LIFE IS NOT QUITE FINISHED YET

“You’ve ripped it up and thrown it to the birds,” I said. My legs felt a little weak and I knew my head was shaking from side to side. “But, Lady Margaret, that was your tax form for next year. It needs to be sent to the Revenue by next Thursday at the latest.”

“I had no bread in the house,” she replied. She bowed her head and looked at me over the rim of her glasses. “The birds seemed excited by the wind. They were swooping in and out of the courtyard. So I just took a tiny corner and threw it to them. A crow swept down and caught it, took it up to the top of the first floor window and then dropped it.” A smile lit her face making her look like an eager child. “Three sparrows then chased the scrap of paper as it swirled round the edge of the sheds. I thought they were going to fight each other for it. I took the tax form and ripped a few more pieces off.” Lady Margaret made tearing gestures with her hands and then flung her arms in the air. “I kept throwing them upwards. The birds had so much fun hunting them.”

She’s never quite sane, I thought sinking into an armchair. I’d been her financial adviser for longer than I could remember, but this was the first time she’d done anything like this. Well…. there was last year. I was just in time to stop her sending a letter to the taxman asking if he minded if she sold just a few nick nacks without telling him so she could change the bedroom carpets.

And the year before that she’d filled in all the tax forms in code. When I challenged her, she said, “I thought it would give the poor bloke a bit of excitement in his working day. To make it slightly easier for him, I’ve included the key to the code as foot notes.

“Would you like a drop of brandy with your coffee?” she said. She banged the stopper on the table and took a sip from the neck of the decanter.

“I’d prefer just coffee please. Shall I make myself one?” It was safer to be self-sufficient in her house. I remembered the taste when Lady Margaret presented me with a cup of boiling milk sweetened to the point where the tea bag she’d added had refused to sink below the surface.

“You carry on my dear. I’ll find the rest of the papers.” She took another sip from the decanter, sighed deeply and replaced it on a silver tray on the sideboard.

Returning to the lounge, I heard the sideboard door bang shut. That meant the chocolate biscuits had arrived.

“Here we are, dear,” she whispered, looking round as though making sure no one else was watching. “Take three and unwrap them ready. If you don’t eat them all, I can wrap them up again after our game.”

Hand painted finches and gold sprays clung to the porcelain of a Royal Worcester bowl placed on the floor by the French windows. “Me first,” she said flicking three silver wraps into the bowl. “That’s three pounds you owe me,” she said as my screwed up foils flopped on the floor.

“I’ll knock it off your bill,” I muttered. “Did you keep any of your tax forms?”

“Of course. It was fun throwing it for the birds, but I kept this part safe.”

She handed me the page containing her signature and the date. “”Not much use on its own,” I said. “I’ll take this signature back to the office and trace it onto a new form.”

“The birds had so much fun chasing the paper. It made me laugh so much. I’ve been a bit worried since though. I’ve not slid down the banisters for the last two days.”

“Margaret!” That must be the first time I’d never used her title. “You are nearly seventy. You shouldn’t do things like that.”

We both started laughing together. I stood to leave and she grabbed the decanter and took a quick mouthful of brandy. “Life is not quite finished yet,” she said. “I’m hoping I’ve a long way to go and when you get to my age there is no point being too sensible.”

She poured some spirit into a glass and this time I did take a gulp of brandy before I left.

744 words March 2011

THE MAN ON THE BENCH

The man hitched his trouser legs up as he lowered himself onto the faded varnish of the bench. A deep sigh slipped through his lips and then his shoulders drooped causing him to look older than his sixty eight years. He stared across the park grass without blinking until, with a start, he shook his head as if to bring himself back to the present.

Then his right hand slipped into the pocket of his tweed jacket, moved around and carefully brought out a tiny crust of bread. A smile eased the stress of his lips and fingers, long like those of a pianist, rubbed the bread into crumbs that fell on the palm of his left hand. Taking a single scrap between thumb and first finger he held it out in front but slightly to his right and let the breeze gently transfer it to the concrete beneath his brown leather shoes.

He waited expectantly for a few minutes and then moved his chin to the left, pushing his lip upwards and distorting its shape to that of a child forced to kiss an elderly and unsavoury aunt. Then he made a gentle whistle punctuated by soft chew, chough puffs of air. His eyes scanned from side to side, and then opened wider as a robin hopped out from beneath the nearby rhododendron bush.

With its red breast held out importantly it moved closer in short bursts of speed. Its head flicked in both directions, making sure no other birds were threatening the territory, before grabbing the speck of bread. The man continued his bird song and the robin cocked its head to one side, leaving one sparkling eye staring at his source of food and entertainment. The beak opened and shut three times, but no sound came. Then as if feeling more attention must be grabbed, it fluttered off the ground and flew to the other end of the bench and back.

Another scrap of bread dropped to the ground and, more confident now it had definitely grabbed the man’s attention, the bird proudly thrust out its bright red chest to acknowledge the source of his lunch.

This time the man spoke properly but softly. “Hello, little one. How are you today?” The remaining crumbs floated down as he brushed his palm. “Let me find you some more.” His hand dipped into his jacket and came out with another fragment of toast. “Won’t you join me on the bench?” he asked, patting the wooden seat with his left hand and sprinkling titbits on the varnish

The robin stared uncertainly as though thinking to itself, ‘I normally only eat off the ground.’ It moved its head and stared with the other eye. Then with a flutter of wings, it rose into the air, made two circuits of the park bench and landed by the crumbs. It ate most of them and then fluttered upwards and hovered, almost dipping its wings in thanks, before flying onto a branch of the rhododendron.

The man smiled before twisting his lip to respond as the bird began its tick tick song. As the bird flew away he part lifted his hand in a wave. A movement in his peripheral vision made him glance along the path. His grin faded as a tall, grey haired lady came closer. She wore red slippers on her feet while a black and white printed skirt flapped behind her.

Reaching the bench she stopped, slightly out of breath, and turned to face him, placing her hands on her hips. “You silly old fool,” she said. “You should have told me why pieces of toast were always in your pockets?” She stepped towards him as he patted the clean end of the seat.

His arm moved to the bench top and, as she sat down, he stroked the back of her blue knitted jacket. Looking into each other’s face they both began to smile. Then, without speaking, the man on the bench leaned towards his wife and softly kissed her waiting lips.

THE GODDESS ISIS

The worship of Isis reached its peak in the 4^th century BC.A large temple was built on Philae, an island in the Nile where the original colour can still be seen on the columns in the hall there. After this time, the Isis cult spread through the Hellenistic world, appearing in Greece in combination with the cults of her son, Horus and father Osiris - Or Serapis in Greek. In the 1^st century BC Egypt became a province of Rome under Augustus and thus was used as a source of money and resources. The Roman domination strengthened the worship of Egyptian Gods throughout the Mediterranean world with easily identifiable gods and goddesses whose mythology provided a central belief of Life after death for a hard pressed population.

Isis was traditionally portrayed as wearing a headdress representing a throne (one of the hieroglyphs of her name) and carrying the ankh or symbol of life in her left hand and the sceptre in her right. This was drawn in the typical Egyptian manner with the head and the body from the breasts down at right angles to the viewer while the upper torso of the breasts and shoulders turned to face the audience. She was also frequently shown wearing the vulture headdress with a royal serpent on the brown. It is interesting here that the vulture is associated with the excarnation aspect of many earlier time periods and we thus have another reminder of the rebirth and regeneration aspects of Isis. In both of these forms Isis occasionally carried a lotus bud or the glyph of the sycamore tree giving aspects of regeneration again

Although Isis was one of the oldest Egyptian goddesses, her origins are uncertain. It is possible that she originated in Sinai, but she also may have been worshipped in Lower Egypt in the Delta area around Busiris which was one of the oldest known centres of Osiris worship. The cult of Isis became prominent throughout Egypt where she became a Goddess of virtually limitless attributes. Isis was known to the ancient Egyptians as Aset (or Ast, Iset or Uset) which can be translated as ‘Queen of the Throne’ or ‘female of throne’ hence the original headdress. However Plutarch suggested ‘knowledge’ was one meaning of her name, but a possible translation of a female of the flesh suggests that although she was now Queen of the Gods, she had once been mortal. Again we can trace the regeneration theme here and certainly this gives a very easy lead on to the Virgin Mary concept.

According to Martin Bernal in Black Athena there was a dominant Egyptian Priesthood which revolved around the symbolism involved with the murder of Osiris by his brother Seth. Isis carried the body back to Egypt for burial whereupon the enraged Seth or God of Destruction cut Osiris into 14 pieces. After retrieving the parts Isis performed the rite of embalming, by magically binding them with cloth strips, turned herself into a bird and by wrapping her wings around Osiris brought him to life. So we have a connection with the bird element as a symbol of life or the soul and the concept of eternal life or regeneration.

After the reincarnation of Osiris, he and Isis conceived Horus, the sun God. There is imagery of Isis suckling her son and she also guided women in childbirth with qualities of compassion and tenderness. It is interesting to note that without Osiris, it is possible that Isis would have no major significance and similarly with Dionysus and Demeter. Coming forward into our times the Virgin Mary would be insignificant without Jesus. So it could be argued that the matrilineal line of goddesses is already on the decline in its pure form. Mythological concepts and artistic improvements might be the reason for this. But something other than the Goddess, virgin or otherwise is now necessary for the regeneration of humanity.

Many links can be traced to the Greek traditions with Demeter and Dionysus showing a possibility that the Eleusinian cult of Archaic Greece was the descendant of Egyptian foundations. Egyptian faïence plaques of the style placed under the corners of temples have been found at Mycenae. According to Paul Foucart ‘there is no doubt that the centre of mystery traditions is the search for immortality and that this can only be achieved through dying.’ Ancient writers such Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato and the like would have learned of the concept of immortality from Egypt.

When the Egyptian pyramids and tombs were re opened by explorers in the 1900s, much interest was created in both symbolism and artefacts. The god and goddess connections and metaphors became very prominent in modern Hermetic mystery traditions. The regeneration through death imagery became a tool of ceremonial initiation. The candidate became Osiris who gave up his normal physical life to pass through various mental trials, often using the symbolism of a vault to communicate with higher forces and faced the equivalent of his own ‘dark night of the soul’. He would then be awakened by Isis. During the ceremony the neophyte would often assume poses representative of the various Gods as taken from scenes in the Book of the Dead. For instance, the sign of Osiris Slain (Standing with feet together, arms extended at shoulder height in the form of a cross), The Sign of the Mourning Isis (The right arm is pointed upwards keeping the elbow square and the lower arm pointed downwards, again keeping the elbow square, turning the head over the left shoulder looking down so that the eyes follow the left forearm), were particularly relevant. This particular posture is reminiscent of classical poses as, for instance, that of the Capitoline Aphrodite

Technically we are dealing with a similar process to the Christian rites of crucifixion and rebirth, but the rich imagery of the Isis, Horus and Osiris story is far easier to associate with in a symbolic and ritual form.

Isis is closely associated with Nephys, her sister, and together were often used to represent Upper and Lower Egypt and also acted jointly to protect both living and dead. So we have the Isis image revolving around life through death and rebirth over the entire period of its supremacy. But finally in 535 AD Emperor Justinian closed the Temple of Isis on the Island Philae and her image there gave place to that of The Virgin Mary.

N.B. This was originally written as a final essay task for a course at Keele University extra mural department to do with the Goddess in Art: The History of an Image.