by Jann Burner
By the time Harry reached the bank of the Elin river, the sun had set over the water. He ate half of his sandwich, drank one can of beer, and fell asleep in the sand. As his eyelids closed, he sensed a dim light on the far horizon, followed by a series of high-pitched squeals. As if battling a physical pain, he tightened the muscles in his stomach and tried to push up through the beaded web-like unreality of dream sleep. But it was no use. Soon, as the light grew brighter, he began to feel the dizzy rumble of deep sleep approaching like a fast freight train....
He stood naked in a clearing surrounded by gigantic stones. By his side were the pale steel rails, gleaming in the moonlight. There were many people standing about, wearing strange costumes. He couldn't recognize specific individuals because their faces were obscured. Perched directly in front of him on top of the largest stone, sat a dignified gentleman in long purple robes. To his left, the large group slowly arranged themselves in rows, as if in chorus, or jury. To his right, stood a grey-robed man whose facial expression had become permanently bent, creased into a dazzling display of frustrated rage.
The grey man dramatically withdrew a sheaf of documents from the folds of his robe and began to read.
"I am speaking to you, love, from the essence of what's true, love. Infinity was yours, laid before you. You had feet as a base from which to view the infinite, as it spread before you in all directions with you as the center. It was made meaningful by desire, and relevant through the freedom of choice. You had eyes from which to reflect love to all things. You had imagination as your crystal and you had an ego in which to hold it. You had, only by trusting, eternal realization, but chose instead limited recognition and labeled it time, mine, and knowledge! The graceful freedom to select and derive pleasure from the realization of selection has become a curse. You have all become fragmenters of The Dream!"
He looked up and glared directly at Harry, "Is it true that these words were spoken by you in the land of was, during the days of future past, before the flood that is yet to be?"
Harry looked around at all the strange people so intent upon accusing him of these words. It seemed that he was the defendant in some sort of trial.
"But, I'm not sure," he replied. "I mean anything is possible; but you see, I have never been to the Land of Was, during the Days of Future Past."
"Oh sure, we've all heard that before. But the fact that remains is the injunction against mankind that I have just read. Is this a probable utterance that you might have made, had you found yourself in such a place and of such a mind?"
Harry had to laugh, "This time is a tea-room, my friends, that I have quite consciously chosen to enter. You see, I am a vagabond, a gypsy, of sorts, and this time, my leaves spread before me...my fortune to tell."
"Oh, sure. Enough, jackass! Enough, and too much, I fear," said the grey-flanneled man. "Extend your right one to The Book and swear publicly!"
The angry prosecutor suddenly withdrew a heavy, black volume from beneath his long, grey robes and placed it in front of Harry.
"Swear by it!"
"Certainly", Harry replied.
As he touched the dry, dusty leather cover, everyone present immediately became as transparent as glass. Everyone, that is, but Harry and a tall slender stranger he felt standing in the distance directly behind him.
In the distance, he could hear the muffled sounds of war and though he suspected it was all merely a dream within a dream of little consequence, he could not ignore the manic actions of the prosecutor, nor the frantic posturing of the judge and jury suddenly struck dumb, but continuing to mouth their lines like transparent glass dolls on a small holiday stage. He felt like a man caught in a stream of anxiety swimming against the current, being swept along by the tide. Somehow there had been a misunderstanding. The stranger knew. It was all just a misunderstanding betwixt a group of misunderstoodlings caught at an intersection of easily misunderstandable assumptions. The stranger would know...
As the stranger touched Harry's shoulder he turned a corner in sleep and stumbled into waking consciousness. "I'm just a misunderstoodling!" He said, opening his eyes and looking wildly about. "You know, you were there!"
The stranger leaned closer and wiped the sweat from his brow
"Where is there?" he said with calm, theatrical precision.
Harry sat up and looked around.
"I'm glad to see that you are well," the stranger continued, "I thought perhaps you might be very ill or wounded. You've been asleep for three days."
Harry looked around at the strange landscape, sandy and barren, except for isolated outcroppings of rock, a few stands of scrub trees, and, in the distance, the river. His face was sore and his body was covered with wind-blown sand. By his side was a can of hot beer and the rancid remains of a sandwich.
"For three days?" he asked.
"Yes," nodded the stranger. "For three days I have kept watch over you."
Harry lay back in the sand and moaned, "I'll just go back to sleep, if it's alright with you. I should be home in bed, you see. I really don't belong here."
The tall stranger laughed happily and clapped his hands together as if in appreciation of a great joke. It was then that Harry noticed that they were both approximately the same age. When the young man finished his melodic laugh, he leaned over and inquired gently. "Where is home, my friend?"
Harry started to answer and then discovered that his mind was blank. "Home...home..." he repeated the word as if searching for hidden meaning. It had a strange foreign and exotic flavor to it.
"Well then," the stranger continued, "do you know where you are now?"
"Well," Harry replied rather hesitantly, "within limits."
The stranger laughed again in his graceful way and clasped his hands together. "But of course you know where you are...going," he said.
"Oh yes!" Harry replied directly. "I am going over...there." And he pointed across the river.
The stranger smiled a rather enigmatic smile. "Me, too," he said after a moments hesitation. "Perhaps we can travel together?"
Harry nodded, "Yes. That would be fine."
The stranger smiled again and extended his hand. Harry grasped it and rose to his feet.
"Good. Then it is settled. My name is Random Cause."
Harry stood rather shakily after his three day sleep, grasping Random's hand. "My name is Harry, glad to meet you."
Random smiled and motioned towards the nametag still pinned to Harry's chest. "Yes, I know. But come, you must be hungry. Let us ask the river for a fish."
As Harry stood and watched, Random waded into the river and began to purr like a summer wind passing through a grove of willows. Suddenly his arms leapt out of the water and in each hand he held a fish--brightly colored and flashing like drops of liquid sun.
He fried them on sticks over a small fire. Harry marveled at his new friend's skill and grace. Random wore nothing but a pair of white shorts spun from the fiber of the hemp plant, and yet, from his pockets he pulled an unending variety of useful items: flint for fire, salt for seasoning, a knife for cutting and trimming. Harry so admired his companion's skills that when he was finally offered a stick of chewing gum, he was not astonished.
For the next few days they played at being young. The sun was warm and the water was clear. Harry learned a lot from his friend, Random Cause. Harry learned how to fish and how to tell which green growing things were good to eat and which were poisonous. He learned how to find crayfish in the shallows and turtle eggs in the sand.
Each night they would sleep huddled around a small campfire at the water's edge and each day they would journey along the gently sloping shore at a leisurely pace, trying to determine a way across the river Elin. As the days passed one into the other, Harry continued to learn; one of the things he learned was that Random was very secretive about his past. Finally one day, Harry asked him where he lived.
"I live where I am, as I was trained," he replied simpl
y enough. "And here I am, so here I live..." he motioned with his hand toward his head and smiled, "in this little ship that houses my mind, which is the source from which all things come, take shape, and give off funny smells." They both laughed.
Later, in the night, seated around a small fire at the water's edge, Harry stared at the phosphorescent waves breaking gently upon the shore and indirectly asked the same question again.
"Where do you sleep, Random?"
Without a moment's hesitation, Random replied, "I sleep on the tideline with my head pointed towards my direction of travel. I sleep with the glow-in-the-dark waves on my left, the burned-off battle field of reality on my right and the stars straight ahead, above me, held in place by The Dreamer of All That Is."
In the morning, when Harry awoke, Random Cause was gone. Harry followed a trail of footprints that bordered the river for about five miles until they veered sharply to the left, through blackberry bushes and over a small grassy hill. The trail continued through the sand, between two steep dunes and eventually led directly to the door of a substantial-looking stone house almost totally buried by the blowing sand.
Harry tried the door; it was open. He entered cautiously and slowly looked around. The house was relatively small. It consisted of one twenty-by-twenty foot room, crammed to the rafters with furniture and strange objects of obvious symbolic significance. The room was quite dark after the brightness of the morning sun. There were no windows; the only illumination came from the open door and the two small oil lamps held by two larger-than-life statues that stood by each side of the large door like ancient centurions frozen in time. There were intricately carved chairs and a long, golden lounge; behind that were two large wooden wheels leaning against a wall. Stretched across the ceiling was a beautifully-detailed painting of a woman with her arms spread as if embracing the universe. Situated in the very center of the room, directly beneath the painting, was a large piece of white stone, carved in the likeness of a sleeping man with his hands folded across his chest.
"That's my father," said Random's voice in the darkness. Harry jumped at the suddenness of the noise. In the shadows he could discern a hammock slowly swaying. "Random, is that you?" he asked hesitantly.
The man in the hammock lit another small lamp and placed it on a table beside him. Harry stared at the man who resembled Random Cause but looked like a much older brother.
"Where is Random?" Harry asked.
"I am Random Cause," came the reply.
"But...you look so much older."
Random peered at Harry across the room with a steady gaze as if looking at himself in a mirror across the great pond of time.
"It's an illusion," he finally said. "I have more years today so in your eyes I appear to be older."
Harry didn't understand. "But...whose house is this?"
Random unfolded himself from the gently swaying hammock and began to stand.
"This is my house. This is, in fact, the place in which I was born, though not the place in which I will be finally laid to rest."
Harry looked at Random quizzically, dumbfounded by the sudden series of apparent contradictions.
"This is the land of my people," he continued, leading Harry to the open door. "My father's father's father is buried not ten miles from here." He pointed through the swirling sand toward the northeast where Harry saw, far in the distance, a pyramid of awesome proportions growing out of the desert floor like the tip of a partially exposed crystal.
"But, yesterday, I thought..."
Random silenced him with a wave of his hand.
"Those were but yesterday's thoughts and yesterday's thoughts are just practice for today."
He retreated again, back into the coolness of the dark stone house and reclined into the blackness of the hammock.
Harry watched Random's movements and then sat on a small, carved wooden stool across from him, obviously agitated. After some silence, Random inquired whether he had anything to smoke.
"No, I'm sorry," he replied without thinking.
Random turned in his hammock and shot Harry a piercing glance.
"Can't you offer a little...hope to a fellow traveler?"
Slightly embarrassed, Harry pulled the embroidered pouch from beneath his shirt. Removing the small pipe, he stuffed it with the smoking mixture and handed it over to Random Cause.
"I'm sorry, I completely forgot."
Random nodded and accepted the pipe.
"Tell me about your journey, my friend, from the beginning," he said.
arry began to tell him about his journey and his encounter with the Geni of Desire and of the different stages of the journey as outlined by Desire and what would happen should he fail at any stage along the way. He spoke of the woodchopper and the savage dogs and The Wall. He spoke of everything, except the small clear capsule given him by Desire.
The pipe was passed back and forth as Harry spoke. He was happy to have someone to speak with about these things and Random was a polite and attentive listener, swaying gracefully back and forth in his hammock, never interrupting, never letting his gaze leave Harry's face. And then, when Harry finished his tale, Random slowly examined the small pipe as if for the first time and said in a low whisper, "That's a nice story."
Harry wasn't sure if he liked the inflection of his companion's comment.
"It is much more than 'a story'," he said.
Random motioned with his hand as if to dismiss his concern.
"A story is simply the tale of a person on his way to a desired goal. It matters little if he even succeeds in reaching his intended goal, nor whether his goal be reality, or a dream..."
"It matters to me," Harry said. "It is my quest!"
"Yes," replied Random with a slow smile, "the quest--full of soft possibility and rising expectation." He handed the pipe back to Harry. "I once had a great uncle who went on a quest such as yours. He was my grandfather's brother, but it is getting late and you are in need of your rest. We will continue this at a later time. Here," said Random, rising from his place of rest. "You may sleep here in this ancient hammock of pleasant dreams."
Harry began to protest. He felt that he should continue with his journey, but it was late, and his head was heavy with sleep. So, like a wealthy person on holiday, he decided to spend another day.
In the morning, after tea and biscuits, Random resumed the tale about his great uncle who made it to The Big Sea and discovered, The Children of The Sea.
"But the Geni of Desire made no mention of The Children of The Sea?"
"No, I'm sure he didn't," responded Random mysteriously. "You see, these are no earthbound sailors; no mere fishermen nor kayakers! Nor are these questors, like your own self, who have given up the past and earthly reference points like fame and gain-games in order to pursue a Higher Order. No, these, who my great uncle discovered, are the wind sailors who know no land. These individuals spend their entire time amidst the ebb and flow of the tides. They ride the ridges and scout the troughs of the sea as intently as any range rider from the old western days. Like electronic impulses skimming the very ridges and ripples of current found within the human brain, these are the very eyes and ears of The Dreamer of All That Is. Their function is to see what there is to see and to hear what there is to be heard. They literally eye and ear for The Dreamer, moving eternally over the pond of time--Floaters, Darters and Skaters upon the surface, the retina, the pupil, if you will, of God!
"The largest of these are the Floaters," he continued. "Their ships are white, bleached from the salt and sun, originally cast from the bones of the large ones, the leviathans of the deep. These vessels are so large and move with such rapidity over The Sea that they appear not to move at all. Even the smallest of The Floaters cover many acres and appear not unlike large farm houses firmly moored within the earth of a well plowed field. The largest of The Floaters are more vast than even the largest city ever to be found upon the earth."
Ha
rry sipped his tea and watched this strange man warily.
"The smallest are The Darters which serve as the individual form of transportation for The Children of The Sea. These Darters are very small and extremely fast. They, often as not, link up in centipede-like sections, forming flexible multijointed string-like roadways between the large Floaters. Over these ribbons flow the endless procession of supplies which are necessary to maintain one of the large floating cities. But though the Floaters are the largest and the Darters the smallest, the Skaters are the ones that truly captured my great uncle's imagination, for they are the pirates of space and time skimming over the surface of The Sea on an invisible layer of what he referred to only as--intent. Though these vessels look not unlike sailing ships of old, through some secret process, these swift surface sailors are able to skim at will over the largeness of the sea on an invisible layer."
"What do you mean by 'intent'?"
"Well," replied Random. "It is not my word, but my great uncle's. As he related it to my grand father, who related it to my father, who related it to me. 'Intent' is a form of anti-gravity, if you will, certainly more focused than mere desire and more potent than just hope. Intent is a force to be reckoned with! And when coupled with the sunsails of the imagination, well, theirs are only the fastest, most maneuverable, most fantastic vehicles operating within this time/space frame. Although there is always the prospect that, at any instant, another, possibly superior, vehicle might just sort of 'POP' through! But so far this has just never, ever happened."
Harry watched Random with eyes grown large with interest. "And what do these amazing creatures look like?"
"Their sails are not of cotton, my friend. Nor of nylon, nor of any acrylic fabric woven or created upon the surface of this globe. Their sails are spun from the seeds of realization, and, as a result, they have no edges, as neither do their gloriously colorful caftans. Though they occupy relative space and move at a specific velocity, they have no edges and cannot be contained nor isolated within any specific frame. It seems that they move across a greater floor in time, to the beat of a drummer only rumored to exist within our rather limited hall of reference. They are each and every one, very dramatic in appearance. They are the freest of the free. They are the personal emissaries of The Dreamer and if not full blown dreamers themselves, they are certainly fully credentialed dream-reps. They are cosmic pirates who choose to gather not beneath the blackness of skull and cross-bones, but before an image of The Sun! The uniforms of those who crew the water Skaters are described by my great uncle as being diaphanous caftans of brilliant rainbow hues, sparkling beneath the sun and giving off streamers of flash and color as they turn here and there upon the high sea. They often form a moving picture--literally, skimming over the surface at terrific rates of speed, with their bleached white skeletal hulls and their misty blue sails of imagination, deriving their sustenance directly from The Dreamer. All the while, the smooth yellow hum of intent, looking for all the world like a yellow light, seems to perfectly fill the gap between the hulls of their ships and the surface of the universal pond.
"The crews themselves often give the initial impression of flowers, for with their brilliant robes and exquisite headdresses they look not unlike the individual petals of an elaborate tropical plant or feathers constituting the plumage of a very rare and exotic bird."
Random stood and moved to the far corner of the darkened room where he stoked the small fire.
"Continue," Harry said. "Tell me, where do these creatures come from?" Secretly he was beginning to wonder if Random Cause wasn't one of the many distractions the Geni had warned him about.
"Where do they come from?" asked Random, hesitating in order to remember, or create a reply.
"Well, according to my great uncle, the elder Water Skaters, the original ones, entered The Sea from the most northern points: from the very center of the earth. These were often seen by beings of lesser order as a spray of Northern light referred to historically as the Aurora Borealis. The other, younger ones, are now apparently produced in the usual manner."
Random returned across the room and handed Harry a hot steaming plate of fresh vegetables.
"They are able to bridge the gap, between imagination and matter. The essential difference, you see, between a Skater and you or me is that they aren't, while we still think that we are."
In the light of the oil lamp Harry observed that his companion had aged from eighteen to thirty over the last few days. "But what do they do?"
"What do they do?" Random looked positively insulted. "They do as they please, of course. They play. They have fun. Skaters are, at one and the same time, angels and celestial vampires. Their only purpose, if purpose is truly the term desired, is to play! They were created from ecstasy and then immediately set free. They are the butterflies of consciousness, the otters of the universe. They are the first residents of The Great Surround. They fan the flame and soak up the sun. They are the fingers that center the clay upon the universal wheel...they are the Children of The Sea!"
Random watched Harry very closely as if to see if he was paying proper attention.
"Sometimes they are like soap bubbles in a sea of foam winking on and off, out and in. And yet at other times, they have the consistency of the purest glass, clear and dense. And though they operate within this gravitational field, they are free to create their own self-organizing rings of singularity--their own little spheres of influence. They are the lords and ladies of change, separated from us only by a very thin wall of light. And yet they are completely aware of our presence. When a Skater casually tosses his cape over his shoulders, he is not unaware that universes are conceived, mature and die...all in a twinkling! They constantly reach up and out in an intuitive understanding that at the same instant, The Dreamer is reaching down and within and in that realization there is a profound touching. Seemingly it makes all the difference, to them as well as to us, the last phantom bodies still bubbling in the stream. You see, we are not the first, nor the most advanced, Harry. We are the last and the rest of the universe is urging us on."
"How come your great uncle was so lucky?" Harry said, laying aside his empty plate.
"Lucky, what makes you say he was lucky?"
"Well," Harry replied, "how was it that he was able to see and become aware of these wonderful creatures, these forces of change, whereas the rest of us remain blind?"
Random laughed, "We have all made contact at one time or another, my friend. Surely even you have felt the pressure from the presence of a nearby Floater or seen the flash at the corner of your eye from a Skater or Darter whizzing by. We have all made contact many, many times, my friend, but we all, seemingly as if by prior agreement, refuse to see what there is to see or to hear what there is to be heard. Often, upon feeling the rush of a nearby Skater, one is suddenly seized by what is commonly called creative inspiration. Many a person haws been driven to press pen to paper or paint to canvas under the guise of artistic inspiration, when in reality it is merely the passing of a couple of Skaters engaged in supraverbal banter which reverberates down through the lesser frequencies. These illumines are much sought after in certain esoteric circles. Such was the force that motivated my great uncle to leave the security of hearth and home. He initially set out upon the sea in hopes of securing the benefits of such a creative spiritual encounter."
"Your great uncle was very lucky."
Random looked puzzled, "No, my friend, he just liked to have fun. There is a difference. He had a great sense of humor. He was, at one and the same time, the punch line to the joke as well as the impulse to laughter. He, too, wished to be a shaper..."
Harry stared into the flickering oil lamp for a long while, considering the pictures that Random Cause had painted in front of his mind's eye with his deeply felt words. Harry wished to stay and hear more and yet he felt impelled to leave, to be on his own way.
"Oh no," said Random suddenly as if rea
ding his mind, "you can't go yet! Surely you have enough time for a bowl of smoke? After all..." he said, gesturing towards the remains of the meal that he had prepared for him.
"Yes, of course. How rude of me." Harry packed the pipe and handed it to Random and then sat back and patiently waited for the next opportunity to leave and continue on his journey. In retelling what may or may not have been his great uncle's actual experience upon the high sea, Random became more and more animated and began to fall upon specifics that were quite obviously beyond Harry's realm of experience. But through his growing animation, Harry began to perceive new and fascinating aspects of Random Cause's personality. Without the distraction of content, it was rather like observing the performance of a talented poet reciting in a foreign tongue. Random stood, after handing Harry the pipe, and began to move gracefully about the dimly lit room as if in a trance, using grand expansive gestures like an actor on a stage performing for an unseen audience.
Slowly, through the beneficence of the stony vapors, Harry's initial anxieties began to dissipate and float upward with the smoke. Gradually, Random's monologue became terribly exotic and Harry smiled as individual words and phrases conjured up images from other times and places. Like long forgotten lyrics to a favorite song, these words took on special meanings.
Random stopped in mid-sentence and looked down at him as if surprised and embarrassed by his presence.
Harry looked back, drowsy eyed from the corridors of his own imaginings and said softly, "It's like a poem, isn't it?"
Random visibly relaxed. "Why yes!" he said emphatically. "The Quest. It is like a poem..." Random sank back upon a carved wooden chair in the shadows and began to speak of his personal experiences.
Harry tried to concentrate on his images, but he was very tired and significant spaces were elapsing between Random's individual words. Some of the spaces created by Harry's lapsed concentration were quite large. Some were large enough to stand in and hold an opinion. Some were large enough, it seemed to live in and grow old. Thus he found myself hang-gliding into the land of sleep on pastel thermals created by his companion's exotic imagery.
Three short hours later in the darkness and the black, Harry's eyes snapped open like hinged doors on metal springs. Nearby, in the shadow, he observed Random's sleeping form. He gently retrieved his pouch and pipe from the low table and slowly opened the large stone door. The wind had stopped blowing. Quickly he slipped across the ghostly dunes like a fleeting thought, intent on finding his own way across the river.