How It Happens (I)

AT ONCE I knew she was a novice, probably her first solo descent, nervous and tired; the Recovery Phase of sleep and dreams was summoning her, but she was distracted by my psychic proximity. She had gone astray in the vast asphodel(*)fields in the hinterlands of the city. How many sincere aspirants have gone astray because of these fields? They flounder and fail, or do they? All things eventually recur, there will be the sweet-scented repose she missed today, and its opposite will be carried by parallel streams at the same moment. (This poem is only concerned with How It Begins. Isn't that enough?) When I approached her, my left arm outstretched, my left palm facing down, she was relieved. This gesture affirms Good Intentions, its power resides in a pure mind. (It is the way two pure minds recognize each other and connect.)"They told me back there, where I began walking, that I would meet a helper. Tell me quickly, are YOU that helper? " She was smiling brightly, I was moved by her immediate bravery. I nodded, also smiling. "Do you have a name? I'm very grateful." She spoke with simple honesty, I replied in kind: "Call me Aaron as I call you Rebecca." And that was a kind of seal between us, for the time being, as we say in English. And we were content in our disguises. (*)Asphodel is a variety of lily, symbolic of moving across alien realms of being; for example, Homer describes the dead wandering in asphodel fields in the Underworld. How It Happens (II) A mysterious force nudged us across the Threshold of Beginnings into a wider world of expectations. It was not a physical touch, but it moved us physically. And we sensed we were breathing a different air, more abundant, more invigorating. Rebecca said this in words, I nodded silently, and we both breathed huge breaths. Our lungs filled with possibilities, that spilled over their capacities and flooded our whole body. What could I do but quote Rilke's "Spanish Dancer"? I shouted in broken rapture: "Her dance begins to flicker in the dark room. And all at once it is completely F-I-R-E." But you, you became the fiery dancer, right there, standing stretched upward, fully extended, fully aroused, you were a column of fire, twirling, wildly twisting yourself into the thinnest of forms, your arms reaching upward, your index fingers joined in an arrow of fire that blazed the sky itself... Or so it seemed. "This is only the beginning, Rebecca." She looked at me with a gaze that asked a thousand questions but could not abide even one answer. I put my hands on her shoulders, I could feel the tensile energy of her dance now cool within her. "This is good, Rebecca. This is what it should be. You are not Passion's slave. Remember that, even if I forget it, you remember it... " I fell silent, and she accepted my silence. She was growing in Nocturnal Strength. Soon (too soon?)the ordinary nights will not hold her.