Tori Amos: Piece by Piece

by Amos, Tori

  There is a chorus here, clearly. Funny, but this one was inspired by an old folktale that I was reading the other day, the tale of Mélusine. I'm just beginning to write the verse lyrics and chorus. The music I've been haunted by while developing the verse for this is a piano riff that I found for less than—oh, I don't know—less than a minute on the tape I was listening to while on the rowing machine. I haven't committed to any final melody to go with this verse. I've got about seventeen that I sing in the shower, and none of them has won “Ms. World” as the melody for “Marys of the Sea” yet. But I'm haunted by this piano riff, knowing that it has to join up seamlessly with the chorus. The verse piano riff is a musical motif that keeps circling itself, conjuring the picture of a ring, an image that happens to work with our story.

  While I was researching this I found out that the early Christians were into ring dancing around Jesus’ time, before the Council Creeds of

  Nicaea (A.D. 325) and Constantinople (A.D. 381) were imposed on Christianity. This compelled me to dig for information wherever I could. I found a folktale based on the power of the ring myth, which had me chasing the Ring Lord myth (the one on which Tolkien based The Lord of the Rings). Historically there is a Ring Lord culture, harkening back to ancient Sumerian and Scythian times. In ancient Sumeria (pronounced Shumeria) in the Mesopotamian region, the Anunnaki gods and goddesses from approximately 4000 B.C. were implementing the ring as part of the municipal government. I wanted to chase down a historical story that originated with Tiamat, the Dragon Queen, and I found one. The story of Mélusine, whose tale (and eventually tail) finds her carrying the three rings, ends up in modern-day France. She is of a tradition that echoes back to the sacred feminine. The story seems to date from A.D. 733, which shows us that the ring dance had been able to sustain itself for thousands of years. It seems to have occurred in ancient Sumeria possibly originating in Scythia, which stretched from the Black Sea region over the Carpathian Mountains, known to us as the Balkans.

  Mary Magdalene

  The philosophy of the ring culture seemed to spread from Scythia to Mesopotamia to Egypt to Europe to what is now known as Ireland and Great Britain, where the ring represented eternity, wholeness, and unity. Many goddesses have been featured through ancient history with the symbols of the ring and the rule, the rule symbolizing a just universal law and the ring symbolizing sovereignty. Some historians think it is possible that Jesus danced the ring, that he partook in the dance as an ancient sacred ceremony. St. Augustine of Hippo, according to ancient texts, wrote about a ring dance ascribed to Jesus and the apostles. This would mean that the Magdalene probably danced the ring as well and might have brought the rings’ symbolic wisdom to their inner circle herself.

  As I'm pulling in different possibilities to try and crack the code of this song, I sketch everything on the canvas. There will be many canvases for “Marys of the Sea”—Les Saintes Maries de la Mer. Because the Magdalene went to France in A.D. 44 and died in what is now called Saint Baume in A.D. 63 in Aix-en-Provence, she is remembered as the Mistress of the Waters. I've chosen to incorporate the phrase in French, because it has existed in this form for hundreds and hundreds of years as the story has been passed down and is with us today.

  I'm trying to include different sides to the Magdalene myth in “Marys of the Sea.” Naturally this includes Mary Magdalene as part of the hieros gamos, sacred marriage, but also included as a subtext is the sexist attitude toward women held by the disciple Peter and the apostle Paul, fathers to the theology of the Roman Catholic Church. This sexist sentiment was echoed by men hailing from the early orthodox Christian tradition, one of whom was Bishop Irenaeus (who could be a dead ringer for my religious grandmother if you ignore their sex difference). Bishop Irenaeus was not a fan of what we call the Gnostic Gospels, and neither was another religious man called Tertullian. From Elaine Pagels and The Gnostic Gospels: “Tertullian directed another attack against ‘that viper’—a woman teacher who led a congregation in North Africa. He himself agreed with what he called the ‘precepts of ecclesiastical discipline concerning women,’ which specified: ‘It is not permitted for a woman to speak in the church, nor is it permitted for her to teach, nor to baptize, nor to offer [the eucharist], nor to claim for herself a share in any masculine function—not to mention any priestly office.’ ”

  “Marys of the Sea” was also inspired by The Gospel of Mary Magdalene translated from the Coptic with commentary by Jean-Yves Leloup. This Gospel sheds a lot of light on the inner relationship of the disciples. Peter's envy of Mary Magdalene is obvious when, in this Gospel, Mary is recounting what Jesus (the Teacher) had taught her in private. When she was finished, after Andrew (Peter's brother) expressed that he did not believe the Teacher had spoken these ideas, “… And Peter added: ‘How is it possible that the Teacher talked in this manner, with a woman, about secrets of which we ourselves are ignorant? Must we change our customs, and listen to this woman? Did he really choose her, and prefer her to us?’ ”

  After Jean-Yves Leloup's explanation of this quote, which expanded my perception of this, the Gospel continues, “Then Mary wept, and answered him: ‘My brother Peter, what can you be thinking? Do you believe that this is just my own imagination, that I invented this vision? Or do you believe that I would lie about our Teacher?’ ”

  In that moment it becomes crystal clear that this is a woman who just cannot win. She cannot win in history, as she has been relegated to her position as prostitute. She cannot win with her contemporaries, many of whom are disciples, because they are filled with jealousy over her intimacy with Yeshua or Jesus (the Teacher).

  I have chosen to highlight Jesus and Mary Magdalene's intimacy in the song “Marys of the Sea.” I was partially inspired to do this by a quote from the Gospel of Philip (59:9), which I quote here from Jean-Yves Leloup's introduction in The Gospel of Mary Magdalene: “With regard to the unique and particular nature of his relationship with Mary Magdalene, the Gospel of Philip insists, for example, that Mary is the special companion of Jesus (koinonos) … ‘The Lord loved Mary more than all the disciples, and often used to kiss her on the mouth. When the others saw how he loved Mary, they said, “Why do you love her more than you love us?” The Savior answered in this way: “How can it be that I do not love you as much as I love her?” ’ ”

  Also referenced in this song are the scarlet women, the sacred women—the Hierodulau. The Black Madonna has been attributed to the Magdalene by many. From Bloodline of the Holy Grail by Laurence Gardner:

  The Black Madonna has her tradition in Queen Isis and her roots in the pre-patriarchal Lilith. She thus represents the strength and equality of womanhood—a proud, forthright and commanding figure, as against the strictly subordinate image of the conventional White Madonna as seen in Church representations of Jesus’ mother. It was said that both Isis and Lilith knew the secret name of God (a secret held also by Mary Magdalene, “the woman who knew the all”). The Black Madonna is thus also representative of the Magdalene who, according to the Alexandrian doctrine, “transmitted the true secret of Jesus.” In fact, the long-standing Magdalene cult was closely associated with Black Madonna locations. She is black because Wisdom (Sophia) is black, having existed in the darkness of Chaos before the Creation. To the Gnostics of Simon Zelotes, Wisdom was the Holy Spirit—the great and immortal Sophia who brought forth the First Father, Yaldaboath, from the depths.

  Hundreds of years after the historical Les Saintes Maries de la Mer occurred, apparently because the Magdalene traveled with two other Marys as well, we discover the historical Mélusine who brings her rings to France from the old Pictish lands of Caledonia (in the far north of Britain, which was later incorporated into what we now know as Scotland). In the end, Mélusine will likely end up evolving into an entirely different song and “Marys of the Sea” will remain her own. An amicable split will eventually occur—as cells in the body would do— creating an offshoot of the original bloodline.

  ANN: Change can come slo
wly or hit like a hurricane. Entering her thirties, Amos kept on her journey toward integration. As her renown grew, each recording showed evidence of the next step on this hard path. The leap came with Boys for Pele, a head-to-head encounter with the dismembered feminine. The claustrophobic, clear sound of that album reflects the moment when Amos stood at the lip of her own volcano and made a sacrifice of her illusions. Stepping out of the

  realm of metaphor, Amos suffered a real initiation. Through it she met the Hawaiian goddess of fire, who became her album's namesake. She also met a male essence that she'd been chasing, and avoiding, for years: the Dark Prince, the other muse for the fiery efforts of this period.

  CONVERSATION BETWEEN TORI AND ANN:

  During Pele I really started to explore the Dark Prince archetype. It's one that a lot of men have been able to explore, from Jim Morrison on down to Trent Reznor, and I felt it was calling me. With my religious upbringing I felt I really needed to discover that. It was different from the Magdalene essence. I'd been studying her for a long time, and she was a muse. But I needed to access the Dark Prince in myself, instead of pulling in men who had access to it. But that was yet to come.

  I was courting demon lovers at the time, but I didn't know who the real Demon Lover was. I knew I needed to initiate myself. So I went to Hawaii by myself and began that quest. I worked with a woman, a shaman, who was reputed to know how to take you on a spiritual journey by uncovering things you were avoiding in your view of yourself. While I was in Hawaii, locals were talking about the goddess Pele in a way that I had heard of, but so distantly; it wasn't something that was in my framework like the Greek goddesses or the Norse or the Celts. Eventually I began to see, not a malevolence, but—through Pele, Kali, and Sekhmet, a few of the dark goddesses—I was really beginning to discover anger. I didn't know how to contain it yet.

  So an apprenticeship began. This woman had done a lot of work with medicine men in South America and Central America, and because she was of the Feminine I felt comfortable with her. We spent a lot of time diving into archetypes. I began to have a relationship with the Dark Prince; I allowed his archetype to seed in me.

  When I use this term, the Dark Prince, this is my definition of a male essence that is able to shed light in darkness. Darkness, in this context, is referring to that which is hidden. Access to the Dark Goddesses and the Dark Prince had been strictly forbidden as a “daughter of the Christian Church.” The idea formed in me that somehow Satan would be there, waiting, exposing any of us young women—sort of like the Gestapo—to the hierarchy of the Christian Patriarchal Church. There were times when I began to think, with strange humor, that Satan secretly worked as an undercover agent for the authoritative side of the Christian Church. I could almost feel the hidden cameras on me, sort of like a Christian moral majority Big Brother, watching when I or any other woman would pick up controversial works by people such as Carl Jung. Works that began to dissect the unconscious. The shadow. The darkness. Thereby making archetypes accessible and tangible. Archetypes as a Forethought and an Afterthought, heralding us as imprisoned Christian women to break the Apostolic chains that were like anchors on our clitoris.

  So when I use the term Prince of Darkness I see his essence more in cahoots with a doctor of the unconscious—Dr. Carl Jung. Satanic, however, is something I started to find very much ingrained in our day-to-day world. Now, obviously, when I say that, clearly there are different levels of satanic—the horrific acts that we hear about, whether on TV or through personal experiences. In a more subtle way I found it more sinister in a “business as usual” manner. The key for me here was the idea of hypocrisy, the definition of which I take from Collins English Dictionary: “the practice of professing standards, belief, etc., contrary to one's real character or actual behavior.” I found this subtle form of the satanic in the forms of friendships. I found it among the crew. I found it within people with whom I worked in the music business. I found it within myself. The hell-shattering moment was when I realized that satanic hypocrisy was not out there somewhere, out there with the terrorists in the world … but that hell was in the inner circle. But so was heaven. The teacher tried to ingrain this in me: “You cannot control the fates, but you can control how you as Tori are going to respond to them.”

  Ayuhuasca is a root from the Amazon that tribal people would take in ceremony. It's an eighteen-hour journey, and it invades the psyche. You're aware, you're awake, but everything you store in the unconscious starts to get unleashed. It's very parable-oriented; things are in parables, and you have to be able to read them.

  It can burn you up in some ways if you're not ready to look at certain parts of your subconscious, and, especially if you view your life as a situation in which everybody else has done everything to you, it's not going to be a good journey for you. You will start to see how you've also been manipulative. Nobody is blameless. If you take this substance, you will see that there's not a “Get Out of Jail Free” card; there's nobody you can call. You're on that trip and no shot can bring you out. And I've been with people on the journey; in groups I've done it … there was one girl who was trying to bite her own arm off. Because you can go that far down. You want to devour yourself because of what you've been up to. It's always a shock to see your own reflection.

  I fasted and prepared myself for ceremony, and I knew that I was on my knees. I was at a place where I couldn't extort somebody else's essence and energy like an emotional vampire. There had been people who wanted to have power over me in some way, or be voyeurs of my life. I had to stop blaming them and realize that I really wanted to merge with this essence. But we're back to the idea of merging the sacred and the profane.

  A lot of people around me at that time were turned on by cheap come-ons, drawn to thinking that the Dark Prince was somebody who would handcuff you and give you the orgasm of your life. Well, he doesn't need to handcuff you. It's boring. Go handcuff yourself. I'm not talking about Satan, either; people have projections on Satan, as we've talked about, and I have my own, too.

  Pele, the Hawaiian fire goddess

  The revelation to me was, I was at that place on my path where, instead of the darkness being outside, it was inside. I needed to acknowledge what it could do. I would always say, Well, everything will work out in the end. But if you're not able to acknowledge that some people are fundamentally greedy, you will be surprised that, when push comes to shove, even people that you care about may not choose the moral code. I needed to see that there were people, including myself, who could have good traits and traits that would enslave another person. So I went into ceremony and met the Dark Prince.

  When I went on this trip I had a sexual/spiritual experience with a creature named Lucifer. The word Lucifer is from Latin, meaning “light-bearer,” also defined as the planet Venus in its appearance as the morning star. The other Being I had an experience with was called Davide. He seemed like a blond angel figure. Light and dark. So to me they represented Dionysus and Apollo—that's the best way to put it. In my Being I was merging, and I remember him saying to me, “The seed is being planted, a really important seed. You will be pregnant, but with yourself, with a part of yourself. You need to give birth to a part of yourself that has been cut out.” Circumcised, I think was their word. A part of my soul had been circumcised. And they really made love to my woman in a way that I had never, ever—I mean, you want to talk about being loved out of my own purgatory …

  They said to me that I had to find the male within myself who is this demon lover. He has to love my woman. So I asked the Dark Prince, “What are you made up of?” He said, “You have to stop chasing baby demons. A lot of people think darkness is making somebody emotionally defecate on themselves. That's baby demon stuff.” He said, “Let's get to a place where you can call these guys teachers, and I say that with a small t. But the lessons can be huge. These baby demons can be wonderful in some ways. Wonderful in some ways, highly conscious in some ways, but until they've done their work on their shad
ow, they are more concerned with the power of seduction and the control over another Being than anything else.” He said, “The baby demons are obvious because there's nothing that they're hiding. They're not even trying to hide. They don't even dance with profanity, they don't respect profanity's power over them; therefore, they drown in it, unknowingly. Pulling down with them everyone who is attached to them. And in the end, honestly, women are there solely so that these baby demons can put another female scalp on their belt.” “Ouch,” I said as I crossed my legs. “You asked,” is what I heard back.

  He said, “The tricky thing is when you have people who really do good things for humanity and to free the soul, but then in other ways will hook you. And you feel that it's a betrayal because you didn't think that this was possible in them. And until you've really, really done the work on yourself and you're able to catch yourself, when you're fishing for heart bait, this will keep happening.” I began slowly to see how I would come across people who do wonderful acts for humanity, whether they were involved in making music or in social causes that were great for the world, but then would come home and shame their girlfriend.

  Boys for Pele ended up being about those people, and that spirit in myself. We all have the capacity to act in a way that could invade another being. And until you're willing to see this in yourself, you think that you're above it. Pele was about not being above that. Before then, I could not see how I was a part of that, because I was on the victims’ team. I had to look at how members of Victims Anonymous could wear badges on their sleeves and hold everybody hostage to their victimization. So it's coming to understand that essence, really. And it's in songs like “Blood Roses” and “Professional Widow.”