Watchmen: Twelve

Reading the graphic novel, Watchmen, has been a surprisingly pleasurable and creative experience. When I first picked it up at my local Barnes and Noble, I really wasn’t sure what to expect. After all, these weren’t the superheroes I had grown up with. The Watchmen didn’t leap tall buildings in a single bound, they didn’t pilot invisible airplanes; and though there were caped and masked, not one of them were nearly as likable. Yet in spite of my trepidation, I ventured into this bright, color-paneled world with the same enthusiasm and high-hopes I have for any new read.

The Watchmen are, as a group, people with whom I would choose not to associate in the real world. Their weaknesses are so profound that it is no stretch to imagine that they would be reviled as much in our world as in their own. On the other hand, when talking books and movies, anti-heroes are much more fun and interesting to follow. Indeed, the Watchmen make for perfect counterpoints to the more banal superhero fare.

I closed this book almost a week ago and placed it back on the shelf.

But it didn’t stay there long because there was something nagging at me, something tugging at the periphery of my thoughts that I couldn’t quite turn from. So I reopened the book and sat quietly with it for a while, almost mindlessly flipping through the pates. It was late. I looked up at the clock hanging on the wall opposite my desk, and latched on to it.

It. The “something” that wanted discovering, the thing beneath the glossy surface of the story attempting to claw it’s way down from the shelf and out of the pages. A symbol. A number.

Twelve.

A few examples among several:

• Watchmen:  Six people each with a superhero alter-ego
• The book is divided into twelve chapters
• Time marches onward until the clock stops at 12:00 midnight

Traditionally, the number twelve has been symbolic of completeness and unity. In occultist texts however, there is another meaning for the number twelve, which is derived through a series of numerological calculations. The meaning is chaos.

Often invoked as part of ritualistic application of the dark arts, the spirit of chaos is known as Choronzon. He goes by other names as well (often the case when talking about matters of the occult) such as the Lord of Dissolution, the Lord of Hallucinations, or the Demon of Dispersion.

Interestingly, Choronzon’s role in the cosmology of the occult is to serve as obstacle between competency and enlightenment. In other words, his purpose is to destroy the ego that restricts us from attaining transcendence. To be freed from the ego is to throw open wide the doors behind which our wildest dreams become attainable through the power of the superego. Through the chaos of dissolution, dispersion and hallucination, the liberation of our ultimate narcissistic self is at hand, unfettered to wreak its will.

The Watchmen as novel, has opened my eyes.

So as I say goodbye to the Watchmen, I say thanks for the ride. Long after closing the book, I suspect its messages, characters, and numerous themes will continue to resonate. Any book that sheds light on the fragility of the human condition, while doing so through the eyes and actions of a band of intensely unlikeable misfits, is one that deserves much consideration and certainly another pull-down from the reading shelf. I look forward to revisiting this world –  and another like it — sometime in the not too distant future.

That is, if the clock hasn’t stopped ticking….

Refuge: To Earth We Return

Refuge pays beautiful homage to the Mormon faith (of the LDS variety). The book is filled with smatterings of stories about Joseph Smith Jr., the founder and first prophet of the religion, which serve to illuminate the various tenets of faith with regard to family, ritual, and love of the land.

These glimpses into Terry’s spiritual life serve to elevate this book beyond simply that of women’s study or of a biological treatise. Or, perhaps that would be better put by saying that all things in this physical world are connected and interwoven by her faith in a spiritual world, like a tapestry of the ethereal.

The Utah desert is a mirror of ourselves, peaks and valleys through which we all pass. The earth is what we are as human, both physically and psychologically. Inseparable and immutable are the elements that comprise flesh, blood, and planet. We are born of earth and to earth we return. The water we drink is the water we are made of; the food that we eat sustains us. The ratio of water to flesh is similar to the ratio of water to land. Seasons are expressed in terms of change: birth, growth, decay, death.

But inasmuch as the book attempts to impart the wisdom of a formalized construct of faith, Refuge also borrows heavily on polytheistic aspects of religion, as well. The notion of goddess, earth mother, is ever-present in Terry’s expressive love for her homeland. In the rocks surrounding the Great Salt Lake Basin, in the canyons and arroyos, indeed within the breathing of the lake itself, the land is a timeless bond between mother and daughter.

This is the story of Demeter and Persephone….

Earth was once an everlasting Eden. Demeter, the mother goddess, blessed this world with the feminine — an endless and boundless love for her daughter Persephone, the Maiden of Spring. Demeter’s abiding happiness brought bounty and bloom to the world of men.

Eros, a mischievous god with lust dripping from the pointed tips of his arrows, fired a shot at the onlooker Hades, god of the underworld, as he gazed upon Persephone lying naked in a field of flowers fresh in bloom. Because lust and love will not go unrequited, Hades ripped open the earth beneath her and pulled  her down into the burning depths of hell, the Kingdom of the Dead over which Hades ruled. Persephone, separated from her mother both physically and spiritually, was now the reluctant courtesan of demons and bride to the dead.

Demeter, broken and wandering the earth as a human woman in mourning, vowed never again to bestow her blessing of life upon the earth. Water turned to sand, humans to dust, fecundity now a barren womb. Humanity prayed to the father god Zeus, begging him to intervene on their behalf. Out of pity, Zeus enlisted the messenger god Hermes to intercede and to demand Persephone’s release and return to her mother.

Unexpectedly, Hades conceded. Persephone returned to earth and to Demeter, who at last blessed the earth with the feminine, with her love. Persephone explained that during her time in hell she had refused to eat, praying instead for death. Then, in exchange for his willingness to release her, she gave in to his single, strange demand: that she eat but a single seed of a pomegranate.

The pomegranate. Food of the Dead.

Demeter recoiled in sudden horror, for partaking of the pomegranate meant spending the remainder of eternity among the dead. Persephone, though presently in her mother’s loving embrace, was now forever dead to her…and a cold wind passed over the earth.

But the father Zeus, interceding out of love or pity, decreed that because the maiden goddess had innocently and unwillingly eaten but a single seed, she would be allowed to return to the living a portion of every year.

*     *     *

Our spirits are inextricably bound to our bodies as we pass through life. So to, earth is bound to the heavens; a green-blue gem suspended in an eternal universe. Faith guides us through this dance between life and death, dust and spirit, earth and heaven. And as seasons come and go, our understanding continues to grow. Terry writes:

If we…believe in God the Father and in his son, Jesus Christ, it is only logical that a Mother-in-Heaven balances the sacred triangle. I believe the Holy Ghost is female, although she has remained hidden, invisible, deprived of a body, she is the spirit that seeps into our hearts and directs us to the well. — p. 241

The feminine, by whatever name given, is the power that preserves.