The wandering monk

The man clad in tibetan robes was walking along the path with a large straw hat on covering his face. He held the beads tightly in his hands mumbling some silent prayer with his dry cracked and bleeding lips. His feet too were soaked in blood as he walked his footsteps painting the sand red. He was walking into our village but he did not seem to notice anything around him, he merely kept walking slowly grasping his bead necklace, moving from one bead to another as though they were the only thing that existed in the world. He walked as a man does who holds the universe in his hands and he merely a vessel for them. He kept on walking till he reached the river, there he stopped completely and merely stood there for a while. I intrigued by this foreign went up close to him to see his face but it seemed as though it were only a shadow but there was on remarkable factor; his lips. There were dry, cracked, bloody and with every silent word he mumbled he took with him another piece of flesh from them.
I was a boy then and had little knowledge of the world, I was afraid of this man yet horribly intrigued. There were other boys also there and they attempted to wake this man by throwing sand, water and one boy even hit the man with a large plank of wood. He did not notice these things, his focus was unbreakable and his countenance resembled stone. The hours of the day passed by but he merely stood there, the odd looking stone sentinel of the river.

I went up to my father and asked him "is that a saint?" he looked at me with a bemused smile, "what do you think?"
-"I think him odd."
-"why do you ask then if he is a saint?"
I stood there thinking for a minute and said "well he looks like a man but he does not act like one, rather there seems to be something else to him."
-"that something else son is the look of a man that has given up on rational means of expression and has given himself wholeheartedly to a leap of faith to find an answer."
-"What answer?"
-"Any son, this world is so full of uncertainty as to the meaning of our existence that some men become so frustrated that they resign themselves to the most surest thing in the world."
-"What is that?"
-"Death, since we are born there have only been two things that are certain that we were born and that we will die. Everything else man is forced to create."
-"But we also breathe, eat, drink I mean surely these are certainties as well."
-"yes but the meaning we attach to them is not, we may be able to answer the how but the why is what eludes us."
I sat there in silence thinking for a while as I eat my mandarin. I remember thinking why was it that I was eating that mandarin there was perhaps no meaning to life. I asked my father "why am I eating this?"
My father looked at me solemnly and asked "When you bite into that fruit, what is it that you feel?"
-"I think that it is delicious and that I might be able to have some more energy to do stuff."
-"It is then for the sensation and hope, the hope for the pursuit, once you are satisfied with that fruit you will feel remorseful that it is gone and as such you may be satisfied but you will miss the desire."
I was quite perplexed by my fathers answer, I looked at him quizzically and said "but I may have another one later."
"And that is why we live son, it takes many different forms but we all desire to pursuit rather than be satisfied with what we have. It is part of mans instinct to be a hunter, the animals feel this as well but are satisfied with chasing simpler things. It is because we are the first species to conquer simple desires that we have been slowly forced to look elsewhere for desires whether in religion, knowledge, labor, or even death. That is what separates from the animals son, the complexity of our desires."
I stood there quietly for a while, depressed at the meaningless of life and that everything will always seem empty; that I'm basically just a dog chasing my own tail. My father though sensed my state of mind and come up to me and said "Do you know son what has satisfied me though, which pursuit of mine has left me with a fruit that continues to satisfies me every second of my life?"
I looked at him with the hopeful eyes that only someone who is young and has not tasted the bitter fruit of disillusion can have.
"Your mother, see in love there is some mysterious quality inherit in it that surpasses all the gods of men and makes politics, storms and everything else seem insignificant. If I die today, I would not mind for I met your mother and I had you. These are the things that are truly important life, everything else is just noise. If you wish to be fulfilled in life be satiated with desire and satisfied with love."

I did not know yet what my father meant but as nightfall came and I went to see if the man was still by the river. There was nothing except a trail of blood leading to the water and a group of beads on the shore. I picked them up and took them home with me that night and just stared at them thinking of all the sights, prayers and blood spilt on these stones. I realized then that I was something of an alchemist for before I touched them they were just stones and now they were vessels that contained many worlds within them. Worlds I wanted to see.

These worlds were still fantasy to me though. Places that for the next year I would contemplate in my head over and over creating great monuments of illusion. They would turn out later to be pillars of sand though for the reality would in turn be different than what I had previously thought. It would not be a disillusion but rather a surprising re-illusion. Nothing is so spectacular in our lives as discovering something unknown and revealing to our conscious mind for the first time. Our subconscious though is never surprised and what in turn occurs is that we discover something new about ourselves. Our conditioning and consciousness help us function in the society we have created but decadence comes from loosing sight of the subconscious. That part of our minds that we have common with animals, except that they have the ability to follow it blindly while we must know it. It was a lesson I was learning slowly as a child but I could not grasp that my mind being human would superimpose an ideal upon everything I wished. The ideal was born out of senseless arrogance, for we believe we know best but have not yet the humility to accept that everything is best as long as it is in tune with our nature.

The next couple of years I spent as a child, I listened to the travelers passing by incorporating their stores into my minds eye and trying to grasp the world outside my small Syrian town. The fervent religious pilgrims spoke of how they saw god in Jerusalem and were now inspired to continue to spread his word. I would often hear of how holy that city was and to how many tongues it was so. However, I would always wonder if God is everywhere what makes this one city built by man no less, so special. Also my father taught me history and so I knew about the centuries of bloodshed and atrocities committed in the name of god for some pieces of stone. How can God value stone above men, I wondered. Are we not his ultimate creation, if so why do we feel the need to in his name destroy the most holy temples that have been built directly by him. It was not something I could understand and the religious fanatics would merely respond to my inquiries in the vein of "your too young to understand."

My father in the coming years had made a lucrative trade with some businessmen in Damascus. He had earned quite a bit of money and he one day came up to me, "son I have grown old and have my peace with the world, now you must do the same." He then gave me a credit card and a leather sheepskin wallet with some cash and coins in it. "Now go make yours." I later learned it was nearly everything he had made the past few years since we had that talk and that he had been earning every penny so that I would be able to travel. I asked him what was I supposed to do and he said "Many people go to school but never learn that life and action are the greatest teachers. That what you learn there is more valuable and useful than that which they teach princes and rich men in those universities. I cannot afford to give you their education but I know that I will be giving you a better one. Listen to your heart and it will tell where to go and do not return here for at least ten years for then you will know what you must do. I give you only one piece of advice, do not let fear and what others tell you cloud your judgement. Listen to that heart of yours, for it is the divine speaking to you." I looked at him quizzically, "but father you have never believed in God or anything divine." He smirked a bit with almost a sense of pride, " I do not believe in a God son, rather I believe we are all part of God. We are like the blood and organs of our body, part of some grand cosmic structure of whose size and shape we will never know. It is our duty then in this life to find our purpose and fulfill it, for if we do not we will become a cancer to this structure and die a miserable death. I want you to be in touch with the cosmos, to learn of things yet unknown and then come back to me and tell me what you have learned. If you feel you have failed, you have not, for as long as your in search of your purpose you will always succeed. Failure in that sense is just the sensation of loosing track of the grand design and it is ordinary for we as human are extremely limited when it comes to seeing beyond ourselves."

I looked at him melancholically but I knew he was right. It is not right that a man contemplates all his life for the more he does, the more he stays stagnant, and eventually stagnation is akin to death. I packed light, just a canteen full of water, some food and a picture of my family and friends to put in my wallet. They would always stay alive in my memories and be part of my soul; I would cherish and carry them with me everywhere I go.

Author's Note

Give me your opinion

Reviews

[Cameron]

I rather like it. Reads well, flows well, story is interesting. Is it the start of something greater, or was that it? It might be interesting to have him return, not 10 years later, but maybe 50. Walking barefoot, carrying the same strand of beads, basically having become the monk himself. Or not, it's good as it stands right now anyway.

Only real criticism would be the grammar/punctuation errors, but those are a quick and easy fix.

Great job!

[RenatoRojo]

Thanks for the review, I'm actually planning on doing something with that same monk, cause I never show a body do I? O.o

[Coyote Poetry]

" I do not believe in a God son, rather I believe we are all part of God. We are like the blood and organs of our body, part of some grand cosmic structure of whose size and shape we will never know. It is our duty then in this life to find our purpose and fulfill it, for if we do not we will become a cancer to this structure and die a miserable death."
I enjoyed the complete tale. The above lines were my favorite. I like the use of the monk and the father's advice. I like he decided to wander off and find his own path and place. Thank you for sharing the excellent story.
Coyote

[Dye]

An interesting read. Truthfully I usually don't read stories or chapters but mostly because I am limited on on time when I am on here. I noticed that books and stories do not get as much attention as poems do. The story had a nice flow with little lessons along the way that made for an enjoyable read. It definitely leaves you with the sense of wanting more and questioning what will happen next. I sense that this is part of a bigger story and you will fill in those blanks along the way.

[RenatoRojo]

Thanks for the review. That is exactly what I was going for :)