English author D.H. Lawrence spent several years in New Mexico and Mexico, years he described as his happiest. During this time, he wrote "The Plumed Serpant", a story about a mystical/political movement to revive the cult of the ancient God Quetzalcoatl. The primary theme of the tale is re-birth, one of the central themes of the Quetzalcoatl myth. For his characters, this is revoloutionary, religious, political, sexual. All converge in the idea of drawing true strength through joy.

The primary symbol is, of course, Quetzalcoatl himself. He connects earth and air, (a feathered serpant), the material and the immaterial, the very ancient idea of 'the great above and great below'. He represents unity and, foremost, the unity of death and resurrection.

Heavy concepts that may surprise those more familiar with "Lady Chatterly" or other, character-centered tales that, while they consistantly deal with social issues, do not generally go so far into the realm of the unknown.

Quetzalcoatl dies in order to live. He returns as the morning star, (as he does in myth). Why? Well, that's part of the core of Toltec and other Meso-American mysteries. Lawrences' main character puts it this way: "The universe is a nest of dragons, with a perfectly unfathomable mystery at the center of it. If I call the mystery the Morning Star, surely it doesn't matter!"

The star (Venus), in Lawrences' novel and in myth, stands between night and day, earth and air, reconciles opposites -- Quetzalcoatl. In twilight, the star represents union, peace (or opposition and unrest). Lawrence also includes a lake, which holds both the diety and the star, the mystery beyond the mysetery perhaps. He calls it "a pool of peace". Here the gods sink and emerge. It is full of all of the potentiality of life and death.

Music and ritual also play a role in Lawrences' book. Although he does not strictly adhere to those of Mexico and New Mexico, he does draw heavily from them. These are all forms through which we invent reality, as is myth. In the book, Lawrence takes us not necessarily through a myth, but to the way we as humans know, understand, and create myths.

It, as is Quetzalcoal, is a beautiful metaphor for reality. It is what we make it, if we only find the source, (ourselves).