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Oct. 19th, 2015 09:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kingtycoonThe musician rides on the sphinx’ back – singing her song that’s a story – it goes on a long time, the sphinx enjoys it, purring & fluttering his wings. The sphinx is a giant godlike presence in the crater. Meanwhile the man takes council with the devil. His devil. Its jeweled tail twitches in the air the stinger gleaming. “Can you help me out? He says ‘a bag is empty but it has something in it – what is it?’ and I don’t know from riddles.” He talks to his devil with thoughts and the devil hasn’t any answer. “I can’t do wordplay in a language I don’t speak.” That’s what the Devil thinks and the devil thinks at the man and the man thinks at the devil, that’s how they talk.
There’s thought about the sacred geometries – the devil explains it. “See, you’re an object in 3 dimensions, mortal – you’ve got length and width and height. See, you can draw a line- that’s one dimension, but a line is a shadow cast by a square- that’s two dimensions – a square is a shadow cast by a higher dimensional shape- something you can’t imagine.”
“What about you devil?”
“Okay – so I’m part of an idea thought of by an extinct species from another unimaginable dimension – I’m a shadow cast by their thoughts occupying 5 spatial dimensions.”
“Are other ideas only shadows then?”
“Oh, sure, think of this – you’re an object in 3 dimensions and the shadow of your consciousness is a spray of words on a page – 2 dimensional shadow of 3 dimensional consciousness.”
The devil sketches it out, shapes & lines in the fine sand that blows into the crater jungle from the upland desert. A dense oasis of towering trees verged on all edges by the red-dust desert. The floor of the forest is dusty red with a patch of fine sand spread thick & still. The devil draws squares & line with its jeweled tail in the fine sandy bottom of the skyward tending jungle. The man tries and tries to consider the Sphinx’ riddle. The Sphinx lies still and silent curling up around the castle at the jungle’s center, it yawns and listens to music – it’s human head is sweet & regal, a princely face, perfectly formed & beautiful. The woman lies upon its broad, furred paw & plays her tortoiseshell lyre singing about far off places. There is a maze in the mind, and she doesn’t even deign to consider it, blissfully caught up in the puzzle of words that conspire in rhythm to make music, not thought but the removal of thought. The sphinx is a thing of thoughts – words. She sings and it is hypnotized by rhythm just as she is. It is balmy and dreamlike under the sky of unbroken blue.
“What shadow does a line cast? One dimensional?”
“Well, see, there are lower planes of things, inner planes. Where things have only one dimension – certainly. If you could see, as I see, you’d see that within the interstices between the atoms – the unbreakable tiniest of things – you’d see there, there are universes – but only of a single type. These are the inner dimensions that express outward – make the universes. Everything on higher planes is made of things on lower planes. So there’s length & width & height & time & Gravus & Intention & Froment – but without the one before you can’t have the next. At the bottom is substance- see, just mass – which doesn’t need any dimension – it’s substance itself. This is divided up into a few forms – I suppose based on the angle they’re viewed from. These one dimensional substances we call Elements.”
“So you know this, but not language.”
“I’ve had other assignments. I’m an explorer – I work with you now, for your lifespan, documenting this existence. In your past I worked with creatures from those inner planes.”
“In my past.”
“Well, I experience everything simultaneously – I’m talking to all of them now.”
“Who do you serve after me?”
“Oh – well, when you die, I return to my native place.”
“Hell”
“Yes – there, and there I’m elevated to a higher place in my hierarchy – for my service.”
“And you do something else?”
“Oh – I authorize the arrangement that allows you to summon me to service.”
“So… Wait, you are your own master?”
“No no, you’re my master. I decided to send me to you. Don’t think about it too much – it doesn’t make sense without Gravus.”
“So you remember me solving this riddle?”
“Oh, no. No I don’t. You don’t solve it.”
“And then the sphinx?”
“Kills you. Because you can’t solve its riddle. It kills you eventually.”
“Soon?”
“Maybe a day or two from now.”
“What about her? It kills her?”
“Nono, she’s a riddle – music & a story – it likes her, it thinks she’s a puzzle- fathomless. You’re too transparent – the Sphinx, it has patience but it doesn’t care for your hesitation – something about decisiveness – that’s what it likes. Next to riddles.”
“How can I puzzle it then? Hm.”
“Oh, it’s easy – ask it this: ‘What’s the name of the great power of the forest.’”
There’s thought about the sacred geometries – the devil explains it. “See, you’re an object in 3 dimensions, mortal – you’ve got length and width and height. See, you can draw a line- that’s one dimension, but a line is a shadow cast by a square- that’s two dimensions – a square is a shadow cast by a higher dimensional shape- something you can’t imagine.”
“What about you devil?”
“Okay – so I’m part of an idea thought of by an extinct species from another unimaginable dimension – I’m a shadow cast by their thoughts occupying 5 spatial dimensions.”
“Are other ideas only shadows then?”
“Oh, sure, think of this – you’re an object in 3 dimensions and the shadow of your consciousness is a spray of words on a page – 2 dimensional shadow of 3 dimensional consciousness.”
The devil sketches it out, shapes & lines in the fine sand that blows into the crater jungle from the upland desert. A dense oasis of towering trees verged on all edges by the red-dust desert. The floor of the forest is dusty red with a patch of fine sand spread thick & still. The devil draws squares & line with its jeweled tail in the fine sandy bottom of the skyward tending jungle. The man tries and tries to consider the Sphinx’ riddle. The Sphinx lies still and silent curling up around the castle at the jungle’s center, it yawns and listens to music – it’s human head is sweet & regal, a princely face, perfectly formed & beautiful. The woman lies upon its broad, furred paw & plays her tortoiseshell lyre singing about far off places. There is a maze in the mind, and she doesn’t even deign to consider it, blissfully caught up in the puzzle of words that conspire in rhythm to make music, not thought but the removal of thought. The sphinx is a thing of thoughts – words. She sings and it is hypnotized by rhythm just as she is. It is balmy and dreamlike under the sky of unbroken blue.
“What shadow does a line cast? One dimensional?”
“Well, see, there are lower planes of things, inner planes. Where things have only one dimension – certainly. If you could see, as I see, you’d see that within the interstices between the atoms – the unbreakable tiniest of things – you’d see there, there are universes – but only of a single type. These are the inner dimensions that express outward – make the universes. Everything on higher planes is made of things on lower planes. So there’s length & width & height & time & Gravus & Intention & Froment – but without the one before you can’t have the next. At the bottom is substance- see, just mass – which doesn’t need any dimension – it’s substance itself. This is divided up into a few forms – I suppose based on the angle they’re viewed from. These one dimensional substances we call Elements.”
“So you know this, but not language.”
“I’ve had other assignments. I’m an explorer – I work with you now, for your lifespan, documenting this existence. In your past I worked with creatures from those inner planes.”
“In my past.”
“Well, I experience everything simultaneously – I’m talking to all of them now.”
“Who do you serve after me?”
“Oh – well, when you die, I return to my native place.”
“Hell”
“Yes – there, and there I’m elevated to a higher place in my hierarchy – for my service.”
“And you do something else?”
“Oh – I authorize the arrangement that allows you to summon me to service.”
“So… Wait, you are your own master?”
“No no, you’re my master. I decided to send me to you. Don’t think about it too much – it doesn’t make sense without Gravus.”
“So you remember me solving this riddle?”
“Oh, no. No I don’t. You don’t solve it.”
“And then the sphinx?”
“Kills you. Because you can’t solve its riddle. It kills you eventually.”
“Soon?”
“Maybe a day or two from now.”
“What about her? It kills her?”
“Nono, she’s a riddle – music & a story – it likes her, it thinks she’s a puzzle- fathomless. You’re too transparent – the Sphinx, it has patience but it doesn’t care for your hesitation – something about decisiveness – that’s what it likes. Next to riddles.”
“How can I puzzle it then? Hm.”
“Oh, it’s easy – ask it this: ‘What’s the name of the great power of the forest.’”
