The Temple
Last night's dream:
I lived in an austere building that ran alongside a Hindu temple. My room looked out on the yard leading up to the tall, imposing gates to the temple. The gates had been closed for a long time and even the people in the neighboring rooms reported that they rarely saw the monks in the inner yard.
Even if I pressed my face against my window, I couldn't see the temple. I was frustrated by this. I considered breaking into a room farther down the hallway but decided better of it.
Each morning people gathered outside the temple gates for something of a mix of prayer and yoga, the whole Sun Salutation progression that begins and ends with the standing, palms together mountain pose. I walked among these people. I knew many of them. I was some sort of outsider but not distrusted.
Always, an old woman led two little girls to a statue of a female diety off to the side of the gate. The old woman would plop down on a bench and nod to the girls. The girls wore peasant dresses, tall white socks, and black shoes with a single strap and buckle. Their hair was pulled back. Each visit to the idol, they would press their palms together and bow hurriedly twice to the diety. And then they'd just stare at it in that unreadable, impassive _expression that only children are capable of.
-cK
I lived in an austere building that ran alongside a Hindu temple. My room looked out on the yard leading up to the tall, imposing gates to the temple. The gates had been closed for a long time and even the people in the neighboring rooms reported that they rarely saw the monks in the inner yard.
Even if I pressed my face against my window, I couldn't see the temple. I was frustrated by this. I considered breaking into a room farther down the hallway but decided better of it.
Each morning people gathered outside the temple gates for something of a mix of prayer and yoga, the whole Sun Salutation progression that begins and ends with the standing, palms together mountain pose. I walked among these people. I knew many of them. I was some sort of outsider but not distrusted.
Always, an old woman led two little girls to a statue of a female diety off to the side of the gate. The old woman would plop down on a bench and nod to the girls. The girls wore peasant dresses, tall white socks, and black shoes with a single strap and buckle. Their hair was pulled back. Each visit to the idol, they would press their palms together and bow hurriedly twice to the diety. And then they'd just stare at it in that unreadable, impassive _expression that only children are capable of.
-cK
posted by cK at 10:28
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