Ghost Guest Geist

We prepare the space.
I, in my dirty jeans and yellow gloves, with piles of split lemons on a table. Each one gives beneath my grip, spilling its sour self to the floor. I push the mop, up and down over faded linoleum, humming a soft tune, because though I sometimes forget, music turns a chore into creation.
Fresh cut flowers sit in a short jar on the round kitchen table. The windows have been opened since dawn first broke, bringing in the smell of a cold spring and the faint whirring of dragonflies. I hear the sound of a vacuum cleaner downstairs, and I feel the dirty remnants of a used-up week disappearing into the black hole of plastic parts and noise.
This is our role. The vessel must be prepared before the Guest can come, before the guest can fall from an upside-down kingdom and land in the cushioned chair of our living room, or another body ripe for the taking. When the walls ring with the scent of myrrh and candles provide the only light, then the guest comes, the ghost. The guest.
It comes through, knocking over u’s and h’s and it takes a reminder to know that they are one and the same. That the man knocking on our door was a copy in flesh, a spark of what was to come.
“Geist!”
I hear someone call, and I turn, flipping through the dictionary until I realize once again, that words move like liquid over tongues and years. Adding u’s and h’s, transforming meaning until it takes a mind-shattering look to see their similar shape.
The same old name, with new letters, now books, new times. The same thing, a new form. Flesh to air, blood to power.
I look at my friend, at his plump smiling lips, his bobbing head. The hole was opened, the dishes washed, the bells rung, the seed planted, the intention set. The walls move with the beat of a ghostly guest, a dancer with no feet, a shaker with no hips. But the walls shake, and I feel my head turning, spinning, moving in ways that it has never moved.
I am spinning, moving through crystal water, bending and turning, following the curves in the music while my mouth runs to keep up.
The guest is here, though we only talk about it afterwards, when the lemons are squeezed again into brown mugs and we sit, using words that always come up short. The geist was among us, jumping between body and wall. Using the vessel, the one of concrete, the one of bone. Taking the water, the sound, the spirit, the space, taking it all for a ride, a lift to the place that can only be experienced.
The ghost is the clear water, the guest for which our doors are opened and the floors are scrubbed and our bodies are cleansed. We prepare for the three, the trifecta, the trinity, the one. I turn on the porch light and set out an extra cup, though there is no flesh and blood, though there is no hand, we set the cup, the plate and serve our snacks.

The Dance of Play

There is no right and wrong, just play.

I pick up my magic scepter, a thin green extension of will and mind.It is the instrument of my child, the toy of the girl.It is long and thin, found in the garden by a girl with strawberry-smelling curls and a laugh like wolves.

I dance within the circle, pointing to each member of the orchestra like a conductor in wool pajamas, though no one sees me and no one responds, I point with a smile, cheering them on with my scepter and hips.

Somehow the music found its way in, and I jump and move, half child, half woman, half creature. Half guest. And when I divide like that, the numbers don’t matter, the calculator hangs by a sorry string on a doorknob and I sing out 5,3,8,3,8,7 Hey! And the numbers dwindle in significance, though their accumulation births the thing before you, a woman with white breasts and wide hips and lips verging on pale.

Now, there is only play. And when I slip, I imitate myself in a frenzy, turning the fall of a foot into a wild move. Play. It becomes part of the dance, the un-scripted move; chaotic, controlled, graceful, disjointed. It was all there, moving in a twisting tornado of movement. And the melody kept pumping my heart, cheering those little sock-covered toes. Jumping over wires, missing the flame of a candle, kissing those eyes that found mine, dancing with my green scepter, the pointer of desire, the cane of a vaudevillian, the green finger to the clouds, the channel towards the unknown.

It came though, like a prince from heaven. From a sky that may be underground, or within, or both. The rules are wide, the rules bend like putty and squishy breasts and plastic nipples squeezed between white fingertips.

There is no right, there is no wrong, but there is play.

There are words, there is movement, and sound. And as I move through them, I join the different points with gold and blue threads, using the attention of a woman and the joy of a child. They melt, forming the carpet for your soft white feet, the landing for a prince, the home of the voyager.

Fueling The Habits

Sitting at her desk, she practiced her writing exercises as she did every morning. Long before the sun ever poked above house covered hills, she arranged long descriptive sentences into tight paragraphs, molded flowery stanzas and simple quotes into colorful stories. As the darkness began to give way to a brilliant, full blue, she paused to think of the next line. She looked out her window into the brightening backyard. The large space was nearly bare except for a lone wooden chair and a gray shed in the corner of the rectangular yard. There were overgrown shrubs that creeped in from the neighbor’s yard, but in her own, there was nothing but hard, smooth concrete land. At the point furthest from her window was a red hued wood fence, behind which was a tall wall of eucalyptus trees that blocked the view of the twinkling city lights below. She looked out, and as her mind freed itself from the thoughts of her writing, new thoughts began to crowd in. They were familiar thoughts, more aptly described as recurring worries that she rehashed day after day, year after year. Their forms did not change, their content, nor their frequency. Hour after hour, she wondered and worried about the same things. She felt the same jealous thoughts. She felt the same anger, the same desire for revenge, the same need to cry.
She sat at her desk, looking out the window, and now, tears were reddening her eyes. A salty droplet left a wet streak across her cheek. Alone in her room, she was filled with anger and sadness. Her body was hot and sweaty and a headache lingered at the horizon of her consciousness. Nothing had really happened to her within the last couple of minutes, nothing external. She did not get a phone call with bad news. Her neighbor had not hit her car. Her landlord had not evicted her. She had not had a fight with a friend. To any outside observer, nothing had happened. There was no external event that warranted the desperate need to cry and her elevated pulse. She had not really even moved, and yet, her energy had completely changed.
In a brief instant, she had paused and drifted into an unstructured realm of floating thoughts that quickly turned into other ideas and then, just as swiftly, morphed into recurring uncontrolled thoughts. They moved in and out of her mind like wisps of passing clouds. Their entry had been in the moments of her inattention. While her mind was off her work, it began to fill with less intentional thoughts. Gone were her poetic lines and colorful descriptions. Her attention had drifted from her creative task and, as it did so, she had begun to devote more and more of her attention to her endless series of worries. The more she thought about them, the stronger the thoughts were and thus, the bodily sensations grew stronger within her. She was overcome with sadness. And with each tear that escaped her eyes, with each suffering thought, her negative emotions grew stronger.
Like a blazing fire that begins with a small handful of thin twigs, each small worry fed the cauldron of negative emotions. Each small jealous thought added a little more strength and fury and soon, she was overcome with sadness and grief and bitter hatred. She fed it to herself, small bit by small bit, letting it grow in strength until it was impossible let it go. If she had noticed the first distracted negative thought, she could have redirected her attention to her work. Caught quickly and early it would have been easier for her to regain her focus, but a raging fire takes tons of water and ample time to extinguish. She had fed her negative emotions with her thoughts, bathed them in her attention and allowed then to consume her from within. Although she sat in the same place, with the same trees and light and view, she now had a large dark hole to climb out of.

Whore of Nothingness

It is the moment that makes itself known. The timeless chamber that is both wide and deep, kept clean and soft by the waiting whore that watches the space. She stands alone beside the great opening, mouth wide and red, moist and dripping. Her long black hair swirls above her, moving like a slow tornado within an underwater kingdom, radiating with the calmness of fluttering stars. Black winds move about her with an air of caution, not the kind humans recognize as fear, but with the reverence reserved for contained power. The currents move in and curl, twirling with the prettiness of invisible smoke, shifting and sprawling like a thousand tongues at work. Licking, covering their symbols with the juice of desire. Their utter devotion is what makes them salivate, forcing themselves to cover their great god with gifts of attention. Within the open portal, the whore moves along the periphery. Like a lady in waiting, wearing the darkest gown of soft black silk. There is nothingness surrounding her, open land and air, all painted shades of black, yet she seems to wait in a contained sphere with the sprawling trees that resemble oaks, but come from another place where names are meaningless and everything is known or taught through intuition. It is there, where the heart is the ruler of people, and the toilers bend over daily, accepting their true nature as false; where they lower themselves in gratitude, accepting their humbling like obedient servants to an almighty power. Extending beyond the horizon, rows and rows of them are kneeling, the great moon is full of power this evening, and the light of countless centuries burns down upon their exposed necks with the coolness of a smothered fire.
The light enters her, with the softness of a warm kiss and the harshness of a terrible rape; moving together in truth as they enter, rocking her center, stuffing her with all that comes from elsewhere. She goes flying back, yet remains still, altered with each step she takes around the portal. Around she walks, from above, she is a flowing black creature made of light and rain, from below, a towering goddess composed of fire and stone. She stops at each of the four rocks laid about the portal, one for each point of the cross. At each point, she stops, bending to kiss each one. She waits for another entering. The whore lifts her dress, exposing the fatal whiteness of her flesh amid the glowing darkness surrounding her. With nothing below, she readies herself for the energy approaching. It comes screaming with a silent voice, painting the black world red with invisible colors. Her heart quickens, her womanly opening expands to accept the gifts. And like a glowing sword, she feels the nothingness move inside. Pushing itself with the force of nothing, with the strength of all, without words and sounds, devoid of any tangible attachment. She radiates from the inside, with the heat of a million worlds, a thousand words and places that have been stripped and condensed to pure energy. They are inside and she pushes the gifts into the darkest depths within, her eyes are wide, her mouth open and wet, her flesh is sticky. She is the whore, the vessel of nothingness.

Delicate Space

Wrapped around his solid trunk are creamy legs, soft and smooth, they cross at his back. Like shimmering roots from a magical tree, her limbs nestle themselves to his waist. At each moment, with one movement succeeding the other, she pulls herself closer to him. Atoms attempt to flee, running ferociously to the warmness of his skin.
His hands grip her waist, with the force of pure love, he slips in. Building the energy with each passing moment, with each thrust and pull, her wakefulness blooms. Feeling every bodily detail, each kiss is a world unto itself- a universe entered and quickly explored. Again and again, lips are shared, planets become defined in all their spherical wonder. It is not only his arms, not only his cock and body, stronger than all are his attention. Capturing each of her cells, each little vein and drop of blood. Like a thin net meant for stealing fairies, he finds her; the little lost pieces, the bits of physic power flailing into the ethers, he recovers everything, bringing it all before his eyes, holding everything before him.
Is this real? Perhaps not, probably not. But he holds her despite this, because of this. With this. She feels a wave, unlike anything she has ever known. Oh, they are on top, an eternity of water below them. Hold me, she thinks. A sound escapes her mouth, a bit of fear that exposes the newness. The crest rises, entwined, they bounce together, the rhythm of the water propelling them higher. She has never known waves like this, with the power of everything she has yet to understand. She feels his arms, enveloping him with a love she could never describe…but they seem like her arms. Is she holding herself? Is it her arms that are his? Is it him that holds her? Is it everything that keeps her close? Everything and nothing. One and nothing. She cries, remembering his massive strength, she sinks into him, trusting he’s there.
Later they rest, warm and soft together. She moves her hand across his chest, each stroke against him is lovelier than anything known. Together, they hold a space- more delicate than any known matter. It breaks with the slightest foul wind. And she, most inexperienced, does not have the knowledge to care for this tender space. Within a couple sentences, she has become human once again, speaking as humans do, worrying as humans do- with all this, the wave moves past. They are left in the water. In the distance, they watch as the peak crashes ashore.

The Meaning of Inner Work

This is what it means work. For this moment, I understand.
The yellow lamp, the smiling mouth, the blue energy-all are open targets for my rage. Screams are close, ready to drench the space with red violence. And the tears, my steady friends remain on the lids of my eyes.
My daily exercises are preparations for this- when the pain sets in and I need every amount of will I possess to not destroy the surrounding spaces. Grasping onto the memory of ritual, I inhale. Slowly, the molecules fill my lungs and stomach.
Through the ache of being- I breathe. Inside, my body is collapsing, every learned expectation and image is being ripped, destroyed beyond recognition.
Piles of memories lay in heaps, my old self walks among them like a lost ghost in a junkyard. The familiar is painful, the new is excruciating, and I am not of either place. Both are foreign, possessing words and people from the netherworlds.
Slowing my breath, moving my hands in circular gestures, opening my eyes in exaggerated spasms…working constantly, I stay.