This is the story of the little one who was thrown into the
bowels of a proud and ornery mountain and lived to tell about it.
Although times have changed, and the land has similarly been
changed beyond all recognition, some forms remain the same, like stories that survive
because they speak about things that have been and always will be. The land may
assume different appearances and may be transmuted into different forms, but
the relationships persist, because the forms are connected and because they
work out of similar logic. This land, like everything else, was born and grew
and matured, facing its own set of eternal challenges, before it declined and
changed and gave way to new forms. The ocean speaks to the clouds, which in
turn weep on the land that receives these tears and in turn crumbles seeps
away, flowing eventually back to the ocean. And the rhythm of these processes has
its own patterns and music, punctuated by the cracks of lightning and icebergs
that fall away during the summer, or percussive like the throbbing of hail on
the vast drums of the plains, or soft and shimmering like the fall winds and
gentle breezes that, like the caresses of a nurturing mother, lull the land to
sleep as night advances. It is never completely quiet for those who know how to
listen, nor are the mountains and valleys, lakes and deserts and clouds and
oceans ever truly alone.
This land has seen the arrival of new peoples and new ways
that have swept away what came before. There is an ebb and flow to these
movements, an eternal retreat and advance. Can we compare the wonders of a
windswept valley that is surrounded by peaks and dry air, burning in its time
in accord with the seasons and yet ever renewing itself in a new profusion of
growth, with the pale and ultimately ephemeral vistas of towers and bridges and
vast and teeming anthills that are crisscrossed by asphalt rivers and that are
visited by innumerable and ponderous winged creatures that constitute our
modern-day urban agglomerations? If one were to stop and consider but only for
a moment, one would see that the likeness of forms persists eternally, and that
the ghost of the past are ever-present. The air might have been cleaner in the
past, less permeated with sulfur and carbon and the residue of eternal
combustion, but the fact is that combustion was ever-present, and had its
seasons and its purpose. The exuberant forests that once stretched as far as
the eye could see have now been receded into disconnected parcels, lingering
like refuges after the rise of the storm waters, and the metallic flood of the
present with all the fury of destruction will be but a moment in time as well.
And the land will persist, and the Rumbling One will wake from its dream and
take stock of what has changed, and will proclaim things much as they always
were.
Long ago, before the arrival of the steel buttresses and the
shimmering lights of dotted the urban anthills of modern times, there was a
mountain that occupied a range of land that was seeded with many others of its
type. It had a wide base, and it rose to dominate the terrain, being taller and
older than its sisters and brothers that dotted the landscape in a string of
family that stretched to the west. It was a simpler time back then, for as the
mountains grew taller, there were always distractions, and the cold at their
cusp somehow dulled their senses. Back then the air was more transparent, and
the mountains talked to each other, answering in the language of their kind,
which was a mix of deep grumblings, sustained grating sounds punctuated from
time to time by fiery outbursts. The noise of the one could be felt on the
other side of the Earth, for the roots of the mountains lay deep, and they were
all ultimately connected, like family.
There was little use for empty and showy language, with formulas
of courtesy or with the vivid and creative snap of invective. The land
communicated in a straightforward way, and because it had all the time in the
world, it merely repeated the same stories, filling them in with details that
were revealed in innumerable hues and traces and sensations, of colors, sounds,
and mineral dispersal, among the other languages that were spoken. The clouds
wept, but not always, and the wind chilled and refreshed, but could at times be
deathly quiet, and the minerals and metals and ores underneath the mountain flowed
and dispersed and imparted their own taste to the mountain that was ever
digesting them, engaged as it was in an eternal repast. But the mountain also
communicated with the little ones who inhabited its slopes, and who were like a
shimmer at the edge of its vision.
The mountain had need of communication, and while its senses
were multifaceted, and glacial in scope, it had taken note of the companionship
offered by the little ones. These communities of overgrown and upright ants had
gathered on its sides, having come thousands of years ago from the north, and
had settled on the mountain, tending to it in their own way. The mountain felt
them as they scraped their plots of land on its side, created terraced fields,
and as they cleared away groves of upland pine and other trees, and channeled
the streams of water so that they were used to soothe away the itching of the
skin that was poked by these little ones. It took note of their activity, and
of the way in which these communities shaped the mountain in their own modest
way, grooming it after their fashion. And for the most part, it tolerated them,
for it had little orientation towards malice.
The people who lived on the mountain were a hardy sort,
patient and tolerant and hardworking. They lived according to rhythms that had
not changed substantially over thousands of years, ever since their first
ancestors had arrived to this land, finding it to be suitable to their needs.
They tried their best to treat the mountain with respect, for they were
naturally appreciative of any sign of hospitality, and because they viewed it
as an elder, one who was not remote but instead took an active part in their
lives. These people called the mountain the Rumbling One, and offered it
companionship, talking to it often, offering their service and treating it with
honor. Most of the time the mountain was quiet, although many said that that it
was never fully silent, for they could feel the pulse of its heartbeat under
their feet, and they were well aware of its red heart that swirled deep inside,
deep in the caldera. They proclaimed their intent to help beautify their
mountain, to stabilize it when parts crumbled or were swept away during
occasional storms, and when it had need trees and bushes to provide cover for
those areas that must surely have grown otherwise sunburnt and calloused under
the weight of the sun’s rays.
Despite the care that was given by these people, the soothing
of its side with the flow of water that was collected and used for irrigation,
and the chipping away at the callouses of its skin as the years flowed, the
Rumbling One had always had difficulty breathing. It was one of the great
afflictions of its kind, and it was due perhaps in large measure to the fact
that its heart was too fiery. From time to time it had need to catch its
breath, for it was in danger of suffocating, and while it appreciated the clear
and chill air of the uplands, the pure and crystalline essence of the sky, this
air was thin, and it did little to fill cool its heart.
So the mountain would from time to time catch its breath,
clear its throat, cough and, from time to time, sneeze violently. It had little
knowledge of what this meant for the people who lived on its sides, and who
would wail at the first warning signs of an impending fit. The Rumbling One
needed to breath, and it needed to cool itself off, and these were natural functions
that could no more be repressed than the emanation of gases that emerged from
its depths, and that bubbled forth out of vents and caves as well as bubbling
out of the creeks that emerged from its sides. The mountain had a great wide
gaping mouth, but it also had many nostrils, and these breathing passages from
time to time grew clogged, and the air of its summit became too still, and its
heart grew hotter, and maybe, just maybe, it simply felt like calling out
mischievously to its sister hundreds of miles away, who was babbling in her
sleep and who would jump if the brother coughed, it taking great pleasure in
reminding itself that it had its own family. And because of these and other
reasons, the Rumbling One would release part of its pent-up energy.
The people did their best to anticipate these events. They
were ever attentive to the signs, for their lives depended on it, and because
they knew that the mountain at time took little stock of its power and of how
it could affect the lives of the community. They had prepared places of refuge,
and paths that made any possible evacuation much easier. They knew of the many
caves that dotted the mountain, and did their best to keep them clear, for they
furthermore knew that noxious gases could accumulate within them, and for those
who ventured too deep into these caves, they risked being overcome by the fumes
and falling asleep, never to awaken again. The fumes, oddly, dried out organic
matter, and they had found it useful to store part of their harvest of crops in
some of these caves, to preserve them through the seasons, but they took care
not to stockpile their inventories too deeply, for these were the passageways
the Rumbling One needed to breathe. And, if the mountain were quiet, the
tunnels could be useful during the winter, for they were always dry and warm,
but only if the mountain were sleeping, for otherwise, the deadly fumes that
normally lingered deep inside the cave might be pushed to the opening, and then
the danger was all the greater of being overcome was all the greater for those
who might wish to seek shelter there. So, it was best to evacuate and flee down
the mountain, and for that purpose, it was best to maintain good relations with
the people of the lowlands as well.
For the most part the people lived peacefully. There were
other groups that lived on the mountain, for it was a very big and expansive
area, and these people were shaped by their experiences so that they came to
share similar beliefs. The people of the other half were also faithful in their
attentions to the mountain, and they referred to each other as brothers. They
came together for certain shared rituals and they traded stories that were very
much alike, but that delighted for the difference in details. Their hospitality
was somewhat more limited when it came to the people of the lowlands, who didn’t
share many of the same affinities as those that resided on the mountain. Those who
lived in the valleys and the flat areas where the water gathered in vast pools
and the forests teemed with wild and exotic fruits and screeching animals such
monkeys and macaws were of a different temperament. They seemed somehow busier,
and were more forward, and also, most notably, louder. It was nonetheless
necessary to maintain good relations with them, for they had useful products
they could trade to the people of the mountain, and because one never knew if
they might need to seek out refuge in their midst when the Rumbling One awoke.
The need for refuge was one that extended as well to the
people of the valleys, for from time to time they were beset by their own
troubles. It wasn’t only that they depended on the water that came from the
mountain ranges and that flowed into their lakes, but also, that they were
exposed to invasion by other groups from the north and east. There were aggressive
communities that periodically made incursions into the valley, driven by the
impetus of imperial ambition or, perhaps, by drought and pestilence or other
factors, and they would attack the lowlanders. The signs were always clear to
those of the mountains, and even before the first wave of refugees reached
their highest slopes, they could often distinguish burning fires in the lowland
settlements, and from time to time, catch the faint echo of cries, and the
urgent warning of the drums that announced the call the arms.
For the most part the lowlanders were able to repulse the
attack of these invaders. They gathered their armies, and proceeded to their
battlements, waiting to withstand the inevitable sieges while their mobile
forces rallied and struck at the flanks of their enemy. But it was also the
case that at times the invading armies were too large and too desperate to be
easily repulsed, and the lowlanders would send their armies to the mountain to
gather strength, received as they were by the mountain dwellers, who helped
them to restock and rest their forces to venture back down and resume the
fight. The mountain was the ultimate battlement, and with the deep and intimate
knowledge of the terrain, as well as with the use of obsidian knives that were
mined in the upper reaches and attached to poles, as well as control of all
routes of ascent, it was almost always the case that the lowlanders emerged to
retake their valleys, renewing thus their bonds of friendship and obligation
with the mountain dwellers as a sign of gratitude. But this didn’t change the
fact that the lowlanders had a different temperament that was not entirely to
the liking of the mountain dwellers. For one thing, they seemed to feel no
similar reverence for the Rumbling One, and they instead expressed their
devotion to the sun, and to the thunderclouds, and to the Deep One that they
insisted swam contentedly at the bottom of their lake.
The matter of this lack of devotion to the Rumbling One was
troubling to the mountain dwellers. They had little knowledge of the Deep One,
and thought it at best a comical invention to terrify the simple-minded among
them, for after all, did this Deep One ever make its presence felt the way the
mountain did? And it was troubling as well to them that the valley dwellers
spoke of so many entities, of the Dark One in the forests, and of the bears and
snakes and their assorted menagerie. It sounded somewhat sacrilegious to the
mountain dwellers who nonetheless stilled their tongues when in the company of
valley dwellers, for they perceived this system as one that was unnecessarily
complex and diverse, with little of the clarity they had come to value. Which
is not to say that the mountain dwellers didn’t have a varied cosmology of
their own, one that furthermore incorporated different entities and that was configured
as a family of sorts.
There was the moon, of course, and the stars, and the eagles
that soared majestically above it all. There were the winds which were given
different names, and which were thought to be alive in their own right,
embodiments of spirit that could wish one ill or good, and were quite
treacherous at times, for they could arise suddenly and blow a person off a
cliff and into the rocks below. There were the clouds, and the shadows that
traversed the landscape, and which at times took their own volition and seemed
to control their counterpart. There were the beetles and snakes and the
insects, and of course, there were the plants that congregated in certain
places, not in the way that the potatoes and chilies did when planted, but
instead in huddled at the base of trees, or near streams, or even the fields of
poppies and leaves that satisfied no appetite but instead increased it, dulling
the senses and leaving the people in a dazed condition from which it was
difficult to awake them. (These leaves were much prized in the commerce that
was held with the people of the lowlands and valleys.) But there was never any
doubt that the main source of power was the Rumbling One and his family,
because he grew from the ground on which they and all the others including the
valley people stood, and because he (for it was perceived as a “he”) was held
to be the ultimate source in their cosmology for the sun, it being a tenet of
their world view that this sun had been spit out by one such as the Rumbling
One long ago, and that it had learned to fly out of envy for the eagles, who
were also held to be sacred. The mountain gave signs of its awareness at every
juncture, and while it could at times be forgetful, it wasn’t necessarily
filled with malice, and it shared much the same temperament as their own
elderly ones, but on a vaster scale. It could be called upon in times of need,
but for the most part, it was best to groom and cultivate it quietly, and to do
their part to insure that it sleep peacefully.
Copyright OGRomero (c) 2013
Copyrighted by Oscar G. Romero 2013
No comments:
Post a Comment