Triple Vision

Triple Vision is the perfect title for this collection. The author sees life through the eyes of a philosopher, a painter, a poet. As a widely read student of philosophy she knows that, before finding answers to life’s mysteries, the seeker must figure out the right questions. As a painter she finds beauty all around her and as a poet she wields language as artfully as she does her paintbrushes. Her stories are rich in exquisite imagery and deep with multi layers of meaning. The lens of her mind's eye is microscopic, telescopic and kalaidescopic and these stories will challenge you intellectually, stimulate you emotionally and delight all your senses.

—Sandra Shwayder Sanchez

TRIPLE VISION

by

Ita Willen

SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

The Wessex Collective on Smashwords

Triple Vision

copyright 2012 by Ita Willen

Cover:

Smashwords Edition

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Table of Contents

The Master’s Chair

The Mask

Lilacs

Camille

280 SE

A Thousand Lights

The Night Garden

Blue Moon

Look Away

One by One

Enterprize

Rain of Gold Leaves

The Window Washer

Chinese Laundry

The Wizard of Ice

Gallery Uno

Lily Mark

Avalanche

Woman in White

a note about the writer

The Master’s Chair

He saw the chair covered with fabrics, carpets and masses of flowers around it. To an elegant house in Maryland he had come. He was a guru, around 60, with close-cropped white hair, sunglasses, a white shirt, in a grey business suit, smoking a cigarette—a small thin man with the face of a hawk, he resembled a CIA agent.

He glanced at the chair and followed his hostess up the stairs. He would be a guest here for a week. From the bedroom window he saw rolling pastures and orchards so perfect you knew they had been arranged. The picket fences were just so, and the horses beyond them like horses in a dream, gliding silently through the green landscape. The orchards were in bloom, clouds of pink and white trees. They looked unreal.

But of course, it was all unreal to him. It was not just that he came from India and might be comparing it to Bombay, for he had already been to Paris and Cairo. It was ALL unreal to him from his view of reality as an illusion. His father had been a guru too, perhaps even a famous one, in Trivandrum, in Kerala.

His was, like most Hindu families, quite extended, expanded even more by the constant flow of disciples, some coming from very far away. It was the first time in centuries India had seen so many seekers from the West. After his father died, he took over. Gurupatan found people coming to him all the way from France and England. Something must have happened in the West, he thought, to have sent so many people in search of the Truth.

One had to be cautious, of course, not to get involved with Americans. They looked penniless and might take the liberty of not leaving at all. He accepted a few disciples from Europe and the Middle East, and taught them everything he knew. Vedanta, as postulated by Nagarjuna, had been transmitted to him, in both written and oral form, and he was qualified to pass on the teaching to anyone who could understand it.

He quickly discovered, though, on the veranda in Trivandrum where he received his students, that they understood very little, particularly those from the West. Their basic premises were completely different. They saw the world as concrete and not in a state of flux. They saw reality as something to manipulate. Their egos were huge. They pursued the Truth as a form of aggrandizing themselves. A kind of personal salvation which, with enough money, could be bought and flaunted, and best of all, could be attained while still alive.

Needless to say, all his Western disciples were of the wealthy variety and somewhat older than the hippies drifting through. He selected his clients very carefully for aptitude as well as funds. When there were enough disciples in one place, he went to them, all expenses paid of course, there was no other way. That was how he came to give Talks in Cairo and Paris.

This was, however, his first time to the States. How this came about is a long story but its fate is in the details.

His father had a certain Ram Raji as a disciple, the two families having been gurus and disciples for many generations. This Ram Raji, however, had gone to the West as a young man, married a French woman briefly, lived many years in France (hence the Paris connection) and had in his old age gone to the States to teach Buddhism at a college in Texas, of all places. After forming a small coterie of students around himself, this Ram Raji invited Gurupatan to give Talks in America. Since Gurupatan already had several wealthy American clients, the time seemed right for a visit. He was very curious about America. His disciples were thrilled to finance the visit and vied with each other for the opportunity to host him.

A wealthy Maryland matron (who had gone to India to see him and had been devoted to him for ten years) won him as her houseguest. All the European disciples who could afford it came, along with a few Californians, and all of Ram Raji’s handpicked students from Texas, who could presumably understand the Truth. An encounter with a guru is a most serious event, the gravity of which must be clearly understood, in order that the participants approach him with the utmost reverence and decorum. It is considered that the guru appears when the disciple is ready. But many people, in 1970, who thought they were ready, were denied access to Gurupatan and the Talks were surrounded by utmost secrecy. Disciples never uttered a word about him or their involvement with him. The truth was closely guarded and shared with only a select few.

Some of these individuals would be arriving over the weekend, under the auspices of Ram Raji. These people might be anyone, not particularly destined to meet a guru. Raji was known to consort with a wide variety of people and most of it had nothing to do with the Truth.

I don’t like it, said the Guru’s wife, before he left.

What do you mean?

The trouble with America, she said, is that they have no caste, no lineage as even the Europeans have. You have no way of knowing who someone is. No Brahmins, no Untouchables, nothing in between. Since the purity of ancient lines has not been preserved, it is a Brahmin’s duty to regard them all as Untouchables.

Come, come, my dear. You have no need to be concerned. They will all be Raji’s friends.

That’s just it! He is indiscriminate in his friendships! He has known actresses and Communists! One cannot tell whom he will bring. The thing I dread most is the hippie element. These people, from the way they dress, seem to be penniless or, I suspect, have been disowned by their families. And worse, they indulge in drugs. How could Raji, a Brahmin’s eldest son, your father’s disciple and friend, fall prey to all this? If any of the visitors are not qualified, it could ruin your credibility and good family name. It is crucial that you keep your affairs spotless. Keep a wary eye on the Americans!

#

The owners had vacated the house to give him privacy. The seekers were arranged to stay in the main house itself or in guesthouses on the grounds, geographical proximity ordained by intimacy with the Guru. Disciples from abroad booked themselves into nearby hotels, at which they were adept, having followed him like fans of the Grateful Dead. These included some ladies from England and people from France. Then the American disciples who were known to him because Raji had told them they were ready for India, and they had shown up in Trivandrum, and those he hadn’t yet met, were slated to use nearby land as a campground. Tents were erected and cooking stoves were on hand. But this activity was not visible from any of the windows.

He lit a cigarette and decided to go for a walk. Better to do it now while he was still in trousers, his western attire. Once he made himself comfortable in the house, barefooted, wearing a dhoti, he was not likely to venture out.

He went downstairs. The house was empty. Twilight bloomed. In the kitchen he found a bowl of fruit. The refrigerator held melons, cooked rice and yogurt. He made himself a dish of yogurt and fruit, then opened the kitchen door and stepped out.

He was surrounded by a blue so intense as he’d never seen before. The houses in the distance glimmered white. The rolling hills turned black against the peacock sky. The moon rose. He walked in a straight line for a mile or two. Out here it was really dark. So few houses, so much space, what they could do with such space in India!

At last he went back, climbed the silent stairs, did his puja and went to bed. The Talks were slated to start Monday morning. All the disciples would be assembled by then.

#

Ram Raji, former dilettante, now (to his own surprise) a professor of Eastern Philosophy, had been very busy organizing the American contingent. Around 60, the same age as Gurupatan, he had a dark equine face on a small wiry frame. His grey hair was shoulder-length, he wore only black Nehru suits. His large nostrils seemed to scent out the world. He was a Brahmin, but had lost his sacred thread and, as the black sheep of his family, had indulged in the glitter of Paris for 30 years. He neither drank nor smoked and was a vegetarian, but loved seducing women. His large and powerful family owned entire villages. But the extent of their wealth was not visible on him. He now lived in a two room garage apartment stuffed with old furniture and books. He always wore the same black suit or had several identical ones, usually rumpled, buttoned all the way up to the neck. He did not seem to be personally in possession of any wealth. It was said he had been disowned when he absconded with the French woman and had signed over his share of inheritance to his sister. At any rate, he was not inclined to live in India, having tasted the freedom of the West. He had never expected to go as far west as Texas, but Austin resembled Trivandrum in all its tropical glory, and he probably needed the money.

Raji had assembled from among his hundreds of students (his large lecture hall was always jammed), a few individuals he had gotten to know well. The fellows chauffeured him around and ran errands. The girls were all of a certain kind, with a raw shining edge. A few dozen people in all. They had private sessions lasting hours in his office. They gathered at his place for tea and more talk. They attended all the lectures he gave and accompanied him to dinner every evening, which invariably consisted of salad and baked potato.

From Texas they were coming by air, those who could afford it, others by car. He himself was coming from New York where he had stopped for several weeks on his way back from Paris. He could not think of anyone in New York to travel with him to Maryland. All his chauffeurs were coming from Texas. He inventoried everyone countless times. Over and over he ran through his mind the students who would be attending. Some of