Copyright (C) 1997 by William Mistele.  All rights reserved.  Note:
This is the first half of an essay/story I wrote about Orudu, the first
salamander I began to work with. 

                      The Salamander Orudu

According to the seer, Orudu is a king within the realms of fire.  
He governs those fire which confront mankind with fear and  dread 
such as volcanoes exploding. The name Orudu translates: 

                    Continents slide 
        obeying the powers over which I preside.

The letters in Orudu's name are magical and have these meanings: 
     The "O": He senses and knows the mass, the weight, 
and the balance of mountains and continents as they move.  
     The  "R":  He  is autonomous--authorized to act on  his  own 
initiative according to his own insight.   He builds according to 
his own designs. He strives to perfect his work and to accomplish 
all that he plans. 
     The  "U":   He  perceives the web of forces,  no matter  how 
obscure, which shape mountains and continents. 
     The "D":   There is a Jovian element in his nature--Orudu is 
expansive.   His perspective is global.  His work encompasses the 
planet and he has a great number of servants.  He is coordinator, 
mediator, and the architect of shifting continents. 
     The  "U":   There is no fire on the surface of the earth  or 
under the earth which can not be influenced by Orudu's will.  And 
though  his  plans  are  his own,  he is  neither  arbitrary  nor 
capricious.  He has a profound and intricate understanding of how 
his actions influence the rest of the planet. 
     Orudu  added this about himself:  "A blacksmith heats metal, 
hammers it on an anvil,  and shapes it according to his needs.  A 
master fashions a sword intricately weaving the metal into a more 
perfect  form.   A steel mill blasts molten iron with  oxygen  to 
burn up the carbon so the metal can be hard and endure.   Even so 
I lay hold of the world,  bending mountains and moving continents 
to comply with my will. 
     "I  take  into account the erosion of winds  and  rains.   I 
consider  the cooling effect of water as my volcanoes  rise  from 
the  seas.   I  take  into account gravity,  ice  ages,  and  the 
shifting poles.   
     "I  study the resiliency of rocks,  their cracks,  and fault 
lines.    I  foresee  and  initiate  earthquakes  with  my  mind.  
Vegetation,  rivers,  water  tables,  and  deserts--these  too  I 
overview.   I  am  a craftsman and my work encompasses  both  the 
depths and the surface of this planet."
     When  it  comes to engineering and the preservation  of  the 
biosphere,  Orudu's skill and knowledge is surely centuries ahead 
of  mankind.   And yet,  we might also learn something from Orudu 
in the area of love.   Surely,  as an individual or a race  grows 
wise, there comes a time when it is essential, if we are to be at 
home on earth, to draw power and love into one embrace. 

Warm-Up Exercise

This  is a brief exercise for learning to see the world as  Orudu 
sees it.  First,  consider the ways the human body absorbs energy 
and  maintains equilibrium.  Recall how your body temperature  is 
regulated,  e.g.,  capillaries dilate to change blood flow to the 
extremities and skin temperature alters due to perspiration.
     Note  other aspects of metabolism.  The kidneys regulate the 
concentration of salt and ions and purify the blood. The pancreas 
insures an appropriate level of blood sugar.   The adrenal glands 
enable us to respond quickly in an emergency.  The lungs exchange 
oxygen  and carbon dioxide as we breathe.   The heart governs the 
strength  and  speed of blood flow.   And  the  digestive  system 
breaks down cabrohydrates into simple sugars. 
     Consider   also   these   mechanisms  which   regulate   the 
temperature  of  the planet--the currents and  tides  within  the 
oceans,  circulating winds and clouds, day and night, the axis of 
the planet in relation to the sun producing the seasons. Ice ages 
come and go;   ocean levels rise and fall.   Volcanic ashe hurled 
into  the  jet stream cools the earth for years at a time  as  do 
asteroids hitting the planet every few thousand years. 
     Imagine  some  of the extremes of temperature  and  weather.  
For example,  picture yourself on the top of  Mt.  Everest.   The 
wind  chill factor this evening as the sun sets is ninety degrees 
below zero.  Notice the colors, the wind, the ice and snow. 
     Now imagine walking through Death Valley in California.  The 
temperature today is a hundred thirty degrees above zero.  Notice 
the colors--reds,  browns,  ash, grays of chalky flaked and baked 
clay  as  tiles of dirt bend and are shaped by the  sun's  fierce 
heat.   Notice the low level of moisture in the air.   Notice the 
air  like  a  blast of heat on your face as when you open  a  hot 
oven.  
     Consider  too  different kinds of lava.  There is  the  fast 
flowing  lava which is more viscous than water.   Lava tubes form 
as  rivers of lava race underground.   Slower moving lava  creaks 
and  crackles  as  it moves--a small hillside  thirty  feet  high 
ambling along at two miles an hour.   Though slow,  it is massive 
and inexorable as it comes toward you.  Houses built in ill-fated 
suburbs  burst into flames before fingers of fire even reach  out 
to touch the painted wood. 
     Travel  with  me  to  visit  an  active  cinder  cone.   See 
vermilion  flames like gas storms hurled into the air and  driven 
by waves from lakes beneath the ground.  As the lava cools, black 
rocks  form a ragged sea spreading out to the horizon.
     Walk  with me now through a tropical rain forest on the  Big 
Island of Hawaii.   Pause as we stop to pick guava,  bananas, and 
mangoes.   The landscape is rich and full of the sounds of birds.  
The  blue ocean sparkles in the distance.   Yet all of this  land 
was formed from the fiery molten breath of volcanoes raging  with 
terrible pressure from beneath the earth.   The magma here raises 
mountains thirty thousand feet above the ocean floor. 
     The  land  itself  contracts and expands rising  three  feet 
as  the magma builds in fiery chambers not very far  beneath  our 
feet.  Heat is an intricate part of the earth.   It is the  force 
moving  continents and causing teutonic plates to  slide.   Pause 
for  a moment to consider the larger view--all the land masses of 
the earth are in motion.  Like our bodies,  the earth has its own 
energy systems and points of equilibrium. 

Introducing Orudu

Let  me now introduce Orudu,  one of the eight kings of the  fire 
element  on  earth.   I  create with my imagination a  circle  of 
flames,  intense, condensed, and dynamic. This circle is a pillar 
of fire carefully contained.   There is also a feeling in the air 
reminiscent  of  tectonic  pressures,  volcanoes  exploding,  and 
massive  fires.   In other words,  I contemplate the fires of the 
earth--gathering and distilling their essence into my room. 
     I  suggest  to  Orudu that he and I meet in  this  place  of 
intense heat.  Orudu is not as far away as you might imagine.  He 
never distant from a purpose which originates from spiritual will 
and  which concerns itself with the fire element.  
     Actually,  I have spent months attuning my mind to  Orudu's.  
Consequently, I do not check off each component in a long list of 
ritual procedures.  When you know something well, working with it 
becomes second nature. 
     Ah,  here he is now.   Orudu appears.  He is seven feet tall 
and of massive build.  Look at him.  Red colors radiate about him 
like  lakes  of  fire alongside a lava flow.   
     Orudu  has  a very strong forehead and a square  chin.   His 
back  contains incredible power.   There is a sea of fire  within 
his  strength.  It might be easy to become disoriented if I  were 
not  familiar  with his personality.   There is  a  terrible  and 
fierce will present, a will that both destroys and creates. 
     When Orudu speaks,  his voice echoes in loud and  thunderous 
words.  I imagine I could hear him easily twenty miles away.  His 
very  breath  carries  a force like magma  under  great  pressure 
breaking  free.  
     His eyes are a cross between a blow torch and a 
welding torch.  They are dazzling and their power is a 
great reminder, as if you needed any, that this is  a 
being from another realm--looking into his eyes is like 
looking into the mind and heart of a volcano. 
     It  is difficult in the presence of this being to not  begin 
to  see and feel whirlwinds of flame,  exploding  volcanoes,  and 
massive earthquakes as if you are standing in the midst of  them.  
Yet Orudu has a purpose,  a commission, and a work.  By his will, 
magma  moves  from deep in the earth to form a volcanic  mountain 
fifteen thousand feet above sea level.   There is little that can 
oppose him.  
     Take a moment to contemplate Orudu's nature.  Allow 
your heart and mind to become a vast, open, and luminous 
space like the sky.  Enter into a stillness great enough 
so that you can imagine a being such as Orudu safely 
drawing near. 
     It is easy enough to imagine that if someone,  in a dream or 
vision, ran into Orudu, he might be afraid.  He might feel he was 
facing  the mouth of chaos opening to reveal an abyss of  flames.  
But  there is no need for us to overreact or to be  melodramatic. 
Orudu  renders  a  service  to the  Earth.   He  is  one  of  Her 
assistants.  He is responsible for a small part of the biosphere.  
     Of  course,  when we witness a Mount St.  Helens or a  Mount 
Ruapehu hurling ash, steam, and dust into the atmosphere we might 
feel  overwhelmed  by  the sight of such raw  power.   An  entire 
forest  of trees may be destroyed in moments.   Lightning  storms 
thunder.  Shock waves rage over the surface of the world like the 
eye  of  a titan awakening and blinking after millions  of  years 
of  hybernation.  Red,  angry,  burning clouds of pulverized rock 
travel downwind for hundreds of miles.  
     Indigenous tribal leaders point out that this or 
that volcano is fulfilling a role. They say, for example, 
that the volcano is asserting its mana or authority over 
the land.  In other words, it is acting with intel-
ligence.  What for us is but natural phenomena is for 
them a drama enacted in a mythical landscape.  Its signi-
ficance and bearing affects our collective psyche. 
     We, however, belong to a modern world.  We have put 
aside mythology.  We no longer see ourselves participat-
ing in a cosmic pageantry of self-discovery and renewal.  
We no longer seek visions nor undertake quests to re-
create ourselves as we gaze into the magic mirror of 
nature.  We assume we have a monopoly when it comes to 
intelligence and exercising will.  
     Yet even now in this very moment as I write, scien-
tists are risking their lives daily to probe and reveal 
the mysteries of volcanoes.  They fly in flimsy, paper-
thin helicopters into the very jaws of the volcano to 
take samples of lava and gasses.  They take up residence 
in old, wooden hotels not far from the slopes leading up 
to the caldera.    
     They  sit out on their lanai's at dusk watching the  volcano 
knowing that if it explodes they will only have a few moments  to 
live.   These scientists venture beyond the boundaries of reason.  
Does  the scientific method require them to risk their  lives  in 
order to comprehend the powers of fire?  
     Of course, scientists are not bards and poets.  They 
do not construct metaphors to decipher the mysteries of 
nature. They use formulas. They analyze. They test hypo-
theses. They hold symposiums and they apply for research 
grants. 
     They teach. They do field research, but their resumes do not 
read:  "Possesses  high levels of empathy."  Rather,  they  study 
each  other's published research and strengthen their theories in 
response to criticism.   But they do not master dreamlike  states 
of  awareness  which attune their hearts to the subject they  are 
mastering.  Evocations are not part of their curriculum.   And it 
would it never occur to them to engage in conversations with  the 
energy which underlies natural phenomena. 
     But my point is still well-taken.  If you observe 
the behavior of many volcanologists, you will see that 
they act like men possessed.  Like a magician who has 
fallen under the sway of a diabolically beautiful undine,  
these scientists are held spellbound by the enchantments 
of fire.  They risk their lives, but they have no mytho-
logy. For them, volcanoes are neither sacred nor alive. 
     They will never think or say that a volcano symbol-
izes the uninhibited passion of the earth rising up from 
out of the depths.  But they are enthralled because the 
fire they scrutinize commands unknown passions within 
their souls--it evokes a source of life they have never 
known.  
     There  are  scientists  in  all  fields  of  endeavor  whose 
dedication  rivals  that  of the greatest  magicians.  They  make 
immense  sacrifices for the sake of their work.   They ask little 
or  nothing  for themselves--only that their sense of  wonder  be 
quenched  as they take possession of a sliver of knowledge  which 
has never before been known. 
     But whereas they deny their adoration for fire, 
insisting they are objective, impartial observers, and 
utterly neutral, I am more honest then they.  Fire is not 
just a power in the physical world.  Fire is where we 
forge our spiritual will--spiritual power is an actual 
substance we can learn to control.  
     I  am  not  writing about Orudu because I am  obsessed  with 
fire.   I am not driven to master occult or archane techniques of 
hermetics  because  I  am  fascinated  by  the   forbidden.    My 
motivation  derives  from this:  if we would master the  barriers 
separating  human  beings from each other,  we would do  well  to 
remember that we are not separate from nature.   The fog  rolling 
across the meadows and the dawn light breaking through, the trees 
drinking  in the sunlight--we can feel these too.   The devouring 
hunger,  the seemingly inhuman throbbing and pulse within  fire--
there  is  nothing within nature that does not  reveal  something 
hidden within ourselves. 
     Orudu, for all his immense power, is but a passion 
burning within our own souls.  He represents a respon-
sibility for the earth we have yet to assume. He is a 
power and a might lying dormant within our own wills. 
     Of course, others will argue that a salamander such 
as Orudu only belongs to fairy tales or, at best, to a 
supernatural order of the world--to a spiritual dimen-
sion.  They would insist that the kind of empathy I employ 
is best left in the hands of God.  
     Science,  on the other hand,  is legitimate.   It deals with 
truth because,  in the end,  all of its claims are established on 
an  empirical  basis.   What  we think as  individuals,  our  own 
beliefs  and  spiritual  awareness,   is  not  a  part  of   that 
verification process. 
     However, my position is that it is too late for 
leaving the knowledge of our souls in the hands of God 
alone.  We, and not God, have invented and built nuclear 
arsenals armed with the powers of fission and fusion.  We 
are the ones who use the heat generated by radiation to 
produce electricity.  It is our own human will which has 
already unlocked three of the four basic, primordial 
powers which sustain the order of the universe.                          
       Still, it is a great leap of imagination to 
envision how intelligence can interact with matter.  Our 
world culture is focused on the external world. It seems 
perfectly ordinary, for example, that a team of scien-
tists and technicians would spend fourteen thousand man 
hours in planning and launching the Voyager space probe.  
     And  yet,  in  another culture,  a single individual in  one 
lifetime, such as Kalu Rinpoche, will spend fourteen thousand man 
hours in exploring the powers of his own mind.  Rather than using 
scientists,   engineers,   and  industrialists,   he   visualizes 
holographic mandalas to study the workings of the inner and outer 
world.   Rather than using computers to correlate, calculate, and 
run  simulations,  he  evokes  within himself the  forces  active 
within the human psyche. 
     As we gaze into the fiery caldera of an erupting volcano, it 
is  another part of our mind and imagination which responds  than 
that  which science commands.  It is not so strange to imagine  a 
being  who  stands  behind this force of  nature--a  being  whose 
apprenticeship spans a billion years, a being whose commission is 
to  watch over the movement of continents and the equilibrium  of 
the planet earth.  
     Of  course,  this  is what you might expect someone  to  say 
whose interest is not just in philisophical understanding.   I am 
interested in the wisdom which underlies all scientific knowledge 
and all power which human beings may attain.  Concerning Orudu, I 
am  not someone taking others into an unknown world and revealing 
its  mysterious  treasures.   I am not  crossing  over  spiritual 
boundaries  at the peril of my soul.   We,  the human  race,  are 
already  learning to see through the eyes of stars and to utilize 
subatomic  particles  in our  industries  and  technologies.   We 
already  scrutinize,  experiment  with,  and apply the powers  of 
creation.  
     Perhaps,  then, we have much in common with Orudu. His scope 
of  activity encompasses the entire earth.   When our  scientists 
study  volcanoes  and try to predict  their  eruptions,  we  have 
already  invaded  Orudu's own thoughts and  dreams.   After  all, 
Orudu himself would smile in agreement when scientists say, "Like 
individuals, each volcano has its own unique behavior pattern."  
     You see, linkage between minds becomes inevitable. 
Our thoughts are not so different from his.  He senses 
and studies magnetism, electrical conductivity, and hypo-
thermic fields within volcanoes as do we. In fact, issues 
concerning the ozone layer, global warming, the level of 
the ocean, and the next ice age--which is already 
overdue--are concerns of his as well. 
     Perhaps  it is time we added another academic discipline  to 
our universities along with environmental and ecological studies. 
For  a  billion years,  Orudu has been doing biosphere  planning, 
architecture,  and  engineering.  Perhaps  this is  something  we 
should do as well if we wish live in peace on the earth. 

                     Orudu's Consort 

It is difficult to find a place to sit among these vol-
canic rocks.  Even though I am standing where the sea 
washes the shore during high tide, the rocks are still 
jagged.  The tides and surf have not yet worn smooth 
their sharp edges.  
     I  am  below the cliffs of Makapu'u on the island  of  Oahu.  
This  area is deserted.   Even fishermen rarely come here to  sit 
the night and fish from the shore.   I find a rock to sit on  and 
settle  down listening to the splashing waves and the howl of the 
wind.   I  reach  out with my mind and  begin  contemplating  the 
islands of Hawaii. 
     I feel the entire island of Oahu around me.  I feel 
the waves breaking on its beaches.  I feel a number of 
small pools which gather the water of the Ko'olau moun-
tains.  I see them.  I hear their sounds.  I taste the 
water.  I feel the sensations of the water flowing around 
my body.  
     I  gaze into the small valleys hidden away at the crests  of 
the  mountains.  I  gaze  also  at the bays and  sense  the  fish 
swimming within them.  I feel the island mass as it descends down 
to the ocean floor.  
     As  I contemplate all of this,  Orudu and his consort appear 
nearby.   Both  are in human form and are sitting five feet  from 
me.  We are next to a tide pool which is about thirty feet long.
     Orudu is virtually beaming with happiness and joy.  
He has that radiance which can still be seen in some 
Hawaiian men as they walk upon the land which is satur-
ated with the energy of their ancestors.  
     Orudu turns to me and says,  "Greetings.  I am not surprised 
you have found us.   This is a place of sacred power.   And there 
is a story to be found here which has never been told.  Gaze upon 
us,  why don't you, with your clairvoyant vision.  See if you can 
feel  as we do the beauty of this place.   Use your  voice  which 
searches for all that is hidden and fashion for us a poem. 
     The energy in the air is full of a wine fermented in a world 
where love and power are joined.   I compose this poem for  Orudu 
and the beautiful lady who sits by his side.   I take the liberty 
of speaking with Orudu's voice: 

                 The Pools of Makapu'u.

Three to six feet deep, ten feet 
From the razorsharp, rocky volcanic shore
The crests of the sea's pounding waves 
Nourish these pools
This is where I come to worship
Memories of what has been and what shall be
Cuping your head in my hands
You float naked
Ripples running from your body 
Across the mirrorlike surface
Returning again
From the edges of the pool
Striving to reach across your hips
To swirl in the crease
To circle and curve 
As they embrace your breasts
Set like a diamond in an emerald sea
Your body lit 
In each drop of water
Raging and sparkling with solar flame upon your skin, 
The bottom of the pool
Blue-green over saffron and rust sands, 
Manini, aholehole, humuhumu lei and a-pua'a also
Linger in the crevices
Cast here upon the surge at high tide, 
Your arms float by your sides
A pod of whales, two adults, two calves 
Frolic off shore
Breaching and spouting
Your legs slide beneath the surface 
Following the moon diving beneath the horizon
The high tide lets go its hold upon the shore.
The water is thick in these pools
Yet here the moist tongue's tip--
The taste of salt 
On your skin
The taste of desire 
Light dipping into water
The glow of fire
Water yielding 
Rippling shadows 
The dancing heat stroking 
The sun caressing your skin
Once each century 
I journey to these pools in mortal form
Just beneath Makapu'u's cliffs
But older than this island of Oahu 
I have risen from beneath the waves
Exploding, unfolding, flowing
From beneath the mantel of the earth
Yielding to my hunger
To build new islands
To expand from fiery depths
Concealed in mammoth lakes of fire
Who am I?
No bite, sting, tear, nor puncture
Can match the devouring hunger 
Flaring and imploding within my mouth,
When I cast off 
The garments concealing my shoulders
My strength appears: 
I am the one
Who rivets the land masses
To the continental shelves,
I am the one 
Who twists in his palm
The folds and valleys in the oceans' depths
Every last one of them
They surrender before my power: 
The tidal waves 
The titanic force rippling through the earth
When but for an instant 
I touch them in their sensitive place
As this woman
Who, in freedom, returns to me again and again
Yielding her love to me
Once each century we appear again 
In mortal form to celebrate
The beauty of these islands where we first met
I, a god of fire, one of eight elemental kings, 
And she, once a mortal woman,
She floats again in this pool
Held steady by my soft touch.
The fire in our love for each other 
Is unmatched by any other lovers on earth. 

When I am done, they smile at each other.  Their faces shine with 
dark passion and power.  I wonder if it might not be safer for me 
if  I  was  not  here--the  air is  suddenly  thick  with  static 
electricity.  But the woman stands up and embraces me.       
     She  says,  "We have met before in your dreams.  I see  your 
heart  has been healed of the wound it once had.   And I see  you 
have grown to love these islands.  They shine in your aura."
     I ask them, "Will you tell me the story of how the 
two of you met and fell in love?"
     Orudu says as he glances at his consort, "Why yes, I 
think we can do that."
     And  then laughing he says,  "And furthermore,  I think  you 
would  keep  pestering me forever until I finally  gave  in.  But 
another time would be better to tell you this tale.   Just now  I 
am  under  the spell of the light in my lover's eyes.   I do  not 
care to venture beyond the boundaries of this moment."
     Several weeks later I was camping alone in Haleakala Crater.  
It  was  just after dawn.   The night winds were  bitter,  bitter 
cold.  I  got up before dawn and did a little jig outside my tent 
in  a  feeble attempt to get warm.   Just then the sun  began  to 
rise above the clouds to the East.  Over to my right, I saw Orudu 
walking toward me. I felt his warm aura bathe my skin.  
     Orudu sat down near to me.   We talked for a while about the 
crater and the island of Maui.  Orudu then spoke, "I promised you 
a  story.  This is a good time and place to begin."
     And then turning his gaze inward for a moment as if 
looking back through time, he said, "This is how it 
was.  I was surveying these islands.  The actual process 
is not easily translated into human language.  
     "Put  simply,  I  was feeling the land with my  soul.   Even 
though  these islands have taken shape by the power of  my  will, 
any  act  of creation is always charged with wonder--and the  art 
inspired  by wonder is independent and shines with its own  life.  
My soul and the soul of the Earth blend and speak with each other 
through the energy flowing within the land.  
     "I felt a pulse in my right arm.   My muscles suddenly  felt 
weaker, my strength being siphoned off--something was distracting 
me from attending to my task.   There was another spirit here who 
was disturbing my concentration. Of course, it did not take but a 
moment to locate the source. 
     "I rose up from out of the earth to the surface. 
There was a woman, a member of your race, sitting on 
newly formed volcanic rocks not very far from the ocean.
     "I drew near to where she sat.  The ocean waves were 
breaking nearby, the tide was in.  Occasionally, sulfuric 
fumes, white and wind driven, drifted through the air.  
Paler and coarser than clouds or mist, they floated over 
the black landscape as if being nourished by the heart of 
the rocks.
     "I  turned  my full attention on this woman  whose  presence 
seemed to undermine my will.   She, like me, was sensing the land 
with her mind.   She was meditating on my craft and the works  of 
my  design.  She asked herself,  What spirit shapes the land with 
his  hands breathing his soul life into its forms and calling  it 
with a voice of power to rise from the sea floor?
     "Even  as she was asking herself these questions,  her mind, 
with  the  ease  of  a  spider  weaving  a  web,   was   cleverly 
constructing  an image of me.   Through some mysterious art,  she 
had begun to create my face in her heart.   I was almost  certain 
that  if I waited a little while longer,  she would begin singing 
an incantation or weaving an enchantment to call me forth.
     "This moment was like no other I have ever known.   I  began 
to feel her hands caressing my body,  her heart seeking mine, her 
mind  a clear crystal inviting the light of my spirit to enter it 
and shine within its radiant purity.
    "And  so,  in  this first impression,  I was  shaken  to  the 
depths.  As an earthquake cracks the rocks, its fingers searching 
into  every crevice and secret place,  this woman's heart slipped 
inside my soul.
     "I stepped back for a moment and pondered on this.  The mind 
that  forms tools is goaded on by pressing need.   The mind  that 
fashions  crafts  to  sail  the seas  is  drawn  by  longing  and 
curiosity.  The mind that seeks the herbs to heal disease desires 
to link the body and soul in harmony.   The minds of humans flash 
bright and brilliant or carry darkness and sorrow.  But rarely do 
humans  ever journey past the boundaries of their own  mortality.  
Their thoughts and lives,  whether preoccupied with the practical 
or the theoretical, are chained to their own desires and destiny.
     "The  eye receives light into a dark place,  shapes  images, 
and  then  cloaks  its visions in form and  substance.   The  ear 
captures  sound  in  a net of silence,  tracks harmony  into  the 
innermost lair where it hides to fashion new songs. 
     "The faintest touch and the nervous system is saturated with 
life  in the form of these opposites:   The sun is dazzling  with 
all the potentials of life;   the moon barren,  cold, and yet her 
silvery light guides all passions to places of delight;  and  the 
earth  is  a  womb where time and space put aside their  war  for 
supremacy--they  make  a truce and build a home so that life  can 
flourish in countless forms.
     "These three, I declare it: the sun, moon, and earth 
are one system of energy, one field of life.  The sun's 
boundless source of power is easily captured, contained, 
and toned down by its opposite--serene lunar mansions 
which sing in the tides and the seasons of the earth.  
And the earth nurses from her breasts all life, all seeds 
take root within her and find a place of birth.
     "These three are not incompatible nor disjunct as 
your religions on earth imagine.  Oh, I have watched the 
human race and considered its search for ideals.  Some 
religions make the moon the mother of life, worshiping 
her outside at night, reverencing her lunar light.
     "Others raise high steeples in praise of the solar 
Logos which shines by day and orders the world with 
reason.  Such would build and dominate the earth without 
a thought of how to nourish or to heal. 
     "Some attune themselves to plant and tree, animal, 
mineral, and the seasons. And also, there are religions 
which seek to master pure awareness without any reference 
to the external world or to nature--as if the Mystery 
could be discovered without studying its manifestations.  
You can imagine what I think of that! 
     "Yet none of these read gravity waves nor sense the 
tides which move the continents.  Each tries to deny the 
truth the others see.  Their hearts are not big enough to 
embrace the world. 
     "The sun has its seasons and tides flow upon his surface and 
currents through its depths.   The moon, a magic mirror, reflects 
the future and all that exists.   Her soul unfolds cycles of time 
in ways the sun can not imagine.
     "And  the  two together,  their gravity waves pulse  in  the 
land,  the mountains, the seas.  Electro-magnetic currents, solar 
winds,  the North Lights, the North and South poles, the aligning 
of  ions and energy fields in rocks and trees,  these intermingle 
and taste each other's breath.
     "I  have watched this for countless  eons:  power  exploding 
from the source, flowing back upon itself, and then flowing forth 
into  the  receptive.   The gentle waves and the  absorbing  seas 
drink  in this heat inviting the raging hunger in solar winds  to 
offer even more.  The land and seas respond with passion to every 
desire  within  fire and yet never surrender their own depths  of 
tranquility and peace.
     "Why  then,  I  asked myself,  if this is the order  of  the 
universe,  why should I exist without a compliment?   Is there no 
opposite of myself, no one whose passion matches my own? Is there 
not  a  soul  that shines with such light that I  can  find  rest 
within  her arms?  Is there no mate whom I may seek whose needs I 
satisfy  in a way which is unique and complete?  These  questions 
were born within my mind like heat lightning in an empty sky when 
I gazed upon her face."
     "As  I  watched this woman,  I realized she did not make  me 
feel weak.  Rather, I just felt young again.  As she contemplated 
the origins of these islands, I recalled my own birth billions of 
years before--
     "When I awoke,  the world was volcanic,  fiery, and wild.  I 
knew that my task was to bring meaning to chaos--to provide order 
and harmony.  I was to watch over the forces separating the lands 
and  seas.   I  was  to shape and arrange  the  continental  land 
masses.   By my will,  mountains arose or crumbled back into  the 
seas.
     "It  is I who uncorked volcanoes and left them raging for  a 
million  years.   It is I who spoke to them with my voice and bid 
them sleep again.   Such is my power--it is I who designed,  laid 
the  foundations,  and then compartmentalized time so it took  on 
the form of geologic ages.   The rays of the sun shining clear or 
shaded,  the ice poles and ice ages, the jet stream and the trade 
winds, the climate of the world obeyed my will.
     "I  recalled my youth.   I was free to explore the world and 
to discover who I was and the nature of my powers.  It was a time 
of unbridled passion and delight.   The exhilaration was  immense 
when  I closed my hand into a fist and watched a land mass buckle 
and twist.  How exhalted I felt in fanning magma with my  breath, 
pressing  it  up through the faults and cracks until  a  mountain 
exploded  when I shouted `Now.'  I felt all of this as I  watched 
her sitting there, as I watched the workings of her spirit."

(Note: for the rest of this story, see my forthcoming book on 
elemental beings.)


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