Old Oracles
“They are dying, the old oracles sent to Laius, now our masters strike them off the rolls. Nowhere Apollo’s golden glory now — the gods, the gods go down.”
— Sophocles (Oedipus The King)
Meanwhile….
“The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”
— Mark Twain
The Old Oracles still rise, benevolent, serene and wise.
Old, centuries old, older than dirt.
Old Woman Oracle always accessibly smiling.
Old Man Oracle her mate pleading prayerful.
Together they magically rise from ancient times before history.
The forest provides everything,
has done so for countless forest generations,
but withering is worsening.
.
So in threadbare tunics died with roots and berries,
leaning on hickory staffs festooned with feathers and nuts,
they come bearing gifts of wisdom in bulging well worn sacks.
Feebly, slowly, the Old Oracles move along under the curious gaze of the modern folks around them.
The Old Oracles soon spread out and walk separately, moving out amongst the people, on their own but never alone.
Eventually contact is established with someone, some lucky person of the modern world. There’s no sign why, perhaps some supreme intervention, but pausing before them Old Oracle seems to exude a mysterious spiritual power. Neck hairs bristle and hearts glow as a magic connection takes hold between the souls of these contrasting people from ancient and modern lives.
The Old Oracle kindly cryptically mimes, ‘reach your hand into the old sack for a prize’. Some are frightened at first, but when they do reach in tentatively, they feel many small snippets, like what’s hidden inside fortune cookies, except hundreds of them. Old Oracle silently reminds, ‘take just one just one missive just one empowering missive and read it!’
The missives are sometimes serious, sometimes funny, sometimes instructive…. but always empowering and supportive, synchronicity in control, always with reason.
Through the many years of offering the missive ceremony, the Old Oracles have each witnessed countless tears of joy, outbursts of laughter, sighs of relief and shouts of glee. They are so well received on their impromptu visits that as their time ends they often look like magnetic pied pipers heading back to the rejuvenating forest, with clusters of the curious following behind them.
The Old Oracles joined the Mortal Beasts & Deities in the late 1990’s and have been popular in a peaceful, spiritual way ever since. Their wanderings are mostly through music festivals and street fairs.
In the last few years Old Man Oracle has adopted an appreciation for music and some aspects of modernity. He updated his clothing and made a horn. Not just any horn either. A Great Big Deep Booming Horn!
He plays it often, walking around music festivals, stopping to jam his rhythms and simple melodies and below bass crescendos to the delight of those he serenades.
Once he played that horn for hours, leading a ghoul’s band on a parade float in collaboration with Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MassMoCA) and the Contemporary Artists Center in North Adams Massachusetts.
A few times he taught children how to make their own smaller horns at school sponsored events, and then taught them to play some Beethoven. It’s always fun to see a couple dozen young horn players holding their own horn creations to their lips, puffing up their chests and cheeks to play real music on a stage, attentively standing before the grand Old Oracle conductor. And of course Old Oracle wears his new formal attire to conduct these horn orchestras, because to conduct Beethoven on the stage is very special!
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