OWL & HERON PRESS
Russell Lockhart & Paco Mitchell, Editors
Our nightly dreams are a natural resource, a national treasure, not yet plundered by the rapacious complexes of the controlling powers, be they military, industrial, corporate, educational, political—or any others hidden from view. If you have not yet thought of your own dreams as a treasure, you surely will after reading this remarkable dialogue between
Russell Lockhart and Paco Mitchell.
CONTENTS
Foreword by Paco Mitchell - 9
Introduction by Russell Lockhart - 13
Dialogues
Throwing the Bones - 19
The Truth in One’s Bones- 27
The Rhizome Layer - 37
Rhizomic Consciousness - 47
Negative Capability - 65
The Roots of the Tree - 77
Through the Looking Glass - 91
The Emergence of Fex and Coo - 101
No Souvenirs - 109
Baucis and Philemon - 121
Epilogue - 129
End Notes - 133
Permissions - 139
About the Authors - 141
About the Press - 143
COVER-IMAGE AS PROLOGUE
To follow bright lights through a turbulent sea may not always lead us to a safe harbor. In fact, we may instead find ourselves running aground. In dark times, it is often best to look to the darkness itself for guidance—to look and wait. If we are patient, we may begin to discern, without any frantic waving of arms, what was there all along. Slowly, something moves toward the visible spectrum, the way black heat-waves rise from the infra-red and into the red. If we persist, the waves may begin to glow, dim-red at first, then taking on shape. Eventually, what had seemed like nothing compared to the dazzle of the lights, may assume an inevitability of its own. Then, everywhere we look, we begin to discover that what we sought was visible all along. We may even find that it was actually seeking us out, and that we ourselves are charged with heralding the unknown presence.
Such is the age we live in. All our bright lights fail us., and the saving factor is something yet to be known. So we keep our eyes trained on the red spot emerging from the black background, and try to make room in our lives where it can emerge into being and live—whatever it may be.
This requires trust and faith, but not traditional faith, in the orthodox sense. It is more of a faith in the generative Intelligence imbuing every aspect of the cosmos, as present in the flea as it is in the fireball. Many try to name it, but it is too soon. So, if in this book we occasionally use names, we do so the way fishermen use hooks, casting them into the moving depths of dark waters. And even when our hooks return empty, we are always happy to catch a few glimpses of swift silver arcs beneath the waves.
—Paco Mitchell