Li's Journals
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Oriental Proverbs
General
| A rumor goes in one ear and out many mouths.
Chinese proverb... |
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written by "Li Ming" copyright 2006
(used with written pernmission of the artist Amy Galloway)
For six years shy of a century the gods that rule the
slumbering moon have visited my nights with abandon. Dreams of cloudy
afternoons, speckled sunlight warming the cherry orchards, and fields of
swaying calla have been their gifts. Memories of moonlight dancing on the
boiling sea have dazzled my memory as I awoke.
The length of time is
ending for me, daughter of the son of my youth. It is time to tell you my
secret dreams. Come, sit close and I will spend for you my last breaths as the
gods command me.
In the thirteenth year of my days in the house of my
father the miracle visited me. The moonlight cast a sparkle upon the crusted
snow beyond my chamber. As I lost my battle with wakefulness at the cusp of
the bridge to sleep, a shadow passed through my room. Strangely I was
unafraid. My spirit self arose from my sleeping body following the shadow into
a dazzeling meadow.
Around my spirit as I rose, appeared an elaborate
cloak of silk and ermine. I knew the winter but felt not the chill. Before me
stood a powerfully built lion. A white lion with a royal mane and ice blue
eyes inclined his head slightly to me. His movement was nearly imperceptable
and his liquid grace as he turned made my heart leap. I followed his silent
footfalls. He lead me around the perimeter of a hedged meadow. Beyond the
boundary were other seasons....summer birds and blossoms to my left, the bare
trees of autumn and dead calla beyond. Then the spring emblazoned with the new
lilies, buzzing bees and animals.
'Guide I will be to you, daughter.
Fear not this apparition.'
His eyes were again turned to mine, but his
words came like a thought wrapped in velvet. I was unable to grasp it all at
first.
'Daughter it is given that you are to be made woman in this
manner. I am protector, guide, sage and councelor. We will spend your life
together.'
I then saw in the mirror of the ice beneath my feet that I
was no longer the girl I had been. I saw a beautiful, refined lady looking
back at me.
'Be not afraid, My Lady. Here in the meadow you are queen
and mistress. This you see is the beauty of your inner self. I am your
companion until this visage denies you.'
Throughout my days I have
walked as the beautiful lady with the great snow lion. He sang comfort and
wisdom both to me as I grew. He taught me through laughter, the lessons of the
world's creatures and by his gentleness. The meadows turned to the palaces of
the world, and we explored them unseen. The Great Wall we traveled unmolested
by guards, and holy men of the temples ministered to us. No gate was locked,
no garden barred, we roamed the world as the moon passed its courses, and I
came to love the lion and the night.
When I was promised to wed the
General who was an old man, my lion comforted my tears and gave me
instruction.
'Child. You are to be wife to an old but distinguished
man. Tears are unnecessary. Live on the outside the good child bride. Deny
your husband and his high position nothing, for that would be unseemly.'
He then came to sit beside me and he curled his warm body 'round me
saying:
'Inside your mind and spirit, hidden from all view live the
life you choose. Such is often the way of the female.' His comfort and wisdom
made me a successful wife, and a happier woman at least for a time.
The birth of my son, your father, was difficult. The snow lion came to
me and gave me his strength at the child bed. When your father nearly lost his
struggle to survive, the snowlion blew a great wind into the child's lungs and
his first cry was a roar.
Every new crisis and joy I shared with my
mentor and gave little in return to him. His constancy in my life gave me
strength and I never knew lonliness.
Dancing into the meadow one
evening as the husband I despised lay dying on his sick bed, my lion did not
greet me. He was motionless and bleeding from deep wounds in a distant corner
of the great meadow.
'Lion! My beautiful snow lion! What has happened?
You bleed and I cannot make it stop!' I crouched near him and cradled his
head.
'Your heart is cold, Lady. 'Tis your cold and compassionless
spirit that has cut me as I awaited you in the meadow. Go from me.'
Startled I fled back to the sleeping body, and awoke with an emptiness
that ached. Then I knew why he bled.
'This is the love I never let
myself feel for the General, my husband and the pain it caused him."
I
had resisted my husband's kindness. Bitterly resenting my father's arrangement
with him I had hardened my heart. Purposly I misused the advice my lion had
graciously given and now he bled.
I rushed to my husband's sickbed to
repent, but it was too late.
With a penitent heart I later returned to
my meadow and lion. He no longer bled, but his blue eyes spilled tears.
'Forgive me lion. I have learned not to despise the opportunity to
love and forgive. Are you well?'
'Walk the meadow with me.'
He
taught me much: how to live burdened without crumbling beneath the weight of
care, the reasons love is more needful to the self than even food, the manner
of the passing day's work on the body, the care of one's soul, and so much
more.
Last night as we strolled, he taught me how to die.
'Lady the time is now come to leave the meadow. The light that has
illumined you is nealy faded. You have one task left to perform. Life's circle
remains unfinished. She who is the daughter of the son I saved is our next
companion. You beauty will melt into me, as your ancestoral women have always
done, and she will join us in our lineage. Her beauty will grace the meadow as
yours has.'
'My lion, I leave you with sorrow.'
'No, Lady, me
you will not leave. You are my essence.' He bowed and his eyed closed.
The meadow dissolved around me and I slept till you arrived. Daughter,
go now to your chamber and await your visitor. I have need to rest.
The lion's shadow summoned the child's spirit and into the meadow
she followed. Her grandmother's spirit also joined the lion's essence and the
circle closed.
Upon her pallet they found the old woman's spiritless
body. Only the child noticed the lion's form in the funeral fire as the callas
and the lady succumbed to the flames.
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