Eve dream. Chapter three. Adam – part four: epilogue

Masaccio, Cacciata di Adamo ed Eva. Detail

Eve dream first episode (Lilith part one)

Previous episode (Adam part three)

 

IV. Epilogue

So, it happened.
That’s how it happened.
In Eden, it happened.
It happened thus.
Adam was also a good man, because Adam was a good man.
Adam was a good man who loved Eve.
Tenderly.
He was a gentle man.
And Eve.
And Eve was a beautiful woman who enjoyed Adam’s love.
Eve loved Adam.
Eve loved Adam far beyond the flesh. Beyond all possible instincts.
They loved each other.
Eve and Adam loved each other and one of them was a part of the other. And vice versa.
Eve was part of Adam and so she conceived herself.
Adam was part of Eve and he knew himself to be empty, useless, incapable of anything without Eve.
Adam had desired Eve to be.
Adam had asked Him for a companion so that he would not be alone and Eve had been given to him.
And Eve cuddled up in Adam’s arms at night, her head on his strong chest, and fell asleep cradled by his breath.
They used to fall asleep in the warmth of the other, the other her and the other him, and so, each morning, they awoke gladly to life again.
Yes: they had both been wanted.
They had been willed to be together. For him to be delighted with her, the other. For her to be delighted with him, the other.
So that one would complete the other and he would complete her and she would complete him.
They were created for each other: she for him and he for her. They were created to be one.
Eve was Adam’s flesh, but Adam was Eve’s flesh.
They owned each other.
Both of them.
They were naive, they were perhaps unsophisticated, you would say today. They were naive until that day.
Then, they knew it.
They recognized it.
They were aware of it.
They experienced it.
They wanted to mold themselves beyond what was logical and rational. Beyond what was right. Even beyond what was obvious.
Beyond their evidence of being created. Of being made. Of being creatures. Of having had a definite beginning, notwithstanding what such a consideration should have highlighted with the utmost clarity.
They knew and should have remembered that they depended on Others.
On an Other. On the One. On their Creator, on the Creator of everything and each thing.
Certainly: they knew this, but they succumbed to the deception and shared in the nefariousness of the Unholy Being. They succumbed to the temptation to be God. They succumbed to the temptation to need nothing but self. To be sufficient to self. Against all evidence.
So, immediately, Eve thought she was enough for herself and perversely loved her own dark image, cutting off the rest of the world.
So, immediately, Adam saw the whole world as his own right of possession, a proof of his own power, and he humbled Eve to be a thing and enjoyed her as if she were a toy. No: not “her.” He enjoyed her body. She had nothing to do with it.
So, they knew it. They did it. They were foolish and suffered it, believing they were actors, protagonists, all-powerful wills, when in fact they were nothing but puppets operated and manipulated by the Serpent. They were obtuse, stolid, evil.
They did it.
And with them, through them, evil invaded the world.
Evil, sin, pain, disease.
Death.
All this burst into the world and was overpowering.
Because Adam was a good man and Eve was a good woman, but that is not enough to be good.
To be good is not enough to be righteous, nor to be wise.
For what really matters is obedience to what we are called to.
The right response to what we are called to.
The adherence to that for which we exist.
Volitional adherence to that which has called us to life. To what only can make and does make us.
We need the right response and adherence to the destiny prepared for us all, First or Second we are. To the good destiny designed for all free creatures.
One is born as one is: perhaps one is born good. Adam was born good; he was made good.
Eve was good.
One is born as she and he is: one can be born good or bad.
One is born as she and he is, but it is what he and she chooses that builds him and her adult ones.
What he or she chooses, not even what he or she does.
One can be born good and die damned.
Another.
No one is saved alone, not even the good.
And He wanted man and woman to be complete, because He loved them. And He made them free. He thought them free. He made them free.
So the Seconds also knew freedom and had freedom, but it was misinterpreted. It was misused.
Because freedom is a great gift, a gift second only to His love, but it is not given to be guarded, buried like that famous talent: freedom is given to be used, so that it bears fruit.
So that it bears eternal life.
For freedom must be freedom to adhere to truth and justice, otherwise it is evil.
A wolf cannot be imputed malice when it disembowels a lamb, for it is not free and can only follow its own nature. Its own innocent nature.
Of course, you can suppress the nature of your cat or your dog by chastising it and forcing it not to do certain things or to do other things. In many cases, your animal will obey you. But you cannot ask it to understand why.
You, on the other hand, are free.
You can understand, so you must understand.
And you must choose.

Finally, one more thing. Have in mind: we, the First Ones, are also free. However, there is a huge difference between us and you: we have such knowledge of things that it enables us, in the immediacy of a moment not even perceptible or measurable by you, to make choices that are always final. Irrevocable. Perhaps we are obliged to do this. However, this is who we are and this is our nature.
When I chose good, I did it once and forever and that decision of mine cannot be changed or revoked. Never.
When the Fallen chose rebellion and evil, they were damned forever. Irrevocably. By their own unquestionable choice.
So are the Firsts.
The Seconds, Humankind, men and women, are different in this and, compared to us, are similar to your children. You need time to grow, to understand, to know, to grasp, even though confusedly and partially the meaning of things. You are like children and proceed tentatively. You have eyes, but you are often blind to what really matters: this is your nature.
After all, you are born children.
This slowness and nearness of yours may be considered a disadvantage, and indeed it is. However, it brings with it the possibility of an additional gift: forgiveness.
You can evolve, improve, change your choices.
Of course: you can become evil, wicked, bestial, horrible. Depraved.
But you can repent of your evil.
No wickedness of yours, not even the most wretched and hideous, has the seal of finality.
You can repent.
And He forgives you.

 

(The end)

Thank you so much to Lizzie Gudkov for her revision af my bad English

 

Eve dream. Chapter three. Adam – part three

Masaccio, Cacciata di Adamo ed Eva. Detail

Eve dream first episode (Lilith part one)

Previous episode (Adam part two)

 

Eve spread her arms wide on the lawn. She found a stone. She clutched it in the fist of her right hand and struck Adam’s face with all her strength; Adam collapsed with a groan, rolling to the side and freeing her.
Eve got up and ran away, stumbling over stones and roots, falling repeatedly. The low branches of the trees scratched her face. Her feet hurt on the stones, which, like everything now, were hostile to her.
The rustle of her footsteps sounded like noise produced by something hitting dry grass.
Dead grass.

Adam knew pain, for his first time. He brought his hand to his swollen lips and sensed his blood gushing from them. He tasted it for the first time. He reviewed with his mind Eve’s wounded knees, her blood, vermilion.
In the comparison, he understood everything.
He saw now clearly what had happened. What he had done.

Adam was a good man.
Adam was the Man, and the Man was good. He had been made good.
He had been made good before Evil was in Eden.
Because He created Man in His image; in His own image he created him;
male and female he created them.
So Adam was good, simple. Today, you would say naïve, indeed.
Adam was a kind man, happy with life and with the work assigned to him.
Adam was the keeper of Eden.
Adam was very sweet to his partner and loved Eve tenderly.
Because Eve was his equal, yet different.
Because Eve was the light of his eyes and the meaning of every smile.
Because Eve was the peace of the night and the breath of the day.
Because since Eve was, he knew no more solitude.
Eve was the most wonderful gift he had been given, an unimaginable gift.
A gift that had filled his life with joy, because it is not good for man to be alone and Eve was flesh from his flesh and bone from his bones.

Yet, the horror had happened and Adam had been its instrument, like Eve before him was.
Worse than Eve: because Adam had offended Eve.
He had treated Eve worse than a beast.
He had been a beast.
No: not a beast, because everything in Eden was good.
He had been a demon.
He had tasted the fruit and transformed it into the fruit of Evil.
He could see the deception clearly, while the horrible laughter still echoed everywhere.
He had turned love into violence, good into evil, light into darkness.
He had turned his beloved into prey, in helpless plaything for the satisfaction of his underbelly.
What was supposed to be the culmination of the purest love and the perfect gift had changed into oppression, hatred, violence. Offense.
Lucifer’s victory could not have been more complete: now the Seconds were his, his property.
Man was lost.
The horror had happened and the Ancient Serpent was laughing now.
He laughed and with that laughter, within that laughter, because of that laughter, the horror spread everywhere.
That laugh that Adam had made possible.
That rotten laughter corrupted everything.
Death had come into the world.
Everything became dangerous, ugly, hostile. Deadly.
The man got up, slowly, because he now knew the fatigue.
He too, like Eve before him, burst into tears.
He wrapped branches around his crotch, as Eve had already done, and he understood everything.
All things.
What could Adam do at this point?

He began to walk aimlessly, and with each step he saw change grafted into everything; the meadows became stained with rusty and dry grass, the pool of cool, perfect water had become muddy, stagnant, and smelly.
Dead branches hung from the trees.
The she-wolf was devouring a fawn and the blood soiled the ground.
He felt with his bare foot an object yielding under his weight and break: the zuffolo.
He hoped to find Eva, the only company now possible.
He saw her. He walked toward her, but kept his distance, dejected with shame.
She, still crying, looked at him and saw him crying. She saw the weeds around Adam’s groin.
Now they were the same. Lost. Both of them.

While they cursed the Serpent, the horrible laughter echoed even louder, mocking, victorious.
They had to flee away from Eden, away from Him.
He, perhaps, would have forgiven them, for He was Love, but pride had been instilled in their hearts. Pride, son of shame for one’s own inconsistency.
Because after a fall you can rise again, but often the fall is shame too great to be accepted.
Because fragility, fallibility and inconsistency are within men and women.
Because, above all, they do not endure such characteristics.
Because fear and scandal over one’s own frailty are the mothers of pride, of hatred, of violence.
Of war.
So they had to flee.
They had to flee, forever.
Away from there.
Away from Him.
They had to hide.

Silence was born that day.
The silence between the Seconds and Him.
That day, indeed, properly, the Seconds became the Men and Women.

 

(to be continued)

 

Thank you Pope Benedict

A very gentle person, an extremely cultured scholar. Passionate about beautiful music, he said “to sing is almost flying”. Above all, he loved Jesus Christ and his church, as he reminded us with his last, moving, words in our world.

He also liked cats.

He was a clear and sure reference point, despite the never seen and delicate situation that he himself contributed to determine, for reasons that are unknown.

I am sorry that he left us and yet I am certain that he is now with the saints and that from there he can still help us navigate this fog.

Thank you Pope Benedict.

January, 5th 2023

Rain. A tribute to Terrygold by Kristine Blackadder

I already told you here something about this Terry’s beautiful and moving work.

There, I already tried to say something about a so nice Kristine’s machinima about “Rain”, the last art installation built shared by Terrygold into Second Life.
Well, this beautiful friend, Kristine, was not satisfied by her machinima, and felt her need to make more and better: thus, another video was born: “Rain by Terrygold”.
These so dear and clever two friends, Kristine and Terry, go on to grow better and better as artists.

This time Kristine gives space and dignity to the words used by Terry in her work. Kristine makes a beautiful machinima where Terry’s words are in great evidence, while into the original art installation our eyes and our minds are so captured by pics and landscapes that words are subordinate and for instance I self really did not give them their real importance and beauty.
The translation into English from the original Italian text was made by another dear friend, Annalisa Mulialina, while a fourth friend, Shyla, enhanced those words with her so pleasant voice.

Four clever and gentle and dear friend, four women from both the sides of Atlantic Ocean made this wonderful work.

I enjoy their work so much; I enjoy more and more their friendship with Judy.

This machinima was accepted into that so great SL event that is FantasyFaire 2022: it will be presented during the event scheduled on Saturday, April 30th, as showed below here.

And this is the event SLURL

Sangu miu (My blood)

As I told in my main Italian blog, Terry built a very interesting and moving art installation in Second Life: Rain. It is dedicated to her mom and shows us something about Terry’s memories and thoughts about her and her death.
If you are interested to know more about Rain, see this post by Inara Pey. Here I underline only that a previous Terry’s similar work, Empty chairs, started considering the death of Terry’s dad yet after it went on applying feelings and extending considerations, emotions and sensations more widely, on the theme of the absence itself.

Well… another dear friend, Kristine Blackadder, liked Rain so much that she shot one of her beautiful machinimas in the garden made by Terry, after it was modified: also Kristine’s work shares her feelings about the absence theme.

This machinima is much more complex than it seems. It is beautiful, up to make shiver.
Kristine perverted the white or coloured Terry’s flowers to crimson, blood ones, and turns on herself in a tiny space drawn by a column of light. Nothing around it.
She shook up those pale yet somehow gentle flowers made by Terry, those flowers that after their so pale and cold beginning in Terry’s work get beautiful colours, as hopes have. Here those flowers are too much big, too much red, too much upsetting.
Here those flowers aren’t a landscape but only a narrow scene in which Kristine and only Kristine dances her pain. She’s alone, even without memories: that’s the absence.
This is a strong and hard reflection about herself, filled with that obsessive crimson: blood and rose, rose petals becoming blood, her bloodlike coloured dress (she always is black dressed in her machinimas) and those so upsetting blood flowers. There’s a bad red scar on her face.
Terry with her work told us something about her blood: her mother. Kristine keeps her eyes on her pain due to the absence, as a monster detail and everything becomes a real blood flow.
If you pay attention, at time 2:47, there is a voice citation from Mulholland Drive, where the anchor-man (a terrifying one) on the stage of a theatre says “It is an illusion”. Of course, this consideration could change definitively the meaning of the whole machinima, as to say “Well, I’m only joking”. Really, in my opinion, it is not so: Kristine tells us that also pain can be something like play, acting, a recital: in such cases we live in a so little and perverted space and we can only feel pain.

Yes: this is pain. Yet, please, we must not be defined only by it.

Another prompt: if that absence were truly absence of sense for our way, work, moving, living?

February, 5th 2022

Tin wind vane creaks

JB, 2009. No neat night, but that’s the same roof.

How the tin wind vane creaks
when the wind turns around
messy like without way
in this so neat dark night

It groans shrill and its face
turns the other way with
no point to look at, with
nothing that could be sense

I am like it when I
watch around without be
inside my gaze, so that
I long for useless lives

Following any changes
of the wind this clear night
makes my rusty heart creak,
useless life toward death

December, 27th 2021

Italian version

Goodbye, mom

Father
That’s a song by Claudio Chieffo, where God talks with a woman; I tried this traslation:

 

You didn’t know how I’d call you
the face that I gave you, the story that you lived
you did not know it yet, you did not know it yet …

When in your prime you did play to be a woman
near the door of your old house
I was preparing for your life so great things
that you didn’t know yet, that you didn’t know yet, that you didn’t know yet …

Then you could know the pain, that takes away things tastes,
but fills so much the words, colours the words with life,
at that time you lived it, at that time you lived it at that time you lived it …

Then I gave you that my real love so unpretentious and great,
so that your pain could became more bearable
and your love infinite, and your love infinite, and your love infinite…

Now I want you here with me: you haven’t to be afraid,
you have to let you go, each thing comes true just now,
each thing comes true just now, each thing comes true just …

… now here darkness no longer exists,
there’s the light in the eyes of God,
there’s the peace in the hands of God,
there’s the joy in the heart of God!

 

December, 19th 2021

 

Goodbye, mom! Please say hello to dad and to your brothers for me.

Italian version

Torn and thorns

 

Pic found here, by Awentree

 

Torn
as an old worn white shirt
meeting thorns on its way
I am torn.
I’m bound, broken
and I’m naked and torn

Cold dry air hurts my skin
like ice breath from wastelands
Winter wins now my life.
I feel used up, worn.
I am torn

Thorns as bugs
bad black bugs
creep and crawl on my skin, tearing even
inside
where I’m torn.

Thoughts are thorns
scampering everywhere
as a frisk in my soul
to find what?
Pain and thorns

Come on, please,
come here soon
don’t let this advent be
sadness, cold, ripped skin
and soul torn.
Came on, please
be my whole

 

My home, December, 4th 2021

 

Now it’s cold

 

To my mom

 

Now it’s cold, here is cold
while we walk toward winter

 

Each thing cold where you walk toward were
I don’t’ know, you don’t know,
only hopes

 

Only hopes, holy thoughts, our faith
while you walk toward Him

 

I know that He loves you
so you will be together
with your husband: my dad
and your brothers, because
you are the latter

 

Now it’s cold, here is cold
while you walk toward winter
toward more light, maybe.
Toward more light: I’m sure

 

November, 20th 2021

 

Windows of spring

JB, 2021: one of those Great tits around my house

 

As a window of spring, some Great tits
came again near my home and now chirp
whilst my time runs to solstice, when dark
wins each day against light, more and more

As a window of spring your green eyes
came again near my face and my lips
met your mouth, in the dark, before that
sleep won against my mind and my hands

We need windows of spring in the life
where we run toward dark, pain and death.
Green grass, trees, Tits and you are refrains
in the song of my life made by God

 

My home, November, 13rd 2021