N. sent her a message but she didn't answer.
Until she did.
"So you really exist!", he wrote back.
"There is anecdotal evidence for that", she answered.
N. is a musician. He sang like Marvin Gaye for her in his messages, and because his voice touched her heart, she wrote a poem for him:
The Piano
I‘ll write your favorite poem
He said
And the piano became still
Parallel lines
How deep can they get?
Can you keep a secret
He asked
And the piano cried
Parallel lives
How close can they be?
I don’t know if I exist
She answered
And the piano trembled
“Once upon a time, I dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was myself. Soon I awaked, and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man.”
Long ago she was fascinated by Zhuangzi's butterfly metaphor.
Then she understood that it is never either or but always both.
She is a woman dreaming of being a butterfly and a butterfly draming of being a woman.
She's dreaming and she's awake.
Nonduality, that is.
Photo by canva
