Esther Racah Writer & Literary Blogger

Tag: mystical journey

  • The Arcane Forest

    The Arcane Forest

    The arcane forest was my place of refuge. It oozed with enchantments, and the trees did not possess a name. It was a place where I became invisible and mortal while still retaining my physical form.

    Softly, the wind whispered to me its hidden secrets, but I could not grasp their meaning. Such was my daze.

    The large clouds were gathering under a grey tone, and all the shades of white contrasted with the blue of the sky. The sound of the streams was like a melody which, however, had a gloomy and at times sinister sound. As if it reflected the image of my heart.

    Lost in my anguish and obsessive thoughts, I was seeking direction in that vast green and dark expanse, although the sun showed its light from time to time. I was lost in the chaos, in the noises that at times followed me relentlessly and at other times vanished into nothingness.

    The trees seemed to move, at times, and at other times they seemed almost dead, shrivelled, as if without vital infamy. But the mystery of that place was unusual and unexplainable. It seemed like a place of my imagination, which did not exist at all in tangible reality.

    In my wandering, it seemed that my shadow no longer followed me, but rather that other shadows not belonging to me had followed my path, as if curious about what I intended to do or where I was going. I was walking without direction and without any goal of finding myself or of finding the right destination.

    It was as if those shadows sighed, or wanted to whisper something to me — hidden truths, sealed secrets, confessions too indecent to be revealed to human ears, or too regal to deserve a particular listening. The trees seemed to encircle an arcane mark, or what seemed like the mark of death, or of the cavern, or the portal through which one might enter another world, a world not reserved for mortals and common souls.

    The arcane forest was my place of solitude alone, but also the place to which I truly belonged. No longer being part of the earthly world, of the world of mortals, of that realm I had tried to possess and understand, but which I then refused to belong to.
    Lisa

  • The Eleventh Gate

    The Eleventh Gate

    The Eleventh Gate stood in the underworld — silent, unmarked.
    I wandered, neither living nor dead,
    Caught between shadows that whispered secrets I could not grasp,
    Searching for meaning in that endless twilight of souls.

    17:17 appeared to me
    While I was confused by the thoughts that crowded my mind
    And darkened my heart,
    Searching and hoping for a way — for a way out —
    Which did not seem obvious,
    Given that I found myself in the labyrinth of death,
    In a world suspended, beneath that of the mortals.

    How I found myself in that world, I think I have remembered it:
    that chariot of skeletons and spectres, of demons from the underworld,
    had overwhelmed me and taken me away
    into their grotesque world of nightmares.

    Monsters adorned in sparse and ancient garments
    wore grotesque masks and stared at me with their dead,
    Yet burning eyes,
    as if they could read my heart,
    and they sneered at my fears and weaknesses,
    and at my ethereal, mortal being.

    I had become a captive of that world, a world of shadows and wraiths.
    Subjugated to their power, I could not resist,
    And my steps grew heavier and heavier,
    as if they echoed the weight of my heart,
    which had become a heap of metal shards and thorns.

    Exhausted and bloodless, I surrendered,
    and no longer felt that languid sense of torpor and melancholy.
    Horror and chills had gripped my entire body,
    And the beating of my heart stopped
    like a broken pendulum clock.

    I crossed the Eleventh Gate, seventeen times seventeen,
    And with each passing, a part of my heart fell
    upon the ground made of bones and carcasses and mud and buried souls.
    And thus it was that I collapsed,
    into a terrible slumber.
    Of death.
    Lisa

  • Dreams and Spells

    Dreams and Spells

    Dreams and spells coveted in the abyss of shadows where phantoms crept,
    Wandering through a realm half-wept.
    The moon hung low; its face was pale,
    And whispered of a ghostly tale.

    The sky became gloomy, the stars were dim,
    As winds sang out a mournful hymn.
    Every path was lost in endless nights,
    Beneath a sky that held no light.

    Through twisted woods, the wanderers found a gate,
    Its iron bars were wrought with fate.
    A voice called out, both near and far,
    Like echoes from a fallen star.

    “Step forth,” it said, “into the dream,
    Where silence reigns and shadows gleam.”
    Those who crossed the threshold felt the spell,
    A touch of darkness known too well.

    The world within was strange and wild,
    Where reason’s grip was swiftly beguiled.
    The ground was ash, the trees were bone,
    Their branches cracked in a sorrowful tone.

    A figure stood with eyes like fire,
    A sorceress of dark desire.
    She raised her hand, the spell was cast,
    And time itself could not hold fast.

    The dreamers drifted then, their senses blurred,
    In realms where whispered words were heard.
    Each secret spoke of death’s embrace,
    Of haunted dreams and hollow grace.

    The stars fell down like frozen tears,
    Unveiling long-forgotten fears.
    Intense was the feeling of the pull of ancient woe,
    Beneath the weight of night’s cold glow.

    The sorceress turned, her gaze met the others,
    A silent bond both fierce and delicate like smothers.
    She beckoned close, her fingers curled,
    And swirled those unfortunates through her shadowed world.

    A beginning of a frantic dance upon a sea of mist,
    Where every wing gust felt like a tryst,
    With darkness draped in velvet black,
    And the time that twisted, bent, and cracked.

    The spell then broke; the dream grew thin,
    Those delusionals found themselves where they’d once been.
    The gate was gone, the night was still,
    But in every heart, there lingered a chill.

    For though every heart left that cursed realm,
    Its shadows clung; they overwhelmed.
    And in every soul, dreams and spells were bound,
    Whispered secrets lost, never to be found.
    Esther Elizabeth Racah

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