It awoke just as the snows were beginning to melt and the green slivers of grass were starting to rise through the scattered, decayed leaves of the last growing season. The trees, though bare, were starting to show the promise of full foliage, sprinkled here and there with buds, and green shoots from the forest floor were emerging, reaching toward the blue sky sprinkled with feather clouds overhead.

It sensed the sunlight before it opened its eyes, felt the warmth of the soft breezes, heard the low moan of a new-born calf, searching for mother, its mother responding in soft communication.

From the distance, the soft chuckle of water searching for the low places, forming the sloughs in which a thousand life forms would draw sustenance mixed with the harsh cries of distant magpies scrapping over the carcass of some newly dead beast; needing sustenance for their soon-to-be-laid eggs, embryos forming as they fought.

Drawing its sustenance from the moisture, the sunlight, and the earth, it took form and substance, testing the wind for music, sensing the ground beneath its feet, stretching and expanding its muscles, sensing its immediate and extended world.

It was Twomanaga: it was ancient and had lived countless lives. Some say it was favoured by the ancient gods; others said it was cursed by them. Both, perhaps were right. Neither male nor female, it was a mixture of both: it encompassed both the light and the dark, creation and extinction, the whole rhythm of existence. Those who saw it favoured by the gods noted its compassion for mankind, its driving wish to help the dispossessed, the poor, the hungry; it wished to eliminate war, to minister against the deliberate infliction of suffering and pain. Those who saw it as a cursed being remarked upon the frustration and despair it met as it tried to guide humanity towards a good and productive life, with high ideals and peaceful existence. Its compassion for humanity was never in doubt by gods or men, neither was its disappointment.

Twomanga was much beloved by the ancients: Twomanaga rose from the ashes of an earlier life to observe again the follies of humankind; it was given the gift of prophecy and foresight by the gods; it was also given a curse in that the gods decreed that no one would believe its urgent warnings to the species it had taken to its heart. Twomanga, it seems, was condemned by the gods to pointless and unfulfilling toil in the warnings and admonitions given to humanity. It was a ceaseless task, but Twomanga also had the very human trait of trying and trying again, never losing hope, always searching for a better way. This was its satisfaction, even its delight. Although the human race made terrible blunders and mistakes, it always seemed to resurrect itself and to try again, and it was from this that Twomanaga drew his spiritual strength.

Twomanaga’s gifts from the gods were many, as were humankind’s. In addition to the powers of prophecy and foresight, when the cold winds of winter blew it lost consciousness, and when the warm winds of spring awakened it, it arose to spread its warm embrace for what it considered its children, the race of beings which were born to disregard it. Twomanaga’s concern for humanity was great, and it wept at the foibles of the species. In each incarnation it witnessed the depredations of the race. The absurd term “inhuman” which proved to be exclusively human revealed the race’s distain for its fellows. No other species on the planet exploited its own kind such as these: they condemned each other to economic slavery, and dictated the of those less powerful than themselves. They fought for power, not because they lacked food or shelter, or the basic necessities of life, but for power itself, the right or ability to command the lives of others.

Twomanaga tried to resolve the differences between the natural flow of events and the human species insistence on defying natural ways. Twomanaga noticed the trail of animals towards a flowing spring: the spring itself was the center of a wheel, the hub that the animals approached when they came to water. The deer, elk, bear, and the myriad of forest animals came along the contours of the land. They wound around hills and valleys, making long, winding trails, which no species owned, and none disputed. The humans, on the other hand, drew straight lines over the hills and brooks; they lived within these artificial lines and disputed with their neighbors about who owned which tree, and which bush was on whose property.

Twomanaga, saw the majority of human problems inherent in humanity’s divorce from nature. When humans made distinctions and insisted on classifying things, they created walls and barriers. Twomanaga saw the main evil in humanity as the insistence on creation of definitions, of territory, and of ethnic origin. When others tried to cross those lines, or they came into contact, the human response was to cause bitter argument and violent responses. Humans classified themselves by race, by creed, by geography, and by many, many other kinds and sorts of distinctions and categories, and when one group met another, it was cause for jealousy, envy, and mistrust, all rationalizations for resentment and aggression.

Another major problem Twomanaga saw with the human race was the problem of balance. Many ancient beliefs accepted that there was both good and evil in the world. The best one could do was to try and draw a balance between the two. Dramatists insisted on seeing human existence as a struggle between the two, while philosophers attempted to come to a resolution of those extremes of human nature.

The ancient Chinese followed this path: they saw life as a resolution of opposites, they called it the “Ying” and the “Yang.” On one side there was light, growth, creation, the female aspect of humanity, art, music, the most desirable aspects of human existence. On the other side was decay, death, darkness, the male in his warrior role, and destruction. But the Chinese philosophers realized that the two were not only connected, they were very tightly interconnected, for without one, the other could not exist. The search for the good life involved the acceptance of negative things, and resolving them with positive aspects of existence, the bringing together of opposites in an harmonious unity. No classifications were needed because, the Chinese thought, one knew, instinctively, what aspects of human existence were good, and which were bad. Bad things happened, but they were balanced by good things; good things were to be enjoyed, with a mind that bad things might follow. An example might be that one might receive a large amount of money, a windfall. One might think this would be a good thing; however, perhaps the money might bring bad things: fighting, drunkenness, or envy and jealousy. The problem, the Chinese philosophers noted, was in being able to distinguish between good and bad. Twomanaga tried to instruct mankind in the wisdom of accepting events with a critical eye, but mankind would not listen.

Twomanaga insisted on the duality of existence and the absolute need to resolve opposites. It saw the world as the bringing together of all aspects of life in a mutual harmony. We often remark, “What goes around comes around” is recognition that good begets good, evil begets evil, and what one does will be revisited upon one. There is the unification of need and fulfillment, the quest, the seeking of satisfaction without depriving one’s neighbor of his or hers. There is a direct relationship between form and function. A part of the quest is that for companionship, for we realize that we are incomplete by ourselves; we pursue the search for the complementary opposite wherein the whole becomes greater than the parts.

Twomanaga saw this in the striving of human nature, whereby the goal is happiness, satisfaction, and belonging. It saw the basis of human striving in the need to augment the whole, and also noted the irony of the human situation whereby all human activity seemed to be directed towards the opposite of the desired end, the struggle in the need to overcome, to outshine the opponent and competitor, to be the star of the team.

The Buddhist concept of heaven is Nirvana, a state of being where there was no struggle or contention, where the human spirit was sufficient unto itself. Many contemporary communities seek to find the ideal existence; Twomanaga saw the human dilemma in the irony of the human situation; the ideals of communism versus the reality of competitiveness, whose god is the personal collection of wealth. And he saw those destroyed in that quest, and wept for them.