'Taking Flight'

The Merkabah — the chariot of light — is the oldest strand of Jewish mysticism, predating Kabbalah by centuries. Merkabah mystics practiced the ascent through seven heavens, passing through guarded gates, reciting seals and passwords known only to the initiated. At the center of the seventh heaven was the Throne. The point of the journey was not the Throne. The point was the journey — the successive shedding of the earthly as the chariot rose.

Elijah ascended in a chariot of fire. Enoch walked with God and was not — he simply went. Mohammed's Night Journey, the Isra and Mi'raj, carried him through the heavens on a winged creature in a single night. Every tradition has a version of this: the human body, given the right preparation, can go where the human body does not normally go.

Taking flight is not escape. It is expansion.

This is for the woman who has felt herself leave the room without leaving the room.