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Leo: the art of lapping
Tongue hanging out, the baby laughs with you,
then for you, then – once adolescence strikes – at you.
You are a performer and he the ever-attentive audience. But when
it’s his turn to perform for you, you'd better turn up the
sound of your clapping or he will sulk and skulk away, convinced
he is unloved.
A bowl of water, a bowl of milk: whatever nourishing liquid you
offer, the cat laps it up and is happy. And if happy, groomed to
impeccable neatness. And if neat, well ready to meet the day, the
awaiting audience who of course cannot help but love him in his
sunny brightness, his generosity of spirit, his uplifting joy.
But if the audience dwindles, bored with his so-obvious self-approval,
he is so deflated that the bowl of milk at home, even laced with
eggs, will not soothe him nor lay his hair down. If you attempt
to pet him he snarls and scratches, even you, his best beloved –
after himself, of course. Things will not be right for him until
an audience returns. This could be the best beloved with perseverance
of strokes and purrs. But not right away, not while the hurtful
memory of not even one hand clapping is more vivid than present
loving.
Is his bowl half empty or half full? Depends on if the big cat is
doing his part in filling other bowls or is only concerned with
his own.
Once long ago, he opened his arms to me with eagerness, glad that
I chose to spend time with him. I was a perfect audience, learning
him, touching him, sharing his joy. But it ended. With characteristic
generosity and aplomb he went on to the next conquest, eager to
share again his bounty, his laughter, his time. Amused, I watched.
He had not truly added me to his fantasy harem, but in a sense only
expanded the way in which I had been included since he first eyed
me. For such a King there is no limit to his kingdom. In the decades
between that one time we touched and the present when we touch with
aware and smiling eyes, we’ve both learned the difference
between lapping up love, and lapping for love. He still calls when
he needs to share. No jealousy darkens our love, no sense that another
limits us, no sense that the bowl will only ever be half full when
we need to come and lap up comfort.
In watching him grow I’ve learned to really value that inner
light which desires only to bathe all in joy. In such a glow everyone
reigns, no matter how poor. It is an elitism to which everyone he
meets is invited. Any stone can be a throne. Every touch is of love.
And all claws are velveted.
To prepare for Leo’s time as the zodiac sun, I immerse myself
in the pleasure of re-reading C. S. Lewis’ Narnian Chronicles.
When I was seven and wandering through the small wood-paneled library
at the corner of Toronto’s Kew Beach Park, I saw a book with
a title which had two words already vivid in my imagination –
Lion and Witch. One alone was a winner, two together invited me
up to a new level. Fifty years later I can with confidence say I
have read the Chronicles at least once annually since. Now with
Earl Grey tea beside me instead of milk, I slide back through the
wardrobe door into that world of enchanted winter, walking with
talking animals and excited Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve to
meet – the Lion.
It was with Him that I fell in love. On my sister’s wall is
an oil I did of Lucy and the Lion on Aslan’s How. They lean
on each other, intimate, aware, wild, wondering as they gaze into
the sky and the future what will come. I had just dreamed of Him,
as C. S. Lewis dreamed of Him. Lewis had already started the story
of Narnia when suddenly this lion just bounded into the story.
Leo does that to your life – bounding into the centre, expecting
you to completely accept him as he is, wild, prowling, snarling,
pouncing, purring.
On safari, though, lions are definitely not Aslan. My brother lived
in Zimbabwe for a few years and tells me they are lazy fly-catchers,
yawning at anyone who slowly eases by in a jeep. World shakers and
makers? Not likely! Over the horizon the females, wives or sisters
or aunts, play with the cubs and teach them how to pounce with profit
– that is, bring back the bacon to the Throne, to the King
of the Congo, the Sire of the Savannah, the Papa of the Pride, flicking
his ear in the shade under the tree.
That’s what wives and cubs are for, isn’t it?
My Papa was a Leo ascendant, walking with head high and confident,
feet splayed in that fire formation as he bounded over barriers.
My Mama has Venus in Leo so she is Queen of the Commons and yes,
she knew how to please her man. She called him “Richard the
Lion Heart” and that he was, he was, growling when in dark
doldrums and laughing when in a sunny spirit, always looking for
new lands to conquer.
“Look what I can do!” Leo cries to the world, sure they
are watching already, just waiting for him to strut on stage in
all his glory. He delivers his best jokes, best lines, best insights,
walking with the wandering spotlight to show his best profile, best
side, best stuff which is always right. And when the cheers come
he smiles and bows and gives encore after encore, energized and
energizing, the pink bunny beating his own drum.
But what if there are boos? Catcalls? Tomatoes? He will stand stunned
for a moment, and then back away into his own shadow – never
to return to an unappreciative audience that does not comprehend
the brightness of his glory and the expressive image of his person.
Leo, you see, is the Sun. He is the centre of our solar system,
the source of all that is warm and wild and full of wonder. Always
a child, always eyes open to what is around, always ready to gift
those nearby with welcome and warmth, Leo never sees shadows. He
only sees the colours he brings out in you, the multi-dimensional
shape he gives you with his light. He sees the glow in your eyes
answering to his.
But what is on your other side? He has no insight. He cannot go
there anymore than he can turn around to see the long cone he casts
on the night side of never.
So how is it, then, that Jung with Sun in Leo was the one who taught
us of the Shadow? And why was Aslan the one who accepted the dark
night of death to save a child?
Leo cannot see any shadows because once he enters the night it is
no longer dark. There can be no mist of evening mystery, no gloom
of garbled gorgons or wail of woe. When he does choose to come it
is with intent to save, since he is the source of life, and life
banishes death. That is why Jung calls the Sun the Christ symbol,
the Light-Bearer, the Self. As a Leo he lived it out consciously,
and fought tooth and claw for his central place in the pride, fought
proudly with anyone fool enough to challenge his primacy as The
Professor of Sacred Secrets, whether at the front of a classroom
or on the altar to Sex.
Aslan also lay on an altar, his vibrant golden majesty tied to dark
stone, accepting the death of a traitor for the traitor, since betraying
was not in his nature. Courage was in his full heart as he lay open
to the knife. Calm, he never counted the cost. And his heavy heart
tipped the scales of justice to mercy, to the magic from before
the dawn of time.
Leo lives. That is his core, his selfishness, his raison d’être.
Be as glad of the Lion King, the Sun God, as he is in and of himself.
Let his childlike joy penetrate your darkness, and beam back to
him the glory that is in your own Sun. Then he will come and rejoice
with you. For Leo is not a loner, he wants others on the stage striving
toward sublime serenity with him. He is not greedy: he offers to
you before he demands of you. He will be a good audience for you
if you are for him.
But if you do not respond, or if you simply take and do not give,
he does not give again. He is honorable, a person of his word, but
if you do not honour him he will not honour you. He will leave,
head high and ready for the next day’s wonder, and not return.
And you must endure the never-ending night alone.
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