Short Stories

Performance Texts

Autobiography

Some stories are medicines, balms for wounds, wisdom bundles & guides back to reconnection with the Deep Self. Shaman-bards journey into the 'otherworld' , undergo terrible & beautiful initiations, bring back these experiences & weave them into tales for others. The stories from which these extracts are taken are not literary fantasy but are synthasised & condensed from very real experiences. These are gifts from one world to another.

from SWAMP TEARS & FRAGMENTS OF BONE

[...] Just as the painful agony was becoming too much to bear, I was transported into a twilight world - a marshland at the edge of a dark forest. The pain slipped from me as a gown. Tall rushes and sedge grass cast elongated shadows that crept across the sodden Earth like menacing fingers, and the air was chilled, moist with mist. I could only just make out the toad, barely perceptible in the deepening gloom, a little way ahead of me, leaping from area to area of the perfidious ground, bidding me follow. Tentatively, I picked my way, careful to tread only where the toad had indicated for fear of sinking into the treacherous open mud-mouths, ever ready to swallow. The ground became more dry and stable as I approached the line of trees into which the toad had vanished, and with certain trepidation, I entered the dark space beyond the evergreen archway.

This forest was like no other. The thin, vapoured chilliness of the forest’s edge fell away as I entered the tangle of trees and bracken, the air becoming heavy, thickly sweet and pungent. The canopy of tree growth screened off the sky, and my way lit only by thin shafts of light intermittently piercing its density. Slowly, I groped my way in the darkness, stumbling over moist, spongy fern and mossy carpet, deeper and deeper into this shrouded enclosure. Louder and louder grew the sound of the forest’s breath, inhaling and exhaling in heart-broken sighs. The entire place seemed overcome with grief, suspended in an intense state of mournfulness. The trunks, branches, roots, undergrowth and plant stuff were all throbbing, heaving in a tormented, twisted-limbed tableau of agony. As I exhaled in rhythmic unison with the weeping, timeless forest, partaking of her burden, my heart was heavy also. It was as if all the forgotten sorrows and broken promises of the whole world were contained here. All the unacknowledged hurts, shattered dreams, lost hopes, all the scars from those things cut too deep and wounds that never healed – the Lady Forest mourned for them all. Teardrops fell unceasingly from black branches to form verdant pools upon the forest floor, and as I paddled through these tear swamps, I too, began to sob. I sobbed for long lost things that I really no longer remembered.

Inhaling, exhaling, still in unison with her, the sorrow growing ever more intense, the pressure weighing heavier, and yet still heavier, my movements slowed. The desire to fall asleep, curl up in this dark burden-basket, was overwhelming me, for also within the rhythm of hypnotic contraction there lay an exquisite beauty - magickal, mesmerising. And the place became an enchanting space oozing a strange, rich sensuality, an erotic somnolence. It was with a great force of will that I moved my feet across the soggy, squelchy, bepuddled ground. My movements became as one in sleepwalk and I was unsure as to whether I was even moving at all. My hand seemed to be touching the slimy, lichen covered tree trunk I had used to steady myself some time before, as my head swam with the narcotic scent of evergreen and fungi. The sound of dripping water and the heaving breath engulfed me as I inhaled and exhaled, sighing in lamentation with the ancient forest.

Then something – I know not what – jarred my senses awake just as I was slipping into a forgetfulness from which I may not have awoken. My own breath quickened and fell out of synchronic rhythm with the forest’s breath. A shaft of light penetrated the gloom and struck a tree tear, suspended and about to fall from a branch close by. Through heavy-lidded and half-closed eyes I was just able to descry a perfect tiny rainbow arch held within its liquid form. Slowly, and with a heaviness of limb, I shook myself awake, and almost instantaneously, my eyes adjusted to the chiaroscuro of my surroundings. Thereupon, I noticed, with a certain delight, that all the tears falling from the sombre boughs shimmered with rainbows. Here, in the deepest, darkest torments of despair, a visual song of hope now played upon my retina.

Within a few seconds, I became bewildered by the trunk under my hand, for not only wasn’t it the same tree trunk, but, indeed, it was like no other tree trunk I had ever before touched. The surface of its slimy bark was slipping and writhing beneath my palm. There was a sound, akin to the screeching of crazy birds and the creaking of aged wood, barely audible at first, then becoming increasingly louder. To my horror, I felt the tree roots curl around my ankles, tightly binding me, cutting into my flesh like leathern straps and pulling me downward. The wet earth became as a cauldron swamp, gurgling, seething, and I was sinking into it. I struggled in vain. Other tendril led roots curled around my thighs and waist and I was being gripped by a long-fingered hand, a hand most ancient, gloved in green lichen, that wanted me for its own. A smell of mildewed rot and decayed fungi filled my nostrils as the gnarled hand ripped me through the black Earth and swallowed me beneath its surface. The atmosphere below ground was a thick, suffocating sweetness, the nauseating sweetness of death, and I retched and choked as it entered my lungs.

Thus, entombed within the Earth, my senses reeling and body trembling, I recognised the sound, now louder still, to be a cackling, sinister laughter, sharp and cold. As my eyes became accustomed to the velveteen moist darkness, I saw that I was within an earthen cave of sorts, an ancient burial mound, strewn with human skulls and bones. Millions of maggots and strange insects were feeding upon the tiny fragments of flesh and sinew still attached to bone, and the once-filled eye sockets of skulls stared up at me blankly [...]

from GREY STONES & FEATHERED QUILL

[…] Stalemate! Intuitively, I felt one thing, logically, quite another. My will was suspended in indecision, unable to move in either direction, and to make a choice at this stage would be killing the alternative, and, maybe, the alternative would prove to be right, and any selection made, wrong. Thus, so frightened by the prospect of making a choice, of coming down upon one side or the other, I was caught in conflict; it was like being tangled in the sinews still connecting the mask of a face that was being ripped apart into two separate halves.

I grew to despise each side of this face, attempted to dismiss both hemispheres, due to the torment this situation was causing me. So there became five of me - an intuitional half, a logical half, a being trapped between, an immobile commander, and a merciless observer. The condition persisted. My feeling became acutely sensitised, my intellect fervent, my pain agonising, my will impenetrable and my sharp awareness cut deep with disdain - all in conflict within my being. I sat counting and sorting beads in uniform rows, ordering outside what I couldn’t do internally.

A moment of stillness. I cut the strings of a puppet attaching it to outward circumstance and I let myself fall into a world within a world.

A raven, jet black and silken-feathered, eyed me with curiosity as I attempted to trace, in the dust on a broken piece of blue slate, the three interlocking triangles of an ancient symbol . Raven's twinkling blue eyes betrayed a hint of mocking amusement. The bird was a hard taskmaster. Each time I made a formation, he flapped his great wings and swooped, pecking my hand with the point of his sharp, hard beak to show his dissatisfaction with the imperfection of the design. Already my hand was pitted and bloody.

There was a certain specific order as to how the design should be traced which seemed to be eluding me. Again and again I drew the triangles each time in a different order, and each time a new wound was inflicted. My companion never appeared to weary of the sport, unlike myself. I had tried so many ways, unsuccessfully, that the solution was beginning to feel utterly hopeless, and I was becoming increasingly dispirited. The flesh of my hand was raw and broken, gritted with dirt and so very sore.

Just when I was about to abandon my task, the correct sequence of marking was discovered, almost as if by accident. Raven gave me a side-ways glance; I gave a sigh of relief. ”Where there’s a Will, there’s a Way“ and ”If at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again“ he cawed. It was not yet quite dawn, but that strange betwixt and between time. The sun had not fully risen and the shadows not yet retreated. The furrowed fields lay waiting and the narrow chalk road was the only thing distinctly visible. It slanted upwards with a gentle incline, and raven hovered before me, a black silhouette against the white. ”Come, come, follow me,“ he beckoned [...]

from ACHMARDI

[...] At the far end of the passageway a ball of light, a rainbow vortex of colour, manifested from nowhere and moved toward me. As it neared, the four rooms and archways suddenly imploded to become tiny specks of quartz particles that glistened, to be embedded in the white walls of the passage: Jewels of Earth, Air, Fire and Water. Light became dazzling as the multi-hued kaleidoscope, filled the hallway, pulsing, oscillating, vibrating closer and closer. Trembling, my perceptions acute now, my panic rising, I turned to flee. My Warrior smiled and slowly shook his head.

Turning back I was engulfed by the throbbing mandala of colour. The beating of Heart, the rhythm of Breath, the rise of Heat, the wave of Caress. Strange patterns of desire, a somatic pulse, sensual delight, the caress of Love overwhelmed me, entered me, soared me into unimaginable Ecstasy. The orgasmic climax shook all universes that ever were, are or will be. As I floated in after-glow, the sphere of light that enveloped me slowly faded and vanished. Yet something still held me so very tenderly. Opening my dewy eyes I realised that my body was entwined with that of the Warrior, both of us shimmering moist with perspiration. Such a beauteous satiated embrace has no words and we unfurled from one another only after the seemingly passing of many centuries.

Our surroundings had transformed. We were in the landscape, sitting close to the iron bridge by the river watching the ripples wrinkling across the surface of the water. It was darker, the sky cloaked in tarnished pewter and the water like black ink, mirroring a few stars from above. From time to time a head bobbed up to break the skin of the river, or a tiny hand waved, or a foot poked through. Then, I started. That horrible dark elongated face of nightmare portraiture was reflected here again in the dark waters. I turned, but though no other was seen, I felt a distinct menacing presence of someone, or some thing, lurking in the shadows. My gaze returning to that awful face, floating like a mouldering sore, blacker than the black water, I shuddered in recognition. Here was the thing that had made the water stop coursing, dammed it, poisoned it, made it to stink into stagnation, intent upon strangling all life, all creative flow. Here floating upon the surface of the river below the river was the spectre of the Murderer of Mind, the Assassin of Art.

My Warrior rose and waded into the water, thigh high, drew the blade and cut the apparition into pieces until it all sank somewhere to the depths below. He then bent forward with cupped hands and became statuesque in his immobility. Suddenly he moved as a lightning flash, plunged his hands into the dark river and tossed a wet form at me. It lay beside me on the bank, a tiny sodden baby, naked and twisted of form, its face screwed like something aged, the black river seeping from the corner of its mouth. I touched it with one finger. It writhed. There was some life in it yet. I cradled its cold form, examined it. There was some beauty in it yet, so I lay it compassionately on the bank, and I joined my Warrior in the bizarre midnight fishing.

Many babies of art were there. Some dead, some aborted, some malformed, some barely alive. Some we threw back, some we hurled upon the bank. Emerging from the river, long did we kneel beside the pile of little wriggling bodies, all blue-white with cold, all wet and slimy, all so very pitiful, all tiny pearls of exquisite promise. Though they stunk of the putrid river, under the stars, in this desolate landscape, they had such an unearthly and delicate loveliness that I had the sense I was beholding a mound of precious treasures. With a tear in my eye, I raised my head and looked into the eyes of my Warrior. Such warmth was there, such tenderness in the gentle smile. He kissed my brow before removing my cloak, whereupon he carefully wrapped the babies in it and then handed the bundle to me [...]

from CRYSTALLINE DEEP & RING OF MAGICK

[...] Holding the black, smoky quartz between my palms, there was a languid sensation of slight side-ways shift as I sank into its crystalline depths. Everything pulsed to the rhythm of slow heartbeat as an icy-cold freshness permeated my being. An atmosphere of solidified silence enfolded me, holding me in perfect stillness. The Veil parted …

I found myself standing, statue-like, upon crisp white snow at the edge of a frosted mountain range, over which draped a shroud of translucent mist. The air was electric, orchestrated with the tinkling of a billion frozen liquid molecule notes in collision; the snow, a covering of sparkling, flashing neon ice-diamonds. My skin tingled and tightened. My exhaled breath hung as a cloth before me and bore resemblance to the misty shroud draping the mountain peaks.

I called, in ancestral tongue, for help and guidance. Within moments a large she-wolf, with flowing black and silver fur, tentatively emerged from the shadowy rocks. She kept her distance, pacing from side to side, her paw tracks forming inter-laced patterns in the snow. As she locked her piercing green-jewel eyes with mine I felt the stirring of something familiar, yet, long, long forgotten. We were penetrating each other, reading each others soul. But more than this, we were experiencing each other directly. I became aware of her gentleness, her deep knowing and instinctual cunning; yet I also felt her fear, mistrust and acute loneliness. These feelings, engendered within me by encountering the beautiful she-wolf, magnified in intensity. I experienced the pain, the longing and heartbreak of all wild estranged things, the separation, isolation of numerous sentient beings. Compelled, I fell to my hands and knees upon the snowy ground, as within me, a howl, like an ancient song in a dream, rose, swelled and released itself - an existential cry in the wilderness.

As I stood, the breeze stirred. Snow particles began to dance in circles across the ground, spinning like Catherine Wheels, slowly at first, then faster and faster. There came, of a sudden, a fierce rush of cold, bitter wind and with the scream of the wind came the she-wolf, charging straight at me, lips curled, teeth barred and eyes ablaze. Though it appeared she was about to go for my throat, I did not move, could not move. She leapt, and the bulk of her body passed straight through me. I felt her as she did so again, from the back, landing gracefully upon all four paws in front of me. It was a strange, indescribable sensation, like being solid, then liquefying and becoming solid again. She went to the right of me, leapt, passed to the left, then, again, left to right, from front to back, threading in and out, weaving around me. I swayed, astonished. She had tested my intent, my trust, and now mingled her energies with mine. The wind gradually subsided and the silent stillness returned. Standing in the wintry landscape, dazed and filled with an inexplicable pulsing, though the place was very cold I was woven with the warm glow of the primitive, ribbon-ed with the green fire of wilderness. And it was a remembering [...]

from RED OF TOOTH & CLAW

[...] Of a sudden, an eerie glow began to generate around me; a primal luminosity emanating, or so it seemed, from my person. Glancing down at my hand I became aware that the carnelian stone was pulsing, sourcing the strange light, and that the coiled serpent in which the stone was set, writhed. And, in the increasing light from this fiery eye, patina of bark became a contortion of a billion petrified screaming death masks. Globules of thick red life-blood dripped from black branches. Tendrils and vines were severed nerve-endings, arteries and intestines, tangled together and quivering spasmodically. Shuddering on beholding such baneful and macabre imagery, onwards I staggered deeper into the place, for to stop or flee I somehow knew would surely be disastrous. The fog swirled and was retreating into the earth. Deeper, into the black forest I went, and as I went, disengaged ebony shadow-shapes lurked, crept through the trees along my way, watching, stalking, tracking me.

Suddenly, I caught a small flash of white out of the corner of my eye and turned the direction of my step to investigate further. The menacing shadow-shapes closed in around me as I peered down into a mass of tangled thorny briars. To my horror I found myself looking straight into the terror-filled wide staring eyes of a tiny child. She crouched within this enclosure trembling, with her knees pulled up tight to her chin. Her hair was matted and she was naked and dirty. So very thin was she that her body was just mere skin covering skeletal form. I was so distressed at the sight of her that a torrent of tears burst from me and gushed down my face, splashing down upon her and causing pale areas to form on her mud caked flesh. I stood there, not knowing what to do, and as I looked down upon this forlorn creature, I noticed her eyes held a hope, a certain trust and a desperate plea. In an instant, those eyes widen still further and began to dart to and fro in extreme agitation and, when I looked about me for that which may have caused such nervousness, there were the shadow-shapes, encroaching upon us. In a low grunted chant of ”Die! Die! Die!“ they threatened in a malevolent mime of stamping, tearing, ripping, stabbing motions, and all the time, their ghostly demonic anti-forms looming larger and larger.

The ring burnt hot upon my finger and an unexpected and terrible surge of energy rushed through me. Two great blood-red, sharp-clawed paws came up over my shoulders and instinctively, with flashing speed, lashed out at the nearest shadow-shape. It let out a shrill screech as it perished, burnt to a cinder, leaving nought but a tiny pile of ash upon the forest floor. The others, upon witnessing this, scurried hurriedly away, retreating and merging into the forest blackness.

I was shaken, my heart pounded wildly, head tingled and skin prickled. I had just experienced the awesome violence of the energy with which I had been empowered and it unnerved me. I grew afraid of the realisation that it was possessed of a will, ways and means of its own, and that it was independent of any conscious decision or control on my part. Before I could really begin to regret the requesting such a terrible power, something restrained my thoughts and said, ”Stay with me!“

The child whimpered and it was evident that she had been attempting to dig herself into the ground with her fingers to escape the shadow-shapes. Her nails were broken, earth-black and bleeding. Despite the fact that I was still trembling, I managed to smile reassuringly down at her and open my arms. In an instant she leapt straight through the tangled briar and hung limpet-like about my neck. She was so light, so unbelievably fragile and so, so cold. I held her close, warming her tiny body with mine, and as we moved forward my step became exceptionally agile, surprisingly lighter, as if this forest child was gifting me something of herself. No longer did I trip, but delicately, and with surety of footing, picked my way over the veins and sinews of the forest floor. The now muted and softened glow of the ring lit our way [...]

from BY DEERFOOT & MOONLIGHT

[...] Together we walked to the old wooden door of the cottage. As we came to halt before it, it creaked open, slowly, and before us stood an old woman with hands on hips and wearing a long black gown. She was bony, ancient and of sanguine complexion. Her silver hair, woven with leaves, tumbled about her shoulders and fell almost to her knees; two thin braids framing her face. Fixing me with clear grey eyes, she spoke not a word for what seemed an age; and, for my part, I knew not what to say. Frowning, she looked me up and down, then finally broke the silence with a scolding: ”What a state you’ve made of yourself!!! “

I looked down, and for the first time became aware that, beneath the cloak, I wore but threadbare and grubby rags. But worse still, was the realisation that I had no hands, just bloody stumps ending at the wrists! I let out a whimper, and with that the old woman roughly grabbed me and dragged me inside, the little deer following on my heels. The cloak was hung upon a hook, and my other sorry attire ripped from my body and cast into the fire. I was told to sit on a couch whilst she prepared hot water for a bathtub that she had dragged from behind a door and set before a blazing log fire.

Sitting, naked, sipping a bowl of steaming hot green liquid held precariously between bloody stumps, I watched the old woman carry kettles of boiling water and communicate to the baby deer in a language of looks and hardly perceptible nods. My surroundings, though simple, were homely, with patch-worked quilts, ragged rugs on scrubbed boards, bundles of herbs strung from beams and the whole place was filled the aroma of bread and apples.

The drink, though sweet, had a bitter under-taste, and as it began to affect me, I panicked. The room began to throb, its colours spun and a loud roar inside my head began to obliterate all other sound. My limbs began to twitch, flail out of control, as I became caught up in the violent throes of a catharsis. The old woman had hold of my hair, had wrapped it around her fist in a knot and into a bowl I vomited a poison of black putrid liquid. I fell into a faint, and when I came to, recovered enough senses, I discovered myself laying upon the floor before the hearth, the baby deer nearby, watching, with a tear in its eye.

Upon instruction, I entered the bathtub to have the old woman scrub me so vigorously I thought my skin would peel off. Then, having dried my body and hair with a large towel, she pulled a starched white gown over my nakedness. She proceeded to rub the places where my hands had once been joined with green leaves and herbs before bandaging them with linen strips. Sitting on the rug before the flickering log fire and she in a rocking chair above me, I was attentive as she opened a large leather bound book and began to read a tale. It was a sad tale, about a man-child who had been injured and had lost his sweetheart, who had searched the land for her, endured many hardships, trials, and unspeakable cruelties, had sobbed and sobbed, had called her name over and over, but had had no reply [...]

from STRINGS OF A SUSPENDED HEART

Bare boards, and then, a dark figure from which light shines. Aa macabre marionette twists and writhes in agonising dance, slow time, between drapes of densest black and shadowed space. Vacant opals for eyes, through which no soul is glimpsed, lost in a white plaster face that grimaces in mockery of a heart that lies elsewhere. Delicate hands, like the claws of birds, tear the air to ribboned shreds and beckon, beckon. Through speakers, a synthesised song, a wail, a mournful cry, is echoed. And from a distance, from somewhere unseen, a sigh upon a breath vibrates along strings invisible.

The crowd watch, listen, mesmerised. Vampiric voyeurs of pain and death, palely loiter with sick desire to satisfy nothing but a hunger to be entertained for a short while, seeking for a tremor of a thrill. The doll, painted eccentric, neurotic, erotic, is manipulated to appease, to coyly flirt, to enter into a twilight midnight excuse for a connection – a solicitous communion. Delighted by the show, by the Gothic eeriness of sound, by shrouded esoteric words, by the sight and plight of the sad, sinister little puppet, the vacuous crowd cheers, applauds and throws coins aplenty, and then - they leave.

A sigh upon a breath. Iin the shades of a space where people once were, a crippled boy kneels and packs the doll away in a box. He knows the crowd are only desirous of a shadow play, a masquerade; only love vicariously what they believe to be real, sentient, for a short spell of time. There is no warmth in the hands applauding the marionette for the puppet-maker, and he sheds a tear. Though contemptuous of their blindness, still yet, his pain too much to bear, he becomes the marionette that he has fashioned [...]

from ANTLERS, APPLES & CRIMSON BLOSSOM

It was just a face upon a screen, a fractured movie progressing mechanically in a succession of stills - and it was just typed words pausing for response from other typed words broken by those inevitable time delays - communication inorganic, lacking in tonal values or the energy interchange of humans in close proximity. Conversation thrice, or more, removed from the natural, meagre hints of unreleased signs and meanings that dispersed before the grasping and precluding space to ponder. It’s unreality, in some real sense, unnerving.

My senses, however uncomfortably aligned to the medium, were also pleasurably stimulated. The face, captured within the frame, was a strange mixture of a delicate chiseling and a substantial molding, ruggedly Romanesque and not without a certain appeal. Likewise, the words I received, though clumsily sentenced, gave indication, if not to intelligence, to a seemingly definitive romanticism and a disarming modesty. And though sparing, these words begot images in the eye of my mind, of kisses and tender embraces, of moonlit nights and a cottage in the woods.

Something about this encounter in cyber-space was beginning to hold a strong fascination for me and oft I would hover around the computer like a firefly awaiting the next message. When, for several days, none came I grew distressed and to my chagrin realised I was forming a bizarre emotional obsession for someone I had never even met. I say ”someone“ but it was just a face upon a screen, just typed words - unreality in a world thrice removed, or more, and divorced from this.

Disconcerted, bewildered, and not a little concerned for my sanity, communication resumed briefly, went array, then curtailed. The emotion that had been thus awakened, however, did not stop, but grew ever more intense. All efforts at quelling it proving useless, I could do nothing but surrender to its storm. When the trembling started, when I found myself curling into fetus position, sobbing, or pacing the floor in agitation, I knew the root of the experience was lying elsewhere.

By now I was an accustomed and seasoned huntress, knew how to jangle a question for it to yield hints of answers, and how to pull threads of circumstance to attract synchronistic clues. Furthermore, I had forged powerful allies in the dark worlds below. I set out on the quest like a pig snuffling for truffles, or a bat fine-tuning its radar to beam in on prey.

Within a circle of light the garment of self was cast aside and the fiery body moved in slow time, twirling, whirling downward, toward the Gates of Anwwn.

I was expected. A great mass of tangled tree roots, like an iron jaw, rose before me encircling a black hole, and there, at the portal to the dark worlds, stood my Lord, majestic and shining, his cloak billowing in the breeze, his antlers moist and shimmering with moon dew. Our eyes met and love sparked the night. Unhurriedly, he strode toward me, his hooves thudding softly upon the black earth, his bare white skinned chest rising and falling, muscles rippling with each breath. Tenderly, oh, so tenderly did he encircle me with his arms and we danced the spiral through space and time toward the answer to my question. Eventually, all motion ceased, and we stood, hand in hand, in the driveway of that awful house [..]