I would like to thank God
for:
Cyan and Cerulean,
Arctic and Azure,
Teal and Turquoise,
for the ever varying light of the sky
and for the infinite ocean hues.
I only asked for Blue.
Tim Eddy
I’ve been thinking about how the Wise-Ones might have planned their journey. I am learning to recognise that different maps or charts are informed by their makers, and by their usage. Any navigational tool holds the potential to change my perspective, to open my eyes to new ways of seeing place and people.
As I researched how the Wise-Ones might navigate by the stars, I discovered that the strategic advice for runaway slaves escaping from their owners via the Underground Railway movement, was how to first locate and follow the constant North Star:
“Keep your eye on the North Star” was the advice because by keeping that star in sight, up ahead, the runaway slaves could be sure they were heading in the right direction. Of course, this meant always moving at night. But how to be sure they had located the correct star? I was always taught to identify it by looking for the saucepan with a bent handle – an easier description to understand than the formal Latin name of the group of stars, Ursa Major (Big Bear). The runaway slaves were taught to look for the constellation that looked like a drinking gourd – it was common at the time to use a hollowed-out gourd to drink water, and these were supposed to look like long-handled cups. Those planning escape were told, “Two star’s on the cup’s edge always point to the North Star.” There is even a traditional song, “Follow the Drinking Gourd”, which describes this and other signs used by people escaping to the North:
The riverbank makes a very good road
the dead trees show you the way
left foot, peg foot, travelling on
follow the drinking gourd
When the sun comes back and the first quail calls
follow the drinking gourd
for the old man is waiting to carry you to freedom
if you follow the drinking gourd
(found in Catherine Bird, The Divine Heart of Darkness, 117)
I can barely imagine the fear levels of those runaway slaves muttering this song to themselves as they hid by day and travelled by night. I know that the Underground Railway movement took inspiration from the story of the Exodus of the Hebrew People from Egypt at night. I wonder what stories those who flee from modern slavery are told today? Where might their guidance systems come from? What myths encourage their spirits? In a smartphone dependent world, what internal GPS do we have left if we are without technology? Whose power, then, might we be at the mercy of?
My Wise-Ones came from the east into the Roman Empire, with its technologically straight roads. I wonder if once they had made it as far as this road network they were able to use the itinerarium, the Latin lists of milestones, place names and landmark features which described the section of road you wished to travel. These were published in public places so one could copy them to take away and follow. Such imperial codification brings with it a whole new set of assumptions and cultural norms through which to negotiate a safe path. How many languages would the Wise-Ones have needed to have spoken, read or recognised on their journey? I feel adrift in a foreign land just thinking about it.
My love, I’m grateful tonight
Our listing bed isn’t a raft
Precariously adrift
As we dodge the coast guard light,
And clasp hold of a girl and a boy.
I’m glad we didn’t wake
Our kids in the thin hours, to take
Not a thing, not a favorite toy,
And didn’t hand over our cash
To one of the smuggling rackets,
That we didn’t buy cheap life jackets
No better than bright orange trash
And less buoyant. I’m glad that the dark
Above us is not deeply twinned
Beneath us, and moiled with wind,
And we don’t scan the sky for a mark,
Any mark, that demarcates a shore
As the dinghy starts taking on water.
I’m glad that our six-year-old daughter,
Who can’t swim, is a foot off the floor
In the bottom bunk, and our son
With his broken arm’s high and dry,
That the ceiling is not seeping sky,
With our journey but hardly begun.
Empathy isn’t generous,
It’s selfish. It’s not being nice
To say I would pay any price
Not to be those who’d die to be us.
‘Empathy’
AE Stallings
Afterlife, 124-5
signs or portents? (iPhone image)
image into ikon 