Interlude
בְּגֵיא צַלְמָוֶת
The physical impact that accompanied these words came like an ocean wave. Grace was caught up by the wave and then sucked down into the wild undertow of the sea. She was tumbled in the whitewash of force, arms and legs flailing, no up or down, no air for her lungs. Panic came, as it always did when she got caught in a power too overwhelming for her personal strength. She began to feel lightheaded and faint from lack of air, slowly the world turned dove grey, grey, slate, charcoal, obsidian. Her bones flushed of all calcium as if she were a chicken-egg-in-vinegar experiment gone terribly awry. Her body collapsed, her frame leaving no support.
She fell but didn’t land. She fell and fell and fell. She fell some more. Days and nights passed, years passed, a millennium passed and she continued to fall.
Later, she landed on a hillside of grace, soft as a whisper. Her eyes opened and she saw cedar branches arching overhead like timber rafters. A scent of something, myrrh–
I don’t know what myrrh smells like
—licked its way past her nostrils. She turned to see her companion with his arm under her head, he reached his left arm to embrace her. She lay enraptured for as long as she had fallen.
Again later, there was a table at her feet. Rough hewn giant planks worn smooth by the ages formed a low table around which were strewn beautiful cushions of purple, blue and crimson. Voluptuously languid, she barely lifted her head and the edge of the table, embedded with jewels, caught her line of sight: jasper, sapphire, carnelian, chrysolite, topaz, jacinth, amethyst, chalcedony, beryl, chrysoprase, onyx, emerald sparkled brilliant flashes at her. As she counted the beautiful stones, twelve on each side, she wondered how she knew some of the names. A casual jewelry maker, she was a little familiar with gemstones from sporadic visits to the local bead store but she was pretty sure she had never heard the word chrysoprase and jacinth before in her life. It seemed as if this mysterious place imbued her brain with a wealth of information.
On the table were seven bowls. One looked to be hammered out of gold into the shape of an almond tree flower, one was of silver engraved with a tree growing next to a river, one was translucent, like alabaster, capturing and holding within its walls the unique golden light of this pasture. Another bowl seemed to be made of a pearlescent shell or maybe even a pearl of giant size, seamless and pristine. The last large bowl was carved from the fallen branch of one of the cedar branches overhead. Around the inside lip were carved lovely characters:
וְנָחֲךָ יְהוָה, תָּמִיד, וְהִשְׂבִּיעַ בְּצַחְצָחוֹת נַפְשֶׁךָ, וְעַצְמֹתֶיךָ יַחֲלִיץ; וְהָיִיתָ, כְּגַן רָוֶה, וּכְמוֹצָא מַיִם, אֲשֶׁר לֹא-יְכַזְּבוּ מֵימָיו
The remaining two bowls were smaller; handcrafted pottery so beautifully manipulated and glazed that Grace wondered if the potter had been possessed of supernatural powers.
These observations rushed to Grace with an unusual combination of clarity and celerity as she was escorted from her verdant bed to this nearby banqueting table. Her body moved, in tune with her escort, with unprecedented fluidity of motion. In unison they sank into the softest of raw silk cushions. Her host pulled the two smaller empty earthen bowls closer, placing one before her and one before himself. Grace wanted to jump up and serve her companion but he restrained her with a glance and reached for the golden bowl filled with apples. She watched him move as if in a ballet. He touched an apple and it fell into sections.
Wait, what happened?
Some sleight of his hand had cored and sliced the apple in the, literal, blink of her eye. He placed half of the slices in her bowl. She watched him lift the food, she thought, to his own mouth and instead he offered it to her. She bit and the crunch against her teeth was crisper than a brisk autumn wind, refreshing, surprising, so beyond anything she had ever experienced. The taste shocked her tongue. The sweetness was unbearable but she was saved from it by a balancing act of tart juiciness. It brewed up a fleeting picture of tousled haired children bobbing along in a red wagon being pulled through the paths of a small orchard, jewel toned leaves falling everywhere. Oh! how to describe the bounty of a single bite of apple. It seems like the most mundane act of alimentation and yet Grace knew she was experiencing the joy of life as it had been meant to be lived, food as it had been meant to be tasted.
They continued exploring with each bowl of food, her host leading her on a culinary adventure. Next he pulled over the silver bowl filled with raisins. Raisins in the red little boxes should be embarrassed to share a name with these giant, plump, red, gold and sable beauties being offered to Grace’s communicant mouth. These were edible gemstones, something out of Narnia, perfect droplets of heaven communicating the Maker’s brilliant genius. Grace was overwhelmed. Each bite brought a new thought of awe and wonder at the creator of such delight.
In the next wave of grandeur, he brought the pearlescent bowl filled with figs near. She wanted to shake her head and refuse these fruits. Grace never liked fresh figs, only the dried ones. But she couldn’t bring herself to say no to his kindness. So she opened her mouth and received his offer. So soft, such a surprise: Grace was astonished. This was nothing like any fig she had ever tasted. She couldn’t describe it even to herself.
Heaven.
Though different, it was familiar; the lovely little crunch of seeds was still her favorite part. Here the seeds served to punctuate and syncopate the rhythm of consuming a piece of paradise.
The fruit was so rich, Grace knew she should be full. Instead she actually salivated as if starving when the nourisher drew the next bowl near. Upon closer inspection, the alabaster revealed a slight reddish hint behind the reflected golden light to be pomegranates. He took one in his hand and the fruit stripped itself of its rosy leather jerkin as if in obeisance to its liege, revealing perfect rows of light filled ruby teardrops, sparkling, begging to be consumed in a culmination of existence.
Fruition.
Her companion fed her, drop by drop. She felt a tear form with every seed that entered her mouth: tears of appreciation for careful nurturing. The bitter afternote on the back edges of her tongue sang a melancholy requiem for the source of all nourishment and the cup of bitterness he had swallowed.
As a tear splashed on the rough hewn plank of the table, her companion pulled one last bowl toward them. She looked inside and saw a strange fruit she didn’t know. It was the green of a granny smith apple. The sides were faceted like a giant jewel or a grenade depending on whether you tend toward Athena or Mars.
“It is a chirimoya.” He explained as he split the fruit with his hand as if splitting a hunk of bread off a loaf. “It comes from one of many reminders of Eden.” Grace was enthralled by the juicy, creamy inside spotted with big dark teardrop shaped seeds. “Take, eat.” He offered a wedge of the milky flesh, into Grace’s mouth. Her eyes rolled into the back of her head, submerged in the newness of flavor and texture. It was like a slightly tart, vanilla custard.
No, that isn’t quite right.
Again Grace did not have the vocabulary sufficient to describe eating the divine. Another picture erupted spontaneously in her mind, this time of a beautiful couple, naked and unashamed, sharing a delectable treat while sitting on a mossy hillock in a lush jungle, blackened magenta orchids hanging in ropy tendrils from a cool fortress of shading trees. The other fruits had been a new taste of an old fruit. This was a new taste of a new fruit and Grace thought she could die now, complete. A thought inspired by his reference to Eden budded in her brain,
“You know the story of Adam and Eve?”
This time his chuckles were flavored with apple, pomegranate and chirimoya.
“Okay, so you know it. I’m thinking about the part where they get thrown out of Eden. I remember there was a second tree. An angel was put on guard in front of this tree because it was the Tree of Life right?” He nodded for her to continue. “Do you think God didn’t want Adam and Eve to eat that fruit and be stuck living forever in their ruined state?”
As he nodded, Grace stopped to contemplate her own words. She had never thought of the banishment of the original couple in terms of mercy. Always before, she had envisioned the defeated couple skulking, slope-shouldered, away from a furious angel pointing his fiery sword away from the garden.
“That was weird, I don’t know why I said that. Where did that come from?”
“Haven’t you noticed that my presence has brought you increased wisdom tonight? Now, here you are in the anteroom to the inner sanctuary of wisdom. This is a place where your questions can begin to be answered.”
Grace nodded her head up and down hypnotized by the fact that this information had already been in her brain before he answered.
“Do you have other questions?”
Grace hesitated. Maybe if her questions could be answered, she shouldn’t waste hers on these new ideas popping into her head. Maybe she should be rummaging through those top pantry shelves, retrieving the items she’d been looking for all night. Grace tried to focus on her old questions but could only think this new thought about the fruit she had just been fed.
“That fruit you just gave me, the chirimoya, is that the fruit of the Tree of Life?”
“No Grace.”
In the tsunami of silence that followed Grace felt she needed to find somewhere to hide from what was coming. There was nowhere to go. There was nothing she could do but stand in the face of his answer.
“I am.”
The two words trembled the earth around Grace, causing it to roll and undulate like the sea. Still a mediocre sailor, Grace lost her legs immediately and fell on her face. She lay in awestruck and uncomprehending wonder.
What do those words mean? They have the power to throw me facedown into the grass. It’s all so strange.
Am I dead?
Maybe I’m dying was one thought that had fleetingly passed through her mind along with twenty other arbitrary guesses as to how she had begun tonight’s strange journey. For the first time she seriously considered that she might actually be dead dead. Why hadn’t she questioned the ramifications of all these incredibly bizarre events? She had floated along passively absorbing a visit from a beautiful stranger, traveling though time and dimensions she could not fathom, watching her life flash before he eyes, without any substantive analysis. Most of the journey Grace held in the back of her mind that this was all one giant drug induced delusion or dream. The new and very real possibility of her death excited her. Faced with the obvious idea of a new life in death, she hoped it could be true.
If this is death, then kill me now.
