..::The concept of the sister-bride is extremely important to understanding what has happened in our world today. Without the bride or bridegroom, the cosmic balance of life itself is thrown out of equilibrium.
The bride, of course, represents the Divine Mother or Daughter. She is the Earth or Moon Goddess of antiquity. She is also the complement of the Divine Son or solar lord represented by Jesus. She is his 'other half,' his twin sister in the mirror of Creation. Without her, the bridegroom and the kingdom of earth are not whole.
The loss of either polarity throws the cosmos out of balance. This was the real meaning behind the stories of the quest for the Holy Grail.
Arthur, the wounded fisher king, the 'once and future king' who is a symbol for Jesus (lord of the Piscean Age), sees that the land has become barren because the Grail, the Divine Feminine, has become lost.
The patriarchal church is taking over the world, and all traces of the queen (Mary Magdalene) are being deleted from holy scripture::..
Tricia McCannon
Return of the Divine Sophia
. . . .
"Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone,
And She's always gone too long
Everytime She goes away..."
Ain't No Sunshine
Bill Withers
* * * *
When Emlyn stepped up to the familiar front door of Nob Hill House, she couldn't help but think how odd it looked, as though she had now become a stranger here.
She paused. She felt more and more that 'home' for her was back in Arcadia, as she preferred to think of the wee town in the Sierra foothills wherein she had come to reside; so to be closer to her Triad sisters and farther from so-called 'civilization,' which Em had now come to consider more of an impending abomination than the brave, new world that the enterprising men of industry bethought it.
'All is vanity...,' Em murmured to herself, as she knocked upon the door. She had a key, of course, but as she was no longer living there, she felt it only proper.
Expecting Daryl, she was surprised when Manuel opened the door.
'Ah, Emlyn! Buenos dias, amiga!' Manuel and Em shared a brief embrace. 'Come in, por favor...Rosa and Sophie are here as well. Join us.'
This was all to the good, Em thought, glancing about the old place. Nob Hill house reminded her of Daryl's Massachusetts mansion, but this seemed different; older -- and there was much here that seemed unrelated to Daryl.
'Daryl is...out, I assume?' Em asked, unpinning her hat
as she dropped her valise.
'Si. He will be back,' Manuel nearly smiled. 'You know him. Whenever it suits him.'
Daryl, a law unto himself. Oh, yes, she knew this well.
'The others are in the kitchen...' Manuel drew her down the hallway.
'Emlyn! Oh, it is good to see you!' Rosa came to Em and took her into a fond embrace. Sophie arose from the table and put an arm about them both.
'It has been a long time, Emlyn!' Sophie remarked, gazing at Em with a long discerning eye.
'It has indeed!' Emlyn took in Sophie's figure, taller now, she was growing into an adult, she realised. 'Look at you! I believe you are taller than I, now!'
Em took in this new Sophie...always a force to reckon with, even when younger, she now commanded a real presence. Not a conventional beauty, but her striking features and dark piercing luminous eyes would turn heads in any room. She seemed a far cry now from the street urchin with dog and banjo who had delighted in teaching Emlyn certain Yiddish-isms that came in most handy but were not usually uttered in public...
Sophie smiled softly, as Rosa refilled the kettle. 'Tea, Em? You have traveled far?'
Emlyn gazed around the old kitchen, thinking again how strange yet familiar it all was. 'Only from Pankhurst. I was visiting old friends there...'
Everyone took a seat at the table as their tea was served and refreshed.
'I think I have mentioned to you the friends I left in Sonora, yes? I found they had returned to Pankhurst, had been there some time, indeed...it was quite a surprising reunion there, in many ways...' Em began.
Rosa served a plate of fruit and biscuits. 'That is wonderful to find your old friends, yes?'
'Mostly, yes. But they were worried about another of our friends, whose health had taken a turn for the worse...'
Em filled them in on her staying with Homer and Marta's herbal cures she had administered whilst trying to restore him back to health.
'He is better now, that is good. Yes, these are all herbs that I know of and use as well,' Rosa commented. 'You did a fine thing, Em, to try to retrieve Homer...and did you smoke him with sage, then, too?'
Em assured her that she had. 'When he was sleeping, or he wouldn't have stood for it.'
'That's alright too,' Rosa nodded, 'it was much needed in a case such as his. When the body is weakened by over-much alcohol, as in his case, it can no longer remain sovereign. It becomes but a slave to cravings. The person is, in fact, no longer themselves. The smoke helps to drive out all that is not them.'
Sophie spoke up then: 'They don't call it 'spirits' for nothing! It is as though they are possessed by the craving. They no longer have control, they're a slave to it. I've seen enough of it on the streets, believe me.'
'That's so. Once the body denies the craving it's sustenance, it will leave.' Rosa patted Em's arm. 'You probably helped save your friend from an early grave.'
Emlyn thought about this...Homer was rather a different person when he wasn't intoxicated. When he was, it was indeed, as if 'something had gotten into him'...
'I don't know how it worked, but it worked. The herbal remedies helped him regain his strength, that's sure,' she stated. 'I think he'll be all right after some rest, now.'
'Excellent!' Manuel spoke up. 'And, you are staying on for the Solstice, of course!'
Goodness, Em hadn't even thought that far along, but...
'Well...why not?' Everyone smiled then. 'If, of course, Daryl doesn't mind...'
'--Who?' Manuel asked, innocently.
Rosa smacked his shoulder playfully. She sighed. 'It's true, he is here rarely anymore! We are used to that, though, yes, Manuel?' Manuel nodded, as he leaned back and stretched his legs before him.
'We could use you back here, Emlyn,' he told her.
Em smiled, stirring her tea. 'I'm glad you would wish so,'
she said. 'But I can't live in the City anymore. Even Pankhurst was a bit much for me.' Emlyn looked out the kitchen window at the homes, streetlights and city surrounding them.
'I belong in the mountains, near the trees and rivers where I can hear birdsong and smell the green of spring...'
Somewhere in the distance over the bay, a foghorn sounded.
'That was some big goose!' Manuel shook his head. Everyone laughed.
'All the more reason you should stay on a while!' Sophie
told her. 'We have catching up to do! You should come with us to the Leeks, Em! My Kabbalah classes are branching out into a whole other world of thought and ideas, teachings and mysteries! You wouldn't believe the things I have learned lately...' She slipped Emlyn a wry wink.
'Tell me, Sophie,' Em encouraged her, pouring more tea...
How good it was to visit, though; she liked being here now, with her old friends...now that she knew she did not have to stay here and was always free to return to her country home.
Sophie complied. 'You know, I'm sure, the Kabbalah centers about the Tree of Life.'
Em nodded. 'I have a passing acquaintance, Sophie. By now, I'm sure you know much more than I.'
Sophie smiled. 'I'm learning. Well! What is truly amazing for us, is that the Tree of Life relates to the asherim, the carved pillars of wood dedicated to the Mother Goddess of the early Hebrews, Ashera.'
'This is all news to me, Sophie,' Emlyn confessed, intrigued. 'Judaism seemed to me to be such a patriarchal religion,' Em sighed. 'As are Islam and Christianity, nowadays...'
'History is not only written by the victors,' Sophie noted archly, 'but REwritten FOR the victors! The old Hebrew stories of creation and the Exodus were not even composed until nearly 800 years AFTER the Exodus.'
Sophie took an apple and began to slice.
'Do you know the Four Divine Elements, Em?'
Em confessed she did not.
Handing apple slices all around, Sophie continued, 'The four elements are Hokhma or Wisdom, Binah, Understanding, Tiferet which is Beauty, and Malkhut or Kingship.
'What is truly interesting is this: Wisdom is identified with the Father, Understanding with the Divine Mother. While the Son stands for Beauty, Kingship is personified by the Daughter.'
Manuel stood, with apple-slice protruding from his lips and declared, 'Beauty it is, then!' -- and struck an Adonis-like pose.
The women chuckled, as he resumed his seat, grinning.
Em noted that Manuel seemed much changed now as well; she would never have thought that he would be inclined to joke around; before, he had always appeared rather morose. While Sophie, who had been such a fey, youthful, carefree and lackadasical sort, had now assumed the role of teacher and mentor to her older associates.
'Time changes everything...' Em murmured.
'And, many Times, not for the better,' Sophie bit into the apple's remains.
'You truly amaze me, Sophie!' Em allowed. 'Yes, I would very much like to attend one of your Kabbalahist meetings, if I may...' Em hesitated, 'I, I don't believe I have a Hebrew heritage, however. Although,' she mused, 'I had heard stories of the Welsh being a lost tribe...'
'There you go, Em,' Sophie smiled. 'We are ALL lost tribes...of one sort or other.'
'...Am I included, then?'
--Daryl suddenly appeared in the kitchen doorway.
How does he do that, Em wondered? She sighed, knowing he had his Ways.
Rosa smiled up at him, used to his shenanigans, no doubt.
'You are always included, don Diego...there is tea, if you like!'
Daryl motioned her to remain seated. 'Don't bother on my account. Greetings, Em, Sophie, and ah, 'Beauty'!' Daryl sketched a small bow, as Manuel's features darkened into a blush and he scrunched down into his chair.
'I'm just en route to the study, don't mind me. Although, Em -- if you will, do come see me later? I assume you will be staying a while, yes?'
Em nodded. 'I look forward to chatting with you, Diego .'
Daryl just poked his tongue in cheek. 'Riight...well, ah, til later then...' -- and bowed his way back out.
'There are some things which never change...' Emlyn noted, staring after him with a long-suffering look.
. . . .
Later, Emlyn was to change her mind about that supposition.
But, as she heard violin music wafting from behind the study door, she felt drawn inside, following the pie-eyed Piper...
'"Brahms"?' She inquired, closing the double-doors behind her.
'Alas, no, Em -- it's only me...,' Daryl ended his 'Hungarian Dances' with a flourish and carefully put his violin away.
'Imp,' she admonished him with a smile.
'You're getting closer...,' Daryl sighed, with the familiar gesture of hand through his hair. He motioned to the window seat. 'Join me?'
'Well, there's no beating you, as much as I would like it at times...' Em took a seat on the cushions lining the bay window seat beneath the tall panes through which burst bright sunlight and were open to bird song and clatter of carriages along the street. Such a nice change from the dark, stormy house of hurricanes back in Massachusetts. And no doubt why Daryl had made this west coast home as different from that other as he could.
'All is well back in Pankhurst, then?' Daryl took a seat at the end opposite of Emlyn, facing her, his feet up, shoes off, and gazed outside, taking the weather's measure.
'As well as may be,' Em replied. 'Jack is staying on at Jethro's for awhile. A good thing for all concerned...' Em laughed suddenly; 'You'd not believe what those two did! They showed up, before I could fetch them, again in Jethro's wagon; Al, Jack and Jethro, with the back of it full of barrels, jugs, jars and copper tubing...'
Daryl raised both brows in true surprise. 'They'd dismantled the still!'
'Oh, yes...whilst Homer slept on, all unbeknownst to him. But they were loath to discard all those barrels and expensive copper. So Jack decided he could make use of it. To make ethanol, he said, or some such.'
'Homer won't like it when he finds out...,' Daryl smiled crookedly.
'That's just too bad, then.' Em stared out of the window, took her shoes off, and tucked her legs under her skirt. She looked at Daryl then.
'Sophie has been giving us Kabbalistic instruction!'
Daryl nodded. 'Excellent.' He turned pensive. 'I wonder who her rabbi is? That is, I assume there is a rabbi teaching the sessions at the Leeks...'
'I'll find out. I will be going with her to the next class. If, that is, it's alright with you, my staying on here for a little while?'
'Naturellemente, Em. Mi casa es su casa, you know this, Josephina.' Daryl leveled a gaze at her.
'Thank you. You would be welcome, as well, I'm sure...' Em bit her lip, looking down. 'Daryl...Sophie is becoming quite a remarkable young woman. I would like for us to do something to further her education, somehow. She should be able to make a place for herself in the world.'
Emlyn knew how important education was to a woman, having herself had a college professor father whose old country bias had refused to consider higher education for his daughters.
Daryl smiled. 'I have been thinking along the same lines, Em. Not to worry. We will see to it. Give her a chance first, to find her way. What would she major in? Medicine, science, liberal arts? Let us wait a while and see...'
Happy that Daryl was on the same page as she on this matter, Emlyn tackled the next bugaboo: 'So, where is this new...artefact of yours?'
Daryl suddenly ceased to be accommodating. Feet to the floor he arose and strode away from the light. 'Now is not the time to speak of such...'
He stopped and turned round in the middle of the room; his mark this time, the center design of the fine Bokhara carpet, (quite oblivious to the odd sight he made in stocking feet with one toe pointed outward, ala Pavlova):
'"Patience, good lady; wizards know their times:
Deep night, dark night, the silent of the night,
The time of the night when Troy was set on fire;
The time when screech-owls cry, and ban-dogs
howl,
And spirits walk, and ghosts break up their
graves,
That time best fits the work we have in hand.
Madam, sit you, and fear not: whom we raise
We will make fast within a hallow'd verge..."'
('I would have to ask...' Em sighed to herself.)
'--"Henry VI", Daryl?'
Pleased with himself, as usual, Daryl bowed, smiling, 'Bolingbroke, at your service, Madam.'
Oy, thought Em...
. . . .
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