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Topic: The Fire and the Rose, an illustrated adventure< Next Oldest | Next Newest >
Alan D Offline




Group: Members
Posts: 3670
Joined: Aug. 2004
Posted: Jan. 17 2007, 15:38

The Fire and the Rose



Far away and long ago, a red rose burned among the stars, trailing clouds of iridescent fire. No one knew where it had come from; no one knew where it was going; but its purpose wasn’t a mystery. It was there to lead the traveller to his journey’s end.

For the traveller was a long way from home. He’d flown like an arrow to a distant ship that circled like a great bird, high above a shining nebula. He hovered in the form of a blue moth by the edge of the ship, contemplating the enormous distance he needed to travel to return to the planets that lay dimly ahead. The moth’s wings stirred, and the traveller began his long homeward flight. On he flew, and on, but the distance was so great that although he soon left the ship far behind, the planets seemed no closer. And so it continued for a long time until, at last, a familiar blue and white planet loomed large and near. The traveller  recalled the lines of a great poet:

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.


 

He was thinking about the meaning of these lines when the burning rose intervened, for this was its moment. Whether the moth became the rose, or whether the rose replaced the moth, the traveller never knew, for the transformation was instantaneous. Now he heard music, while the rose scattered jewels of red and gold.



Blazing with light and colour, the burning rose carried him downward to the fresh and dewy surface of the planet. Down from the black velvet of space he fell, into the pale blue mists of earth. It was then, as the flaming rose vanished and the blue moth returned, that the traveller saw the fountain of flowers.

Thousands of roses soared into the air like flames reaching for heaven. The traveller guided the moth towards them and plunged in, the wings of the moth flickering in the dazzling light. Amazed by the fiery joy of the light and music, and unable now to tell flowers from flames, he heard again the words of the poet:

All shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.


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