The following is an excerpt from chapter 18. Our ship had been bombing the shore. I too advantage of a break between my battle station watch and my underway watch.
Night decorated the black sky with twinkling stars. The moon hid behind a lone cloud. I climbed up to the flying bridge and found a secluded place to meditate. The signalmen were nowhere in sight. I leaned my back against the steel bulkhead and slowed my breathing. After a few deep breaths my shoulders relaxed and I began my mantra. I floated into a meditation of me sitting on the beach with salt spray teasing my nose. The sunrise tinted the clouds pink, yellow and orange. Thunder boomed in the distance and someone gently touched my hand. A nude Vietnamese woman, about my age, sat next to me with her legs crossed, facing the water.
Night decorated the black sky with twinkling stars. The moon hid behind a lone cloud. I climbed up to the flying bridge and found a secluded place to meditate. The signalmen were nowhere in sight. I leaned my back against the steel bulkhead and slowed my breathing. After a few deep breaths my shoulders relaxed and I began my mantra. I floated into a meditation of me sitting on the beach with salt spray teasing my nose. The sunrise tinted the clouds pink, yellow and orange. Thunder boomed in the distance and someone gently touched my hand. A nude Vietnamese woman, about my age, sat next to me with her legs crossed, facing the water.
“Take in a deep
breath and hold it,” she said in Vietnamese, but I understood every word. “Let
it out slowly; let your breath take away all your deaths. Now breathe in
slowly, let the air spirit restore your soul, let it bring in beauty.”
The rumbling of the
ship threatened to pull me out of my meditative trance. I told myself to let it
go. Refocus my attention back to the Vietnamese woman’s words.
“How can I do that?
There is no beauty here,” I said. “There is only hate and death.”
“There is no death
unless you hold it.” she said. “There is no hate unless you refuse to let it
go.”
“But people are
dying, we are shooting them.”
She stood up,
stretched out her arms and twirled around. Standing up, I became aware of my
own nudity, but not embarrassed by it. She put her arm around the small of my
back as we walked along the water's edge.
“Beauty cannot be
stopped, even amid ugliness and death,” she said. “It can only be ignored.”
She recited a poem
in a singsong voice. The sound of her Vietnamese words illuminated everything
around me.
“Beauty abounds. Just take a look.
I mean really look. Beauty abounds around you.
Under foot, overhead, side to side.
Awe.
I mean really look. Beauty abounds around you.
Under foot, overhead, side to side.
Awe.
Such splendor is gifted upon us. Beauty abounds.
See the fairy hiding in her wooden cloak.
"Look!" She shouts. "Down here, up there, everywhere.
See the fairy hiding in her wooden cloak.
"Look!" She shouts. "Down here, up there, everywhere.
Beauty abounds.
Ignore not the wondrous glory.
Open your eyes and see.
Beauty abounds all around you.”
Ignore not the wondrous glory.
Open your eyes and see.
Beauty abounds all around you.”
No comments:
Post a Comment