Journey Within the Human Womb

Journey within

the human womb

A philosophical tale by

Patrick LOISEAU

Translated by

Martha MAURI

(Illustration by J.B. Monge)

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©Copyright Patrick Loiseau – La maison du lérot (2018)

Sometimes while searching a course, there is a silent and timely fight between the compass and the dream ... The compass indicates to the North of the journey to be accomplished while the dream strives to place (healthy) sticks in the wheels, for the greater good, naturally, of discovery, the unexpected and certain revelation...

Our hero, although quite common, experienced this initiation journey. He took the path of scholars, looking for some kind of chimeric guru, and later on had several encounters, some richer than others.

But his journey has the characteristic that it takes place not on the moon, on a mystery island, in a balloon adrift at the world’s mercy, or even in the centre of the earth itself ... No! This journey shall take place in the human womb, this human womb we claim to know so well, and yet it is still a stranger for us, a paradoxical place where discrete beings hide to operate the pulleys of our ontological disguises...

P. Loiseau

Warning -

Born from a flash, a sudden lightning, an indolent fraction of time, or an irresistible momentum of survival, this tale could be hopelessly drenched by the next fraction of time, condemned by the urgency or need. But tales are flames that never really burn out... It all started in 1990 with the sudden desire of dipping my pen in a more infinite time. This tale has slumbered here and there, waking up from time to time, till finally...  reaching its end 28 years later, in 2018. That is to say Saturn’s Return.

Perhaps it was also hiding in Jupiter, maybe in Mercury, or in the Third House, ready to give me a hand; just to make out of my pen other than a device to scratch my ear.

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- PART 1 – The human womb

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Poil d’Ours

Poil d’Ours was an old stingy man, full of madness and derision. It is said that he always walked with a bag full of keys that no one knows what good they would do for him. It is said that some of the keys were made out of metal, others were made of wood, but the mystery of their use has always been well kept. What can actually be done with a wooden key?  All these hypotheses have been posed, and yet no one knows so far.

One thing for sure is that Poil d’Ours had more than one trick and more than one mischief in his life. He had already run across the countryside and the city, the mountains and valleys, the streams and deserts without ever regretting. There is already a legend about him that no tears have run down from his eyes nor has he frowned.

This all may be true, but no one has ever proven it. Not even I, who have met him several times, can confirm to having seen any sign in this sense. He was always present and absent at the same time, talking with me as if he was a pleasant reflection of my own answers. He always managed to be whenever needed, no sooner no later. That is the reason of my answer.

I saw him one day disappear just as I opened my mouth to ask an important question. I came to ask him for advice of the exact meaning of my life; I wanted him to explain to me the rules of existence, to provide me with a tool or guide for use; something to help me survive.

There is no doubt I was not well at the time and he seemed to be the only one who could help me. Unfortunately, it was at that moment, the only moment that seemed important to me in my now frail existence, when he decided to disappear.

This disappearance caused me a lot of pain. Of course, I was disappointed with his attitude at first. He, with a magical and lifesaving presence always, had flown away at the most critical moment! But eventually, time and thinking helped me through the disorientation and pain of his absence. I had just realized that I was close to him and that he was a valuable ally. A vital link and an endless source. A representation of my consciousness.

So, I took the road on my own looking for him.

The great quest had started.

I took the same roads he had; I went to the same cities and through the same dangers. I thought I could follow him, arrive ahead of him, come close to him, and even surely meet him. But I never saw him. Not once since that great disappearance that I have considered, perhaps mistakenly, as the last one.

So, I went on and redrew the map of the world, rediscovered the geography and the history of peoples simply from his footsteps. The Africa of my childhood became another Africa when I walked on the sands where his steps had already left trace. The seas did not have the same taste as I imagined them before he climbed into a boat. For him, I discovered at each side of my memory the other side of another reality. Not much later, I made the discovery. And then, from one discovery to another, I fell into the sweet learning of revelations. I discovered the pleasure of openness to the world, thanks to his absence, which had now become more valuable to me than his virtual existence.

I went over the gestures, the emotions, the dilemma of my first experiences, as if I had become a child. And I learned to grow again.

As I said, I’ve travelled around the world looking for him, to no avail. At least I did not find him in the flesh. For, as I travelled, he had become physically and mentally closer over time, he was increasingly present, until I had the impression that he was under every stone, behind every foliage, in every cup of coffee or in the void of my mental questions. A bit of him, of his breath, constantly calls me. He was actually there! Had I identified with him or had he conveyed me, unknowingly, a way of existence?

Despite there was no use to keep on looking for him anymore, for I have managed to make him live without him being there, my attachment to his person became paradoxically stronger, and more demanding. I had to see him again, at least to tell him how my search for him became a fantastic journey, how it started as a quest for the grail and continued as a conquest of the Golden Fleece.

I was not so lucky because, after five years of walking, taking trains, going down the roads, taking ferries and charters, a painful ordeal was waiting for me at the top of the highest mountain in the Mexican landscape: an old shepherd without sheep. I learned that the old miser was dead!

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The news of his death astounded me first.

And then, after the shock, I tried to find out more. Where, when, how, why? It was an avalanche of questions for my mountain host.

The old shepherd did not answer me right away. He let a silence settle between us, as if he wanted to let the words echo in me, and the echo replied. I even thought I recognized in this attitude what I had already seen at Poil d'Ours’ house.

And then, as if my questions did not matter, he replied:

The man from far away has left me something for you.

And he held out his hand, in whose palm I saw one of the old miser’s keys. The key was neither wood nor metal, but a key woven from dead leaves with a special treatment to solidify and prevent them from falling into dust.

I felt particularly thrilled at that time I even cannot describe to date. It was a mixture of happiness and inner crisis. It made me feel good and bad at the same time. And my body, more than my head, was the first to feel it. It was, in any case, a wonderful gift.

The old shepherd continued:

The man used strange words that seemed to be for you.

He carefully thought it, as if to collect the pieces that could be scattered in his head, grabbed his staff and began to draw on the ground a set of strokes and curves.

He told me that your inquisitiveness would lead you to him... his exact words were, ‘He will come here, where my journey ends.’

And then he did the same as me, he drew roads on the ground and added: He will have to go on until the end of the twelfth night that separates him from here to the Eastern border.

Questions flooded my mind by then. It seemed to me that I was already moving into a fairy world, a brain world, where human values and social rules were no longer valid.

What power did Poil d'Ours hold to make me suddenly believe that there is another life, a life made of treasures to discover or planets to explore?

And there I was, in a Mexican mountain, embracing the nonsense of three quirky fellows: the old miser, the old shepherd, and me. Since I was not a man who wanted to stubbornly cling to human realities, I faced the old man's wishes. I was ready to walk; to take the road again to the place Poil d'Ours had shown for me. He said I should go east; I shall go straight to the East. He had said that it would last twelve nights; I shall walk at night until the twelfth sunrise.

The old shepherd's eyes twinkled as he realized I was up to the challenge. The years he spent in the mountains had made him forget the bets of humans and strange rides that men from below sometimes borrow for a purpose in life. He had learned here the quiet and silence he shared with his animals with just a long, unspoken and respectful caress. He only had a vague memory of human games, the ones he saw adults play half a century ago.

But he was already shivering thrilled to imagine this little piece of man that I represented going in search of a chimera.

He helped me prepare for my trip, gave me a sheepskin for the cool nights and a whole lot of spicy food. The trick is not to let ideas settle in the stomach.

He wished me good luck and made me promise him I would visit him someday.

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And so, my journey began.

The first days of my long walk were as dry and hot as the freezing nights. I crossed, one by one, the boundaries that set apart the night of the day. I crossed forests, deserts, villages, mountains and rivers and began counting time through the steps I had taken.

The contrast between day and night generated thoughts that made this contrast attractive. I actually learned from the night to distinguish the shadows, to name them and even to talk to them. The night became an absolute accomplice and my whole being changed at its touch. Days, in comparison, appeared to me faded and without any essential message. They were only immobile steps, modest stepping-stones to be eagerly swallowed into the evenings that I was impatiently waiting for. Twilight was a presage of a new door that I was soon to open. My mind then woke up to sensations, emotions that the day was unable to produce.

I first discovered that black was a colour, despite what textbooks say. Black is a colour because it shines, and the night is never silent.

I discovered then that the transition from day to night was a change of time and space, that reliefs, just as sensations and thoughts, are neither immobile nor frozen: they belong, like them, to the shadow or light itself. 

The moon itself, which carved there the dim light of its brilliance, disappeared and let me dialogue with other forms, other sensations, and other brilliances. Blackness was never complete, so much that it lit me with mental candles.

This moment was no other than another experience to my existence. But until then I had not paid much attention to my way of advancing in life and taking hold of its teachings. My discovery of the contrast, my discovery of the day and the night went much further than a simple trip from one observation point to another.

I felt in a whisper, a slight soughing, the small wind blowers of words that inhabit the night, like a secret soul walking with me, blowing me a hint, a mystery to solve, a question to ask, an answer to prepare...

Discreet and invisible, these little winds played with my me-skin, as Anzieu would say, sticking to the night and adventure in a form of symbiotic dependence to a complete assimilation of my next steps... A veil printed, a watermark of the future...

And my twelve nights passed without me really counting the kilometres that separated me from the old shepherd. He was already far, and I suppose, near his sheep, surely playing a flute or enjoying a meal made of scented ham and peasant wine.

At the dawn of the thirteenth day, I felt a deep eagerness running over me: I was going to have the appointment that Poil d'Ours promised me.

The sun rose majestic, embracing the grass and small trees with its many rays. The horizon seemed calm, barely cradled by a small wind that seemed to whistle a melody. There was not an extraordinary sight here: I had often seen beautiful sunrises, some of which were already printed in my memory.

Yet, I had before my eyes a landscape with a particular atmosphere. The colours of the tree foliage were not those of the oaks, birch trees or hazel trees of my childhood gardens. Some trees were yellow; others blue or red and others were even multi-coloured.

I waited there for several hours and nothing seemed to move. And then, I heard a light music rising in the air and, almost immediately, a female voice that echoed:

"hoo – la – ooh –