Dream:
I'm among a group of American tourists in some exotic, mountainous country. We're observing some local people who have prostatrated themselves in front of an ancient shrine, where a headless statue of Buddha sits among the ruins. Common legend holds that for some especially devoted followers, Buddha restores the head to the statue by inhabiting it. The tourists are moving on, but I can't go with them. In a gesture completely out of character, I throw myself to the ground and stretch out my arms before me, my palms together in namaste. A girlfriend tries to draw me back to the tour, but I refuse to move, to speak, to acknowledge her at all. I am intently praying, somewhat surprised to find myself doing so, but passionately given over to it. My friend whispers--you must have loved him in a past life, and disappears.
There are some ugly American tourists in a bath behind me, hoping sheepishly for the Buddha to come to life. He will not come for them. An indian man, about 15, steps in front of me. We are standing in front of the pool where the Americans squat. We are not in the water. We are divided from the others. I step to the side. A wall moves back and squeezes the pool into a rectangle, then a box, then into nothingness at all.
The scene changes. Local women with long dark hair and brightly colored saris join me on the ground, our hands outstretched in supplication. We are like flowers scattered across the hillside.
The Buddha comes to life. Among all the women, it is me he looks at, me for whom he has awakened. He reaches out his arms to me, and I rise and go to his side. We have found one another again. I am my beloveds and my beloved is mine; he feedeth among the lilies. We are together briefly, and then he must turn to the daily business of caring for his people. There are lines of supplicants, and dignitaries, and diplomats. Among them the representatives of Abraham Lincoln have come. It seems the Americans are planning some kind of invasion, or colonizing movement. Between them and the Buddha, who retreats sometimes to the tallest and loneliest plateau in the mountain range, where he reads a few carefully chosen books of philosophy, shuffle the women with the long dark hair. Each of these bureaucrats would give her life for the Buddha, each of them has a personal relationship with him. He loves them, but is not intimate with any of them. He tells me that I am the one he has been waiting for. I am his beloved and my beloved is mine. But the women who minister to him and for him do not believe that this is true. They interfere between us, they refuse to let me advance up the mountain, through the many different plateaus of increasing importance and intimacy. The ministers have turned Buddha's open lap into an elaborate court. They want to protect him.
A toy plane, with Buddha's household on it, zooms by, catching me up. Or I catch hold of it and go careening above the heads of the guests at the party, who are holding their breaths in fear. I am not afraid. Carried impossibly by the tiny plane, I tear around under the enormous, red, ceiling of the tent, or giant hanger, that houses all of us. Elated--my childhood fantasy of flying has finally come to life--I laugh uproariously. Not hysterically, but happily, full-belliedly, mirthfully. I see the humor in every situation, in all the petty worries of human life, the immense joyfullness that defeats despair. The central truth of existence is mirthfulness, joy, laughter.
I return to the Buddha's court, and throw myself beneath the Banyan tree where he usually manifests himself. "He is not here," one of his ministers tells me. She is irritated, clearing up the mess from a recent appearance. There is debris on the ground, ribbons and long swaths of colorful cloth sweeping among the branches of the tree. He has just departed. "But I must see him. It is urgent. There is danger!" I have news of an encroaching enemy, which share with the minister in the hope that she'll let me past the gate. But she rudely pushes me away, "Now I will be the bearer of this news. The Buddha will reward me and never know that you were here at all." I am desperate, I plead. The ministers herd me away from the tree, away from my beloved, towards the edge of the plateau, a cliff that falls miles down to the ocean. I know that I can fly, and leap out...plummet, and then, miraculously, level out and lift. My body arcs through the air, finding the current, pulling up and up, nosing into the wind, rising. I head up the mountain, above the amazed and angry ministers, and find my way to the eagle's nest that the Buddha can reach, his most private refuge where he reads and mediates. I have proven that I am his coequal, his beloved, as he is mine. He manifests and embraces me, and I know perfect bliss.
We move down to the level where he communicates with his ministers, and tells them that I am his partner, and that they must accept me. They complain, and then adjust. Time passes.
He disappears. Suddenly, without a word. He is simply gone. Is this a test? Terrible things begin to happen--tornadoes of bolders begin to whirl up the mountain, and the ground erupts, spitting rocks. All the angry forces that the Buddha has kept in check unleash. The people are frightened. Where has he gone? What will we do? I must act. I must believe in my own power. I must try. I hold out my hand against the tornado, willing it to settle, and, amazingly, it does! I halt the rocks sputtering out of the earth. When the winds rise up again, I calm them. I quiet the waves. I have always had this power within me, but have never believed in myself enough to feel it.
Yet my faith falters. I doubt myself, I pity myself. My ability to fly comes and goes. Sometimes I can lift only a few inches off the ground, and then can move only slowly. I can't seem to steer. Other times I careen straight up above the skyscrapers, and flit about like a swallow, or a bat.
A toy plane, with Buddha's household on it, zooms by, catching me up. Or I catch hold of it and go careening above the heads of the guests at the party, who are holding their breaths in fear. I am not afraid. Carried impossibly by the tiny plane, I tear around under the enormous, red, ceiling of the tent, or giant hanger, that houses all of us. Elated--my childhood fantasy of flying has finally come to life--I laugh uproariously. Not hysterically, but happily, full-belliedly, mirthfully. I see the humor in every situation, in all the petty worries of human life, the immense joyfullness that defeats despair. The central truth of existence is mirthfulness, joy, laughter.
I return to the Buddha's court, and throw myself beneath the Banyan tree where he usually manifests himself. "He is not here," one of his ministers tells me. She is irritated, clearing up the mess from a recent appearance. There is debris on the ground, ribbons and long swaths of colorful cloth sweeping among the branches of the tree. He has just departed. "But I must see him. It is urgent. There is danger!" I have news of an encroaching enemy, which share with the minister in the hope that she'll let me past the gate. But she rudely pushes me away, "Now I will be the bearer of this news. The Buddha will reward me and never know that you were here at all." I am desperate, I plead. The ministers herd me away from the tree, away from my beloved, towards the edge of the plateau, a cliff that falls miles down to the ocean. I know that I can fly, and leap out...plummet, and then, miraculously, level out and lift. My body arcs through the air, finding the current, pulling up and up, nosing into the wind, rising. I head up the mountain, above the amazed and angry ministers, and find my way to the eagle's nest that the Buddha can reach, his most private refuge where he reads and mediates. I have proven that I am his coequal, his beloved, as he is mine. He manifests and embraces me, and I know perfect bliss.
We move down to the level where he communicates with his ministers, and tells them that I am his partner, and that they must accept me. They complain, and then adjust. Time passes.
He disappears. Suddenly, without a word. He is simply gone. Is this a test? Terrible things begin to happen--tornadoes of bolders begin to whirl up the mountain, and the ground erupts, spitting rocks. All the angry forces that the Buddha has kept in check unleash. The people are frightened. Where has he gone? What will we do? I must act. I must believe in my own power. I must try. I hold out my hand against the tornado, willing it to settle, and, amazingly, it does! I halt the rocks sputtering out of the earth. When the winds rise up again, I calm them. I quiet the waves. I have always had this power within me, but have never believed in myself enough to feel it.
Yet my faith falters. I doubt myself, I pity myself. My ability to fly comes and goes. Sometimes I can lift only a few inches off the ground, and then can move only slowly. I can't seem to steer. Other times I careen straight up above the skyscrapers, and flit about like a swallow, or a bat.
