Neptune the Psychopomp

Was it a coincidence it happened on All Souls’ Night?

No. The old lady always had perfect timing, panache and style. Maybe the scene was a prophecy from the famous Yeats poem of the same name, or conversely; was the scene an inspiration for his beautiful poem. Life has a habit of deceiving order, like the debate over the sequencing of the chicken or the egg. Neptune’s role was the spirit handler leading the old lady’s spirit to the next realm. While others would be putting the old lady’s body to her final resting place, the candle lit and decorated headstone in the village necrotaphio was being readied. The graveyard, especially on All Souls’ Night, was always at its best, with the focus of all the villagers remembering loved and cherished ones that had passed away. By tradition this would be the final resting place for the old lady’s body with other members of her family. In parallel, Mercury and Moon watched their father Neptune, the black cat doing his duty, assigned by his deity, the demiurge of all living creatures, in the entire and infinite universe.

In some circles Neptune was named a psychopomp. Meaning a guide of souls. A creature, a spirit, an angel, a demon depending on which religion or the circumstance of the recently departed soul. It was the responsibility of the psychopomp, Neptune the black cat, to escort newly deceased souls from Earth to the afterlife. His role is not to judge the deceased, but simply to guide them. People would be shocked to learn that it was the local stray cat – Neptune, that undertook this responsibility.

It was All Souls Night, and the old lady blindly followed Neptune, the village stray black cat, to the next realm, her next destination.

It occurred in the small village beside the vast Mediterranean Sea, a sleepy village cooled by the Meltemi winds in the summer, the village only came alive during the summer months, encouraged by the tourists, not by the winds. The cooling winds normally did the opposite, sending the local residents to their shaded rooms for afternoon naps, their serkeleme, a siesta for the many.

Neptune watched from the shade and waited.

They would be even more shocked to learn that the old lady knew her days were numbered when Neptune turned up and stood like a guard outside her small but tidy house during the last days of her life.

It’s an interesting fact, that psychopomps often appear on funerary art, from the tombs of ancient Egyptian cenotaphs to the Terracotta army tombs; psychopomps have been depicted at different times and in different cultures as anthropomorphic entities, such as horses, deer, dogs, all varieties of birds such as ravens, crows, vultures, owls, sparrows, and cuckoos. In the case of birds, these are often seen in huge masses, timelessly waiting outside the final home of the dead, the huge tombs of the deceased. But not many of these excavated edifices have carvings of cats.

Nonetheless, Neptune was a psychopomp from a long line of ancestral psychopomps.

He was also the most sexually active tomcat in the neighbourhood, no female cat in heat could ignore his charms, and his formidable appetite and desires. Thus, Mercury and Moon were amongst many of Neptune’s offspring, born in a chimney, completely grey in colour, with little beady mischievous yellow eyes. Unfortunately motherless, as their mother, a pure white cat died in kitten birth, but credit to Neptune, he never ran away from his responsibilities as a guardian mother and father for the two tiny kittens. On top of his responsibilities as psychopomp.

That’s another story, and the writer digresses.

Neptune is a perfect name for a psychopomp, a spirit guide. The planet cannot be seen by the naked eye, and rightfully has been designated the planet of mystery and dreams. Also, Neptune the god of the water kingdoms, connects those different watery realms on this planet, the depths of oceans, lakes and seas are ruled by this god with his symbolic trident. Conceptually the essence of Neptune is to work through superficial attraction, Neptune is the teacher of us all and is the anvil of the soul. In many realms, Neptune helps us to transform and heal any inner wounds that lacerate the soul.

The old lady never moved far from the sleepy Mediterranean village beside the mesmerizing blue waters, on the remote occasions she did travel, the sounds, the smells, the sights of the village by the sea had captured and haunted her senses, and she quickly became homesick and vowed never to travel away again. The old lady eventually grew roots which were attached to the ground around the village, and she became part of the landscape. Her face, her body, became as one with the surroundings, weathered like the ascending granite hills, her body perfume smelt like a mixture of sea salt, kelp and wildflowers found scattered amongst those granite hills.

Nonetheless, she lived a life, she grew and ripened into a young woman, fell in love, gave birth to children, and her children gave birth to their children, and grew old. Her life was full, but now Neptune had come calling.

In her later years she would sit for hours looking at the sea, the minuscule dots of white sails on the horizon, never seeming to move far, a flick of the painter’s brush on the virtual canvas. Only the Meltime winds knew how far the white sail would travel, and to which haven it would rest and gain shelter that night. She breathed in the sea air full of imagined sea spray and imagined being carried to the clear depths of sea bottom, where the forests of green kelp waved lazily by the tides, sometimes hiding the owners of shy peeping eyes. She counted her days, blessing her existence, when Neptune appeared.

“I was expecting you.” She said in a dreamy voice, still visualizing the depths of the sea, the feeling of peace and tranquility filling her senses, her soul was full. The old lady was ready for her journey.

Neptune sat in front of the old lady, he knew she was ready for the end of her life, and the start of a new journey. This one was ready, he thought. This one had a nature unto itself, natural wisdom beyond this realm, without sorrow, fear or regret. He watched her heavy breathing, her last breaths, and although her face and her body were old, her bright eyes still sparkled with youthful gaiety. There was no interference from those outwards seeing sparkling eyes to the depths of her soul, she would follow blindly when she passed. Neptune knew, and in some ways, he wished he could stay longer with some of these souls, but he was the guide, and the duty of the guide was never to linger, never to prolong the journey. Others were waiting.

The old lady glided from her physical body still sitting on the chair, and followed Neptune blindly, but not before she murmured a thought.

“I wonder who your guide will be, when it is your time black cat?” The old lady said to Neptune the psychopomp, as they both moved into the shadows of the night.