14. In Maya's Eyes I See

I am safe in Maya's arms.

Safe.

Safe.

I stare into Maya's eyes and I see all. All there is to know. All about me. All about my Purpose. All about Everything. I see a perfect world of peace and I know how to make it real.

I know All.

I am All.

I stare into Maya's eyes and I See All. But the roar of the world is crashing down upon my soul, crushing me in its unrelenting march into the future. It is burying me in its certainty. Devouring me in its justice. I am lost in its relevance.

Maya turns my face back to face her eyes. I stare into Maya's eyes and I see...I see...I try to see who I am.

"Think, Ward," she whispers. "Remember what you already Know..."

Vague uncertainties drift beyond my perception. I see huddled masses reaching upwards with blood-stained hands. A hundred billion lost souls. I see their silent screams pouring out of gaping, toothless grimaces.

They are calling for comfort.

They are begging for a better life.

They are pleading for peace.

I feel the hot breath of their pleas pressing upwards against my face, and it suspends me in the air far above them.

"Answer them, Ward," Maya whispers.

"I..." I moan as the weight of the heavens press down upon me, and it overcomes the buoyancy of humanity's hopes. I am plummeting from a great height.

I feel Maya's fingertips upon my face. She is trying to keep me from turning from her gaze, trying to keep me from losing my balance.

But I am cascading down, caught up in the raging fury of thunder and storm, and a grasping gravitational pull is spinning me around and around, veiling me in confusion, blinding my perceptions, dissipating the urgency of my existence as I tumble and dive, uncontrollable, inconsolable.

I am descending upon the musky breath of humanity. Its earthy familiarity bathes me in reassurance, and I try to reach out in empathetic understanding, but I am suspended above their numbly outstretched hands, unable to touch their hearts.

They are reaching up for forgiveness, trying to let me soothe their pain, but the raging stormy outbursts that have delivered me, have filled the air with electricity. It bursts in paralyzing shocks and surges through the mob, causing their hands to flail in spastic twitches, leaving me helplessly swimming above the tide of their grasping reach.

I feel the gentle caress of their lingering desire beneath the tingling sensation that rushes through their collective fingertips. But their humanity is an ocean, and I am tossed in its waves for all eternity, and as we are caught in the web of time, their fleshy digits are slowly armed with unforgivingly sharp taloned cuticles.

I roll and spin and wince as they unknowingly and unintentionally rip at my skin. They tear at my soul. And the blood of guilt and shame pours down over their eyes, increasing their blindness, increasing their pain, leaving them listless and lifeless. But the electrocuting surge of emotion will not cease, and their arms are locked in parasitic tetanus.

The roar is growing louder. Something is approaching. It is those from whom I've been hiding. They pour down upon us in floods of fury. The masses disperse. They stampede outward in every direction to escape the flood of their own desires.

I dam the waves with my soul. The pressure is so very great against my mind, but I hold my breath, and my sacrifice helps me to bear the pain. I call to them. I try to reassure them. But the stampede crushes humanity's hopes, and we are all washed away in the tide.

I am swept beneath the waves as I give in to time. I am choking, drowning, sinking to the bottom, pulled downwards by the weight of my own indifference.

But as I numbly settle into the seabed of my apathetic horizon, Maya swims by, armed with a lifeline that stretches down from a future yet to be and yet always present. She wraps it around my heart and gently tugs, then firmly holds on as my muscles resist in their newfound rigor mortis.

She lays me down upon the bottom of this empty sea, and fixes my lifeless gaze upon my bold reflection in her eyes, while she breathes a sweet breath of life into my lifeless lungs.

I awaken from my death of disappointment, coughing, sputtering, gasping. The world is quiet and still, and my awareness of it is alluring, and it tempts me to explore its dark and hidden secrets.

Quickly, Maya firmly holds my head so that I cannot look away. I stare into her eyes.

"Think, Ward," she begs, "Focus on that vision of peace on earth," she whispers urgently, and she struggles in vain to hold my attention.

It has all been in vain, for I am too weak, and I cannot see my reflection in her eyes any longer.

Above us I see the fishermen's net thrown out to catch me. They have found me. The net wraps around my curiosity, and yanks me from the safety of Maya's embrace.

I shiver at first, missing the warmth of her body, realizing I'd never noticed how comforting it had been until its radiance could no longer bathe me in its glow.

Maya tries to tear a hole in the net for me to escape. But the fishermen see her through the prism of water, and another net is cast upon its surface. As the weight of its intent pulls the net downward, she tries to swim from its embracing grasp. But it follows after her, with a purpose and fervor, as if she were its sole purpose for being and it would not be denied its wedding night.

She swims and she thrashes at the water and I watch, but I do not see what is happening until the moment is gone, and the net just suddenly stops its pursuit of her illusion; unfulfilled it is pulled to the surface.

Maya quickly reverses her retreat, and thunders upwards towards me. But it is too late. They have nearly pulled me to the boat.

"Ward!" she cries, a siren's plaintive song that drifts in and out of my awareness as I gasp and choke in the frozen water that is so filled with the bitter stench of my own weakness.

 



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