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Beyond a Near Water by Patrick Jasper Lee
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When I look out of my tent to the great mountains I am glad
that I still remember where the Old Land really is. It is within the blue veil
of mist upon the mountains in the west; it is concealed in those places where
the bird soars and where heat hazes shimmer; it is beyond every ocean, behind
the sky and beyond all those places we can never quite see. And that is why I
send my gold nugget back to the mountains in the west every evening, with a
prayer. For there is nowhere better for my nugget to be. The misty veils will
guard and protect it, just as the blue misty veil I wear guards and protects
me.
Yes, we are a mystery to people, because we are beings who understand the language of gold, the language of the Otherworld and woodland spirits and little people and dragons and the wisest of men. It has even been suggested that some of us are nature spirits in disguise. It has also been suggested that we journey west to make it look as though we originated from this physical world after all, because everyone is compelled to move west or east along the main routes connecting these two important directions.
And we tell everyone - really because they keep telling us - that we are wanderers from the land of Egypt, because Egypt seems to be the most otherworldly and mystical place that anyone has ever heard of. And we tell them we are journeying back to that place as we move west.
My father, who is a holy man and who knows many things and who has long had visions about the past and the future, used to say to me: ‘Our homeland is beyond a great water. Our homeland will be found where we are able to fall off the edge of the land in the place where the sun sits down in the west.’
And so we long for this great water to draw near, as that is bound to take us closer to the Old Land.
And it has been said many times that we Egyptians can enter the Otherworld by falling off the edge of the horizon, because the sun falls into the Otherworld in the same way every night. And our people consider it sensible to follow the path of the sun. The sun is a lover of the moon. And my father says that by the time we find the water and step across it we will have become so like the sun that the moon will part the waves of her waters and will be begging us to move within her so that we can cross to the other side.
Remember that to fall off the edge of the land purposefully is to enter the Otherworld skilfully, with your soul intact, as the sun does. This is what our wisest elders say. They also say that to fall by accident, stumbling on a rock on the road or simply tripping over something, means you could risk falling by someone else’s hand. So if we do not take care, we could enter the Otherworld under some kind of enchantment and risk losing our souls forever.
And what would we do then?
So I do not want to trip up on the road. I have no desire to become enchanted. I would rather keep my soul. We have always taken every care to step along the road with our eyes open wide, because the road is long and it is all we have.
For a long time many of my people were unable to understand how we could all fall off the edge of the land into such a vast stretch of water all together at the same time, as my father had suggested. But my father explained that in his vision there was a sheet of pure blue silk and it was being stretched out across the earth by invisible spirit hands. Sometimes this sheet was smooth, other times silver coins were being tossed upon it like a great many dancing stars. He said that when it was being shaken by all those unseen hands, billowing and ballooning so beautifully, he couldn’t take his eyes off it. He knew we would all somehow have to fall upon it together so that we could all fall off it together when we reached the other side. He didn’t know at the time that he had seen an ocean. And nobody else knew he had seen an ocean, until one day an elder was recounting a story about the sea, and then everyone realised exactly what my father had seen.
But many of the old ones still prefer to believe that they will one day walk across a sheet of silk bearing dancing stars.
There are naturally a few in our tribe who question our passage west because it appears to take us no nearer to our destination. There was a time when we moved north, south and east as well. But most believe it is safest to keep to the sun’s path now that the world is changing so rapidly and so many are losing their souls. It is also thought that with our horses, asses, carts and tents we are simply doing what we have been doing for thousands of years: trading as we move, entertaining as we move and fortune-telling as we move. So if we continue moving and doing all these things we will keep ourselves safe and all will be well.
But so many are now travelling along the main routes west and east that we think they too must be questioning their destination. We see merchants, traders of all kinds, bandits, beggars, holy men, masters with slaves, slaves without masters, people from the east with slant eyes, people from the west with hair as red and wild as fire, people with skin as black as the night, people with skin as white as sunlight upon white stone, mule trains and camel caravans and elephant processions, and all moving as if part of a great snake, weaving sometimes in one direction and sometimes in the other.
And the very worst travellers of all are those from the south with teeth. Yes, those I have already spoken about, those who have many shadows in their huge white teeth and who will show you their teeth purposefully to try to bewitch you. They will terrorise, rob or kill you if they can. And they will do it all with their teeth.
But do any of these travellers within the snake really know where they are going? So many of them are moving in their sleep, we are not sure. Much of the time this human snake is not really moving at all, because none of the people who are part of it are awake. And so they are not moving in their souls. They want to become rich. They would rather travel to find a small nugget of gold somewhere in a vast range of mountains than travel to find their destiny. That is the way the world has become. That is the spell that gold casts if we succumb to the spirit of greed.
I hope it is better in the future.
Sometimes we grow weary because we are always travelling, travelling, travelling. Sometimes we think we are no better than the next person who is just ahead in the giant snake or just behind, and we wonder if we will ever meet the edge of the land.
My father has fallen off the edge of the land many times in his dreams and he has left his body sitting under the stars, so that it is still sitting there in the same position in the morning. And when he returns to speak to us, his voice has become full of stardust. And so we learn how stars talk to each other. The stars are our ancestors who have risen up to the heavens after death, having earned themselves an honoured place in the sky. So to hear them speaking is a wonderful thing.
© Patrick Jasper Lee 2013.
Yes, we are a mystery to people, because we are beings who understand the language of gold, the language of the Otherworld and woodland spirits and little people and dragons and the wisest of men. It has even been suggested that some of us are nature spirits in disguise. It has also been suggested that we journey west to make it look as though we originated from this physical world after all, because everyone is compelled to move west or east along the main routes connecting these two important directions.
And we tell everyone - really because they keep telling us - that we are wanderers from the land of Egypt, because Egypt seems to be the most otherworldly and mystical place that anyone has ever heard of. And we tell them we are journeying back to that place as we move west.
My father, who is a holy man and who knows many things and who has long had visions about the past and the future, used to say to me: ‘Our homeland is beyond a great water. Our homeland will be found where we are able to fall off the edge of the land in the place where the sun sits down in the west.’
And so we long for this great water to draw near, as that is bound to take us closer to the Old Land.
And it has been said many times that we Egyptians can enter the Otherworld by falling off the edge of the horizon, because the sun falls into the Otherworld in the same way every night. And our people consider it sensible to follow the path of the sun. The sun is a lover of the moon. And my father says that by the time we find the water and step across it we will have become so like the sun that the moon will part the waves of her waters and will be begging us to move within her so that we can cross to the other side.
Remember that to fall off the edge of the land purposefully is to enter the Otherworld skilfully, with your soul intact, as the sun does. This is what our wisest elders say. They also say that to fall by accident, stumbling on a rock on the road or simply tripping over something, means you could risk falling by someone else’s hand. So if we do not take care, we could enter the Otherworld under some kind of enchantment and risk losing our souls forever.
And what would we do then?
So I do not want to trip up on the road. I have no desire to become enchanted. I would rather keep my soul. We have always taken every care to step along the road with our eyes open wide, because the road is long and it is all we have.
For a long time many of my people were unable to understand how we could all fall off the edge of the land into such a vast stretch of water all together at the same time, as my father had suggested. But my father explained that in his vision there was a sheet of pure blue silk and it was being stretched out across the earth by invisible spirit hands. Sometimes this sheet was smooth, other times silver coins were being tossed upon it like a great many dancing stars. He said that when it was being shaken by all those unseen hands, billowing and ballooning so beautifully, he couldn’t take his eyes off it. He knew we would all somehow have to fall upon it together so that we could all fall off it together when we reached the other side. He didn’t know at the time that he had seen an ocean. And nobody else knew he had seen an ocean, until one day an elder was recounting a story about the sea, and then everyone realised exactly what my father had seen.
But many of the old ones still prefer to believe that they will one day walk across a sheet of silk bearing dancing stars.
There are naturally a few in our tribe who question our passage west because it appears to take us no nearer to our destination. There was a time when we moved north, south and east as well. But most believe it is safest to keep to the sun’s path now that the world is changing so rapidly and so many are losing their souls. It is also thought that with our horses, asses, carts and tents we are simply doing what we have been doing for thousands of years: trading as we move, entertaining as we move and fortune-telling as we move. So if we continue moving and doing all these things we will keep ourselves safe and all will be well.
But so many are now travelling along the main routes west and east that we think they too must be questioning their destination. We see merchants, traders of all kinds, bandits, beggars, holy men, masters with slaves, slaves without masters, people from the east with slant eyes, people from the west with hair as red and wild as fire, people with skin as black as the night, people with skin as white as sunlight upon white stone, mule trains and camel caravans and elephant processions, and all moving as if part of a great snake, weaving sometimes in one direction and sometimes in the other.
And the very worst travellers of all are those from the south with teeth. Yes, those I have already spoken about, those who have many shadows in their huge white teeth and who will show you their teeth purposefully to try to bewitch you. They will terrorise, rob or kill you if they can. And they will do it all with their teeth.
But do any of these travellers within the snake really know where they are going? So many of them are moving in their sleep, we are not sure. Much of the time this human snake is not really moving at all, because none of the people who are part of it are awake. And so they are not moving in their souls. They want to become rich. They would rather travel to find a small nugget of gold somewhere in a vast range of mountains than travel to find their destiny. That is the way the world has become. That is the spell that gold casts if we succumb to the spirit of greed.
I hope it is better in the future.
Sometimes we grow weary because we are always travelling, travelling, travelling. Sometimes we think we are no better than the next person who is just ahead in the giant snake or just behind, and we wonder if we will ever meet the edge of the land.
My father has fallen off the edge of the land many times in his dreams and he has left his body sitting under the stars, so that it is still sitting there in the same position in the morning. And when he returns to speak to us, his voice has become full of stardust. And so we learn how stars talk to each other. The stars are our ancestors who have risen up to the heavens after death, having earned themselves an honoured place in the sky. So to hear them speaking is a wonderful thing.
© Patrick Jasper Lee 2013.
