Friday 22 October 2010

The Impression of an Apparition

I referred in my last instruction to the mobile phones the young men had about their persons. Aquinas had two! Despite the group’s sincere desire to experience spirit manifestation, these intrusive items were so important that they remained permanently activated. Did they expect the dead to text-message them? Did they expect a member of the eighteenth century clergy to ‘blue-tooth’ them. Not only has this technology led to all manner of vulgar verbs being bandied about, but the most trivial matters have been vested with an entitlement to intrude upon one’s consciousness: I have to stop talking to you in order to text my friend, I have to respond to this photo I have been sent. Indeed, it is common to see groups of young people in a pub, all sitting in silence, texting others who aren’t there. Indeed further, the panic engendered by the treat of the battery failing in such a device whilst we were in the house, was a great as any sparked by an outbreak of preternatural phenomenon. Even as I voice that observation, I feel that the true haunting of Albion lies somewhere within it.

As I have indicated in my last teaching, I had proved beyond any serious doubt that the house adjoining St. Hilary’s Church, Wallasey was a focus of spirit phenomena and after a number of preternatural manifestations, the stage was set for the vigil through the night.

I forget precisely what time the first apparition manifested, although it was after Mr Crass’ experience. I had returned to the stairs where I slipped into deep meditation, experiencing Samadhi (a state beyond the daily self which is in communion with the Divine Principle that sustains the universe), when I became aware of commotion around me. Reattaching myself to my senses, I found the young men seemingly pointing cameras at me. My initial instinct was that I was exuding waves of compassion and peace (Prana if you will) which were registering on their assorted devices however when they gestured above me, it became apparent that their interest was drawn to a figure on the landing above. At the head of the stairs there was a single step which led to either side of the upper floor. The area of landing in-between the two steps was broad, hosting a grandfather clock which rested in a niche built into the wall. On this occasion, as evidenced by the light from the landing lights and by a flashlight from the young men below, the clock and the alcove had faded behind a shadowy figure. It stood, neither between the stairs, nor in the alcove but somehow it covered the two. It eluded the eye, no sooner had one registered it than one’s gaze slid to the banister or to the landing running away and so the viewer had to continually readjust the gaze. My initial impression was that it hovered before us and then I thought our tangible world was opened up and we looked upon a shadow from beyond. Although motionless and in no wise threatening, it was deeply unsettling to look upon an apparition which first protruded into our world and then seemed to suck one’s awareness out into the gloomy world beyond our own. The young men reacted with some degree of horror, yet they retained enough composure to try and capture the apparition on film; I, on the other hand, sought in vain to detect any features within the shadow and as I looked on, the sigh of the wind and settle of the wood, drew my consciousness and I found myself drawn on those noises out into a wide space, until my awareness spilled into the gulf of the sky, attuned to the winds whilst another strand of my being plunged in a leaden dive, down onto unyielding rocks washed by waves. Around me, voices flickered and danced and beings unseen were propelled through the ether, drawn around me, whilst below, beneath the sand, below the thin grass roots, below the soils, there was an awakening, an anticipation of my descent. And under the pressure of those who regarded me unseen, I dissolved into the immensity of the space, the crashing expanse of sea, the layers of rock and the weightless expanse of the sky.

When I awoke from this period of self-abandonment, the shadow remained and I was aware that there was something of a face, which looked to my right, even as it strained to regard me from the corner of a stern eye.

Friday 15 October 2010

Threshold of deliverance

It completely slipped my mind to wish one and all a happy Michaelmass, I even referenced the moon of that date yet I not wish you all well, forgive my ill-manners. I should say in my defence that I was unconsciously pre-empting and turning inward in preparation for my battle with the un-dead in North Yorkshire.

Anyway, in my previous posts I have proved beyond any doubt that the house I investigated over the summer was haunted. I left you last time as night fell and a gale had blown in. I was sitting again in the stairwell, where I uttered a soft note which echoed from the woodwork, creating a reservoir of sound into which my awareness dipped and then passed completely. I felt immediately a number of violent gasps or exhalations around me, as if I were close to one who was struggling for breath, whilst I was also aware of various banging sounds thundering through the house along with rough scraping sounds from the building’s grave-side wall.

It was the cries of the young men which dispelled the trance for the moment. Mr Crass was loudest of course, although initially we deemed an unfortunate football result had sparked his outburst. However when a subdued and sober Crass appeared from the living room, the young men hurried o record anything of note. It transpired that as he watched the football, he became aware of a pale shape outside the window. Taking it for a seagull he rose, intending to close the curtains over the patio door. As he drew level with the glass however, the shape returned and it seemed to be a sheet billowing against the glass; Mr Crass perceived it suddenly press against the pane, a face crumpling through its fabric until the whole thing collapsed and ‘washed away’.
Cameras were duly checked and repositioned after this phenomenon, the curtains having been partly pulled down in shock, much to the annoyance of Mr Aquinas.

When I returned to meditation, it seemed that with the advancing hour, the atmosphere in the house deepened, it was not so intense as to be oppressive, but some thing seeped out from the corners, up through the floorboards, from the crevices; it were as if coming night found its way into the house and pressed upon us. I am conscious of the effects of tiredness or ill-health, I am impervious to alcohol and all other stimulants – one cannot be enslaved by what one does not crave – and I knew that this impression was something external to each of our physical and spiritual selves; something from the outside, from the land, leaked into the house. Some trace of the sandstone bluff, of the salt-rich winds, of the low-lying, sea-choked marsh, passed into the building and it regarded us.

Once all had settled down to their vigil in a mood of nervous anticipation, the only sounds were that of the clock on the landing, the crack of a beer can, the murmur of the television and Mr Crass’ subdued commentary on the football, the occasional bleep of a mobile phone and the creak and crack of the house under the scurrying winds and occasional flashes of rain. Despite seemingly every effort on the part of the young men, the house did deliver its secrets to us.

Friday 8 October 2010

The real medium of investigation

Friday returns and again I am dictating to my acolyte the next stage of my teachings. I shall start immediately with the continued recount of the haunting I investigated last summer. First however, I should say that my acolyte is exuding a peace which was hitherto lacking; he zealously welcomes the times he can spend serving the wisdom which I am blessed enough to hold – he truly senses and loves the divinity which has awoken within me. Soon, he shall find that immortal essence within himself.

Should this missive be shorter than the last, it is on account of the bath my acolyte’s wife invited, nay insisted, that I have before we dined this evening.

As I reported last time, I had returned from my second trance in the house, to find that the young men were busy shouting animatedly and bashing their sensitive equipment about. I felt rather drained, so much so that I wondered if I was succumbing to the effects of alcohol – something I have not experienced for years; it became apparent that the young men were concerned with several factors. Firstly, a recorded drop in temperature, secondly, some microscopic manifestations in the air caught on camera and thirdly a variety of noise phenomenon. Not only were the rapping sounds heard but the young men variously claimed to have heard a voice shouting ‘faintly’, a rumbling from below the house and scraping noises from beyond and below the churchyard wall!

There was also a suggestion that a figure had appeared in the garden, ‘all faint in the sunshine’.
As they were so keen on validating these impressions on their machinery, I decided to absent myself from this oppressive building and I found myself wandering back to the Cheshire Cheese at the bottom of the hill: a quiet corner and the fermented products of the English field would prove a welcome tonic from the house and its investigators.

No sooner had I purchased a pint of Liverpool Organic than I was assailed by the sight and sound of Mr Crass. I am free of all attachments but even a saint can recognise a profound social irritant. Thankfully Mr Crass was largely sober and less cantankerous than when I had first met him although I could not share his enthusiasm for drops in temperature etcetera – indeed I did wonder if the real medium of spirit investigation were technology rather than myself – a mistake which is very easy for those chained to the material world to make!

When the other gentlemen inevitably joined us, their anxiety had been subsumed by excitement. They had apparently found a number of phenomena on their recording devices that they could not explain and for purely professional reasons they had decided to leave the house so their equipment could run without any living presence that might, presumably, deter any spirits that might otherwise manifest. I am of the opinion however, that it is the living who are the mediums through which the dead appear – or rather it is an innate quality within the living attuned to a certain type of physical surrounding.

Deeming the operation a success, the young men indulged in much celebration, although we were warned byAquinas not to reveal to any outside parties our mission. Apparently the unofficial leader of the group, Aquinas also decreed that there was not enough money for us to dine at the pub and began, after a period of carousing, to insist that we all leave. A dreary altercation blew up at this point and with the landlord’s assistance, Aquinas was able to remove us all from the Cheese and purchase Chinese food from a 'Chippy' in the row of shops at the bottom of the road. It appeared that money was the issue although the notion of buying food and cooking it was beyond the resources of these young men. I have no idea why the owners of the house did not leave sufficient food for their nephew – or whatever relationship he may be to them – perhaps I have spent too long in a country which takes its obligations to dependents seriously.

Fortunately any residing irritation was dissipated by Crass leading an expedition to the off-licence, which I volunteered to be part of. The evening was warm although the western sun was swallowed in a dense furrow of clouds that cloaked Wales. A wind had picked up and by the time we were eating our chips and Chinese vegetables, the storm hit. We had been debating the existence of a cellar when the rising winds suddenly gusted and then battered at the windows. The whole house commenced a prolonged groaning and as the tumult persisted, various creaks and raps sounded throughout the place. We fell silent, save for the occasional burp or crack of an opening beer can until a shattering sound resonated from the window and they all jumped, expecting the thing to be cracked, but as the sound came again, it was commented that hail was flung in flurries at the glass. The sounds of the hail, the wind and the house all conspired to lure me into a state where I expected a snapping, growling bark to snare my consciousness and I perceived a pale shape suspended, writhing, in the air outside the window. I watched, transfixed, until Crass announced, ‘there’s sea gulls, blown into the yard.’

After tea had been cleared away – and I applauded the fastidiousness with which the young men disposed of everything into bin-bags which were then dumped into the back of the van outside – preparations were made for the evening’s investigation. Crass found some sort of football match upon the television and announced that he would monitor interference of the electrics. Whilst the rest bumped and bashed and bickered, I located the cellar. It was a small space, stuffed full of detritus and boxes so that the sandstone walls could hardly be seen. I managed to fit down the stairs but it would require a major operation to remove all of the items and I decided to return to the staircase.

For the evening investigation, Aquinas decreed that one of the fellows would sit on the stairs of the cellar, with another in the kitchen, whilst myself, he and the third would monitor the staircase. Once the television room door was closed, muffling Mr Crass’ monitoring of the electrical equipment, I began to chant once again. It emerged that the spectres associated with the house were waiting for nightfall before their most vivid manifestations were to occur...

Friday 1 October 2010

Using stairs in a measured fashion

I am aware that two weeks have passed since my last instruction. It was no lapse in devotion that prompted my absence from this particular abstract realm rather I was called away on matters of the greatest importance. I have previously alluded to a threat to our world and of forces which were marshalled against it, without revealing too much now I will assert that I am a significant element of the force which stands between us and oblivion. I fear to say that all around us, in lonely and hidden places, the shades of the dead are conjured and hijacked by fools; meddling in necromantic evocation, these dabblers believe they are exploiting reserves of residual spiritual traces and in doing so are unwittingly – one hopes - opening up gateways to the abyss which hangs below our shining cosmos. The matter is now dealt with – all may sleep well in their beds but I was forced to travel through many hostelries of a northern town in pursuit of a presence that had slipped into one such dabbler and was driving him into ruinous ways. I shall reveal the methods employed to bind and destroy this shadow when you are sufficiently advanced in understanding however those of a mundane persuasion who witnessed the affair may have misunderstood what was occurring. It will be a while, I suspect, before I am permitted admission to the assorted hostelries of Whitby.

For one raised an idealist – perhaps I should say born an idealist – that folk should seek to meddle in spiritual matters for personal gain can come as an unpleasant shock. That there is an abyss circling our worlds of sound and light can be similarly disconcerting. What will anchor us is a faith. Whilst my parents were not psychically inclined, my maternal uncle – Sir Parnassus Mang – lodged with us during his final years. His anecdotes and demonstrations of his subtle powers were an inspiration and indeed assisted me in coming to terms with my own gifts. However, it was his assertion that the text of the Bhagavad-Gita is a genuine utterance of the Divine Mind, has been my personal rock that has steadied me as the waters of delusion and despair crash around me. It is in honour to both recount and commemorate his memory in my writings! Swami Sir Parnassus – I salute you and the realms of bliss in which you reside!
Now I was concealing my initial course of teachings within the factual narrative concerning the haunting at St Hilary’s. As I reported last time, sitting on the staircase, I had passed into a trance wherein a presence was detected. It is unsurprising that a staircase should often be the focal point of a haunting. There is so much that can happen on stairs. Not only can accidents occur on them but they can be the scene of tempestuous emotions: people storming up them, down them, people creeping in expectation, in fear etcetera. Those of us who have departed the shores of ego-attachment observe such displays of untrammelled passion with detached and even amused tolerance. I have only ever used stairs in a measured fashion for the past few decades. Also, the staircase can be considered part of the ‘limbo’ of the house – it is neither up nor down; I do wonder if it is this transient quality that renders them appealing for disembodied shades.

We sat again in the sitting room of the house – I suppose it should be called the Television room, as that item held court with the chairs arranged around it. West-facing and in receipt of the setting summer sun, there was yet an air of sadness about this room. Indeed I soon detected an air of sadness about the west side of the house in general.

The séance again started almost instantly and spontaneously. There were a number of ash-trays about the room although none of the young men smoked and I detected a pungent and vivid reek of smoke. So much so, that I was carried back to my years in India and i might have believed that I was stood on a Ghat overlooking the strand of shore where cremations were carried out. So vivid was this impression that I found myself sniffing the stale ashtrays, as if I would intensify the experience and I even called for smoke, until a lighter was struck and a joss stick lit. The sweet scent and the tendrils of blue smoke writhing through the room took my awareness until I was wafted onto that Indian shoreline, standing over a fire. A waning moon was in the sky, the house and the young men having vanished for me under the slop of the waters and the faint noise of the distant town. I could not say how long I remained in India, but when a frenzied disturbance broke through the water, I was shocked me into awareness of my physical surroundings. The sensation from my vision coincided with a distinct drumming sound from one of the empty rooms on the other side of the hallway. It could have been water dripping from the kitchen tap, or some old beams adjusting in the night air although the flurry of activity from the young men suggested they heard the tap of fingers against a window or even on a hard surface inside the house. I cannot say whether the breaking waters in my vision was an internal rendering of this exterior event, if it presaged it or indeed was even the origin of it. To this day I cannot say but I noted a room full of men driven into anxiety about a couple of tapping noises before I re-entered the trance. Again, I stood amid smoke at the water’s edge. There were no stars overhead and again the waters were upset as if one drowned within them. I perceived something surface, something glistening but indistinct before I was subjected to a rush of powerful and unpleasant sensations. I felt a blow to my torso, ripping the air from me or perhaps I suddenly plummeted; this was accompanied by a savage, stabbing blast of noise - a grinding, like the screaming of tormented metal and I was jolted back into consciousness.

Once fully conscious, I realised that this experience felt similar to that in the graveyard earlier that day. Disturbed as I was, what had befallen the young men had pitched them into a greater state of anxiety and excitement...