Invocation

Hear me! I am Peter Paul Conlon Corless, and I have a prayer and a dream to share with the world, and a need to invoke the spirits of the divine.

I invoke the name of Calliope and Clio, muses of epic poetry and history, their mother Mnemosyne, goddess of Memory, fair Apollo, god of the Sun, and, above all, the indominable and superior spirit of the Creator.

I invoke the name of good King Edward the Confessor, blessed saint, who may watch in fair stewardship over the history of the land of England.

I invoke the name of good King Olaf of Norway, blessed saint, who may watch in fair stewardship over the history of the land of Norway.

I invoke the name of the good Laud of Coutances, known as Saint Lo, blessed bishop and saint, who may watch in fair stewardship over the history of the land of Normandie.

I invoke the name of Homer, who taught me how to make an invocation for an epic. For this man knew how to craft an epic story of warring nations that would be retold for thousands of years!

I invoke the name of Aristotle, who taught my poorest mind rhetoric and politics, as he taught the same to Alexander of Macedonia, who we know as the Great. For Aristotle knew how to inspire others through his wisdom in such a way as to transform the fate of nations and the world!

I invoke the name of Jesus Christ, a man, and yet more than any other man, who birthed into the world a new hope for our humanity. That we may love the Creator, and each other. His life and his death was lived so that we may increasingly appreciate the love of our Creator and our fellow humankind in turn.

I invoke the spirits of those who fought and died, and all those who survived intact, whether whole, healed or crippled, and all those who lived in peace during the year AD 1066. So that they see in this work their lives retold as they would have wished for us to know them. For us to understand their world, and appreciate the meaning of their lives.

I invoke the names of Guillaume de Jumièges and Snorri Sturluson, as well as the hidden, mysterious and unsounded names of the authors of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, likewise Matilda of Flanders, and all the unsung, forgotten and unnamed spirits who, with industrious and nimble fingers, created the Bayeaux Tapestry. I invoke these and all other historians of the events of the year Anno Domino 1066. Without them, there would be no story known to be told.

I invoke the spirit of Wolfram von Eschenbach, who taught me how a tale of foolish young worldly warriors can be transformed into a work of most sublime wisdom, humor, and love. I pray to follow his works in the seeking of the Holy Grail, to achieve spiritual peace. I pray that, like him, I do this for the sake of and to the glory of the Creator.

I invoke the names of Gruffudd ap Arthur, known as Geoffrey of Monmouth, Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare, Joseph Campbell, Akira Kurosawa, and all the other epic authors, skalds, bards, jongleurs and storytellers that inspired them and me as well. For these men knew how to frame the epic histories and mysteries of our world in a way that they were told and retold through many generations. These voices knew how to transfigure the mind and altered our view of the heroes in our lives, and the spirit of the hero that lives within the heart of each of us.

I invoke the name of Elizabeth Regina, Gloriana, First Queen of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales by that name. For this woman bore in her blood, her upbringing, and in her whole being, the heritage of all these nations intermingled, along with that of many other nations of Europe and the world. She was a woman unparalleled without equal, who knew how to arbitrate and settle the most bitter and terrible of disputes, to compromise and negotiate the needs of many for the sake of all her people, in order to bring about a better and more lasting peace and mutual understanding in her realm. I pray her lasting wisdom and grace bless this work.

I invoke the names of Ludwig van Beethoven and Freidrich Schiller, who inspired in my mind with music and words, the Ninth Symphony and its Ode to Joy. These men, and other musicians in history, like the common minstrels and monastic choirs of the year AD 1066, lived during a time of great historical turbulence and tribulation, a period of monumental war and disaster in Europe, a time of challenged faith in social and religious institutions, and yet all the while they kept in their heart their passionate beliefs and the desired state for the world around them. May my works bear with them the same hope, idealism and joy for the Creator, and all his creation, and for our fellow and future humankind.

I invoke all the spirits of all the saints, and all the peoples departed of these lands of Europa and Terra, for whom the story of this year, these moments in history, were their life, their fate, their future, and their heritage.

Beneath us all, and as foundation for this work, I invoke the names of Europa and Terra themselves. I pray for these personifications of the patient and loving and most beautiful women who bore us, sustain us, nourish us, and in silent good humor and in maternal mourning, watch our follies and our passing from their presence. I pray these works please them and their memories, and fulfill their inward hopes for us all.

I ask all of these incorporeal beings to watch over and safeguard this work, that it may be pleasing to their invisible eyes, and to their perfect ears, and that it appear right and good to their brilliant minds, and that it may gladly and truthfully touch their elegant bodies, comforting to their sympathetic hearts, satisfying to their deepest souls and reflecting in its embodiment and expression their eternal spirits.

I pray each day, each moment, I may feel their gentle hands guiding my work, and their comforting reassurance on my back and upon my body. I pray that, if and when and as they will and desire, that I hear their hands’ applause for my good efforts.

I ask them to inspire, to harmonize, to further, to illuminate, and to safeguard this my work, and the related and similar works of others.

I pray they forgive me for any intellectual hubris and egotism I may have to believe I am worthy to undertake this work. For they know I am only human, hapless and prone to many faults, including the omissions and commissions of imperfection.

I pray they grant wisdom in the creation of the possibilities emergent for this effort, and to other related efforts in the future, and insights into the world-to-come that only those truly divine may understand.

I ask them to help me remember the ideas and ideals which inspired me to make it, and to share them intact and perfected, embodied in a collective and collaborative set of works under the name and identity of “AD 1066: One Year in History You Will Never Forget” with countless others to come through their shared creation and appreciation.

I ask them to hear me as I dedicate it to the sources of my inspiration in life, and especially to dedicate it to the Global Understanding movement and to my fellow artists who embody the Flowers in the Cracks.

I ask these spirits to hear, watch, and bear witness to the mottoes I invoke:

• Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you.
• My heart is in the work.
• Leadership, friendship and service above all.
• At your service!
• Onwards to adventure!

I ask all these spirits, and any witnesses to this invocation, to bless this adventure as a work perfected in art, to preserve its scientific and historical accuracy, and to fill it with meaning, profundity and joy.

I ask for this work to align its own makers. For my vision and my words to inspire similar desires in others for its successful completion and distribution to the world. I pray it immediately inspires and compels others to join me in the making of this movie. I pray this movie is finished before the day of my death on earth.

I ask all this of you, my fellow humans, so this dream of my mind and heart and spirit becomes a truth embodied in tangible and intangible products and services: movies, books, lectures, class curriculum, games, and any other form of future media we may invent. I pray that it inspires future generations for at least as long as Homer has already thus far done in history: for the next twenty-seven hundred years, or as many more as deemed valuable to humanity.

I pray to present this story to the world in best light and efforts, all in the hope to inspire us, mere mortal humans, to learn from this time in our past, to understand the world around us, and to see what we may do to ensure that calamitous wars are not needed to birth nations and harmonize the peoples of the world in days to come.

All this I pray today, through the invocation of the fairest Muses, their mother Memory, the illuminating and sustaining warmth of the Sun in our heavens, and of all good and loving humankind, and above all, through the power of the Creator of all creativity and all being in the Universe. Hallelujah!

Amen.