With a darkening sky, and grey billowing clouds, a late autumn storm comes racing through an alpine valley and over the towering peaks. Nonetheless, a lonely figure dressed in animal skins cautiously approaches along a narrow goat path, over bits of loose fallen scree, along the unprotected face of a jagged summit. With each step he scans the grey rock face ahead of him, seeking a tell-tale sign, one which marks a hollow crevice leading into the hill’s depths. He knows it is near, having been there previously, but then he had been with others and this is his first time coming alone, and so he is less confident.

However, brushing away the long strands of hair which the cold robust wind has blown across his face, he once again pans the broken rock verge for the slight tell-tale shadow. After all, he is keenly aware of the approaching icy mist, and therefore must find shelter soon. However, just as he pauses to stroke his wiry beard a moment, he looks up and spies exactly what he seeks. Cautiously he makes his way to the ledge, squeezing his way through the narrow crevice, and finally into the gently inclining cavern.

At last, sheltered from the raging storm, he gratefully drops, upon the cave floor, the leather bag he has carried all this way. He next rummages through the bag for some dry straw and a piece of linen wrap smeared in animal fat. These he uses to cover the end of a short wooden limb which he also has carried in the leather bag. Then with a small wooden bow and drill, he quickly sets light to a small amount of dry grass, and from a spark to flame thereby lights his torch. Well guided now, this spelunker gathers his leather bag, and next wanders deeper into that obscure and mystical terrestrial womb world of past perceptions and memory...

Soon enough he finds a good spot, a relatively large section of the cave wall, smooth for the most part, therefore well-fitting his purpose. Of course, he is not the first person at this location, as evident rings of powdered ash and snapped branches for kindling confirm. Regardless, it make his job easier at any rate. Quickly he sets about building a small hearth, and then, with kindling and a few small branches left behind by previous occupants, he urges a blaze to improve the lighting, while adding a touch of much needed warmth.

Rummaging once more through his leather bag, he removes an assortment of greasy pigments, like cobalt blue; okra red; saffron yellow; earth-tone browns; chalky white; and a piece of charcoal from the remains of a fire for black. Nevertheless, before he can set to his vital task, he must first prepare his mood and focus his mind. So, he takes from a small leather neck pouch a handful of ceremonial mushrooms, which he calmly swallows with a sip of water from a small skin bag. Then, while waiting for their potency to take effect, he rearranges his long hair, tying it out of the way with a strip of leather; before next staring deeply into the growing fire while chanting gently under his breath.

In this way he hopes to evoke the profoundness of the Goddess and God, the sacred spirits of elements and animals. He also desires to access the wisdom of the ancient ones, and of his own inner self, so as to channel such energy through the focal point of his hands, thereby lending a power and force to his forming inspirations. Indeed, he soon senses a slight tingling sensation beginning to seep throughout his form, as his surroundings and inner perceptions begin to shift. Therefore, he willingly basks within the warm spiritual glow of this rapture washing over him, as his mystic vision manifests before him.

He now watches coloured beads of light emitting from the fire in an arched curve of dripping moisture, the shadows now gently swirling, drawn by various energy fields. Every feature of the cave surface then jumps out at him, each stalagmite and stalactite as well as every hollow, and he perceives that he is no longer alone in the cavern. An ancient being of pure energy is surely guiding him, the power of the mushrooms having fine-tuned his metaphysical frequencies to sense such a spiritual event.

Slowly rising to his feet, the spelunker carefully selects the first pigment, watching as if from a distance as his body begins to carefully paint the cave wall. He is a long-distance traveller between various wavering spheres of reality and illusion. Fathoming the endless realms of innermost thought, thus he gropes in the darkness for whatever might await. He is plunging his hands deep into cold black waters, fishing for abysmal creatures which dwell within the Ego and the Id, trying to get a feel of where he stands within himself. While charting the obscure paths of his concealed shame and repressed hostility, he slips even further through mists of the past, toward a landscape of memories lost.

Thus, he relives all the stinging failures and stupid mistakes, the blinding rage and anger forming a vortex, drawing him down to his very core where the many lifetime wounds of his pain and misery are painfully reopened. However, at the very core, where the truth is laid bare, there is a light for those brave enough to mend the wounds of such an outworn life. Surrounded by that glow they can discover the strength to forgive and move on, yet only by changing the very cycle they find themselves trapped within, can such be done. There they find the strength to change from the inner beast, which we fear the most, and rise above the ethereal being, which all beings exalt with awe towards.

His heart of darkness is therefore ripped asunder, to receive an inflow of advent elucidation, so as to purge his obscurity within. Face the pain and anger, struggle with it, as the insane keeper of this harsh and cruel purgatory, accept that this is a part of the spirit, and then let it all go while leaving the heartache behind. The lonely spelunker then looks back at all the tormenting memories for one last time, no longer punishing himself for what he now knows is only human nature, and releases the fear of such thoughts, like the shedding of a dead skin. He next steps out from this (and each proceeding) empty shell of himself, each a relic of his past, those parts of his life are gone now and he is thereby free to choose whatever path he might wish to take.

He is suddenly alive with a renewed spirit as he paints living images of spirit animals, running swift and wild (as is his own soul) leaping among grasslands like the wind, scattering helter-skelter with a playful grace full of mystical life; meanwhile, joyful human figures waver and sway symbolically, playing primal instruments as they celebrate the hunt; spears and arrows swift let fly into the air, arc at the zenith, penetrate the living flesh cutting, life blood flows and the animal spirits soar…

The same must be done of his soul, which is once again all part of the mystic circle. These petroglyphs tell other stories as well, of his monstrous inner demons and odd imps, protective spirits, tribal history and of mystic apparitions. Every colour, shade and form he uses blends into the universal chaos, which is without commencing or completion in its undertow. Images that easily spill forth majestic, brutal, yet externally abstract, flowing with the wondrous power of the unobstructed mind, and each trip offers a different gift...







Sligo January 20/1997

a rewritten excerpt from the novel "In Transition"