IV
Just before the break of dawn, there was a buzz of activity, even amidst the air of drunken slumber. Rex, the giant of a man, with hands like an undeveloped foetus’, rushed around the encampment ringing a ball that hanged from a rope of which was clenched between his teeth. His head swung back and forth with rigor as if the rope in his mouth were a tail that he was gnawing from a dead calf. And in the spaces between each ring, he shouted long strings of vowels that sounded as if he were trying to move a herd of stubborn cattle.
“Aaaa-eeee-ohhh-oh-aaaaa-eeee-ohhh-oh,” he sang, running through the encampment, swinging his head to and fro as he gently nudged and kicked at the doors of carriages, at the sides of tents, and against the backs of drunken performers, passed out in their soiled and torn attire.
It had been barely an hour or two since most, if not all, had buried their sick and drunken faces in their hands, and even less since they had collapsed upon their beds, to the cold wet dirt. Struggling to keep their eyes open and lift their aching bodies, it felt for most as if their heads were filled with granite and molten lava.
Still, as tired as they were, and as staggeringly impossible as this all seemed, one by one, they pulled themselves shy of their stupors and fumbled around in the dark, scouring through their belongings for their grey mats and black silk veils. Then, in the darkest hour, they each laid their mats on the ground facing east.
Not a word was uttered, not even so much as a grumbling complaint, as each person calmly took their place on their mats, ignoring the struggle and fight in their limbs, and the questionable authority in their tired and hung over minds. Each placed their veil with gentle care over the tops of their heads, so that the one end hung over the backs of their necks, while the other covered their eyes and noses, exposing only their lips, chin, and their ears - which stuck out the sides. They sat with their legs crossed, and their backs, erect and noble, like mountains.
In her carriage, The Young Cripple struggled to move her cumbersome legs about. There was no way she would be able to get down the stairs, not without making a racket. And she wouldn’t have the time either.
The last bell rang, sounding the beginning of Morning Prayer.
“Mother?” said The Young Cripple, looking desperate around her squalid room. “Are you there? Have you gone? Can you help?”
There was no sign of her whatsoever; aside from the mark that her body had left in the bed, from where they had slept. Normally she left a note. She would draw a picture of the two of them, so obviously happy, holding hands and smiling. She preferred pictures to words as only the child knew how to read or write. The Young Cripple loved her notes, as much as she loved to be held and coddled in her mother’s arms. But there was no note this morning.
Three bells rang in quick succession.
Desperate, The Young Cripple dived to her knees in what she thought was facing east. She had no idea, about anything really, not unless she was copying someone else. She tried to cross her legs but it was impossible, the metal contraptions would only let her legs lie straight in front of her, or tucked, as if they were broken, out to her sides like a duck.
There was a rattling of a drum, followed by what sounded like a bird cooing. Then a woman’s voice, like mist or light drizzle, spoke faintly as the troupe sat erect and noble on their mats, their thoughts trained on their breaths.
“Breathe deep my children,” said Gaia, herself breathing profoundly. “Inhale the night, the infinite dark, and fill your stomachs whole.”
The troupe all inhaled and held the ends of their breaths.
“I exist as air, as a bridge between night and day, between the void and infinite. I inhale nothingness into my lungs, and I paint upon it, with the Light that burns within me, all the colours of day,” said Gaia, inhaling profoundly. “Breathe in,” she said.
The troupe all raised their arms, lifting them up into the sky, their stomachs swelling like balloons.
“The voice,” Gaia said, “rides on the crest of the breath. So breathe then. Breathe and then speak with me. Because of I,” she said, lifting her hands above her head so that her mind’s eye peered through the triangle her fingers made.
“From darkness comes Light,” repeated the troupe, lifting their hands over their faces – their fingers too, positioned as triangles.
“Because of I,” she said again.
“From nothing comes life,” they said, exhaling their breaths and pushing their bodies forwards onto the mats, their arms outstretched before them.
“Breathe,” said Gaia, pointing her triangle on the edge of the horizon, where dawn was starting to break. “Breathe,” she said once more. “Colour this world with Light.”
Dawn indeed broke, in as much of a hurry as it did every morning. The troupe all stretched out their bodies. Erecting their backs once more, they pressed their palms together in prayer and cantered them at their chests.
“And before we fall away from our breaths, and again stretch into our skin, let us align our minds, our energy, and our bodies, with the Om of the omniverse,” Gaia said, hitting a small rubber hammer against a tuning fork that she held in her left hand.
The troupe all sounded the end of their prayer, aligning their thoughts. Some stayed cross-legged while others quickly dusted themselves off and returned, both, to their sore heads, and to their comfy beds.