noctuary
“While I can’t have you, I long for you. I am the kind of person who would miss a train or a plane to meet you for coffee. I’d take a taxi across town to see you for ten minutes. I’d wait outside all night if I thought you would open the door in the morning. If you call me and say ‘Will you…’ my answer is ‘Yes’, before your sentence is out. I spin worlds where we could be together. I dream you. For me, imagination and desire are very close.
”
Whenever the girl felt a little melancholic, she would go for a walk by the ocean. Water soothes the stymied lust of the organs. The girl was far too adept at withholding. She enjoyed being tied up, blindfolded, and mute.
It was the withdrawal of one thing that amplified the other.
The girl did not masturbate. Instead, she’d lay in bed with her palms spread against the linen. Naked and beating in the cold. Her mind roamed the nether regions. If she really wanted a razz, she’d start at her toes. Her shins weren’t sexy. Some people had alluring legs with pointed ankles and little feet you wanted to put your mouth on. The girl's shins were like a gas station en route to the main destination; necessary, albeit forgettable. Bordered by bunions and a short femur bone.
She’d imagine a lover's hands squeezing her feet with her eyes closed. Skin-to-skin contact helps to regulate breathing. The girl had read a long list of benefits in a post about Post Partum Depression in a Mother’s Magazine at the dentist. During the tooth cleaning, her mouth propped open with a dark blue isodry, the girl tried to ask the dental hygenist to take the plastic gloves off. It will help me calm down—the girl had tried to articulate. She’d splattered saliva down the kerchief pinned at her neck and the hygenist smiled and nodded.
Most people do that when they don’t understand. Smile and Nod.
The girl rarely made it past her navel during these daydreams. She didn’t have the stamina. She could not bring herself to ascend the clavicle and neckline. Arousal peaked at the earlobe. Once a lover settled his lips outside her auricle, with a hand between her thighs, the girl dissolved. Her body was a wave breaking the shoreline. As her heartbeats accelerate, the rip current forms and breaks, forms and breaks.
The girl longed for the sound of the tide. She didn’t have a comfort object in the desert. In place of rain, she rubbed her body with marula oil. The girl performed Abhyanga twice monthly to increase her Ojas and ate oats each morning packed with honey, ghee, dates, almonds, and raw cows’ milk.
The essence of vitality, Ojas, rules immunity, happiness, and vigour.
Or so the girl had read in a Post Partum Depression article in a Mothers Magazine.
The desert was a pruning practice; the girl purged nightly in the twilight musk. One had to release in the womb of wasteland; the sun sucked all colour by nightfall. The piety of the desert people. Tapioca-toned churches on every corner by the Moenkopi sandstone native to Arizona. Jesus hangs from a silver cross at the entranceway. In some sculptures, he smiles; in others, he drowns. The cracks in the ground force passersby to assess the drama. What you cannot see will trip you up if you don’t look where you are going.
Forward and backward, the girl hops over the shadows and watches for rattlesnakes. Slip of desire; is it better to tease Death from the shadows so you can watch Him waltz towards you? Would you rather be taken by surprise?
The girl’s teacher taught her the practice of cleansing her insides. Proper digestion and elimination are essential to stimulate the flow of Ojas. Organ scrubbing, she’d called it. Her teacher was an ample woman with green eyes like pine needles that pricked through the blanket when you went for a picnic. She had silver hair and silver rings and only wore silver garments draped over her wizened body.
Her lips were purple. By sun or rage, no one knew.
The day of the organ scrubbing took the girl by surprise. The teacher had planned a meditation retreat day at the Seven Sacred Pools outside of Sedona. It was a small group, fourteen women. The teacher, let’s call her Sidney, lacked the inclination for notoriety and liked to keep things intimate.
Meditation in the pine needles initiated the journey. The group lunched in the shade and exchanged idle bits of information. Nothing series, just a little to ease the passage of time. The itinerary said ‘Meditation Walk’ in the afternoon, though Sidney said she felt it right for the organ scrubbing instead.
The women waded into the water, clothed and considering how wet they’d allow themselves to become. They stood in a haphazard circle. Sidney spread her arms as the eagle and told them each to close their eyes.
There are seven vital organs to cleanse. Bladder, kidneys, intestines, stomach, liver, lungs, and heart. I’m going to describe each organ in great detail. As I do, I want you to imagine that you are holding it in your hands and gently washing it with the water of the Seven Sacred Pools. You can visualize the expression or act it out where you stand. If you tire, please rest but do so within the container of the group. I ask that you not leave the circle unless you feel it is absolutely necessary. We will not break the line. Move slowly if you choose to mime. You can work with colour, texture, or light as you wash the pieces of yourself.
We will start with the bladder and work through to the heart. The heart goes last.
Are you ready?
The girl saved her vitality as she gently consoled her bladder and kidneys. The intestines were a bit more work, and her liver screamed so loud the reverb richochete through her body and into the water. The girls stomach was a bit sad—to be expected—though her lungs lit up and gave the girl a refreshed sense of hope.
Her heart was last. Sidney had slowed the tempo of details and the outer world entirely disappeared. All the girl could hear and feel was the steady, bomp-bomp-bomp of her heartbeats. It was the size of her fist and easily fit into her palms. It burned. Her heart was hot and scorched her hands. She knelt as slowly as she was capable and lowered her arms into the water. Her heart bubbled and spat—laughing! What a joy the heart was when it wanted to be.
In the water, the heart told the girl magnificent stories. You will be, bend, and break; you will be so wildly consumed by passion that your body will know things no consious thought can construct. If you listen to my song, you will be forever dancing. You must be brave when confronted by pain and trust in the thrust of life. Accept what you will not; absolve your fear and open up. You must tell others of what you feel; you must not squander what you know.
The heart continued, whispering a little more with each sentence. It was tiring.
Love will never be understood. Do not try to define it. Embrace what you feel, no matter how strong or insufferable. Love is pure being—when you meet those who make thunder in your body, do not shrink. Expansion is an inside job. I must be broken to get bigger; confront your foes and express your passion to those you admire.
Do not hold anything back.
Go wide with the wind. Reflect sweetly as the moon. Breathe deeply as the ocean.
When the heart stopped speaking, the girl brought it up from the Seven Pools and stood with it, wet in her palms.
You have to put it back inside of you, Sidney said over her shoulder. You cannot fling it outside and leave it in the ether! Put it back in. It belongs to you.
The girl was about to ask how when there was a great splash. Her heart, beating furiously at her palms, had become too hot and threw itself back into the ocean.
The girl opened her eyes and looked all around in the waters, though she could not see her heart. She’d lost it!
Alright, women. That concludes our circle for this afternoon. Let’s go back to the earth and dry off in the sunshine. I recommend drinking lots of water. Perhaps hold off on eating until you’ve digested this experience.
As the women made their way to the shore, the girl approached Sidney.
My heart—it leapt out! I’ve lost it to the water.
Sidney smiled. Well then, you’ll have to be close to water to remember how to love.
What will I do?
You’ll figure it out. Come. Sit and reflect. There’s nothing to do at the moment. The time will come when you will have to act and fish for it back. That time is not now. You are tired, and we act recklessly when we are worn out. Did you hear its lesson?
Yes, there were many.
Good. Hold tight to what you heard. How will you remember?
I brought a journal; I will write it.
Good, said the teacher.
And they went to sit in the sunlight.
Photo source.
