King Pellinore's Wife

When King Pellinore found his castle rocking and tossing and falling down whenever he built it up, none of the magicians or wise men or astrologers could tell him why—until Merlin, god-inspired, told him that there were two dragons in the ground deep down under his castle, unseen by anyone, who fought—and when they fought the castle rocked and he had to use up all his wealth to build it up again.

Very few have recognized the twin dragons of art and life—art in the sense of music, writing, painting here and now, life in the sense of living, home, children, relationships.

Any and every musician, however little distance they have gone, has a potential . . . They one day will have that complete fulfilment of expression, and the musician inside them is a dragon that knows it. If he be a musician (or artist) as close to completion as Johann Sebastian Bach or Cézanne, he lies still and listens to the sons of the morning singing for joy. If he is not as old and wise as that, he may kick up a fight and knock over the conscious castle.

But the other dragon—the perfect, home-loving dragon, the unique, special, family relationship, different from any other, the mother-child relationship that is perfect and allows no intrusion, fights too, and says—"My perfect home is a holy place, and a sanctuary, and don't you come enticing me out into the forest of adventure, unknown, unheard—marvel of music (or art) that takes time away from my perfect home-making work." So the perfect home-making, bringing up children, makes one tired because, heard or unheard, the other dragon is calling . . .

No life practice is wrought out without effort and courage and patience and forbearance and love—and plenty of other graces as well, as many as one can muster—and the work is done in the secret closet of one's own consciousness . . .

The expressing of perfect home, perfect wife, perfect mother is very close to the expressing of perfect musical harmony—and when one reaches that point the two dragons become friends and helpmates. Very few human beings have found that out, and any that have, have taken time over it—and have been supported and 'understood' by those, or by someone, near them.

A man has a creative artist demon beneath him too—but a man in his life-working dragon is often doing a highly disciplined professional job, and the expression of that keeps that dragon in harness. A woman's life is less disciplined and it has no time schedule and is far harder to resolve—especially on the human plane of emotional human love. Which woman up till now has been a creative artist of the first category?
 

(Published in Unknown Colour; Paintings, Letters, Writings by Winifred Nicholson, ed. Andrew Nicholson, Faber and Faber, London 1987).