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THE DREAM ~ When the butterfly woke up in the early morning, he couldn’t tell whether he had a dream about Guru Nanak or that he was a holy man who had a dream that he was a butterfly. It was distressing news for a butterfly, and while he tried to reassure himself that he was indeed a butterfly, not a holy man, his wings began trembling. 
The butterfly tried to remember the events of the previous night, but nothing could explain what had happened. He felt compelled to find someone who could help explain the dream to him. The butterfly couldn’t tell his dream to his friends who would think he was playing a joke on them, or that he had lost his mind. The simplest solution was to find someone who would understand and help him. There was an eagle who was said to be able to read and decipher dreams. After a few enquiries, the butterfly learned that the eagle lived on a mountain a day’s ride away.
With a few deft movements, the eagle landed firmly planting its talons on the ground. ‘Don’t fret, little one,’ said the eagle. ‘I am here.’ A faint acknowledgement came from the butterfly that he was equally delighted to see the eagle and that there was no need to impress on the large bird why he was here. All is well, thought the butterfly and he felt the safety of the eagle presence envelop him. It seemed the eagle was already listening to his mind, penetrating his tiny head and trying to hold back thoughts he’d prefer the eagle didn’t know. ‘You have quite a name,’ said the butterfly, ‘and you come on the highest recommendation’. The butterfly noticed a deep gaping scar on the right side of the eagle’s face. ‘I’ve spent most of my life deciphering dreams,’ said the eagle. ‘I’m told that I’m a profound reader of souls, but most of what I know is what you might call a self-styled apprenticeship. I’ve never had any formal training, learning what I know from the old-school guys.’ ‘Who are the old-school guys?’ the butterfly asked. ’What I call father figures in the business who’ve been around long enough to decipher dreams,’ the eagle replied. It was already sunset. The eagle and butterfly entered a small cave. The inside was filled with acrid smoke from spluttering tallow candles. He noticed a stack of books in one corner of the cave and piles of unrolled scrolls. The eagle spent the evening pouring over semiotic texts, alchemical symbolism, and the history of dreams. It was not the eagle’s reputation as an interpreter of dreams or his scholarly erudition that impressed the butterfly, but the humility in his gentle eyes grey eyes that allowed the butterfly to feel at home. The eagle peered at the butterfly with his deep-set eyes as an orange glow flickered across his face. ‘Your dream intrigues me,’ said the eagle. ‘Much of what I can read is still fragmented, but it appears that you have been blessed by the Guru, for reasons I can’t quite explain yet.’ The eagle spoke in a soft voice. ‘Those who are blessed with ‘Prasad’ are indeed lucky. Have you ever met a Sikh before or felt the presence of God inside you?’ ‘I once met a Sikh in Haridwar on the bank of the river Ganges during Baisakhi,’ the butterfly said. ‘He was no older than thirty. He told me that to receive the Guru’s grace was a blessing that doesn’t happen to everyone. It was an invitation to wake up from a dream.’ The eagle laughed. ‘A butterfly who happens to be passing through Haridwar during early spring.’ ‘All kinds of people come to me with stories that happened when they were awake and when they were dreaming,’ continued the eagle. ‘It doesn’t surprise me that when you woke up you thought you were a holy man in light of what you have just told me. If I was to go into the whole story we would still be sitting here when spring comes again.’ The eagle raised an eyebrow. ‘But there is something else about this dream.’ The eagle shifted its gaze to one of the candles watching the warm flickering flame. ‘What I can tell is that when you fell asleep and started to dream, reality and illusion became blurred. When you woke up you realized that you were living in a dream. That you woke up thinking that you were a holy man was in fact a transformation in your consciousness, just as I imagine what happened to Guru Nanak when had spoken to the creator and returned a different man.’ ‘Well, I can hardly believe…’ ‘What you believe is not the point. No matter what you believe you have to concede that what happened to you is real.’ The eagle closed its eyes. The butterfly stood perfectly still pondering what the eagle had said. It’s not a dream after all thought the butterfly. It’s quite real. |
He flew across scores of mustard seed fields inhaling miles of woody smoke that billowed from chimneys in the villages. The butterfly tried not to be anxious about all the things that he had dreamed about. They were not bad thoughts, but thoughts that nonetheless bothered him. He finally found himself under the shade of a flowering acacia tree close to the bank of what was a small river. An eagle was standing atop a tree stump like an ancient sentinel waiting for a sign or omen. The butterfly marvelled at its colour. It had never seen an eagle with a saffron-orange beak and talons before.