I

At first there were two who hoped to rid themselves of the world.

They lived in a small village along the edge of a coast.

And although their bodies spiralled slowly through the passage in which all material things must pass in the world, unlike the others in their village, the waters resounded through their souls with all its disembodiment -and thus eternity-, and energy in them alone. The sea and its constant pull and push that beat against the edge of their world. The sea as the lull that sings their world to sleep, the crush that closes their eyes, that foam which clusters into their dreams, and that salt that twisted in their blood.

They believed in themselves. Of the salt in their bloods.

That they had to rid themselves of the world…but how? They did not know…

II

One evening they stood by the cliffs, and she said: Always, always I imagine myself falling from the midst of the sky, very high –and then, dropping, falling. I become pulled apart by the sea.

The boy shook his head, But you know already, said he, you must not think to return to an origin other than yourself…how can you rid yourself of the world, if you are to turn back into the loss of everything?

She said: The child cannot go back to the womb to lose the world…and still wish to attain oneself.

Yes, the boy replied solemnly, One has to remain sensitive; awake…the most important is now, where you witness so clearly. Even as each second peels away to oblivion…the present is the only thing that is ever true, and ever constant.

She said: Everything else is either memory or conjecture.

She said: What happiness is it to have the rarest flower that always bloomed in your dreams, that the moment you were able to behold it you lost all your senses?

Said he: Attainment through belief –no matter how true, cannot equal experience of attainment, and thus claim…

His voice folded in her gaze.

And gazing across the dashing silk shadows of the sea she said: To die no way to rid oneself of the world. Though that is difficult…it is not the way. How nice the thought remains, however.

And he: That is not our way. We would lose the very ability to attain the thing we want.

A silence moved over them, and they bowed their heads to the sea.

A truth tormented them from the bottom of their tongues: if this, too, becomes a vague memory, why should the present even matter as well?

How sad, how sad, they repeated quietly, in their salt-kingdom hearts.

There was no path across their seas, only the muddied track behind them.