Tuesday, 24 February 2015

Thirteen Crucifixions, 103


“I have lost time.  I don’t know how long I’ve been here, and mostly I have slept, and dreamed. I cannot remember my dreams here, none of them.  But while I have them they are vivid, complex, dramatic, then I awake in almost complete forgetfulness.  For some reason I don’t find this frustrating.  I have been mostly left alone since I came here last week?  Month?  Last year?  Three times a day a meal on a tray is left at my door.  A soft knock summons me but when I open the door there is only the food and the sound of softly receding footsteps.  I still have not ventured outside, so great has been my need to rest, but now it compels me.  The air that blows in through the window is sweet, and fragrant with sea salt and cedar. I always hear gulls, crows and other birds, sometimes eagles.  Yet, outside of my inevitable treks to the bathroom, I never leave this room.  I have become like Proust.  My single recreation is writing in this journal. Someone now is knocking at the door.  I have only finished lunch, so it can’t be time for dinner.  Though it’s hard to say, since time doesn’t seem to follow the usual pattern to which I’ve always been familiar.


            “It was the old woman, the one whom I am to call “Mother.”  She was courteous and asked if she could come in.  Well, how could I refuse her?  I hadn’t realized how tall she is, taller than me, towering almost.  I hadn’t noticed this when I first saw her.  Her hair seemed more under control, and her eyes were very bright and very young.  Her voice had a lilt, a musical cadence, but I must say that I felt diminished in her presence.  I could not look in her face, though she was very kind and good.  She sat down in the comfy chair in the corner, I reclined on the bed.  Perhaps she was yet another dream.  I could no longer tell the difference.

            “Do you know why you’ve come here?” she asked.

            “To rest?”

            “You’ve been rediverted.   You were on your way to commit an act that, while in itself innocent, would have precipitated great evil over the earth.  You will still end up in Nicaragua, and there you will marry Maria, a diplomat’s daughter by whom you will father a child.  Because you have been summoned here, the harm you might have brought on the earth will come only upon you.  There is a man in Managua, a CIA agent, who has just yesterday died from a heart attack.  Had we not intervened he would have found you, and used your influence over the diplomat’s daughter to destabilize the new government in Nicaragua, and with tragic consequences.  The American-backed forces would gain in strength and momentum thus toppling the Sandinistas, and bring in first Cuban, then Soviet intervention.  Then the US war machine would be displaying its most ugly and naked might, only to be matched by the Russians who would bring in their nuclear missiles.  Do you recall the Cuban Missile Crisis?  Had we not intervened at the eleventh hour by bringing a certain person of influence here to our Refuge just in time, this planet would now be shrouded in the cold darkness of a nuclear winter.  And once again, by diverting you here, we have again rescued your planet from destruction.

            “When you came here you were carrying many wounds and heartaches, along with your stubborn refusal to reckon wisely with your conscience.  Thus you would have brought to a particularly dangerous and explosive part of the earth your own psychic and spiritual toxins that would have set off an irreversible chain of events.  It is one of the many tragedies of your species that you have not yet learned to reckon that the spiritual, invisible properties of your beings are in themselves the most real, and therefore the most vital and powerful forces in this planet.  Behold now the great destruction that has thus been wreaked on this jewel of the Cosmos, your Earth.  Slowly the air and waters that sustain all life are being poisoned with the venom of your very human greed, fear and violence.  Since the advent of your kind, this planet has seen an acceleration of species extinction unprecedented since the ending of the Age of Dinosaurs.  And now your atmosphere is rapidly losing its protective shield.  Soon the very sun, that gives life, will become your terror and destruction.

            “Were you less stubborn and wilful, we would have embued you with the charge and all the necessary power to influence change among your kind, such change as would cause each of you miserable creatures to turn your selfish hearts of stone into giving and living hearts of beating flesh.   Long we have watched you, to see if you would turn and repent and you would not.  Now, the best we can do for you, is that we render you incapable of harm.  Your own end will come soon enough, after which time you shall be returned to us, that you might complete your healing.”

            “Who are you?”  I asked.  “I mean, you’ve already told me you’re my mother.  But, who are you?”

            “I am of the Millionth Council, and it is our task to watch over your earth and especially over your species.  Because you have become corrupted and sinful you have wrought great destruction here, and have gone entirely contrary to the charge that was first given you—that you take care of and nurture this planet.  You have created a charnel house of Eden, but still we labour and strive with you, and against your great harm, for the record of your species is not yet complete, and we hold out for you in the greatest redemptive hope.”

            “What is this place?”

            “You are in the Refuge, one of many portals between the dimensions.  Here it is that our watchers and agents gather to determine the outcome of this planet and how best to preserve your species against its own destruction.”

            “Who are these watchers and agents?”

            “You are neither.  We have had to rescue from you one of our agents, for she is, and for many years to come will remain, torn and conflicted as to her role and calling.  Only following your death will she come to resolution and begin to faithfully carry out her task.”

            (By this I knew she could only mean you, Carol.)

            “What exactly is a watcher?  And what is an agent?”

            “I would never be able to fully explain to you those mysteries, because our natures are so different.  Yet I shall give you an idea.  The watchers are such as I.  We live throughout the earth, but we are not of the earth.  We appear as mortals, but we are not mortals.  We are the guardians who have been placed in charge of all the celestial and the earthly orders.  Your religions and mythologies speak of us as angels, as spirits, and so we are, yet we are more, much more.  The agents are ordinary mortals such as yourself, who have been chosen to express and show forth the Divine Intention.  Many, sadly, fail at their task, yet they also shall be rewarded.

            “And now, Richard, you shall soon be dismissed from the Refuge.  You will leave here your writings, which I shall promptly post to her who is called Carol Hartly-Atkinson.  You will wake up on the beach near your hotel in Tofino, and you will have forgotten entirely your writings and everything about your sojourn here, until the last moments before your death in Nicaragua, after which time you shall be returned to us.” 

           

           

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