Aloysius and I are temporarily stationed in the Valley of Bones and our conversation is taking a strange turn. A turn for the best, I’m sure, but sometimes ’strange’ can instill a sense of fear as well, in one. Such as I.
My donkey journeyman has uncovered for me a pile of white bones and he has brought them up to the surface for me to look at. I approach, gingerly…
To bring you up to date, this is what transpired last night, whilst I was still very tired:
Aloysius is a digger of bones.
He has a shovel for me and tools to make a fire.
We settle in for the night while soon, we will be on our way again.
It is peaceful here – no voices in my head, though many still in my heart.
Aloysius hears my thoughts… he answers: “That’s because you don’t take the time to listen – really listen – to what those voices are trying to tell you. They are calling you – your voices are the bones of the past come to revisit you.”
Here we are, talking about bones again… how can voices be ‘bones’?
He continues… and I begin to understand.
“They are bones of a little girl who never got her dream of having her own home one day…
bones of a story-teller who never got to tell her precious stories…
bones of an earth-walker, who was kept from walking and who cries still, to walk her land, her Mother Earth, and visit the whispering Pine, the denizens of Arcadia, the trickling spring hid from human eyes, the moss-carpeted deep, deep woods where rarely has any other human walked in the last century.
oh, the bones are crying and need to be heard – will you listen?!”
The petulant child in me:
“Are there any more who want me to listen? Seems to me that’s a lot of people that I need to listen to! how long will they be and when can I go to sleep?”
Aloysius pauses as he is about to speak again. He knows I cannot listen in this mood – in this petulant child mood that I’m in tonight. I need to have my senses softened – some sensibility imprinted upon my being, or else I will not hear. He knows I will not want to hear.
Soothingly, he whispers: “That’s ok. At least you know. You now know of their existence. At least, maybe … tomorrow you will be willing to listen?”
yes, i say in a quiet, diminutive voice, i will — i will listen.
“Then make the fire,” Aloysius commands. And we have our fire to sleep by, to dream by.
Back To The Future/Present
The Valley lies before us, a wide expanse of rock, rolling hills and bones, many bones. Under an already-hot sun, pouring its energy upon us. I know they are there, the bones. Some are hidden under cairns, some have fallen down a cliff that shelters a dried-up stream from long ago, some lie under the Old Willow Tree, as if reaching a plea for the tree to provide moisture to their parched surfaces.
As I approach Aloysius, he is standing still, staring out over the bones at his feet. He is quite serious that I examine those bones, I see. Maybe I could talk him out of it, but I think not. Besides, the petulant child in me has fallen silent and now… well, now maybe I can listen to the bones. At least for a little while. We still have to join the others, soon.
With trepidation, I reach down and squat, touching the long white object closest to my hand. It is smooth and oddly, warm.
“This is the Story-Teller. She holds many tales that need to be told, once and for all.”
A sense of total familiarity washes over me and I am transported back in time to a place long, long ago. Woods surround me and I sit, a mere child of ten, under a thick Spruce tree. It is Spring and though the air is chill with the remains of last Winter’s snow, scattered about in dirty patches under some trees, my spot is dry and warm, as I bask in the sun’s shining rays. In front of me is a little house built of sticks and branches. I look down upon it and in my mind’s eye, I picture a woman talking to a little girl who is lying in a miniature bed made of woven willow twigs. She is telling her stories that enchant the little girl. Stories of animals and elementals that inhabit these woods, wildly going about their very interesting and intriguing lives. The little girl wishes she were an elemental, too – a sylph perhaps, or a dryad, so she can also live a very interesting life.
I was that little girl, revelling in wild, untold stories. The bone has become cold in my hands and I quickly put it down. An intense sadness overcomes me as I look up at Aloysius. He has such gentleness in his eyes now, and I know he wishes he could take this sadness away for me. But that is the strangeness of bones, they are yours to carry and sing over, no one can take that away from you, and no one should.
I can sing, though, I can sing a story to heal this pile of bones. I can use my soul voice…
“To sing means to use one’s soul voice. It means to say on the breath the truth of one’s power and one’s need, to breathe soul over the thing that is of one’s power and one’s need, to breathe soul over the thing that is ailing or in need of restoration. This is done by descending into the deepest mood of great love and feeling, till one’s desire for relationship with the wildish Self overflows, then to speak one’s soul from that frame of mind. That is singing over the bones.” (CPE, Women Who Run With the Wolves)
I sing a song of repentance
Of sorrow overwhelming my heart
Of gratitude ever filling, over coming
The pain and loss of a childhood dream
I sing my song to my soul – my StoryTeller’s soul
And promise — to make her live again
This time, she will have her wish/dream of living
Amidst the Elementals, amidst the Fairies
Of the Wild Arcadien Forest
She will live!
The bones of the StoryTeller start to move, each piece inching ever closer one to another, and I watch, transfixed. My tears fall on the parched bones and flesh starts to grow and reach across the distance to join the other pieces of flesh growing (thriving) from each piece of scattered bone, placing themselves into some sort of order. I expect this new ‘body’ to come alive, somehow…
I am exhausted, I realise. This has been more traumatic for me than I thought it would be. I mount the donkey and stare at the bones-become-flesh on the ground…
{According to Wikipedia, the nest of a squirrel is called a Drey. This is my Drey. My nest where I come to snuggle and indulge my writing passions. Welcome to my nest!}
