Hyborian Bridge 71

So, X-ray diffraction crystallography, which detects so many biochemical molecules – from peptides to DNA - is a universe whereby light is bent by crystals. Even molecules which are not in crystalline form can be precipitated, and hence detected via diffraction.

The biochemical universe is therefore highly crystalline and, while crystals aren’t lenses, they act in a lens-like way. When light is bent, an image is cast, and that image is a perspective image (ultra-precise).

Therefore, you could easily say biochemical science is a parallel universe of light cast by crystals. Scientists are noted for their brains and, if the information they get convinces them of the rightness of their methodology, it feeds into their reasoning logic.

But it’s not actually real. It’s an illusory universe of crystalline molecules. Yes, they exist, but the vast bulk of living matter is cell protoplasm (cytoplasm). This is mostly water, with molecules suspended in colloid – a jelly-like medium (substrate.)

What that tells you is that living things – plant and animal – are mainly water and colloid, and that is how they operate. If you take a slug, it literally leaves a trail of jelly as it squirms on by. The vast predominance of water in vascular plants and our own blood is not to be overlooked either.

The real trouble with biochemical science is it’s not real. It applies to crystalline forms which get treated with crystalline medicine. The fact that blood courses through our veins and that we are muscular and athletic is only a side-issue.

In a way, it would be easier if we were a literally crystalline form for any treatment to be issued. The fact that we have a physical substance is quite a nuisance, really. To take that a stage further, physical substance when it dies will decay and return to the earth. The strength of decomposition is in the revival of life from the raw components. This cycle is a physical destiny, and from it one can assume that psyche emanates.

There is quite strong evidence to that effect. The universal presence of ancestor worship in all tribal cultures, for example.

 

Heinrich Schliemann

A physical universe is strong, and the psyche is correspondingly strong. We live in a universe of the predominant brain which is manifestly weak. The brains of our scientists live in an illusory universe of biochemical crystals – essentially a hall of mirrors (light). It is a non-physical universe, so is bound to be weak (Hyborian Bridge 20)

Strength comes from physical revival, from the ground of Mother Earth. This was the theme of BWS’s Adastra in Africa (Sacrifice: Sombre Gaiety) The revival feeds the psyche of tribal beliefs (see Red Indian quotes Hyborian Bridge)

In a physical universe, Earth, sun and moon co-exist along with the planets. It’s not a perspective universe of precise facts but it is naïve and real. This world of blood and revival is brought into sharp relief in Clair Noto’s “Skranos” plot-cycle (prev.)

In “Red Lace” particularly, the blood-cycle of rapid growth, death and rebirth is played-out in a  Dante-esque fantasy second to none.

 

  Red Sonja #10

The centaur who grows the eggs like some Vulcan of the wood-embraced cavern, the roc that grows monstrously, only to perish in #11 at the bow of the deadly Narca.

In that selfsame issue, Sonja’s sight is restored by yet another perishing roc, which sheds its heart’s blood over her weeping eyes.

What of Apah Alah, the sorceress who built this naturalistic fortress of the rooted ground? She it was who placed a curse on the fated temple, in revenge at Suumaro’s father for forsaking her. It is this curse which Sonja and Suumaro play their part in lifting.

The red lace takes them to an emblem of unspeakable power coveted by Apah Alah. Her son then safeguards the emblem, while tasking Sonja with taking his cause to his father, Quilos, who lies near death.

To cut a long story short, loyalty defeats revenge, and love conquers death. Such purely human themes make this a curiously moving yarn, for all its supposed sorcerous malevolence. The motifs of rebirth and the feline grace of the warrior woman.

In this story, sorcery and sword are never wholly parted. Sonja herself evidences a trace of shadowy power (observes Suumaro – “bite your lip”, she replies!) Only when the sorcery departs from the purely physical – and hence human – is it a black and inhuman force.

Such was the emblem – the golden chalice which Suumaro spirited away – the fatal pact with a demon that was never to be.

Red Sonja #13 (Buscema/Milgrom art)

In that context, has Man made a pact with a nameless demon? By “nameless”, meaning something that is inhuman, that is not flesh and blood, that cannot laugh and love, only live and die. As one of the guys says at the end of Codine, “all our songs are love songs”

CODINE (cover of Buffy Saint-Marie)