Tales from the Welsh Marches
Sources of inspiration for a writer are almost as exciting as the writing itself. This one was the result of a challenge inspired by ‘How Much Past Can One Person Accumulate?’
This is what arose in my memory when I considered the accumulations in my past!
A Voyage by Wilma Hayes
The air is warm and very humid, but as the sun has not yet broken over the horizon, the air is still. Light however, is beginning to tint the lanes of the old city to look like a faintly washed water colour -
The lanes wind between old buildings where people are beginning to arise; a tethered goat watches you and you group pass. It and it’s street dog friend await their breakfast.
Among the many turns through the lanes, the city ends and you stand on the top of wide steps leading to a broad and quickly flowing brown river. This is one of the ghats of Varanasi, the oldest inhabited holy city in the world.
At the ghat is a low, open wooden boat and your group is helped aboard. You sit on wooden plank seats secured to the side of the vessel. On the covered bow sit two young men each with an oar and at the stern another man stands with a single oar to act as a rudder. The boat is pushed off into the rapid water and with power belying their size, the two oarsmen pull the boat into the river and upstream against the current. This is the Ganges, the mother of India, just recovering from its annual flood and now still giving life to the cities and people along its banks.
Once out into the river a young woman in a colourful sari brings a tray of small bowls made from pressed and dried leaves. Inside each is a small candle and around it are either marigold blossoms, the flower of India or highly aromatic rose petals. There is one bowl for each of you.
You are invited to put among the flowers, all the hate, horror and hard times of your life, your sorrows, failures and painful memories, all the events from your life that caused you harm or hurt, all the defeats, put downs and emotional blackmail that have given you pain. With all the hurt, guilt and actions needing forgiveness or to be unburdened now packed safely among the petals, the little woman returns and lights the candle for you. When you are ready, you gently lower the little craft into the water and the magnificent Ganges accepts it and takes it away without question or conditions.
Rest now and let the calm come to you as the boat is gently turned to broadside the current and then pushed by the water to return you to the ghat from which you came.
Ahead of you is the invisible sun, already giving light to the new day and floating to meet it are all the little lights, in those tiny crafts taking your damaged past away. With the first golden shaft of daylight in front of you, there is an eternal promise that your life can now be gentle, forgiven, forgiving and free. You can begin again, just as the sun does every day.
Rest now and enjoy the light.
