to visit his uncle.
‘Something is worrying you, Jigmed,’ Uncle said.
Jigmed held his tongue: he felt that he must keep the dream a secret, that it had been a divine revelation.
Uncle moved aside to give him half of the shade cast by the plum tree. ‘Come, sit here.’
He sat down and Uncle placed the wood on his knees. ‘Hold the knife like this. No, too straight, tilt it a little. Now carve . . . with more force. Good . . . very good. Keep going . . . more. See? Like this, and a syllable appears.’
Jigmed knew the syllable: it was the first on the list of combinations, one that even the unlettered knew. People said it was the origin of human consciousness, the mother of all poetry, like the first wind that blew over the world, the first drop of water from the melting river ice, a fable for all prophecies and, of course, the prophecy of all fables.
‘My dear nephew, with so many people in the world, the gods cannot take care of us all, and that is why you feel out of sorts. When that happens, think of this syllable.’
‘I don’t know how to carve.’
‘Then treat your heart as if it were the best pear wood. Imagine yourself holding a knife, carving this syllable one letter at a time. As you think about it and say it, only this syllable will flicker in your consciousness. It will bring you tranquillity.’
On his way home, Jigmed said to the donkey, ‘I’m thinking of the syllable.’
It was pronounced Om. When that sound is made, water wheels, windmills, spinning wheels and prayer wheels begin to whirl. And when everything is whirling, the world turns.
The donkey did not understand but it ambled along, with its head lowered and its eyes cast downward. There was a sharp bend in the road by a sparse grove of pine trees. Swaying its narrow hips, the donkey disappeared from Jigmed’s view as it made the turn. He raised his voice and spoke to two parrots perched on a wild cherry tree: ‘Think of the syllable.’
Startled, the birds fluttered up, clamouring, ‘Syllable! Syllable! Syllable!’ and flew away.
He quickened his steps and found his donkey waiting for him by the side of the road. It gave him a dispassionate look, then set off again, the bell on its neck jingling as it plodded ahead.
For a long time after that, Jigmed spoke to all manner of living things that appeared along the way, telling them, in a half-serious, half-mocking manner, of how he was focusing on the syllable – serious, because he hoped it would help him return to his dream world and not forget it upon waking, and mocking, to help him prepare for the inevitable disappointment. Deep down he hoped it would work magic.
He said it to a lizard sunning itself on a rock as they crossed a valley.
He said it to a marmot that held its front paws together and stood up on its hind legs in a mountain pasture, gazing into the distance.
He said it to a stag that seemed proud of its wide antlers.
But they all ignored him, or scurried off, as though fearful of his muttering.
He spent that night in a mountain cave, while his donkey grazed near the opening. Moonbeams flowed like water on the ground; in the distance they were like a mist. It felt like a night made for dreams. He recited the syllable before he fell asleep, but knew as soon as he awakened that the dream had not come.
As the road rose higher, the sky grew brighter. He had planned to spend the second night in a town, at a hotel, but there was no stable for his donkey. The manager led him out to the yard behind the building, where cars, large and small, were parked on the tarmac.
The manager appeared puzzled. ‘You seem to have travelled a long distance, but people usually take the bus. We have a bus stop in the town. I can show you how to get there.’
He shook his head. ‘There are no seats for my donkey.’
He searched for a spot on a hill outside the town where he could spend the night. It was barren land, so he slept beneath a steel tower whose base sheltered him from the wind. He built a fire against the chill night air, made tea and roasted a little meat, wishing he had bought some strong drink in the town. He did not plan to dream here, for it did not look like a place for dreaming. From the dreary hill he could see the flickering brightness of the town below, and when the wind blew, the steel tower hummed – Om, om.
Curled up under a woollen blanket, he gazed at the tower rising into the starry sky. With it, the people in the small town could listen to the radio and watch television. They could make phone calls at the post office, with its many small rooms in which they could sit with a handset, flailing their arms as if dancing, talking animatedly, though they could not see the person to whom they were speaking. As he listened to the incessant Om from the tower, the noise became like the congregation of voices, the words jumbled together into a hum that made him dizzy. He tried to recite the syllable, the first of all sounds, but it merged into the Om from the tower. He pulled the blanket over his head, blocking out the starlight and the sound.
To his astonishment, he found his dream again, but this time it was unfamiliar. He saw a mysterious, crystal-clear light at the tip of the tower. It grew stronger.
It was not the steel tower. It was a crystal tower in the celestial court.
He was still restless and anxious.
But this time he was anxious not to be startled awake.
The Story The Wish of the Deities’ Son
The Bodhisattva, who had been gone for what seemed like eternity, emerged from behind the crystal tower and arrived at the gate of Heaven. ‘Where has he gone?’
But the Bodhisattva was, after all, the Bodhisattva, and understood everything, with no exceptions. Her surprised and puzzled look changed to a smile that spread from her mouth outwards. ‘He was so impatient. Too impatient even to wait. He has missed an opportunity to meet the Supreme Deity. Well, perhaps it is not yet time.’
The Bodhisattva returned to the Supreme Deity, who simply smiled. ‘I once thought to let him become a leader in the human world. He would help to destroy the demons and bring peace to the world. Perhaps the humans would then have been able to build their own Heaven on Earth. But it seems now that that was wishful thinking.’
The Bodhisattva suggested that it should not be the Supreme Deity who was disappointed, but the demon-infested place called Gling. With the myriad sins committed during previous lives, the inhabitants of Gling had lost their chance to build a Heaven on Earth. And, besides, the world below was boundless, so there must be another place where the Supreme Deity could carry out a similar experiment.
Om! The sound of all praise and condemnation emerged from the Supreme Deity’s mouth and sent a profound shock through the Bodhisattva’s mind.
It was a summons. Instantly the gods in the celestial court gathered around the Supreme Deity. Ripples in the air confirmed the Supreme Deity’s existence, and the auspicious clouds beneath the deities’ feet floated away. Below them more clouds roiled, turning a cheerless grey and a sorrowful black. The Supreme Deity shifted again to reveal the world below: landmasses large and small, the Earth’s continents, appeared in all four directions. On one continent, tens of thousands of people in battle formation were killing each other; on another, people were being whipped as they dug a canal. On yet another, skilful artisans had gathered to build a colossal mausoleum for their still living emperor. Around the construction site, the graves of artisans who had died from hunger or illness took up great swathes of fertile land. In a deep forest on another continent, one group of humans was chasing another, and those who lagged behind were roasted and eaten. The leftover flesh was dried as food for those who continued the chase. And still others appeared to have attempted to escape from their continent, but their ships had capsized in storms. Fish even bigger than the ships leaped out of the water and gobbled up the humans as they struggled to stay afloat.
The Supreme Deity said, ‘One nation after another has been created. See how