigate. Anyway, I had arrived at a busy open intersection near an elevated train track. I was waiting for someone, but I was having trouble remembering who. Soon, I saw Gordon Trubey come around the far corner, under the tracks, and I felt much joy and a feeling like relief. He was beaming, wearing a hand knit serape with horizontal stripes in different hues of blue. I was aware that each stripe represented a specific sky. He wore aviator sunglasses with amber lenses. Light blue jeans. We strolled arms around each others' waists to a nearby shotgun apartment on the second floor of a St. Louis style brick building. We went in, and inside Tim Noe was waiting there for us, with a few others.

The floors and trim were all beautiful hardwood, and one wall was inset with mahogany lockers of different sizes, all with black wrought iron padlocks. Some were unlocked. I kept going to the window, which curved out in three large panels with a windowseat and lace curtains, looking out on the street below for someone I was waiting for. I wanted desperately to visit my son Matti, who was a toddler. The rest faded into a different scenario which I have only a sense of a few vague recollections of, but in which I was visiting and playing with Matti, who was laughing and running around playing a game of tag in which I was 'it' but had to 'sit' while he ran to and from my arms, tagging me over and over. He delighted in this, and I so loved to see him laughing and running, but each time he ran away, my heart ached inside my chest. I went back into sleep.

Two or three dreams later, I was full of anxiety about time. I had volunteered to join the army, and my notice had just come. It was 3:40 in the morning, and I was in a white basement with lots of stuff in it. I was trying to find my things, rummaging through baskets of clothing and worrying about a suitcase. My mother, Rob's mother, and the Reverend Jimmy Moore were there, chatting. I began to panic as it was suddenly 4:20, and I was supposed to be at the Army Base by 4:30! The thing I was most concerned about was underwear and shoes, as I figured I would be given a uniform at basic. I was trying to find boots that I could wear to church on Sundays. Finally, at 4:31, Jimmy Moore said he would drive me to the base.

I didn't mind going into the Army at all, and in fact, felt that it would be a relief to finally not have to worry about what to wear or where to go. I seemed to know exactly what I was supposed to do. Jimmy Moore was wearing tortoise shell "Buddy Holly" glasses, black trousers and a white shirt.

Girl Drummer

In and out of sleep, visiting a playground made of sand with a young boy I was apparently babysitting. Introducing him to my brother, the Colonel. He squatted down on one knee and extended his hand, saying "Hello Noah." Fast forward, inside a building, maybe a coffee shop . I reached to scratch an itch on my chin, felt a beard! Surprised, went to find a mirror. It was true, I had a beard on my jaws and chin. As I stroked it, I realized I was dreaming. Some of if was silken and blond, like very long peach fuzz, and the rest was coarse and grey, all of it about 3/4 of an inch long. Fell back into sleep.
Later, in an apartment that was my own, Dena Elsafar and Tim Moore brought me two little girls to take care of. I was still custodian of the boy, but he was off with Rob, getting the car. The girls were small and delicate, one wore diapers, the other pull-ups. They were sweet and had curly brown hair, lovely demeanors, tender and quiet. I loved them and wished they were my daughters.
Rob and the boy picked us up and we went to a department store with Rob's mom, Kaye. We entered through the furniture department entrance, where there was a living room setting with a lovely red couch. A band was playing in the corner, a little three-piece. Two boys seated amidst various keyboards and synthesizers, and a girl behind a keyboard and a drumset. The boys wore matching camouflage fleece feetie pajamas with Winnie the Pooh and Tigger faces (!) and the girl wore a t-shirt and jeans, glasses.
Kaye and Rob sat on the red couch with the boy, and I sat down on the floor and played with the little girls. The music was so beautiful, I thought I might cry. My heart was swollen and feathery in my chest, and the girl was singing this song in 6/8 time:

may your trembling always be bright
may your daytimes sparkle with light
private voices within you echo in the night
forgive them, big-mouth Will..

I wanted to stay asleep to hear the beautiful music, but I knew I was waking up.

I remained in bed for a while. Thinking about the song, memorizing the sound of it, the lyrics. letting my thoughts drift where they may. For some reason, the song "Baby Mine" from Walt Disney's Dumbo arose in my mind, and it sang in my heart to the little girls from the dream, and then to Rob.

Enter the Matrix...

“In the dream state, man is situated in a world imagined[1] entirely by himself, and whose very element is consequently drawn from his own individuality, more or less extended (in its extra-corporeal modalities) like so many “illusory forms” (mayavirupa). This is so, even if he possesses no clear and distinct consciousness of the fact. Whatever the interior or exterior point of departure that gives a dream a certain direction, the events which occur therein can only be the results of a combination of elements contained, at least potentially and, as it were, susceptible to a certain species of realization, within the integral grasp of the individual.

If these elements, which are modifications of the individual, are indefinite in number, so is the variety of possible combinations of the same. The dream should in fact be regarded as a mode of realization for possibilities, which, while belonging to the domain of human individuality, are for one reason or another not susceptible to realization in the corporeal mode. Such are, for example, the forms of beings belonging to the same world but other than mankind- forms which man possesses within himself in virtuality by reason of the central position which he occupies in this world.

These forms evidently cannot be realized by the human being except in the subtle state, and the dream is the most ordinary, one may say the most normal, of all the ways in which he is able to identify himself with other beings while not ceasing in any way to be himself.

In the course of his dream the individual takes an active part in the events which his imaginative faculty creates, that is to say, if he plays a determined role in the extra-corporeal modality of his being which currently corresponds to the state of his clearly manifested consciousness, or to what one may call the central zone of this consciousness, one must nonetheless admit that simultaneously all the other roles are equally “played” by him. They are played either in modalities, or at least, in different secondary modifications of the same modality also belonging to his individual consciousness. If not his current limited state of manifestation as far as its consciousness is concerned, then at least in some one of its possibilities of manifestation which, taken all together, comprise a field of indefinitely greater extent.

All these roles naturally appear secondary to the one that is principal to the individual, that is to say, to the one in which his current consciousness is directly interested, and, since all the elements of the dream exist only through him, one can say that they are real only insofar as they participate in his own existence. It is he himself who realizes them, as so many modifications of himself, and without thereby ceasing to be himself independently of these modifications which in no way affect that which constitutes the real essence of his individuality.

If, moreover, the individual is conscious that he is dreaming, that is, conscious of the fact that all the events taking place in this state have no more reality than that which he himself gives them, he will be entirely unaffected, even if in the dream he is actor at the same time as spectator, precisely because he will not cease to be a spectator in order to be an actor.

To the extent that he effects this attribution, he is subject to an illusion whose cause is within himself- an illusion which consists in separating the multiplicity of these events from that which is their immediate principle, that is to say, his own individual unity.

This is a very clear example of a multiplicity existing within a unity, yet not affecting it.

The unity concerned here is no more than the relative unity of the individual, but it nonetheless plays a part, in relation to the corresponding multiplicity, analogous to that of veritable and primordial unity in relation to the universal manifestation.”

pp. 62-65, chapter 6, Analogous Considerations Drawn from Study of the Dream State, The Multiplicity of Being, Rene Guenon

---

[1] The word “imagined” should be understood here in its most exact sense, since a dream is essentially formed from images.

Chuang-Tzu

“One night,” said Chuang-Tzu, “ I was a butterfly, flitting about contented with its lot; then I awoke to find myself Chuang-Tzu. Which am I really? A butterfly dreaming that it is Chuang-Tzu, or Chuang-Tzu imagining that he was a butterfly? Are there two real individuals in my case? Was there a real transformation between one individual and the other? The answer is neither of these: there were two unreal modifications of the single Being, of the universal norm, in which all beings in all their states are one.”[1]

---

[1] Chuang-Tzu, chapter II.

come back, alice!

3.03.08

vague recollections of going to a church, it was filling up with people, and i was with my family- a husband and son- along with a couple others, maybe friends? relatives? we took up about half the pew. our coats were in a pile beside us, and more people were filing in. i picked up our coats to make room, and went to hang them. i remember walking down the side aisle with this bulky bundle of outerwear, thinking it was a bit unwieldy, past the other pews filling with people, and through a hallway, toward a large foyer, where there were coat racks with hangers. i noticed then that the pile of coats was actually half of a big layered wedding cake, but it was made of a combination of papers, like paper mache' and tissue. it was white with blue trim, and had some silver dangling sequins or flashing somethings that sparkled here and there at the edges of each tier. i remember thinking they moved like dangling earrings on a woman as she walks .

as i walked with it, i saw janet fox waiting for me, leaning on the glass case in a front-desk type of area. the foyer was quite spacious, with a very high, bright ceiling and seemed like a large white entryway to a museum. she was smiling, and it was clear we had planned to meet there. the paper cake i had been carrying was the Torah. inside it, all of space was infinite and empty. “ you need some help with that?” she said. i explained to her that it was, in fact, very light, since it was infinitely empty! but, yes, it was a little unwieldy. we giggled and she stepped to take a corner..

i wondered how i could be carrying infinite space , since that would suggest the impossible, as i would be outside of space, and one cannot be outside of the infinite, but then i realized it was because it was perfectly empty. it was about then that i knew i was dreaming, so i pondered this quickly, how i could be in a space that was filled with locations, carrying a space that was filled with emptiness.

i awoke and waited for an answer. the only thing that came to me, later, was from a drawing i had made on a card to meg and zeb. it poked out at me from a pile of papers on my desk. it’s a heart, made from a continuous line: at the bottom is a little loop, and at the top, in between the two matching lobes, is another. a mobius heart. the one lobe reflects the other.
to see infinity in a grain of sand indeed. what’s in that quantum foam?

the manifestation of being is truly, to my understanding, dependent on the void.

to dream or not to dream

that is the question.