Short Story: Burning Bush (part 2) Follows…

Short Story: Burning Bush (part 2) Follows Moses And Gandhi Into The Clouds

"How God just has to ironize everything on the planet," Burning Bush laughed, shaking his head sympathetically.

The New President of the Greatest Country in the World was on his mobile and was returning from the Copenhagen Climate Summit, empty-handed and frustrated by the Chinese, to the worst snowstorm in Washington in American history.

"Your inn'r landsc'pe is of your own creation, Barack," he explained helpfully.

"As we forget pain violence is no longer writtn on our bodiez and so the vocabulary of suffering surrend'rs and nu colourful

landscapes replace them with boundless energy. History was turned into graffiti in Berlin, but just keep an open mind and

remember - you're writing that hizt'ry," he added promisingly." Whadd'd that Indian say?" He turned in an instant to his wife with her book of quotations. She had her index finger in the Gandhi pages.

"Be the change you wanna see in the World." He repeated it.

"No problemo, Mister Prez! Have a good day."

He hung up and took in the fresh air high in the Andes and as the sun shone down suddenly out of sullen clouds he felt hopeful.

"That's Gandhi hunn," he told his wife, like he had just found the quote himself and not her.

Since studying the Tao he had been intent on opening his mind to all possible directions of faith and unexpected avenues of understanding.

"There's a nu Cold War in Washington!" he quipped. "I dint startit!"

His Term had not of course ended with 911; instead it had ended neatly with the complete collapse of the World economy.

Anyway as President he had stopped watching J.R. Ewing and Dallas re-runs and started watching the eccentric English Osbournes in line with his "Nu Advent'rous Nature". He thought it might help in his quest to understand the British leader and "the special relationship" they were meant to have. No one could claim that he had not tried everything in the terrifyingly dark times after the Trade Centres and shown his better side, chatting at regular intervals with Bono and even praising his "muzik" and "nu take on Christianity". Eventually he had even grown fond of the loud-mouthed Bono with his urgent message - who clearly liked the sound of his own voice just as much as him - and that eccentric English leader Moses.

"Here is a Summit - a mountain summit in Argentina!"

It might never have happened - his inner search - had it not been for mighty Sharon and Ossie Osbourne, the Sage of the

Andes and Bono ranting about Third World Debt which made him feel he was really lucky by comparison, and with a decent wife too.

"If anyone had been Nero it certainly muss've been me," he thought. "My best friends joke thad'I open'd that nu chain 'Caffe

Nero' and that my 'reign of terror' haz to'fe bin the most terrfy'g 'n' humilit'g in the history of the Good ol' U.S."

He felt up here in the huge expanse of sky and nature that he had grown out of his old 'J.R. landscape' and was reaching out for something more colourful which he could not yet express. All the talk here in Argentina's Punta de Vacas was of "inner

landscapes" and how "we create our own inn'r landscape" which had fused in his mind with Gandhi's "be the change you wanna see in the world".

These mountains weren't quite as great as the Himmilayas which he had flown over in Air Force One a few times and admired

out of the window.

There the Monsoons he had learnt were caused by a 'massive build up of moisture'; he had a little notebook and wrote down,'Find inner moisture' and then added a couple of lines below,'Find your inner monsoon'.

He felt pleased like he was growing in all kinds of directions at the same time and he no longer talked down to his wife or daughter the way he used to, although he thought of them more as fellow pilgrims or - now that he thought - his disciples.

"So - this lull in your reign of terror, Dad," she mocked him. "How long izit gonna laast? You haven't quoted J.R. Ewing 'n

ages," she smiled, her hair floating gracefully in the wind.

With his mind set free by the "nu surroundings" and his spirit floating he often pondered his "reign of terror" and his own terror in those times that had made him feel like crying out to God, "Tell me whada do, God?! Pleaaaaze!".

Maybe he was just beginning on a great adventure, everything seemed in motion within now and his inner landscape was fusing with the beauty of mountains and higher thoughts that made him dizzy like the thin air and the sun shining compassionately down on him.

At his feet and above were only endlest sweeping magnificent chains of rock bordering Chile and Argentina.

In his two terms in office he had found out that power was delusion, that he could not have felt less empowered than as

President. All the people here seemed so light of heart and serene, chatting in various languages about the experiences they

wanted to share.

During his last years he had tried many varied paths sleeping late for Bed Peace trying to invoke the spirit of John Lennon

and Yoko or buying chickens for the backyard at the White House to try Voodoo, which had frightened his wife so much when she was given a booklet by the postmaster about "how best to behead a chicken" that she had had to start therapy too, worried about the fantasies her husband and his cronies had about Bin Laden.

He thought of his recurring dream in which Lincoln flew down out of a sandstorm and on closer scrutiny was clearly a black manwagging his finger at him and tutt-tutting, it made him glad to wake even in a sweat. Now with a black President who had

the magic touch it started to make some sense. At least he had not had snowstorms.

"Yu kno that I was terrified, durin' that Reign of Terror," he finally replied to his daughter with a touch of irony, waking out of his reverie.

His wife Linda laughed. "Well, thoze storms blowin' inna D.C. now - are not of our creation," she added.

"Anyway yu'all kno that Mos's over the pond and me have restyled ourselves." He felt he was standing tall and looking down from a view, of his life but with freedom for the first time.

As he walked ever higher into the clouds of the Andes with his disciples, Bush continued, 'We are a People of the Book, even

tho' we walk thru the valley of the shaddow .. " he looked at them wondering if they even remembered his quote from Psalms.

"- Don't cha remember the State of the Nation Address after 911? - you guys shuldd read moir. 'Tho I walk thru the valley of the

shaddow of death I will fear no evil for you are wit'me always Lord.'"

Instead of ritual boasting as 'President of the Greatest Country in the World and insulting some smaller countries'

as his father had taught him, he had continued gently listening to 'Moz' and learning various yogic positions at dawn, eventually

even unafraid and oblivious as to whether he might be being watched by journalists or his assistants.

"Moz-ez" his wife accentuated, beginning to feel blurred as to whom he was referring. The British leader and he were so into

regressions that she feared he might lose contact with reality.

A bumble bee suddenly flew out furiously buzzing from underfoot, which nearly made him slip on the grass. He must have come close to treading on it as it stabbed at him instinctively, but totally dis-coordinated like it had been in deepest slumber.

"The so-called busy bee actually sleeps 22 hours out of 24 each day," his wife Linda smiled, "so it is more like a bear with a

sore head, like that legendary Russian friend of yours and Mozez who hibernat'd wid th' bears in Siberia and helped ya'll when the sky fell. I still thinks it's funny that the homeless tried to sell pieces along with bits of the Berlin Wall."

"Oblomov," he reflected,"- who criticized the West for the unexpected sandstorms and said weather fluctooations were doo to lak of inna reflect'on." He thought guiltily of Lincoln again but also of his 'guru' who had appeared in his happier dreams as a smiling figure, winking at him in a magician's hat. That was why he had decided to come to Aconcagua.

He tried to dodge the bee although it seemed intent on flying vengefully straight into his face apparently rejoicing at his misery like some fanatical Al Qaeda pilot in ectasy at destruction.

"Okay, I'm sorry," he whined to it pleadingly as his wife and daughter laughed at his now dis-coordinated hip swinging dance and ducking.

The bee would nearly drop to the ground or back right off before then taking aim again or so he thought mournfully, wondering why he yelled out 'Allahu Akbar!' in defence.

His daughter and wife guffawed.

"Yu see this bee dozn't understand 'la non-violencia' yet, Dad. We create our own landsc'pes. Or maybe he can see the dawnbreaking in your inna world and he's trying to fly n'!" Linda giggled delighted.

"Maybe hibernation is a form of yoga, if you could just hypnotize the bees, Dad, like Oblomov hypnotized the Armies and Taliban fighting in Afganistan and the Middle East when he was visiting and they all slumbered and wandered around for a few days forgetting to fight and asking each other what they had dreamt."

Burning Bush's eyes glinted at his daughter and as he started laughing uncontrollably he keeled over, his long beard and

baseball cap falling off that he had worn to hide his true identity. As the beard slipped Linda saw what looked like a tattoo of a dragon flying round his neck towards his right ear.

"Whadth'hell?"

He started laughing uncontrollably at himself keeling over and seeing the funny side of the turn of events and how seriously

he and 'Moz' had taken their spiritual adventure. He had always always fantasized about a tattoo and long hair so that people would stop "pigeon-holin him". She hadn't realized that he was that serious and that he and Sophia had gone to have it made in town by an Inca.

Suddenly the past and Oblomov and Lincoln wagging their fingers seemed wonderful and he wondered if he might not go down in history as a legend of these bizarre times after all.

"Extraordinarily eccentric Oblomov, " he said. "He was really the key to the sky."

"It's made 'a broken dreams," Sophia and Linda chimed in.

"Yup!" he replied. "We al needa dream tog'ther otherwise it's like a crossword puzzle withou'a solootion. The landsc'pe of

each country is diff'r'nt, ya kno. Berlin was a tot'l'y devastated one after the war. South America's is expanding. Yur own inna palett dep'nds on ur psyche," he fumbled on trying to reach out at his inner profundity. "The outside is a pale rfl'ctoon of whads inside."

The Russian dreamer Oblomov who legend claimed had hibernated with the bears in Siberia for centuries and after the start

of the Russian Revolution and only woke up after the Fall of the Wall. During that time however he was meant to have had dreams that were healing all who met him. His hypnotic lectures had people daydreaming instead of going to work and children walking around New York and London in their pyjamas. He predicted a 'Great Sleep'. In his over-wakeful, anxious days as President Bush had never realized just how funny, playful and likeable Oblomov now seemed and was. Walking around barefoot in his strippy yellow pyjamas, which he had worn even when interviewed on t.v., were for many now the hippest clothes to wear or a fashion statement.

He stood still but everything seemed in motion. "This must be what they mean by walking into one's own inner landscape."

Perhaps it was the thin air that kept making him ruminate over Oblomov.

"You know clouds were originally put there for sleeping and dreaming," Bush told Sophia, repeating Oblomov's words.

"Yes, Dad, you said that."

He looked into the mid distance and thought of the homeless selling pieces of the sky to tourists after it collapsed alongside pieces of the Berlin wall.

They had started singing the "Sky Belongs to Everyone" when the government made out the sky was not their property.

They had street stalls with shards of glowing orange and yellow pieces of sunset on one side and white pieces of cloud and blue sky on the other next to pieces of the wall. That had scared many not just him. On all the radios they played variations and

adaptions of the song as they debated in Parliament whether or not it was legal to sell it.

Many had wondered whether they could fit it back together again if people sold bits! Theories abounded as to whether everyone had to dream the same dream to fit it back together or if as Yoko Ono was saying people should grow their hair long and 'Sleep for a year' the so-called ' Big Sleep'. The 'Big Sleep' was discussed; some progressive people talked of a period of 'beelike hibernation and quiet reflection' and 'self-hypnosis' to guide their dreams. There was a political movement 'Geepps!' which enthused about a 'Great Pyjama Party in the Sky'.

"Lizzie and Oblomov told us," Bush said dreamily remembering their words "People flew from star to star.. and had what they wanted. If you left a dream half-dreamt - you could return at some later stage, climb back on the cloud and from the earlier desire and dream a tree would have grown there. You just ate the fruit and continued dreaming your dream. But in time people forgot the real purpose of life and clouds and sat around on some planet drinking water - on the Water Planet or tomato soup on the Tomato Planet or asparagus soup on the Asparagus Soup Planet.And there was even a planet for Lemonade, with lemon trees next to a lake so you could mix the lemon and water easily. The Lazy Dreamers forgot how to fly."

Sophia and Linda,, his wife, both chanted, as though his apostles, the words of the Dreamer from Russia,

"How sad that people forget that clouds were for dreaming and desire and not just water."