Meeting a wise one opens the way. There is an unseen chamber of the heart. It lies within us, dormant, until a wise one comes to awaken and open it.

This opening is painful and life often creates these openings, through loss, grief, and such. But for the opening to result in the awakening of the unseen chamber of the heart is the work of a mystic, or a student of mysticism.

I held in my hand the medical model of a human heart, accurate anatomically but missing very significant unseen aspects of the hearts reality. Far better, I thought, to hold a valentine heart — it is more accurate to denote the scope of this unseen chamber.

Labyrinthine was the only word I could use to describe the territory I was now engaged in. After the words, the wide beaches, I followed the bird to the south, and entered the old village through it’s Northern Gateway. Heading toward the centre of the town, I found myself on a road that seemed to lead far away from it, and soon was on the periphery once more before heading into it once again. And again the road took me away into another area entirely.

I saw a young boy on a bicycle and went toward him, followed him for a time. It broke the spell and I was nearer the bell tower. One long one-way street was to my left but I couldn’t tell if it led away from the centre or toward it. I took a leaping chance and joined the others on the one-way street. It was easy, and soon I was in the town centre recognizing the plaza and the well. The bell tower was to my right, the gardens to the left. A large market was just being set up, for it was still early morning. Despite all my twists and turns and alternate pathways, I had come very easily to the destination. Later I heard the town had been specifically designed as a labyrinth to support the Pirates. This is true, for the town was Camaguey in Cuba.

Is that where I am looking for the clues? I didn’t think so. But my mind was not settled wherever I would go. The heart called from side to side and I leaned left and then right, no resting place.

It was a hidden thing, the reason for my restlessness — to be without rest, the hidden thing came into my heart and waited there for me to find her. She was there before the new chamber had opened up, so it was old and from before. Once the chamber had opened, the hidden one had been exposed – for there were only three sides to hide them, and light poured through where the fourth wall had been.

This hidden one, crouched and kneeling, turned from hiding her face toward me, then quickly turned away again.

“I’m done with this,” I said sternly, “come out and stop this right now.” She was taking valuable space, putting pressure on the heart, and everything had to detour around her. “It’s become ridiculous,” I told her.

Finally she began to very slowly back out of the little den she made for herself by burrowing into my heart. Her hair was honey-coloured and her face, when I saw it, was round and clear. But her posture was hunched and clutching, crouched. She would not stand or sit, but stayed put in her crouching kneeling pose. Head down on her hands or on the ground. I could see a spot where she had been attaching to my heart. A sore spot she had been sucking on. Her lips were red from the blood. She’d secretly been puncturing the membranes with tiny tiny bites as she crouched and brooded, then sucked away the blood so there was no visible evidence. The cuts were so tiny that I didn’t feel them, or even know they were happening.

She was now exposed, and her eyes opened. Shivering and quivering she was wearing thin damp clothes that stuck to her body with a mucus-like substance. I washed her with a gentle cloth and warm water, then covered her with a soft blanket. She was so small she could fit in the palm of my hand. She looked terrified and continued to shake. I gave her a tiny bit of milk and as she touched her tongue to it I saw the redness of her mouth and the red blood still on her teeth. At that sight I almost crushed her in my hand, but something stopped me. Her eyes perhaps.

She closed them and went to sleep so I placed her in a little cloth nest on the table and turned my attention to myself. For my heart was in pain now she was gone. There was a seeping of blood from the place she had held most of my life. How to stop the bleeding when I can’t go in there easily?

The extra chamber acted as a portal for me to go into the heart. It was flexible and could take any size or form. I entered it and reduced in size to examine the seepy wounds. All along the top were infinitesimal puncture wounds, all slightly seeping, all bright red. I realized they weren’t seeping but were weeping, and the pain of loss had kept them open.

I wasn’t sure that the little creature I just removed would be able to be trained and returned, it seemed unlikely. So the heart had to become stronger and heal itself. The seeping holes were like little mouths and as if it were a singing organ all the mouth together produced an exquisite chord of calling. But first they spat choked on their own blood. It was a rumbling unbeautiful cacophony.

But soon, sensing a new freedom, the heart worked to make a new capacity. Squeezing once, it spat out all blockages from the tiny openings, and the next squeeze was it — the chord of amazing beauty. It healed itself for my eyes and ears. I saw it from the new chamber and understood. It didn’t need my engagement or so-called healing efforts. Naturally it was self healing and self regulating.

The sound it made gave me a relief and a new tone on which to build another greater life. I was grateful and the tone pierced me into gentle tears. At the tone, the little one woke again. Mouth moving and mewling, seeking the suckling and not finding it, she raised her head. She cried out in a tiny voice. I thought if I left her there, she would soon die. What could I do with her? Train her maybe? Where would she go? She couldn’t go back to the heart.

And what if she went to someone else? I thought of putting her tiny shrivelling body in the microwave, took her out of here into the freezer. Took her from there. It was night, the moon full.

I held her body up to the moon, asking what to do. The little one stirred alive again, crying and hungry like a crack baby. I thought maybe I can just feed her for a little while, I can give her a little bit — prick my finger so she can rest. But I knew it was impossible.

Her mother came then. Appearing in the doorway she flew to her and scooped her into her wide arms held her to her breast, and gave me a look I was terrified to see. But I faced her. The panic in her face turned to gratitude and from her wild eyes flashed an unworldly light — an energy of truth. I was enveloped in the vibration of gratitude and truth that she had given me. I was now free. She was where she belonged too. And it was up to me to create the new configuration the new open life.

But just as the heart naturally healed itself, so I realized it wasn’t up to me to create the next steps. I was to follow as I had followed the boy on the bicycle.

The heart spinning and singing shot out waves of delicate filaments in extraordinary moving patterns expanding in all directions. The heart was in fact creating again, creating a new life a new world in harmonious sequences, waves of beauty and bliss.

From the newly opened chamber I could see it all as it was happening. Radiant. And each filament was a line of pure love, seeking form. Seeking connection. This connection was to become my new life. As events configured along the lines of these filaments, life built itself anew. As I stepped into it, I bowed low in a grateful pause.