Marc Gafni – Poetess, Prophetess and Priestess

Marc Gafni
posted on marcgafni.com
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Eros is the birthright of everyman and everywoman. Though we may search long and hard for priests and prophets who can guide and counsel us, in the end we must return time and again to our own inner sanctum. There the priest and prophet we seek sleep in our depths, waiting to be stirred and finally woken.
I will never forget one of my early dates with Cary. We were walking Jerusalem’s streets. It was late, the silence was luminous. It was one of those moments when intimacy lets you enter for a moment. I asked Cary, ‘What do you pray for, in your heart of hearts, what do you most want to be?’ She became very quiet, I could tell she was deciding whether or not she was ready to offer up her truest, most vulnerable, answer to me. We walked on. She started a sentence, but faltered, silent. Finally, mustering a whisper, she told me, “When I pray for who I most want to be…” glancing over at me uncertainly, “I pray…to be God’s poetess, prophetess and priestess.” Her sincerity was so precious, so deep. I knew she felt silly, her most inside place exposed. I also knew then this was the woman I would marry.
Sadly as time went on I realized that it was not all that it seemed to be. But that is another story. Not for the blogs. I hope one day we will be able to work out how we hurt each other in our marriage and more significantly how we hurt each other after our marriage. One of the dangers of eros is the inability to face our own darkness. It is not all sweetness and light. Sometimes the desire to be a poetess is eros in pure form. And sometimes it is pseudo eros hiding a deep knowing fear that we are not the special one. And it was no less true that I was so caught up in my mission and my desire for the great partner, the great love, that I did not take care of Cary. She needed care and nourishing. I was distracted by the siren’s song. I betrayed her and in doing so betrayed Eros. That the betrayal was mutual and in the end, her mask dropped to reveal for a time not Kali but Kali in disheveled and distorted form, only makes me feel better when I am contracted. I wish her blessing.