As I grounded and centered, I felt my Spirit yearn to rise above my body and visit the World Above. I shed my skin like a husk and rose into the velvet ink of space wearing the iridescent wings of a dragonfly. As rose, I felt myself expand and diffuse, the delicate shape of my dragonfly form translucent and iridescent.
Earth loomed large in my eyes as I rose above and beyond its sphere. I cupped it in my hands and cradled it gently, reading its needs. The atmosphere roiled anxiously, and black, dirty clouds girdled it. Breathing in, I drew off the dirty air into my own body, where it was transformed and exhaled as star dust. As the atmosphere grew troubled and dirty again, I repeated these cleansing breaths. This cycle recurred several times before I released the Earth from my care.
The Earth receded as my Spirit expanded further, and the surrounding stars shone forth in a dense, shining blanket. I found myself surrounded by images of myself at all previous ages, stretching back thirty four years to my infancy. Expanding once more, I gathered all of these younger selves into my arms, where they became a single swaddled bundle, held in my left arm like a cradled infant.
The sun was glowing before me, and I reached out my right hand toward it, where it became the glowing gem on the brow of the Sun God. His hair flowed away from his face like a mane, and his whole being was suffused with the glowing light coming from the sun he wore.
The Star Goddess manifested as a vast Presence, the stars clearly defining her shape, stars spilling from her breasts like milk, starlight tangled in her flowing hair, and stars shining in her endless eyes. She reached around and cradled me in her arms, just as I was still holding my younger selves.
I looked back to the Sun God, and saw the rays of light that shone from his brow were connected to the light from a million other suns. There was a web of unimagined complexity linking them all together, and this interwoven fabric of light also formed the body of the Goddess. The God and Goddess were inseparable, each formed from the same web of starlight. We are all connected to this web of life, and the Earth is merely a tiny part of that. And yet, each tiny part is important to the whole, for my one small spirit is able to participate in the larger reality. As above, so below.
I felt my spirit fill with starlight, shining through the delicate double set of dragonfly wings I had mysteriously acquired for this journey. I opened the now empty swaddling blanket, which faded into starlight, and began circling closer to earth. I soon found myself returned to my starting point, once again grounded and connected to the Earth.
The journey ended.
~Flame RavenHawk
April 20, 2003