These are the last breaths of the first story for #StarflightVR.
The very first part of the story can be found in audio format in the Story, which is a part of Starflight, the rest are a sequence here on the Huffington Post.
This story has been about a transformative journey, one that started with a trip into the Underworld, into the realm of the shadows, but is now moving back out.
It really is meant as a journey for all of us- a symbolic journey for memory retrieval, a revival of forgotten parts, an inquiry into the deeper dimension of our psyche. It dives into the importance of taking some time to be receptive, to ourselves and our own processes, and respectful of our own transformative patterns.
In the end it is about developing our very own compass-about being able to embody who we truly are, without fear or anxiety, and without self judgement. Opening up into our own flow:
Looking at Hades
Hades is different indeed,
or is he?
A juxtaposition if I dwell
on
how much he reminds me of other beings,
places and things.
Before I came and settled here,
before my adventure became clear,
I was caught
in the swirl
of every day life up above.
And, irony will have it,
that not so much was different there,
from here.
Where did the dance start?
Up there on earth there was this belief
that all that matters is producing.
It can be about producing babies, producing food,
producing experiences,
producing moods,
producing moves, and dinners and smiles.
And,
of course, there is the possibility of loosing some more weight,
so as to produce some more lust,
some fire,
some more passion on demand.
Trying to produce all that
is exhausting-
and smiling dressing up,
and filling cups,
on demand,
is easily done through clouds of wine,
or cocktails.
Easily done through the darkness of disconnection.
How is it even possible to produce
this much?
Like a machine, new to the industrial revolution
Running at high speed,
Running.
Collusion,
Conclusion.
Sinking into this in agreement-
Disconnection.
Like a sharp blade,
A knife that cuts
into some deeper realms.
So the visit into the Underworld had to be.
Love,
Up above or down below.
Hades' arm had that one particular glow,
that one smell,
that reminded me of the Nordic woods in the Fall.
Love,
a piece of godliness,
in all of us.
Hades really never abducted anyone,
falling into his arms is a choice,
that could happen to all.
The dance with Persephone,
just reiterated that possibility.
So I chose to go below,
and see-
not attached to production of any kind-
And there it was:
Swamps of sadness,
and a large pompous burial
of all emotions.
With loneliness hobbling right behind-
The landscape of the Caverns
That's where the lies stop-
The fear begins and why I had chosen
to sink into the tunnels of hell.
I had chosen to waltz with Hades,
chosen to linger in death for a while,
chosen to dance through Persephone.
Inevitably,
I had chosen to find the way out of the Caverns.
But I still feel,
that day when I sank deeper there-
in the cavernous enclave-
the juice of the pomegranates running down my throat.
Ruining my shirt,
staining my courageous outer stance,
my inner iron countenance.
I bit into the pomegranates next to me,
I so remember that one day.
The luscious fruit just had this inexplicable draw.
And so, I bit into their juicy flesh.
I bit into their decadent, pleasureful,
burst.
It made me think,
that here was my opportunity.
My opportunity to be right here with my own destiny,
and I took another bite again.
Illusion,
Delusion.
Take your pick.
And there I was years later,
Surrounded by this landscapes of tunnels and visions.
Struggling to come back out,
looking for a clear burst of momentary clarity.
A lightning flash of total insight and cutting precision.
One that would then help my decision,
but, then the every day scenes would
draw me in-
Like, when I watched this woman at
breakfast-
Watched her melt down over her bountiful granola
mixture,
as she recalled the past,
her past.
Time travel swished her through space,
in its dashing embrace.
To the music of the opera,
playing through the speakers.
With every note it moves, this music,
this rhythm, this tune,
this exact vibration.
It adjusts to whatever
everyone needs to hear,
imperceptibly.
It can open their own can of memories.
Whatever it may hold so varies,
as the lives it brings forth.
So, by dinner,
she sat there lonely and shrunken
to the size of a raisin.
Because she could not, would not,
hear.
Because she had given up that bit.
And refused to revisit it-
Or the day when
Hades asked me
please take that one in.
And gestured to this old man, hunched over,
with streaming white hair and wrinkles.
And I do- I did.
I moved to the creature in the corner
with the snow tangled hair,
and tears streaming down his worn face.
I helped him up.
I took him by the hand.
I tried not to look into his eyes.
Did not want to see his ocean of heart movements broken,
and given up.
The pain,
in the air,
in those moments is like lead.
So, I just held his hand,
in silence, instead.
That day we moved down the hall
to the next tunnel.
There are only few that know the road,
that know this particular path,
and can actually come back from it.
I did dread going there-
As I go-did go,
I was met with the dark figure,
the one that never talks.
He smells
of rotten clothes,
of dirty,
decaying bones.
I forgot about the hand,
because
I focus on the handover.
But then I feel a sharp pain,
that almost sucks me under,
as the old man and his silver mane,
stumble
into the boat.
I can no longer hold him,
from here on out.
He had to meet
his own destiny,
his own fire fully.
And, maybe
just maybe, he will let go.
Replenish the earth
in his final act of surrender.
Can I go?
Can I leave this place?
The other choice is to stay
with the wailing, crumpled beings
of hardened sorrow
that refuse to open
their own can of memories-
to feel.
But then I cannot
stay with the kiss of death,
that leads to that cavernous despair.
One being saps the other entirely,
and then has to pay debts for that karmically,
as the other slowly fades away.
Did they even seemingly matter anyway?
Or they suck each other dry.
Not anymore appealing.
And then the day came,
when none of this
would work.
When it was time indeed,
to find another path,
to make the way,
out of caverns, sorrows and crevices of darkness
and
loneliness spreading wide.
Sometimes the way out is the way in.
I retract thinking of the tree I feel into
where my journey started
one morning.
And,
sitting there,
pleasure, pain, happiness and grief wash
over me.
In a sort of strange rhythmic vulnerability.
Then as I peer out of my dreams,
I remember looking up and seeing
Hades.
As he was perched over my head,
as I was waking up.
Back then I thought
we would walk together,
because after all,
we were joined.
Back then-
It didn't even occur to me,
that at some point this was
no longer going to be.
That at some point,
I would simply walk alone.
Up above.
A new journey
A moment after
I walk through the tunnels
feeling the aliveness of the rocks and caverns as funnels,
feeling the shadow play on the walls,
feeling some sort of new embrace.
It is a whisper of cotton protection,
of soft cloudy reflection,
where it feels calm and safe,
where the life that has been, churns and works.
Mystifies and intensifies until it holds
the rainbow.
Just like a diamond would.
Beautified in small, slow measures
by nature's whims and pressures.
I breathe
My feet take me further in.
Feeling my way through a dream.
Falling footsteps,
tapping in the air,
They are flowing boldly
to I don't know where.
Black-
I stumble in that tunnel,
not sure I can see any light at all.
I just feel pointy edges protruding my skin,
feel the blood.
I feel the edges of my skin,
the lack of air,
that seems to suffocate me softly
just when I needed to speed,
make haste.
I have to sit for a minute-
I stay with the panic.
It sits right next to me.
I can hear the guards,
the wind of their pursuit reaches me.
The shouting of Hades as wounded,
he seeks like a blood hound,
after that lost possession of his:
me.
I crouch deeper into the darkness,
not sure if I can harness
any more energy.
A wave of futility
sweeps over me,
Yet, none of this is futile at all.
I could swear that there is lead
in my blood.
While I know running would be good,
hearing the dogs approach,
hearing the voices that slowly encroach,
on the tiny bit of silence left around me.
Sounds are coming through,
piercing the air.
But,
I am frozen in hell.
Coming out
As she took one long breath
She was back.
Back leaning against that tree,
back with an earful of melody
from that place.
She had finally encountered
the wave that she had been able to ride,
right out of the gates of hell.
Somehow she could still remember that smell.
A sigh of relief,
came to her lips.
On the other side of hell
is bliss-
Just staying put.
Staying with that sweeping feeling
of ecstatic churning
as the willows kiss her hair.
The wind softly nudges her into that room of tranquility,
the pendulum goes back and forth.
It is coaxing with the sweet scent,
illuminating the sky with this one intent,
of reunification
diving deeper into her.
Feeling unified with her fragility
remembering that she had started
in the jungle of fecundity.
She had walked the path of embroiled trees,
birds of fantastic colors,
the fluttering of the puma in the distance,
and, the slow silky touch of the paws.
Paws and crouching motion,
of a predator's devotion.
The beauty of that path,
winding through the jungle thick
only to be conquered by the depth of it.
It is like an opening into further worlds,
One meets the other
and they whirl us into their beat,
resounding in her ears.
She had gotten lost
in an arrid land of stern voices.
Carrying in it cold fragments of logical choices,
devoid of that luscious song of the soul.
But back she was-
She felt-
We do not have a choice indeed
We must love ourselves
in our whole entire entity
in all ways and continuity
our wounds, our failures our hidden agendas-
our worst part of ourselves.
Then the pull comes
like soft honey running to its source
like waves of delight going back to their original course
Turn around a minute and see
who is the one loving so explicitly.
In the end,
there is a swirl within,
that brings out a fire,
carrying breath.
It consumes and creates
destroys and celebrates.
It is joyful and fierce
and all within me
All light and flame
all flower and nothing to tame
It is there that she can rest within herself.
While she continues the whirl,
throughout her office.
Odd dance-
Within challenges and routines.
Contortions,
shifting proportions.
Somewhere inside of me
Persephone now is free.
She has tasted the fires,
She has traveled the tunnels of loneliness and despair,
She has come through,
and although still burning,
she swims in ecstasy.
She is dancing to the rhythm of the drum,
that springs forth from life's healing hum,
The beat of the inner earth
rising through her,
within her,
moving her limbs,
imperceptibly, calling her forth.