Broken Mirrors, Broken Minds

12th October 2010

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THE LAUGHING SHADOW

Demetre II of Georgia was only two years old when his mother was killed in 1261 by Mongols. He ruled his country with the utmost respect for his people, leading his life through his devotion of religious faith. He was in turn a popular leader, although criticised in some quarters for his polygamy, known for several relations with the Mongols themselves. In 1288 Arghun Khan, fourth ruler of the Mongol Empire’s Khanate, discovered a plot against his leadership, found out to be organised by his powerful minister, Buqa, whose son was married to Demetre’s daughter. After the slaughter of Buqa and his family, Demetre was summoned to the Mongol capital by Arghun as being heavily involved in the conspiracy or Georgia would be invaded. Against the will of his people, Demetre traveled to Arghun, where he was immediately imprisoned and later beheaded in 1289. Georgia was not invaded.

He felt familiar surroundings. The corridor of sorts was cold, but he was warm, possibly perspiring. The corridor was silent. Yet numbers of unknown people existed here. The floor was a straight route of cold, square, black marble tiles. He did not touch these tiles, but had the same sense of awareness a person has when they walk on darkened kitchen floor, in the middle of night, in the middle of Winter. He became conscious of someone familiar near to him, in front, feeling the persons agitation. To his left were the same cold, square, black marble tiles. To his right, what seemed like aquariums of sorts, although nothing was certain, the people mulled and maneuvered to the left of the corridor, inspecting like rapid shadows, unfamiliar. The person in front began to run, although time seemed slow. He wanted to follow, to the half open glass double doors at the end of the corridor. But he sensed fear from the person in front. He became aware of the sound of voices, fused together to make no sense, only a recognisable wave of noise that he realised had been there all along. He turned slowly to his right as the person running in fear reached the doors. Between the people, now like flickering, faceless shadows, he saw a glass tank. A black silhouette stood inside of the glass tank, the size of an average man’s torso, his torso. He felt fear as he realised the silhouette was that of a scorpion, fear grasping him instantly, the creature seemingly bigger than what he was familiar with. As he turned and ran in slow motion towards the glass door, between panic and navigation, he was aware that the person in front was no longer there.

Fear manifestation. Become anxious as a strange yet familiar feeling arrives unexpectedly. This panic becomes fear, and can stay for a long time, for a lifetime. The Grandmother, all wrinkles and stale nicotine aromas, would tell the young boy not to play in the garden behind the house. If he played in the back garden behind the house, in the grass, he would chance being bitten by a poisonous adder snake. A subconscious anxiety would evolve. Fear manifestation.

Elizabeth of Portugal married King Denis of Portugal in 1283, when she was twelve years old. She developed a devout sense of religion, often fasting and undergoing other penances in her search for absolution and virtue. She also spent her life resolving conflicts, in particular those that were directly linked to her surrounding family. This led her to be known to her people as o pacificador. When Denis died in 1325, she was heart broken and retired to the Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Velha, which she herself had formed in 1312, and devoted the rest of her life to the sick and the poor. This caused resentment to many of the Portuguese people, yet in 1336, when Alfonso XI of Castille came under attack from Alfonso IV, Elizabeth was brought upon again to act as the peacemaker. Despite overcoming age and illness she traveled to the small town of Estremoz, where the two armies battled. Elizabeth stopped the conflict, resulting in the two sides signing terms of peace. Immediately after this final mission, Elizabeth, in a feverish and weary state, died on July 4, 1336, in Estremoz castle. 

For Jack, my Grandfather

2010.

Tagged: fearfear manifestationscorpionchildhoodgrandmotherportugaldemetre