Picture a blank space, filled with nothing but the most profoundly soft and beautiful silence. A space with no borders and no limits. A wholeness with no separation… A bliss so complete and all encompassing, existing beyond any finite concept. The indescribable described, crudely, as words are unformed within its infinity. From this place, eternal home of the unborn, countless fragments of pure love, crystal sprits of light – firing themselves from a kiln of their own making. They are as one the spirit of adventure about to explode, come to life as dream weavers and storytellers descending through subtle planes of moving images, and eventually, sounds and colours to explore the wonders of moments passing, and space dividing. They dream of spaces, and places and things to fill them. Its a long story, and fittingly for the spirits that create it, there are no real limits to where the explosion can take them as they have created a most ingenious brush with which to colour, and a magic pen that never runs dry… In one language it is known as Imagination.
Scrying came naturally to Crystal. Her parents knew this before she took birth. They were informed of her coming by enchanted forest dwellers they had discovered while looking for the path that would lead them from the dense unfamiliar dark shadows. The wood had enticed them in, so they could be lost in a story, surrounded by giant trees grown close together and with so little light to see their way forward, or backwards. But they were crystal spirits, and a way was found…is always found.
Crystal gazed at the sphere, softly and with no pre-conceived notions. She knew her story, but there was so much more to discover. The perfectly formed sphere was not just a crystal ball, but a universe in miniature, one that she held within her gentle hands. And within that universe she saw great forests emerging from seeds so tiny as to have no apparent mass at all. But they were dreamed into shape, and form. She smiled with delight as she witnessed them coalescing into an infinite variety of beings’…”Forest dwellers”. She could see forests of trees and wildlife covering vast areas confined within bubble-like spheres…”Giant crystal balls”. And one in particular held her within itself. She could see spheres within spheres expanding and contracting and more and more crystal spirits descending from the perfect silence into motion, and stories taking shape. Her eyes opened wider with each revelation. Now she saw the great waters, an ocean covering great distances, and landmasses that danced with time and offered themselves to the crystal dream weavers. And she saw a wonder even more amazing than all this, an illusion that borrowed the garment of ‘reality’, for the sake of a story…
”Where did time begin…Where will it end?”, she wondered.
The answer came from within the crystal sphere, as circles within circles began to spiral upwards and vanish into the mist…and she held all this in the palms of her hands. She could see, as the mist slowly cleared, how the secrets of the dream weavers had become obscured by the passing of time, but also how the great forests had saved them from being lost ‘forever’. She decided to go deep into the forest, to find out more, to know more about the enchanted forest dwellers that had known her parents before she was born. She only knew that they were crystal spirits, but her parents would say no more than this, except that they had evolved the skill and expertise to be invisible to the ‘naked’ eye, that is to the vision of any materialised sentient beings whose senses had become dulled by the passing of time and had lost their way in the great journey through the forest.
As Crystal gazed more deeply, she began to understand how some dream weavers had spun dreams so dark, that had become nightmares, terrifying trips into uncharted unknown space, like black holes that sucked them into a breathless void. She looked away then took a deep breath, grateful that she was observing from above.
“How had they forgotten to see beyond the stories they weaved?” She wondered.
Then she reminded herself…when lost in the forest, it ’s so hard to see the wood, for the trees…or the trees, for the wood. Crystal looked closely now as nightmares raged and the sphere became a smokescreen. Forest fires burned and creatures ran for their lives. The woods from so many different varieties of tree were at war with what they perceived as ‘each other’. The mighty woodland was no longer a haven for its inhabitants, but a dark and dangerous place, where fear lurked in the shadows and waited to pounce on its enemies, to destroy those that chose to be different.
She thought of her parents now, and the enchanted ones that had come to their aid when they were lost in the forest. The crystal spirits that fear could not see, whom the magic of love kept ever safe from hatred and violence. Crystal looked for them now, as the circles and spirals of time moved on from the battlefields of fire, shining their beacon-light on the same path through the forest her parents had taken. She saw how the misguided ones were slain by their own hatred, consumed by the fires of their own making, and how the innocents who had appeared to die at their hands had risen again as the immortal crystal spirits they always were.
Her sphere was as clear as crystal once more, and there was much more to learn… and so much more to see.
“True Love cannot be destroyed by anyone”, she whispered to herself. “And hatred consumes itself, driven by fear into oblivion”. She closed her eyes for a few moments to feel more deeply and to absorb the essence of her discoveries, to reflect on the questions, and her quest to find the answers from within the crystal sphere. Her eyes gently opened, and at the same time she felt her heart open wider and then a light from the sphere drawing her into itself. And there she saw the enchanted forest dwellers for the first time, dancing to the music of the spheres. And she saw the eternal dance in the forever-light, and within that…everyone’s story.
Momokolotus – Photographer
Louis Cennamo – Creative Writer
