Posts Tagged ‘island’

This, then, is our ordeal.

The wildness here is like no other. Even in the wildest range of mountains, there is solid ground for us to put our feet on. Here, there is nothing solid.

No safety.

Only our boat.

Only our small cramped boat that is being tossed about in the wildness of solitude. Even in the sudden calm and doldrums of the sea, there is a wildness, a language that we know but can not speak. In this stillness, we languish, hoping for a wind to take us west, north, south, east. Somewhere. The horizon is everywhere. Distant; smudged and misty. No island. Nothing solid. Only the wild stillness and silence.

When the island appears, it seems as if it does so from nowhere. Perhaps it rose up from the bottom of the sea. Perhaps in our stillness we have moved more than we perceived. The island that called to us long ago, the island that has always called to us, has been reached.

We put ashore on the misty and mystical shore.

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I hadn’t expected it and maybe it was the change from the slate blue lake to the closeness of the green of the island, but once I set foot upon Innisfallen, I knew it was a special place. I wonder if, as I suspect,  it is inherently spiritual or if the centuries of learning, contemplative practice and service make it a place more spiritual than most.

I wonder if that is possible, that any one place can be more alive than others. I doubt it.

I suspect very strongly that Innisfallen is inherently spiritual, but I also suspect very strongly that the years of work that happened there make that spirituality more available to the dull senses of the all-too-common and limited human.

At any rate, as soon as I set foot upon the island, I knew. It was like seeing a lovers face after a long absence, but it was also the thrill of new love; the excitement of seeing new life and knowing that that life is surfacing from somewhere deep within the cosmos, emerging here for whatever reason. I knew it, and I was thankful for knowing it.

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Imagine the Dagda and Lugh and Ogma journeying across Ireland to find the oak of two blossoms. To regain their sovereignty. The harp. The music of the land.

They had no insurance. There was no store. They could not just make a new one. They had to regain their sovereignty. The music of the land.

High stakes. Life or death.

We  are on that same journey.

Journeying through time. Through our souls, we are journeying to recapture the harp, the music of the land from the Fomorians. We are journeying to recapture our sovereignty from ourselves.

High stakes.
Life or death.
Up to you.

Sometimes, in my mind, the gift of voice and word of Ogma are still powerful. Sometimes, he tells me the story:

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There is an island where there is a spear-burning river that keeps us away from the calves. Such a river need not be deep to protect the calves. Go, dip your spear in that shallow river and watch. Even small things can weigh heavy here. The calves of this island are calves, but appear to our young eyes to be great and magnificent oxen. Yet they are calves. The river is shallow. The herdsman on this island is huge.

Pay heed to the herdsman.

Don’t cross the burning river.

Even small meals must prepared. The branch must be given time to blossom the nourishing apples. The calf cannot will itself to grow. The mothers of the calves, we learn, are on the other side of this island. We must travel to the other side of the island. We must leave the calves and travel to the mothers on the other side of the island.

Pay heed to the herdsman.

Don’t cross the burning river.
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But so that I may reveal
The secret of this island
to you
inquire of me.

-The Woman of the Fortress

Do not be alarmed.

Most of us in the western world today are in trouble even before we are in trouble. We are in trouble because of the greatest secret in our society. The greatest secret for most of us in the western world is simply “who am I?” This secret causes most of the problems we have in our world.

When we are raided, this trouble is in trouble. And that is the trouble.

Put away blissful ignorance.

Put away the safety of religion. Put away petty obsessions and reckless addictions. Forget the hiding places you have sought out and furnished comfortably over the years.

It is time to put away blissful ignorance and come out of hiding.

With no more blissful ignorance, we can no longer act as if we are not in trouble. We can no longer hide. We know we are in trouble.

This, then, is our ordeal.

The beast on this island is turning, revolving. Its skin rotates around its bones. Its bones churn around within its skin.

Do not be alarmed.
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To find the beginning of the birthing, we must be willing to continue, we must be willing to sail on to the next island. It is there that we find a door with a valve.

The valve turned by willingness.

The valve opened by willingness will allow the nourishing salmon from the sea into the house.

Consider the wisdom of the salmon. Consider our wisdom that blinded us and deafened us to the riders and their races. Consider our wisdom that created giant red ants and hound footed horses to devour us.

Consider the wisdom of the salmon.

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