Monthly Archive for July, 2007

The Temple

Dreams :   July 19, 2007

This dream dates from the Vietnam War era, but I have decided to post it now:
I am walking on a dim, gray plain. At first, I am alone. Then, I begin to make out shapes in the misty distance to my left and right. Gradually, the shapes get a little closer, and I can make out human forms. Other men are walking on this plain! More dim figures appear beyond the first two, and it slowly becomes apparent that we are converging from every direction towards a central point. We are all very fearful and suspicious of each other. Who are these strange figures, and what do they want? With each step, in spite of our fear and distrust, we are moving closer to one another, and eventually it is evident that we form an enormous and widely spaced circle, the opposite side of which is almost lost in the mist. We are converging on an ancient temple at the center of the circle. The temple is small and simple in form: a ring of simple stone columns sits upon a raised, circular stone floor, encircled by two or three concentric stone steps. The columns support a simple, somewhat flattened dome of stone. Worn and weathered, it looks like it has stood there since time began. Still quite suspicious of one another, but attracted to the temple, we cannot help but get closer to each other as we approach our goal. Eventually, we are a solid ring of humans, shoulder to shoulder around the ancient structure. We stay like this for a long time, and then the temple is gone, replaced by the circle of humans. The circle of humans has become the temple. The scene switches to a formal reception at the U.N. We are well-dressed representatives of every nation on earth, gathered to celebrate an historic accomplishment. World Peace has been achieved, and the mood is excellent.

1 Comment

Permission to Kill

Dreams :   July 19, 2007

I am walking with Betty in a primitive village with dirt lanes, and thatched houses of unpeeled poles and rough boards. We are talking in a small, shady, quiet earthen square in the center of the village. As we approach some old stone steps in the square, I am overcome with deep sorrow. I begin to tell her that my loneliness and lifetime of longing for my mate have reached the point of being unbearable, but the feeling is so intense I can’t put the words together. I know I can’t live this way any more, and slump, exhausted on the stone steps, crushed by a sense of hopelessness.

Betty has wandered some distance away, and returns with a pretty, younger Native American woman from the village who has something to show me. Smiling, the woman extends her hands to me. Her right hand grasps my left wrist, drawing me closer, as her left hand places something repulsive in my right. It is a squirming, flat, hairy triangular creature with little ciliated feet on each end of the triangle’s short side. It is wiggling and looks like it is built to suck blood, like some kind of land leech. I don’t want to hold it, but take it anyway, not wanting to appear cowardly in the sight of the village woman who is brightly, enthusiastically proffering the disgusting creature.

She asks what it is, and I say it is clearly some kind of horse parasite, since I have seen horses nearby. I am looking for a way to kill it when I feel a sharp sting in my right heel. Looking down, I see 2 little metal darts, like pins, each with a small feather attached. The thought flickers across my awareness that the heel is a curious place to be attacked. I know they are blow darts, and wonder if some drug or poison is already in my bloodstream. Then, I see a dark, coarse-robed figure aiming the blow gun at me again, from under the dirt street somehow, as if the street has become a web of tree branches underfoot, and my attacker is below the ground. Before the strangeness of this setup can even register, I feel the sharp stings of several more darts, and feel intense fear.

It is then that I see the Shaman, a dark, smallish figure, perhaps the same one who attacked me, standing next to a repulsive, viscous, breathing, talking pit in the earth which looks as if it is filled with organs, membranes and guts. It is a disgusting and terrifying sight. Before I have even a moment to take it in, a voice from the heaving pit asks me, “Do I have your permission to kill you?” I know it is actually the Shaman talking. I counter with my own question, “Is this a way to know who I am?” He says simply, “Yes.” I say, “Yes, then, although I know it will be rough, and I am afraid, Yes!”

I know I am going to have to enter that suffocating, disgusting pit, the entrails of the earth as it were, and endure a terrifying ordeal which my personality will not survive. I also know this is exactly what I have been searching for. I am awakened by the fear of personal annihilation.

0 Comments