Happy Halloween?

I had a most unusual dream last night. It's different from any dream I've ever had before. And I found it interesting (and creepy?) that it occurred on the eve before All Hallow's Eve'n.

Are there any dream analyzers out there who'd like to take a go at this one??

I am a man, with blonde hair, in my 30s or so. I am dressed in clothing from the 1800s or so - a puffy white blouse with long, flowing sleeves and a vest. I have committed a crime and have been sentenced to death by fire. I am in a holding tank of sorts - a place to wait for the execution of my sentence. I am with a whole bunch of other people who have committed crimes, too, and who are waiting to be executed. The people are all young, black boys - between the ages of 4 and 12. They all have bald heads, and are wearing tattered clothes. And they are all smiling and lovely. Big warm grins that light up their faces.

The next scene takes place inside a small, square, enclosed room. It is dark, there are no windows and no doors that I can see. One third of the room is a huge, roaring, hot, orange fire. The room is very hot. The other two thirds of the room is made up of a raised, wooden platform that sits on top of the fire. The platform is made of slabs of wood, that have gaps in between them, so that licks of fire come up from below. There's an assortment of blankets and old clothing that you can use to sit on to try and ease some of the heat.

I am in this room, still as the man, but in my own body, and dressed in a white tank top and a pair of jeans. I am barefoot. And it's very warm. There is a young, black boy with me. He can't be more than 8 or 9 years of age. His name is Articules, and he is the executioner. He sits on my lap, as I lean against the wall on top of a blanket. He straddles my lap, one leg on either side, and he's very happy and friendly. Laughing and giggly. He askes me how many times before it's my turn. I say 4. He asks if that includes or doesn't include my own turn, and I say that it doesn't. So he writes 5 times down on his piece of paper. I say to him, very gently, "Articules, I am having difficulty with the heat right now, but give me some time to adjust. And I suspect I'll be OK."

The next scene shows a letter that I've (as the man) written. It's written in an old-style English, using words like, "my betrothed", etc. The man's voice is narrating the letter he's written. (Like a voice over). He describes how one boy, Aristotle, was brought into the fire room for the day, as he was scheduled to be executed by fire the next morning. In the morning, we found his body, charred. He had made the choice to jump into the fire on his own, instead of being forced to do it.

And that's the end of the dream.

Winter is coming....

A field of geese
lifted off from the fields of straw-colored hay.
Like bombers in the sky;
on a mission,
in formation,
shadows against the sun.
The birds turned the world dark.
I could feel the humming their wings,
beating in synchronicity,
as they honked their calls
and passed overhead.

- lml, oct. 21

Hunger

I wrote this a few days ago.

We all experience sadness in our lives, for various reasons. When I felt this way, I realized that I wanted to take a few minutes to experience how I was feeling. To listen to myself. To see what my bodymind was experiencing as I acknowledged my sadness. It felt therapeutic to put everything into words - and I find that I use words as my outlet. The mechanism of finding a sentence, a passage, a single combination of letters to describe my feelings, paint the portrait in my mind of how my body feels and how my soul wants - leaves me feeling very soothed and comforted.

"Why does my sadness have a taste?
Like a thirst
That only physical contact can quench.
I feel hoarse from screaming
Inside my heart.
The hunger pangs in my belly
Are echoed by a deep yearning
That feels as if it will only be abated
With a simple touch. A kiss. A hug.
An acknowledgement.

This hunger hurts me.
And the lingering sensation of salty tears on my lips
Makes me only crave more."

- lml

Life as a festival

Life is a festival! Everything around us is bursting forth with possibility and opportunity and the fresh, full, ripeness of love and laughter. There is beauty everywhere, even in the moments when you feel challenged and when your being is dislocated from the events around you and the feelings inside you.

How to exfoliate yourself from suffering and pain? From feelings of sadness and despair? One way of approaching things is to look at how you hold on to things in your life. How tenacious a grasp is the one you have around the weight that is straddled across your shoulders, pushing you down? The weight that crushes your ribs, in an effort to disrupt your breathing?

Osho has some powerful words about that.

"Suffering is not holding you. You are holding suffering. When you
become good at the art of letting sufferings go, then you'll come to
realize how unnecessary it was for you to drag those burdens around with
you. You'll see that no one else other than you was responsible. The truth
is that existence wants your life to become a festival."

-Osho

Do you believe in ghosts?

Here's an interesting perspective about recordings and life energy from Howie Gelb...

It makes you wonder.

"And then another man there told of his friend who witnessed a regiment of roman soldiers marching down an ancient road. The image of these phantoms were only from the belly up because the ancient road they once walked on was now a meter below the current terrain.

I determined something there and then. The explanation of all this seemed to be that they were not ghosts at all. They were recordings. It made some sense, more so then ghosts anyway. It seems that there are more things on this magnetic earth that gets recorded then we know about. It has to do with repetitive actions. And if this occurs as such, then sometimes long after the cause of the actions are gone, the recording of the action remains.

Why not?

We have heard sound recordings on petroleum (vinyl), metals (wire), even paper coated with alloys, and of course magnetic tape. We have seen visual recording transmitted through the waves we are all ready saturated with, there on the TV. We live on a magnet. Sometimes things must get recorded on the elements around us.
What’s more is this would explain the difficulty in trying not to obsess over a lover that has left us. Or worse, a loved one who has died. After so many repetitive actions with this lover, their imprint on you is stuck. You have to suffer that recording long after they are gone. This will drive you mad of course, unless you acknowledge it as a recording. Then maybe you will figure you are lucky to have such capture."