2/15 (Part 2)

2/15 Pt. 2

I walked the hearth, placing the items in each direction, moving my thumb through each slot of the wheel.

I spoke the prayers and smoked the sage,
placed the staff against the hearth’s fire,
and sat down in the chair, facing the flames.

The Hooded Man came first. 

I could sense his presence behind me now,
suddenly “there”. 

He emerged from the woods,
slowly and stealthily,
while I sat feeding the flames. 

“I can feel you behind me,” I said,
speaking directly to him, and aloud. 

A low, weighty whisper:

“That is because I am.” 

His response,
and presence,
gave me chills.

I take a breath. 

He leans closer,
lips almost touching my ear,
and said:

“You do well to keep the fire burning.”

Understanding his meaning
and its implications regarding preparation and planning ahead,
I looked and saw that more wood would be needed for this night.
Much more. 

I got up and retrieved much more from the wild,
several thick and sturdy logs, and fed them to the hearth. 

Chaak, watched on in silence from his high perch in the South corner, was glowing  in the heat of the flames. I had never seen him with this disposition. He, a mighty god, looked wide-eyed like a child suspecting some kind of hidden surprise… which, for a god, is a very odd expression to self-possess, since it implies a limitation of knowing and something less than omniscient; Chaak was out of his element ~ but this was not a negative for him ~ his face showed that it was a positive, and a gift and a privilege for even him to have been brought here; and I saw that even Chaak was learning, evolving, understanding more about the Universe he exists in and the new world he now lives in and the joy go discovering new ways to be integrate to the gifts he possesses by right of simply existenting and being, in time and space. His face was like a child, feelign the magic of mythical incarnation and watching me confidently stride around the hearth one, two, three, four times, clock-ways, stopping at each corner and offering the prayers and medicine needed and leaving the respective sacred item in its respective “direction” ~ Chaak’s face lit up with such childlike wonder as he watched me, with a look and a feeling that, again, every father knows when looking at his or her own child – it felt ((oddly)) like being a father ~ and the confidence flowed to Chaak as I completed my path.

And, because his face was that of child, he could not hide the fact that when he looked at me, he felt an unspoken fear of what might befall the Little Big Chief this night.

I felt the Hooded Man agree with this sentiment. 

And then…. she came (or something like her)

———

---

“I’ll be a slave for you,” she said. 

And she began dancing around the fire, slowly and like some stretching, yearning, seeking, breathing animal, alive and filled with trepidation. 

Her dancing was for me. 

She touched the ground with grace and wildfire, each step kissing the ground in a steamed hiss. 

She danced around the fire, clock-ways and following my former steps when I approached the place, carrying the fire with me, and burning the sage on all four sides. She matched my path, with steps her specialized own. 

Oh how she stepped. 

She neared me, rested her arms of the chair I was sitting in, and leaned her face towards mine.

“Kiss me,” she said, ever close. 

I prepared myself to do so. 

“Why can’t I see your mouth?” I asked.

“And why does it now look sewn shut, and twitching?” I said, shocked to this revealed about her, as if it was some hidden feature that she didn’t want to be seen.

And as soon as I asked about it she flung her arms off the chair and into the air, spinning around nd dancing again around the fire as before and acting as if she hadn’t even heard me ask the question (it was childishly defiant; I could smell the fear).

She completes the path around the fire and walls it a second time, staring even deeper into my eyes this time, with every single step. 

And as she completes the path a second time and is about to pass me to being a third, I spot her eyes: tears. 

And I see the thread across her mouth, woven across her lips, sewing her mouth shut.

Her eyes brimmed with pain and rage. 

She shrieked at me, every muscle in her neck, arms, and face straining to the limit as she said it, an orgasm’s hellish Shadow:

“I AM FORSAKEN!!”

The soft cracking of the wood in the flames.
 

“By who?” I gently ask. 

“YOU!” she shrieked again. “You LEFT me! YOU LEFT ME!”

Anger and rage brewing, replacing her pain and sadness.

I stared into her. Locked eyes. I could feel sparks of fire rising in my own. 

“When did I leave you? And how? I cannot leave you any more than the moon could leave her orbit of the Earth.”

She stared at me, weighing my words.

“Stay with me…” she said, softly.

And she released. 

And, walking towards me, she sat down on my left hand side, and placed her head on my shoulder, and hooked her arm around and under mine. 

I could hear Holding Eagle chuckling, watching from afar from inside his lodge, clearly amused, and extremely proud. 

We sat there together, by the fire. My mind drifted towards the iChing reading. Intuitively, it felt like I was being asked to marry myself to this woman. 

She started singing a song

Hushabye
Dont you cry
Go to sleep my little angel….

I spoke up immediately. 

“That song,” I began, “it’s -“  

“I know,” she said. 

“I feel there’s meaning here for both of us,” I said. 

“Or just Us,” she said. 

“Yes…” 

Quiet silence. 

Peace. 

The crackling of the fire. 

She nestles into me even closer, safer, softer. 

I lift my right hand, and slowly begin brushing her hair with my fingers. 

I moved my hand to the back of her head, brushing with hand – and suddenly, it was wet. Matted. 

I froze. I knew what it was, immediately.

The blood from the back of her head, unseen in the darkness, was everywhere. A large matted wet spot, with my hand in the middle of it. 

I was doing my best to breathe, stay focused, and not run or react. 

“Does it hurt?” I asked. 

“No.”

a short silence….

“Sometimes.”

And then…

“Yes.”

I leaned towards her, touched my nose to the top of her head, and breathed. 

The air was stale – it was full of death.

(and I know the smell of death)

This was something… different.

My hands begin to tremble as I take in the weight of reality.

“What is this….” I say, stand up from my chair at once, fearful for where I saw this all logically leading…. fearful of where I was, and what I was doing, and where this all was going ~ and fearful of the further isolation from all I’ve known that it would certainly cause…

Continued in 2/15 (Part 3)….