for the absence of rain

By Ric on March 13, 2007 in Archetypal, Archetypes, Austin Poetry, Jungian Studies, Modern Poetry, Movies, Myth, Mythology, Mythopoetry, Politics, Psychology, Texas Poetry, mythopoetics, poetry

& what leaves
having
been

round
the grave
of hard dreams

***

say what unsays
the unsaying of what
says too much of wanting

did she ask for anything
did the mountain
fall just there

to be a cut
in this
river

who sees inside
a knot of
bones

in a hollow
of a deep
running

clean of shame
perfect in
waiting

***

she says
love steals
nothing at all

& he who knows
no world must
always stay

o what aching
to see so
clearly
&
know
how clear
it is to be &
yet they turn
in clouds & weep
for the absence of rain

on Pan’s Labyrinth, one side of a conversation with Stephanie Pope
my take based on James Hillman’s work
& other readings which i
now do not recall

so let’s begin working this
& we are thinking by writing . . .

child molestation or child rape
which means an inversion of infantilism

(the child “transforms everything passing over the threshold into its own condition”
Hillman Loose Ends, p. 21)

& with that quote we have to be very careful about who this Pan is
seen only thru the eyes of a child & the sexuality we see
becomes perverse because it is alien to the child

Pan was a tester in the sense that Satan was a tester in Job
Pan was the adversary in the sense that whatever you believed strongly
whatever you held too tightly to he would threaten
he would show you what you would not see
what you refused to see in your
ONE WAYness

Pan was the tester of mono-vision

in this world (fascism & fanaticism) only the child is open to a point of view
that varies from the accepted bifurcation though as a child
she has already been inculcated in the Catholic
& bourgeois world of the infantile view
of nature (faeries & benevolent father)
even as her soul is keenly aware of
cruelty & deception of
the seemingness of
things that belies
deadlier intentions

this Pan tests the soul of the child in the usual way Pan tests us:
in panic it is not death he shows us, but loss of life
to Pan life is all
continuation of
soul is life

the adoration of being is what matters
Pan, being immortal, has no fear of death
but nor is he alive in the sense of being human
so what he values is life

he tests to see if your belief (in this world) actually supports LIFE
fear truncates life & he hates that which thru greed etc. denies life (the toad)

in this case what does the child fear?
the loss of her mother, of her father, of her own childhood . . .
the final test: will you stay the same (be dead) (a child) at the cost of life?

no she will not . . . so she will not be dead . . . even as she dies
(this is somewhat counter to a Pan that loves life for Job was restored but Job was a man . . .)

Moana is a girl child
a princess lost to life
a goddess herself, immortal as Pan . . .
so is this, again, a Christ story, a version of Jesus & the Devil
in the desert for 40 years (reduced to 10?)
political power/righteousness
a temptation of Christ?

this Pan is adversary in politics (family/church/nation)

tester of the soul?

the child/woman as soul of us?
what is her condition?
first fatherless, then motherless, an orphan become mother to an imperiled male child,
a mother incapable of protecting anyone!!!
the soul is powerless in this world!!!

she returns to the narrow heaven & she is eternal child & what has she learned?
what has Pan taught her? that she must sacrifice herself (soul) for material life?

she was lost to heaven because somehow she had not remembered
that her own wants meant nothing to her father & mother?
how narrow is this human view?
remember Pan also parallels the action of the fascist step-father
who asks her to completely obey . . .
so the dogma does matter?

each side believes they serve life by killing (sacrifice is also a form of murder)

i don’t know

there is sadness in all this

Pan is a hard teacher

(he of the mountains
where winters are harsh
& the winds beyond the treeline
speak a language that we cannot understand . . .)

Pan is

all things

Bookmark to: