# [D24:7M] Vision: [[What None Knows is When, Not If]] Hexagram: [[Twenty Fourth Hexagram]] Trials: [[Twenty Fourth Trial]] Archetypes: #boat #sheep #wolf #well #black #blue #shepherd #darkwindow #cloud #LadyOfTheBeasts #arm #four #sea May 20th, 1927 1. In the dream of the boat  I drifted in nowhere  did I near.  What never I’ve learned  is how to arrive  except to disappear. 2. The green hills were dotted with sheep, each one marked with an orange dye.  Up in the bright  blue sky above, the fluffy white clouds mirrored the wandering sheep.  Their shepherd  discovered one among their number was missing, his prized ram.  It had been stolen by a wolf, which he did not yet know.  He took his thirsty flock a short distance into the valley to a well.   Soon he spied the little stone circle in the distance, and there slumped upon its rim was the grey  black wolf, letting its hairy toes dangle over the abyss. The shepherd left his sheep where they grazed and approached the disquieted wolf, who coughed  once woefully, or possibly twice, and turned to the man.  The shepherd demanded a confession. "I'm sorry to tell you," said the wolf, "but I'm afraid your man has taken quite a fall.” The shepherd drew close to the thieving wolf to examine its wet blue eyes. Although its tears were real, one ought not assume the fall their cause.  The shepherd gazed into the abyss now and could make out, along the bottom, a dim and noiseless shape. "I shall make you a promise,” said the wolf, “a quarter of my total wealth.”   Absentmindedly, he produced a well-worn nail file from the thick fur of his lower region and began to work his cuticles, then continued.   “I ask only that you'll go down and fetch the lad for me.  I assure you it was an accident, and I had meant him no harm.” 3.  And then I saw the woman, the Lady  of the Beasts, whom once I must have  keenly known, bent over my breakfast feast.   Her bathrobe was well open, a dark window  was ajar, where now two dangling  clouds should ease, a ghastly image each. Not once failed I to cower, not less  than twice beneath, the weather in my window, and the Lady of the Beasts. 4. The shepherd knew better than to trust a wolf, but he also knew, just as everyone did in those days,  about the fortunes of wolves.  He estimated that with a quarter of a wolf’s typical holdings, he might afford about ten new rams and, thereby, increase his own holdings exponentially.  Therefore,  he handed his wool coat over to the wolf for safe keeping and gripped the stones as he descended  into darkness. The shape below him seemed to move, if just barely, and he therefore believed the animal must yet live.   Finally reaching it, the shepherd dipped his hands into the dark and sticky ram’s wool and felt its ribs rise and fall.  He could lift it a little in the darkness but could not climb out with his arms full.  He wished he could tie something around its spiral horns and pull from above, but there was nothing, and the animal only suffered.  The shepherd sat down in surrender until he could catch his breath.  He could find only a large stone on the dry dirt floor of the well.  All that remained to do was bash the prized ram in the head, which he did, four times until it was certainly dead.  The animal did not struggle, and had but quietly whined, staring emptily up beyond the man’s dark shape and into the heavenly mouth of a blue and cloudless sky.    5. What none knows is when, not if. 6. The shepherd held the sleeping ram in the dry dark and wept.  Things had not turned out the way he  dreamt.  He looked up at the empty blue disk above. Thinking he might never recover, he almost immediately recovered. Whatever the heart desires to rid itself of is itself the sickness, and recovery can only happen of its own accord.  I shall close my eyes to the start, he thought to himself, that it might start itself, and contemplate an endless end. The words were not his own.  The words were his own.  Finding no safety in remaining, the shepherd gripped the stone wall of the well and ascended. His heart demanded he forgive the wolf, and he inquired nothing further of it.  He would serve his heart and be made free.  7. From that day on, the rolling green valley cradled nary a sheep and the forests returned along with a miniature breed of deer, something the villagers had long forgotten about.  The shepherd built himself a canoe and found the nearest shore.  His wife had thrown him out and he was exiled by his clan.  Yet he suffered no loss, and his noble freedom awaited the sea.