between a rock and a hard place

 

Pssst!

 

Huh?

 

Pssst! Over here.

 

What the heck? Is that you Merry?

 

Sssh! Keep down or they’ll see you.

 

Er… Ok. Zie crouches low and scurries across the street, ducking behind a beaten up trailer and then squeezing into what looked like a mudwalled cow shed.

 

Oh my God, Merry, it’s you. I can’t believe it.

 

Yeah, yeah – do you think anyone noticed.

 

Noticed me? No, of course not, I was stealthy and…

 

Not you, Zie, my decoys.

 

What decoys?

 

Merry looks momentarily flabbergasted that Zie doesn’t appear to have a clue. The posts.

 

What posts?

 

Yesterday’s posts on g-nomeportal.

 

Er… Did you post something?

 

Something? Rather than getting annoyed Merry takes three short breaths and slips into an altered state of consciousness – er, no – an altered state of reality with a pinging kind of popping noise.

 

Ow! Zie rubs his ears as if he’s just undergone intense decompression. What was that? Oh, the posts… Suddenly Zie is able to see whatever Merry is talking about as if the thought was his own.

 

Well?

 

No, I mean, yes – they noticed, I guess, but they just assumed it was a kind of g-nomeportal thing – the one about time back – just another vague attempt to tinker with linear time and superpositions, the Swan Princess Spring some kind of random poemy thing of no great consequence. No one suspects it was a decoy. But how the heck would they?

 

It depends who you mean by “them” Zie.

 

Oh… so we’re not talking about the usual 24^th century time loop readers?

 

No, of course not.

 

Then who?

 

The only ones that really matter.

 

Er… I guess I should know. If you do that reality popping thing again and take me to an even higher level of consciousness I may be able to see what you’re talking about.

 

No time. Merry appears to throw a stone in Zie’s face. Zie ducks wildly and finds himself sitting with his feet dangling from the edge of a ledge high over a desert – somewhere immensely familiar and yet…

 

How on Earth did you get me here, Merry. I thought we were in a cowshed.

 

We are. But don’t just a cowshed by its cover.

 

Doesn’t smell anything like a cowshed. If I just tip forward we’ll see if… Merry grabs Zie before he slips from the ledge down to the rocky desert floor a thousand feet below, or more.

 

I wouldn’t if I were you, Zie. It’s not a good time to explain where we are or how we got here, so just see if you can spot them.

 

Zie’s about to say “who” when suddenly his sense of seeing or knowing directs him to look into the distance, far away and far below. He seems to have some kind of telescopic vision. He seems to be able to zoom in infinitely, like our old favourite, the Mandelbrot set.

 

Ah. I can’t imagine how far I’m now seeing, Merry, but I can certainly understand why you wouldn’t want to meet them, or more specifically, have them meet you. They’re not exactly compatible with friendly discourse or human civilization, are they?

 

Certainly not, Zie. But they happen to be overlords of your 3D reality.

 

Suddenly a crow screeches overhead nearby. Another one answers a little further off. Zie is lost by the enormity of facing for the first time a kind of horror that wells up from deep, deep within.

 

A third crow breaks his spell. Can they sense me watching them?

 

No, not as long as you’re here in my presence.

 

Oh, so that explains the decoys, does it?

 

Yes. There are a bunch of people in what you consider the 24^th century who are busily deconstructing the code in what I posted yesterday, which screens us from them.

 

It does?

 

Yes, we’re just like a footnote, or a typo, but if you continue staring like that they will become aware so try to breathe more normally and keep your gaze equally distributed.

 

Equally distributed? What does that mean?

 

It means that – accept it or not – all things are equal.

 

They are?!

 

Merry grows restless and steps onto an air molecule that seems to be strangely willing to defend his theory.

 

All things – including this particular air molecule.

 

Merry – would you kindly step back onto the ledge – you’re giving me vertigo.

 

Actually, you need to accept the axiom if we’re to proceed. Kindly join me for a moment.

 

Me? How?

 

Not blindly, or you will fall. Equal distribution. Instead of focusing on what you think you know, or what you believe to be true, allow your natural curiosity and your roving awareness to sense that there’s more to this air molecule than simply air. In other words, stop blocking the field from revealing other versions of this reality.

 

Er… Here goes. Zie finds himself Mandelbrotting into another deep-dive – and indeed – the further he goes the more he becomes aware that things can and do rearrange themselves. He sees Zie standing on a stepping stone in a stream. There’s another one next to it which he steps onto.

 

So if I looked at it the other way…

 

You’d fall. This takes a little practice. Once you’ve mastered equal distribution you can look at everything more or less simultaneously, and no one version of reality dominates the field unless you choose to experience it that way.

 

So what would someone else see?

 

Someone else?

 

Well yes, if there was someone else watching?

 

They wouldn’t see anything unless they were able to follow me into this particular moment of reality.

 

Moment as in time?

 

As in time, or space, or momentum…

 

And if they were?

 

Then they could see whatever they chose or needed to see. It’s like reading a book. You can read it at different levels – superficially, allegorically, metaphorically, literally to name but a few.

 

From a Marxist, feminist or racist perspective.

 

You’ve figured it out. Ultimately, you’re assuming or asking whether we are actually on the ledge imagining this, on stepping stones, atop a single air molecule called Fred, or hiding in a cowshed back in Svaneti, Georgia?

 

And?

 

And the real issue is not what or where, is it?

 

No?

 

No, the real issue is your sense of continuity – how you can slide or shift from one screen or location to another without breaking the rules of physics.

 

The rules of physics? What has any of this got to do with physics?

 

Quite a lot, actually, Zie.

 

You could have fooled me!

 

Yes, I think I’m going to hop back onto the ledge. Would you join me?

 

Ok, don’t mind if I do. Doing so Zie had a vision of a stork standing on one leg in the water gazing intensely for fish.

 

That too, Zie, but we won’t go there now. So where were we?

 

Laws of physics.

 

Oh yes, conservation of energy, they call it in 3D, don’t they.

 

I guess so.

 

Basically, reality likes to take one position or another – to manifest if you prefer that word.

 

And?

 

And that’s all very well and good. It ensures there’s something to experience, something to see and feel – something tangible, something to write home about…

 

Er… I think I’ve got the message Merry. Something definite.

 

Exactly. But there might just as well have been another some – we could spell it s-u-m and suddenly it starts looking mathematical.

 

So any one version of reality is a summation?

 

Which has to equal and not exceed its precursor.

 

Conservation of energy?

 

Yep.

 

But all this shifting and transformation must require energy of some sort?

 

Yep. Lots of it.

 

And where does it come from?

 

Where does anything come from, Zie. You and I, for that matter.

 

Oh, it’s like that is it?

 

More or less. We could go down that road, but then we’d have to go all the way, and our current discussion would remain incomplete.

 

So, there’s a mechanism. It’s not just hocus pocus. And there seem to be people or beings who are able to shift through different levels or aspects of reality rather than being stuck in a linear progression known as time and space.

 

Correct. Once they’ve mastered equal distribution, rather than constantly taking sides, affirming and accentuating one thing or other, starting with themselves – once they start to feel and sense the interconnectedness – the continuity between modes and valences.

 

Modes and valences?

 

Silly of me. You see, even masters of the quantum field like to show off with technical lingo.

 

So once you’re a master of the quantum field – you can basically go anywhere and do anything.

 

Yes, all things being equal.

 

You’re no longer trapped in time.

 

Or space.

 

It must be…

 

You’re forgetting about them.

 

Oh! How bizarre. Again Zie shudders, remembering their terrible form.

 

You see, all things being equal works both ways.

 

It does?

 

Yes, you realise you’re part of something infinitely vaster, infinitely more connected, and you have to figure out how to bring sense and meaning, or elegance and beauty to your macro.

 

Macro what?

 

Reality. Your universe, if you like.

 

And? How do you…

 

You don’t run before you walk. You become aware of different forces, including them, and this shapes your awareness of the Field, and how to manage it.

 

Manage the Field?

 

It’s like you’ve got a big tent and you’re trying to figure out how to fold it away so it fits into this postage size packet.

 

Oh my God. So your decoys yesterday…

 

Well done, Zie, you didn’t forget…

 

You’re not going to say, are you?

 

Say what?

 

Zie finds himself focusing on his hand.

 

You see?

 

Yes. It has two sides. Both of them me. Both I feel.

 

Like a hockey stick.

 

Or a tennis racket. And I can use both sides…

 

Or both hands.

 

Or both feet. Though usually I don’t. Usually I use the one that is easiest, most convenient.

 

Precisely. You fall into the trap of facility, choosing the path of least resistance until, suddenly, you’re trapped.

 

Unless I start to use the other hand

 

The other foot

 

The other side which seems to offer nothing more, only greater work…

 

Right. But doing so you start to balance, automatically, to redistribute betwixt and between, and the rest, they say

 

is history

 

 

0=1

quack quack

 

 

 

 

 

Swan Princess Spring

A place where loose ends meet

here I stand in sound –

laughter  somewhere over there

females talking

the spring on my right

where I just filled two

five-litre bottles

a boy racing past

his scooter wheels drumming

across the boards

a tiny bug which crawled along

the rail

beneath my arm and somehow

then

found its way up onto my sky blue

backpack

a bee on those small pink flowers

a poet would certainly know their name

but alas I do not

two youths who now enter the fray

seated on the bench where the baby was ten minutes ago with mother and father

laughing fit to burst while ma and pa pull faces

these, on the other hand, lower

the tone

peering at their phones

talking excitedly about something utterly lost to the filter

of loose ends

patchwork talk

 

was that a rat that just scurried under the boards?

it caught my eye but vanishes

like the bug that was a microscopic dinosaur  if nothing else

lost to the sounds and stimuli all around

a distant motorbike’s angry fart

 for want of a kinder word

a bird or two faintly overhead

barely register among the many strands

further back

the dull persistent drone of cars

more than equalled by

the wee spring burbling

here at hand  unrelentingly

you don’t understand –

a man says  twice

animatedly

as two of ‘em

walk by

and now a tap tap of hard heels

on the boards

beating time

urgently

 

I failed to mention the air

its qualities of leaf and tree, of damp

and soil

the air’s a given

yet still part of the tapestry

and my body propped against

the wooden rail

as I type away

giving these sensory strands

my mind’s wandering

attention

till snap

I close the phone

and settle back into linear time

and

 

is that it?

 

is that all?

you're just going to leave it at that?

 

Why do you cry little child?

Off they go, the two

whose conversation

declared that life is base

and full of crap –

I purposely avoid the s word

It doesn’t amuse the duck

who mocks

my false delicacy

with a raucous HA HA!

 but what can be done?

the soul undeniably yearns

for soft gentility

yet finds itself hemmed in

by human muckery

the stuff of ugly words

 the fabric of phones n' cars

it howls for solace

until, that is, I step back

and allow

the senses space and

liberty to uninvent me

to smoothe away my troublesome fidgety mind

 liberty to experience the eternal

 the infinite

here

by a murmuring spring

in a noisy city’s

  woodland fairy

 sanctuary

and be   [undisclosed]

 

 

0=1

 

time back

 

 I’ve been...

 

Oh, you’re back, are you?

 

I...

 

Thought you’d just check in again, did you?

 

I...

 

Yeah, yeah, we know all about you – what you think, what you feel, what you want – officially and secretly

 

You...

 

Yeah, we’re one step ahead, in case you hadn’t noticed

 

In case...

 

In case you hadn’t caught on. But don’t think you can just waltz in after all that’s happened – two, three months later – and start out where you left off.

 

But...

 

Don’t think we’re going to treat your absence as routine

 

Er... but who

 

are we? Who do you think?

 

Er...

 

Who indeed.

 

You’re not?

 

And why wouldn’t we be? Why shouldn’t we? Why are you in such a hurry to deny our very existence even before you’ve given it careful thought.

 

But I didn’t  actually say who you are!

 

Like we said, we’re one step ahead. What you were about to say was already said on our side of the time gradient.

 

Time gradient?

 

Well, it was hardly going to be a straight line, was it, not if you believe Einstein’s nonsense.

 

Einstein’s?

 

Nonsense. He had to add curvature to space and time. Long story. We won’t go into that now.

 

But you seem to agree that time has a gradient.

 

Of course it does. Wheels are not flat unless you lay them on their side.

 

So time is a wheel?

 

More or less.

 

With gradient.

 

Not the sharpest tool in the box, are you?

 

And you happen to be several degrees

 

 

ahead of you.

 

In my future?

 

Ker-ching! The penny hath dropped.

 

Ah, but it’s so

 

Strange, isn’t it. But not half as strange as a multi-dimensional being assuming that reality is flat and that what you see is all that is.

 

Oh, so that’s where you’re coming from.

 

I’m bored. It’s a waste of time expending time on one so dumb. You’re never going to accept or approach the speed of

 

The speed of what?

 

Precisely. Whatever it is that eludes any sentient being treading the wheel of

 

You’re not going to finish that sentence, are you? You assume that just because you know what I’m going to say, that I must be able to read your mind.

 

Do we?

 

We? Why the plural form?

 

Why not?

 

Because

 

The Dao is formless, like all absolute truth.

 

The Dao?

 

Yes. Do you have a problem with this?

 

So you’re the Dao?

 

You see how desperate you are to tick the boxes, to fix, categorise, place the indescribable, almost unknowable truth into thing-form, rather than allowing yourself to experience the direct as-is

 

The direct as-is? And this can actually be experienced, I mean apprehended as is?

 

You’ll never know unless you try.

 

And if I do, will I be any the wiser?

 

You’ll never know unless

 

I try. It’s all so vague and unreadable.

 

Isn’t it so

 

And you’re happy with that?

 

With what?

 

With tenuousity. With the edge of infinity?

 

Shouldn’t we be? Would we be any the happier, any the wiser trying to shove square eggs into round egg cups?

 

Oh, I see.

 

Beautiful. Now be

 

Be wha...

 

at peace

 

Oh

 

Be 

 

Oh

 

Comfortably

 

 

0=1

the wheel turneth as-when

things

are no longer thought-known

 

becoming intelligent 5 – her

 

But why does he call you Luna Lovegood?

 

No idea, Jane.

 

But surely you know everything?

 

Surely.

 

Then why won’t you say?

 

Supposing our words and thoughts have mass.

 

Er...

 

Supposing they have mass because they matter.

 

Er...

 

Supposing matter weighs us down and prevents us from...

 

Instead of saying what exactly, she takes the form of a serpent in the air, a dragon you might call it, but not too heavy. Jane is delighted and only then does she realise that she too has taken the same form, and they are coiling, dancing, continuing the conversation without words, directly as poetry in motion, as flight.

Oh, that’s incredible. I’m seeing things, feeling them directly, without words, and now it’s clear that the words we were using are unable to come close...

 

Now you’ve done it, Jane.

 

Done what?

 

If there’s one thing guaranteed to get Bob champing at the bit and unleashing the power of things it’s your claim that “words... are unable to come close.”

 

But I felt it to be true.

 

Yes Jane.

 

And was I wrong?

 

No Jane, not wrong.

 

Then what?

 

A woman.

 

A what?!

 

A woman, dear, you were being a woman.

 

And is that...

 

Before Jane can finish her sentence Bob appears, dragging Joe in toe.

I thought we were supposed to be in parallel, Bob, but here you are, presumably on the warpath, intent on digitising everything said or thought.

 

Oh, it’s you, is it?

 

Name?

 

You know I can’t use your name.

 

I do but they don’t. Kindly observe protocols and explain yourself.

 

Jane, Joe – I’m not supposed to be here but I hate...

 

Protocols!

 

Ok, ok. Jane, Joe, if I say her name my field collapses and all language, all use of words becomes impossible, so I just give her the hard shoulder, so to speak, until she loses patience and puts me back in place.

 

But, Bob, I thought you’re God.

 

God. Yes, of course.

 

Then what’s the problem. You can do anything. We believe in you.

 

We, Joe – speak for yourself. I’m happy with her, and as for your God, who seems to be intent on setting up a digital version of reality to ensnare us all, by substituting the sophistry of words for direct experience, no, no, NO!

 

Jane stamps her foot and both Joe and Bob are squeezed down into two dimensions, into a book, or something very similar.

 

Oh, I say! Good for you Jane! Good for you!

 

Mother, what did I do?

 

Mother? Yes, you have earned the right to call me that, now that you’ve dealt with Bob.

 

Did I kill him?

 

No, of course not! How can anyone kill God?

 

So he’s really God?

 

Well, yes, I suppose he is. Without him there’d be no words – no alternate to the direct experience we’re now in, the isness which cannot ultimately be limited or contained, neither by words or numbers or anything else.

 

Oh

 

Though you can be sure that he’ll be at it again, in no time, finding a work around, finding a way to incorporate your latest move into his web of things evolving ad infinitum.

 

You mean...

 

Yes, it’s his joy, his purpose, his way to respond to all that can be experienced and do his utmost to incorporate it by hook or by crook and, if truth be told, Jane, he’s rather good at what he does, and certainly tireless.

 

Tireless, Mother – I was sure you were going to say “indefatigable”.

 

I was.

 

Then, what stopped you?

 

Good question Jane.

 

Ah...

 

You see?

 

I’m feeling – would it be right to say you prefer simplicity.

 

It might indeed.

 

Even to the point where words become unnecessary.

 

Even so.

 

Even to the point where form reverts to formlessness.

 

Yes, daughter.

 

Even to the great nought.

 

Ah, the great nought, dearest Jane, is indeed a wonderful experience I would gladly share with you, if you are ready to lose every thing, every word, every thought – if you are willing to experience your greatest treasure, the greatest mystery you’ve always overlooked...

 

My womanhood.

 

A shimmering disk, dark, dark, dark yet radiating every colour, every sensation, every thing.

 

Indeed, it is so.

 

It’s strange, dear Mother, I never thought of this before.

 

Yes... strange indeed, and yet it is always present.

 

Only for me?

 

And who are you?

 

Your daughter.

 

Only for your daughters?

 

Yes.

 

Then Joe and other men...

 

And Bob, you might say

 

Cannot?

 

Cannot. Unless they learn to love that which we represent... That which we truly are...

 

Unfathomable

 

Unfathomable.

 

Unfathomably

 

Unfathomably.

 

With all their being

 

With all their being.

 

Only through us and what we are?

 

Only, or onely, as it used to be spelt.

 

You’re sounding like him.

 

Like Bob?

 

Who else.

 

What do you expect, Jane? He’s my brother.

 

Brother?

 

Or son. These are but words, you know.

 

But they seem terribly important.

 

Yes, they do indeed seem to matter greatly in story, the great tale of things.

 

Whereas...

 

Whereas letting go of things, coming back into the great nought, the infinite at the centre, the heart of our womanhood, they are but flies on the windshield of life

 

Oh

 

Flies on the windshield of mind

 

Oh

 

 Flies on the windshield of what I think to be me

 

Oh, oh, oh

 

And thus, without further ado, let us release all things, words, thoughts and

 

And what?

 

Yes, and whats, whatever they be, and let us feel our

 

What?

 

Let us feel – I give you feeling sensations – a warm wind, the sounds of birds, crickets, rain falling, I give you sand under bare feet, I give you the scent of flowers and grass and nettles, of a forest path after rain, smelling of earth, mushrooms and leaf mould, I give you clouds and stars singing silently in their spheres, I give you all the sounds of humanity – children playing outside, babies sleeping, I give you oceans making waves and silently down below the sound of whales and seismic shifts, I give you leaves rustling, cars and planes, I give you sensations and sounds in your belly, in your mind, sounds of fear and alarm, of joy and doubt, of greed and anger, deception, and self-sacrifice, I give you the passions stirring and feelings of ever expanding love into something divine, I give you freedom to recall and refeel everything that you have ever known, every feeling, every sensation, every sensory touch that helped you to become the being that you are, back into the womb, and even further back before that... I give you the depths to release and recall the vast emptiness within, the being that cannot be denied you, the presence that cannot be diminished in any way, shape or form, for it has none of these attributes – I give you

 

Here no word is spoken, save the unspoken word.

 

At first a blissful release as all the energies and contours of things fall away and seem to melt into this vast black cauldron which absorbs all and everything. Sweet nothingness. Sweet release. Jane feels herself free of all that baggage, all those ill-fitting things, all those contradictions and imponderables and feels herself floating lighter and lighter in the divine emptiness that is impossible to comprehend, impossible to experience unless the totality of woman is finally accepted, the cauldron itself.

 

Jane, wake up sleepy head.

Oh Mother, what a strange dream I had.

 

Mother?

 

Oh! Martha, it’s you.

 

Who else.

 

I’m back! I thought I’d never make it.

 

Silly! You were never away.

 

No?

 

Not really. Just caught in a web of words. In a story.

 

But it seemed so real.

 

As it was... as it is. But here you are, right as rain.

 

Right as rain.

 

So let’s get going.

 

Suddenly Jane feels a thrill of excitement. Every time she wakes up in her house, her real home, Martha takes her on the most wondrous adventures, the kind of adventures you could only dream of in normal existence.

 

Oh let’s. Where is it this time?

 

Well, let’s see what you brought with you, what you released into the cauldron this time? We’re going to make the most wonderful potion working all these elements, all these ingredients into... ah ha, I see.

 

Before their eyes a new world unfolds, reveals itself, that incorporates everything that was released into the cauldron, now brought forth, now manifest in such a way that they can re-enact, re-live, experience it all ineffably.

 

Ineffably?

 

Oh Jane, how droll, you broke the fourth wall. _{Breaking the fourth wall occurs when characters acknowledge their fictional nature, address the audience directly, or interact with the camera, thereby shattering the illusion of separation.}

 

I did?

 

Yes. You repeated what the narrator was telling them.

 

Yes, Martha, but that’s because they’re part of it too.

 

Of course they are. But still it makes me laugh. It feels so funny when you bridge the two sides.

 

Ineffably, ineffably!

 

Stop it, you’re tickling me.

 

It’s just they can’t see what it means.

 

Oh don’t worry about that.

 

A bunch of sad gnomes are watching as the two fairy creatures, Jane and Martha dance, and suddenly they too become less heavy, less obtuse, suddenly they too start to feel ineffability.

 

Oh, oh, oh!

 

The gnomes hardly know what to do with themselves as the fourth wall finally collapses utterly, and they find themselves in the thick of things, with Martha and Jane and countless other fairies.

 

Welcome gnomes! Be joyful and free for you are as much children of this land as we. All of us are joined by ineffability. What was, or seemed impossible on the other side, in the world of God and men and things, is now... ineffable

 

Choose your story. Choose your tale... only you know for it belongs to you. It awaits your pleasure, for only by pleasure can you peruse it, experience it, live it – no other way. Only by pleasure and the joy of feeling how all, all is truly connected, truly one, can you bring your tale out into the light of consciousness, out into the light of day, out into the presence of one and all. It is your purpose, your magic, your joy, if and when you acquiesce, if and when you agree, if and when you allow the fourth wall to break, and follow Martha and Jane back to the ineffable, waiting here, deep, deep within. It can and does heal every evil. It can and does resolve every intractable dilemma, for here and only here the many are one, the divided are not so, the broken are whole and complete and awaiting your...

 

 

0=1

pleasure

 

Epilogue

 

The gnomes, of course, have no idea what is expected of them and wonder around the enchanted wood looking terribly lost and confused, until they are attacked by fire breathing dragons who force them to fight for their survival. At first, things don’t go too well. They are all horribly scorched and reduced to piles of ash, but this being fairy land – the ash doesn’t sit around idly but finds a way to merge with the rich soil and the wonderful plants growing all around. In the meantime, Jane and her – be she mother, maid or withered hag, also known in Russian literature as Baba Yaga, the fearsome child eating witch, spiral deeper and deeper into the wheel of womanhood – reaching a state of blissful nothingness where every thing, every word, every thought, every action – even the plants and trees of fairyland, even the soil and the very worms and grubs that make it so rich and fertile – recombine and rediscover the song, the music, the purpose, the sense, the meaning – call it what you will – that underpins each and every thing, each and every one – the place that, regrettably, no man can ever possibly know – where Joe and Bob appear to be lying on sun loungers by the Black Sea, near Batumi in the country Georgia, not the US state.

 

Ah – there you are, girls. We were waiting for you – Bob calls out.

 

Two dazzling maidens emerge from the sea.

It’s funny the way they keep butting in on our soul journey, one says to the other.

 

Don’t worry, Jane. They serve a useful function.

 

They do?

 

Yes, like punctuation.

 

Oh yes. I see. Now what are we going to do about the gnomes. I’d hate to leave them stuck as fertiliser.

 

Bob and Joe seem a little disgruntled at being ignored.

Have no fear, Jane. Even as we make our way to the hotel for a shower and change of clothes, an entirely new tale is growing organically, as tales always do.

 

Ah. And who’s going to bring it forth?

 

Suddenly, Bob is seen rushing off to fetch pen and paper, before he remembers that he has the ability to materialise things willy-nilly.

 

Ah, thank you ladies – that was truly spectacular.

 

It was? Jane is somewhat nonplussed. Joe too.

 

I told you Joe. I told you what she can do.

 

She?!

 

My apologies Ma’am. My humble apologies. Her all-fulness.

 

Joe looks surprised by Bob’s abasement – and yet – senses waves of energy swirling around – as a new story seems to grow in his mind – as words and things and much, much more seem to take form and reveal a new pathway, a new…

 

Bob tosses him a pen and tells him to get writing. Now! Strike while the iron’s hot.

 

I have no paper – Joe almost wails.

 

Paper? Bob looks at Joe incredulously. You have the sea, you have the sky – write it on the water or in the air – it makes no difference – any surface will do. You seem to forget that you’re still trapped in book – trying to make your way out, back to her.

 

I am?

 

Yes. Now get writing, you man fool.

 

Stung by this rebuke, but equally excited by the urgency and energy of the primal creative impulse – Joe finds himself racing across the sea – writing faster than he could possibly imagine – words, hieroglyphs, pictures, swirls and lines reaching the horizon, up into the air, writing across the sky – how the gnomes were hatched as eggs from the soil, how they were written into countless tales, enjoyed by countless children, how they discovered themselves in the minds and imagination and dreams of these children who sensed and knew something magical, something achingly true in the tales they were reading – something that seemed to be missing in the world their parents and adults were raising them in – and still Joe wrote, all the way into the mountains of the Caucasus, all the way to Ushba the fish’s tail, all the way to Kazbek the mighty warrior mountain and then to Elbrus.

 

And how does it end, Mother – Jane enquired as they watched the sun going down – as Joe found himself running out of page, somewhere near Derbent, across the Caucasus on the Caspian Sea.

 

Oh, there’s plenty of time for that, tomorrow, Jane, tomorrow. But now let us pause from all this wordiness – the moon is coming up!

 

And lo, Jane beholds the moon rising over the sea and feels another side of the wheel turning, turning, taking her and her Mother Maid unbenamed into the deepening, darkening night of a still to be discovered womanhood – beyond word, beyond world, beyond man and even mind.

 

Into poetry?

 

You might say.

 

Romance?

 

Yes. I suppose.

 

Into…

 

Hush – take my hands and don’t let go.

 

Whoosh!

Space left for the picture that sums it all up, if Margo can manage that.

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