down a long track only accessible by four wheel drive, in the middle of the blue mountains is a lost city. my two friends and i set of at dawn to find it. we stopped once for supplies and my coffee which i require each morning, it was a crisp, blue autumn day, birds called out their songs, wisps of strange clouds filled the air towards the horizon and the gps in unsexy female voice gave us directions, mostly correct although that strange robotic voice, with it's uninterrupted promptings and warnings resulted me in hauling out the maps and doing it the old fashioned way. i was enjoying the company, peter a struggling playwright and chris a dot com millionaire who had just bought this expensive toy. 3 men in a kinda car boat tank.
peter was telling me about artists, how they have an inquiry into themselves, i was actually fascinated with this and probed his genius for more. what he was saying was mccarthy had the natural talent, so it was just easy for him to write tune after tune, on piano on guitar, but lennon, he had the pain, not the talent. he had to write his pain out as he dug deeper into his unconscious. this is what makes an artist according to peter, that deep inquiry into the unconscious.
i was reminded of william burroughs who when asked why he writes said he had no choice, he was filing reports and was attempting to write his way out. this is a kind of magick i guess and something i relate to. after all why am i writing here, day after day?
eventually we came to the end of the road, it just ran out.
we had a quick cup of tea using the camping equipment and then trekked along an old pathway into the valley.
majestic mountains engulfed us and it was easy to feel very 'aboriginal.' these places have special power, i can feel it, it's not just nature it's something else, a place where time just stops and you can see and feel the way nature has shaped even stone and terrain over all the millions of years. once upon a time all this area was underwater, now wind and time have eroded away at the powerful rock shaping out what appears to be a lost city. we stand in a portal.
i was in asia or perhaps himalayan areas, every mound seemed to be a great fortress or temple, the scene stretched out before us. the sun sinking, the last light gave everything an etheric imagery and i sat down on one of the huge rocks and watched the lost city frozen in time and space.
i thought of the past few days and the way everything here was so peaceful, i loved the remoteness and the way this enviroment was about geology, i listened to the birds and travelled with the wind and the currents of time. then as we walked back to the car, i saw sitting on a small rock, a preying mantis.
now through my ayahuscia journeys i have learnt that the preying mantis is my symbol and it is also humanities oldest representation of god. seeing it there was a confirmation, a sign i guess.
as the sun set and we drove out, down the trail, 4WDing i felt at peace with everything and in the lost city i had found something wonderful. it's so strange how that happens. what a great day.