Snowflake Symphony

I am repeating a part of my last post as I feel that it became lost in the photographs of Ireland. When I look back, it seems an intrusion rather than an addition to the post.

My name is Spindel – or it could be Sentinel.

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In one time, I experienced radius; double radius. It sliced and as it sliced, I parted; two personae out of one – to become one later, in a different place.

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I was here and I was there at the same time; in both places at once …........ and it began to happen. It: I cannot tell what 'it' is – not yet – perhaps further on – maybe not at all.

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'In the great scheme of things' is often said. I suppose that is where I am, but not in an exact space; not in an exact time.

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Gazing above and around, from my far flung position, I hesitate. I see created, glass palaces breaking in upon the midnight sky. Drifting in through its vicinity, I cast my gaze upon the stars, a galaxy beyond, and back towards this strange city of glass; reflections of itself; a puzzle – what is actual and what a mirage: one palace reflected, or many palaces.

I pause; float towards the city, to discover what purpose it serves other than a sheer study in reflection.

My feet glide noiselessly over the surface of the streets; the silence intense. Resting, I note the intensity of silence, the significance of a pause – a space in time devoid of sound. I collect the memory; store it. In this time, in this space, I have no prediction of the future of this memory.

Reflected within this city am I, Spindel, multifaceted; each reflection as transient as myself. I am repeated as are bars of music; a chorus. Am I the music or the composer. Am I one and the same. I reflect upon this as I am reflected, thin as ice, in this glass.

I, Spindel, am a composer. I am searching for a symphony. In my mind it is a precious thing, perfect, unique. But it is not yet formed and so is an embryo, a nucleus, a speck.

My journey is as a discoverer, both as Spindel and 'mind of Spindel'; sometime Sentinel, although not now, not in this instance of resting.

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As a younger, smaller being I could feel the rhythm of my environment. It made me call out in delight with its tiny, hardly discernible nuances, doubling, tripling upon itself. It lulled me to sleep and lent me a sense of security. I rode its rhythm each day, becoming disturbed if the rhythm was interrupted, lost itself …. and reassured as it returned to the beat that is its essence.

Others rode the rhythm, tussled with it, pushed against it; some let it carry them through. I, Spindel, lived the rhythm, absorbed its perfection, discarded its imperfections. And so I made my way, discovered a path to follow, revelling at each twist, turn, emboldened as I skated long, smooth straights. As I travelled I developed, honing my senses, strengthening my being.

For sustenance, I sought fragrance of taste, sweet on the lips; texture that pleased, rolling softly or riding roughly over the tongue; this from flora along the way.

I soaked in the warmth of each day, to its noon zenith and beyond, was soothed by the cool balm of evening. There are two parts to every day; one day with two contrasting parts. Each day similar in pattern …. until the path arrived at a divide as I passed round the curve of a bend.

Silence.

The rhythm paused. My heart a solitary beat with no sound.

I curled at the junction, as a foetus, on the ground, solid, a ball; metamorphosing to a steel thin disc, glinting, hovering just a small space up from the ground, settling to lie in disc form on the path.

The sudden appearance of an insistent radial arm, with a hand tense in the act of gripping a blade poised to slice, transfixed me. And slice it did, pinning my discoid self dead centre, slicing once from centre to circumference; my radius. The arm returned the blade to its pivotal position to slice an opposite radius; a cut direct and sure to complete my dissection, forming two parts. I, parted from myself, now two selves – geminal.

On that day, at that moment, I became two personae. I am Spindel, Sentinel my alter image. My form evolved diaphanous, film-like; light shimmered as it caught my skin. Sentinel emerged pushing, as does a chestnut bud about to sprout a magnificent leaf, strong, flexible, opaque; durable, sensitive, at one with the natural world and with an inner beauty of his own.

And so we were, neither acknowledging the presence of the other, but in the knowledge of being two personae; two beings before two paths.

The blade wielding arm had disappeared; no glint, no swish, no grinding point.

Peace

Choice lay both at our feet and in our minds. We remained motionless. And then came the call; I heard it from the left branch of the path. My mind and ears strained. My feet danced – a skip, a leap; I followed the call.

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Moving with the motion of time, I progressed not in leaps and bounds as my feet desired but in soft pulses, light streaming, deflecting my vision. The only way forward was to abandon myself to the pulse, allow myself to be carried through the stream of light against which the pulse, with its call, led. That call came to me as soft brush-strokes of movement gently beating a surface, creating rhythm, enticing me onwards. I became distant to myself, as a watching figure disappearing from view.