Mouthing Thicket

A somatic exhibition was called holyverse in our jargon. It was embedded in and at the same time separate from the universe of time, space, sense and meaning. The entrance to the exhibition was a ritualized transit between the universe and the holyverse, between two different dimensions of the same reality. Pilgrims would be yanked from their everyday lives and hurled into a sacred spacetime, where their flabbergasted mindbody would be subjected to experiences unheard off on the outside. Holyverse swallowed them and affected them on various levels simultaneously – cognitive, emotional, sensory and cellular.

The overall experience was formed by the permeability of the mindbody just as by the feng shui of the environment – the color of the light, direction of gravity, temperature of sound, taste of walls, elasticity of the floor, electromagnetic waves, flexibility of the atmosphere. Through proprioceptive bodily reactions, awakened by the environment, Pilgrims realized their presence in the Present and immersed themselves in the hidden layers of reality. They ceased to be Spectators who observe reality and became Participants who partake in it, through whom the reality is accomplished. The experience of embodied immersion brought forth a moment of instant hallowing.”

A fragment from The Songs and Memories of Great Pekari, Last of the Facilitators.