Underworld Guides

Artwork by John Dervishi

“What’s your purpose?”

I was on a group coaching call with several other men when we were invited to share our purpose. Not just for a project or even for a season, but for our whole lives. I was in a bad mood - low on sleep, stacked with professional tasks outside of my comfort zone. Stressed, stretched, and running on E. Not interested in shouldering questions of purpose or meaning or whatever the hell.

I didn’t want to be on the call. Not one bit.

When a deep and question like “What’s your purpose?” hits the table, I knew there was no faking it. I let everyone else answer first, contrary to my normal verbose, excitable mode of discussion. B, the day’s facilitator, asked gently - “Jeff - wanna play?” B is a master facilitator. He knows that bringing gentleness and levity can ease the weight.

So I took a deep breath, willed my tense shoulders to relax, and let my mind wander. Out of nowhere, I got a mental image of Charon, the boatman of Greek mythology, who ferries dead souls across the river to the Underworld in exchange for an obol, a coin of passage.

Kind of grim, isn’t it?

Only in that moment, it didn’t seem so. I was thinking of gatekeepers– not in a restrictive fashion, but an enabling one. The gatekeepers grant access to those who show up properly, pay their dues, honor tradition. But they’re also guardians. They protect the magic and power of the Other place from those who would invade and squander.

The image caught me off guard. It was so strong I was embarrassed to share. B helped curate my thoughts by offering the concept of guidance, shepherding. Another participant commented that going to hell was quite a pilgrimage! I had just sent off my book of sacred travel to the publisher.

What this meant for my purpose, I don’t really know. We pull the thread and see where it goes, yes? I’m not at the end of this thread-pulling yet.

After the call was over, I was haunted by the image. I leveraged Google, discovered a bunch of other soul-ferriers. In Persia, the Zoroastrians held that Daena led people to the Chinvat Bridge. To the worthy, she appeared as a beautiful maiden, while the unworthy saw her as an ugly hag. I was reminded of Anubis, the jackal-headed Egyptian god. Hermes/Mercury especially led slain heroes to the Greek and Roman underworld, while the fearsome Valkyries of Norse myth led worthy warriors to Valhalla, the eternal meade-hall of the Aesir. Celtic mythology is less clean-cut; it seems that any and every god or goddess leads the dead to the afterlife in one form or another.

There’s more – quite a bit more. Both Veles and Morana of Slavic folklore, the angel Azrael in Islam, Whiro for the Maori, Ghede in Haitian Voudon, and Oya for the Yoruba. It seems every culture has a character whose dubious honor it is to escort the dead to their resting place.

But back to Charon, the prototypical psychopomp. What a delightful word.

I feel an odd kinship with this shadowy figure. There is an abundance of artwork depicting him. Often he is ancient and skeletal, barely capable of navigating the liminal skiff of souls. Elsewhere he is strong – strong enough to wrestle interlopers away from the shores of Acheron, the River of Pain. At times he is armed with a double-sided hammer. Only mighty Heracles could overpower him and use brute force to enter the land of the dead. Charon is the offspring of Nix and Erebus, and his siblings include Nemesis (vengeance), Eris (strife), Thanatos (death), and Geras (old age). While playing a minor role, Charon likely preceded all the Olympians in the Greek pantheon.

From his name, Charon, one extracts the descriptor charopos, meaning “of keen gaze”. The implication is that he sees much. He has to, if he’s going to discern who belongs in the Underworld and keep out the riff-raff.

My poet friend, K, is a hospice nurse. She’s awakening to the power of her poetic inclinations combined with her intense, sustained, and wise encounters with death. Already she’s taught me much about how to approach death with more honesty, more frankness, more gentleness. For it isn’t loving to dodge the issue or mask the pain of it with empty platitudes and misleading euphemisms. More than once, when an announcement is made, “We lost _____”, she asks, “Where did you last put him?”

But unlike K, who has had the honor of shepherding many individuals towards death, it isn’t the association with death that I see with the old ferryman. What fascinates me, speaks to me, is how Charon periodically, reluctantly ferries the living through the Underworld.

To complete his labors, Heracles bullied his way in. Orpheus broke Charon’s heart with a lovesick melody. Theseus, Aeneas, and Psyche also all travel the underworld. Charon even makes a cameo in the Inferno, literally mad as hell that Dante wants in.

I spoke with another dear friend last night. He just got the biopsy back on a lump, and a cancer diagnosis seems inevitable. In the same week, however, a family member took their own life. My friend could use the navigation of a boatman to see his way through this experience.

So what Underworld experiences are you currently navigating? When you are in the midst of it, to whom do you turn? Who walks you through the shadowy places of death? What token do you bring to gain access to a realm that you would likely rather not ever be?