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thousand feet tall. They think of themselves—as we do
of our selves—as
just the right size.
    All such things are relative. They probably
think of us as two thousand nine hundred ninety-four feet too
short. As antish.
    Perhaps appropriately so.
    And as for time, remember that for the
spirit anything short of eternity is ephemeral.
    When Gotama Buddha, to the
happy cheer of the many Devas who welcomed him back, returned after
his brief Indian spell on Earth, he assumed the Deva form and self
of Natha , to enjoy
a brief respite. At least that was the plan.
    Natha, however, was concerned and not a
little impatient. He often thought back on Earth, on his time with
the Sangha, and with his friend Ananda and the other monks, and he
would not let go of the love, of the compassion he felt for the
place.
    “Natha,” they would say, the other Devas,
“Natha is troubled.”
    “Natha is troubled,” Natha would agree.
    “But you have so much reward,” they would
point out. “So much yet to savor.”
    “Things are not well with Earth,” he would
answer.
    “Bother yourself not with Earth now,” they
would say, there is a time for that soon enough, but that time is
not now.”
    “That time is drawing near,” he answered, as
often as not.
    Then, one day, Natha was gone. But they
knew, these many dwellers in the Tusita heaven—for they are nothing
if not wise, even if a little too fond of sensual pleasures, these
dwellers—they knew that Natha had returned to Earth, and had been
born a man in a small Italian town called Nola.
    “Probably just to take a look around,” said
the Devas. “He will be back soon.”
    “Probably, yes,” others agreed.
    Then the Devas pondered and discussed
Natha’s curious impatience for a little while, but soon threw all
such thoughts to the wind and returned to what they were here to
do: enjoy themselves.
    While Natha burned at the stake.
    And now, rising, rising.
    :
    Below him the square grew smaller, though
still stabbed by the angry plume of smoke rising from what were
once Giordano Bruno and the pyre surrounding; the plume rising,
too—along with him—into dissipation and lighter air.
    Perhaps he should not have returned—he
certainly had no taste for martyrdom; but he had to see for
himself. And so he had seen: things were not well with Earth. No,
far from it.
    Soon the square was no longer discernable,
though the plume still was, for another heartbeat of rising, maybe
two, then the plume, too, was gone; and then the city, and then the
big boot that was Italy, and then the small blue pebble that was
Earth, all gone, vanished into black. Sol, too, now fading into a
point familiar.
    And rising still, or gliding perhaps, or
shifting.
     
    The gates that guard Tusita, the golden
portals that mark, and serve approach and ingress, are not
physical—though often described as such. In truth they are state of
mind, and when you reach the proper height, Tusita gradually
appears, until its fields and waterfalls and untold number of birds
and trees have grown as real—nay, much more real—as anything here
on Earth.
    And so Giordano Bruno, shifting into Natha
now as he dons his tall body of light, enters once again this
wondrous place called the Tusita Heaven.
    And soon the others, one by one, recognizing
his presence, ceased their doings and turned in wonder. Natha was
returned.
    “Nathadeva,” one of them addressed him. “You
are back.”
    Bruno now nothing but a brief glimpse at a
troubled world, flickered in Natha’s eyes, as he replied, “Yes, I
am back.”
    “You will stay this time,” suggested the
fair voice.
    “No,” said Natha. “I will not stay
long.”
    “How long?”
    “A day and a night,” Natha replied. “No
longer.”
    “Let us take leave properly this time,” said
another.
    Natha did not answer this. Instead he sat
down, folded his new and nimble body into a perfect lotus and
reflected upon his first visit some two thousand years earlier,
then upon his recent