CHAPTER FIVE

 

 

 The Dark Side.

(Exegesis Part Five)

 

(1963-1983)

Dichotomy and Synthesis.

 

       If it had been the case that there were no such thing as spiritual reality (and as I had perhaps assumed the case to be as a youngster) then all such talk and speculation on spirituality (and mystic revelation) would be mere opinion or belief; and unjustified opinion and belief at that. But when however, such reality becomes self evident by direct personal demonstrable experience such as I underwent, and of which you have just read a brief synopsis of, then it does indeed become a real justified target for thought and contemplation. I would imagine that people’s immediate reactions to such a profound event as a mystic death and resurrection encounter such as that would be very different, and depending to a large extent upon the personality involved and their past mode of thinking. My own reaction was immediate ambivalence and much confusion. I include this chapter then, ultra-brief though I will have to make it, in the case that it might assist others to avoid so many years of inner frustration and a long drawn out synthesis in acceptance and understanding of the events.

 

*

 

Thus it was then that at the age of twenty-four, whilst sitting alone one evening minding my own business and expecting nothing, that event occurred. And how is one supposed to react to that! Then again how is one supposed to react to any experience? What IS experience? Could anyone even begin to describe how they felt I wonder, for I certainly cannot, and there are no words anyway. I did not even know that such inner ‘events’ existed to be known and experienced. I was dumbfounded and mind blown. This was not knowledge as I understood knowledge and experience to be; and yet it was as real as being alive on earth. For three hours (on the outside) and forever (within) I had seen things and learned things, knew things; that I could not accept as being true when returning to ‘normality’. How does one cope with that? How is one supposed to cope with it? No person tells us that. We all walk through this mysterious creation alone—or in existential conscious terms anyway.

 

For a while then I was confronted with a direct demonstrable reality which I did not want to know, could not understand, for it was too much and too ‘way out’ and different. Not only that but it was too good. It was too good for me and it was too good for reality itself. The world was an obvious obnoxious cock-up; but that thing, elaboration of the mind, hallucination during a trance, or whatever it was, was wondrous beyond words and belief; there was nothing better, and nothing even equal to that existence. It did not add up or equate with the rest of reality; whatever ‘reality’ is. Was it the case that I had gone mad maybe? Did I really die for three hours? No that cannot be right surely! Was it a vision of death whilst yet still alive maybe? Was it the case that the mind was some kind of confidence trickster to itself maybe; and for what purpose or function? Or was it the case that it really was what it seemed to be—could that really be true? And why me of all people? I am not that ‘kind’ of person. My mind was in a giddy spin for about three months. Yet one also had to carry on with the normal daily chores and events as usual, as though nothing had ever happened at all.

 

It occurred to me that it was a damn good job that I had a keen sense of humour and a down to earth kind of personality. I think that alone kept me sane. Is it any wonder then that such people to whom these things happen (I found out later that it did happen to others) then begin to wander the moors on their own, to think, wonder, contemplate, ask themselves questions: and try to understand it all; and as to why it happened to them. It is no wonder at all. Life shows us things and in so doing the nature of the mind is forced to ask questions and seek answers to them. A question is much like a vacuum in the mind, and nature—and the mind itself it seems—abhors a vacuum. In due course I came to learn that some people actually go looking for esoteric experiences. They must be the mad ones I thought; for sufficient unto the day are the problems thereof. After about six months had gone by I decided to give up even thinking about it at all. For it did not make any sense; and obviously no answers were going to come. A peasant like myself could not work these things out, so there was no point even thinking about it.

 

As a young man I had never had what some like to call a philosophy, religion or belief system; and being young is the time when one is learning so much about life anyway, and not for forming conclusions. But I guess I thought along the lines that the human mind and consciousness was the product of electro-chemical actions within the brain and that the thing which we called ‘our conscious self’ was the product of this biological and electro-chemical stimulation; and that being the sum of it.

 

What I learned that evening however—and among other things—was a contradiction to that hypothesis. But one is so used to thinking along certain channels of thought that when one is jolted out of it one then questions the reality of the new concepts not the old ones; for the old ones fit in the mind like a snug warm glove—potted thinking and self created assumptions maybe. And which for the large part have been put there by our indoctrination, nurture and education from other people since childhood; for they tell us what life and reality is all about. Thus one is faced with the dichotomy and paradox of all time. If these things are really real, truly independent of simply experiencing them, then the conventional thinking of both science and religion is wrong. So what is real then; book learning or direct human experience? The dichotomy was also exacerbated by the fact that I loved and enjoyed the events and that reality so much, and yet the implications which it also brought did not appeal to me a great deal.

 

One of the implications in that transcendent mode of being is that you and I are never terminated as such, but simply undergo a broken continuity of self existence. (Broken by the event of annihilation and then beginning again in that mysterious resurrection—and which then eventually led back into this world or perhaps some other incarnate world or dimension again.) But I did not fancy the idea of continuity, broken or otherwise. Another is that you and I are not even from this world at all, in essence or spirit anyway. Also that we are not mere puppets of a Divine Order but rather the very right hand partner of it all; its direct progeny. What a lot of stupid nonsense surely; that cannot be true! The initial question then which one faces after such an event is as to whether one actually believes or accepts such events and such learning done therein to be really true or not, and irrespective of experiencing it—and actually LIVING it.

 

This new situation caused me a little trouble to say the least; for I did not even know how to believe things. I was happy enough in knowing a few things and also of my ignorance of other things. I had seen a little of life on earth, and mysterious and pleasant as it was some of the time the large part was that of suffering and downright misery for most people on earth: and most of which was caused by people themselves; arguments, wars, hostilities, deprivation, exploitation, and it was no joke and certainly no paradise to be sure, and we were no divine beings to be sure. Or if we were then something had gone very wrong somewhere along the way. But what I had seen and been in that evening was a paradise of perfect existence. Why? How come? And why me! What was the point of it all? How the hell could anything be so good... and yet real. And how could it be so good... and yet not real? How can you exist in something that does not exist to be existed in? How can you know something that does not exist to be known? It must be bloody real—but it can’t be! And so the inner synthesis goes for a while.

 

But if it were true that you and I were never destroyed in absolute terms, and if those things are true, then who in their right mind would ever want to come back here again anyway? For you cannot stay there in that dimension of mind even if it is real. I do not want to come here again and that is for sure, for this world is juvenile and cretinous enough without having to live here with the memory of that other place—and which makes it even seem worse here on earth.

 

I began reading all kinds of literature for a while; for I had to know if others had seen and been in this same identical reality that I had seen and been in. But there is so much to read and so little time left after work to do it all. Yet that which I did come to read during the first year or two had no resemblance to what I had seen, learned and knew. After reading much ridiculous nonsense that had no relevance to that which I had seen and known I gave up reading again and tried to revert back to my love of chess—but it had gone! I could no more get interested in playing serious chess than I could in digging holes in the ground. I could not concentrate on chess—it seemed too trivial and a waste of good time. And that annoyed me so very much, for I had loved chess for so many years; and now that love had gone, deserted me; and not of my choice. Why?

 

After about six or seven months I decided to give up even thinking about that evening and that wondrous transcendent event; for not only did it not relate to anything in normal perception but it could not be got at by choice anyway; and nobody knew anything about it. So what was the point in even thinking about it yet alone asking questions and trying to think and make sense of it all? I returned to my old philosophy, of ‘sod the lot of it’!

 

I had concluded that whatever it really was, and experienceable though it was, knowable though it was, that I did not want to know, and that I did not want to think of it any longer. I was not mentally up to it. So I stopped thinking about it. Every time the thought, memory, feeling and inner passion, flashed across my mind I deliberately pushed it aside and thought about other things instead—difficult though it was. But resolute I had always been.

 

After about another month had gone by I had my first and only nightmare that I have ever had in my life. A nightmare which was a dream which I will never forget for as long as I live; and which then acted as a major catalytic event at that time.

 

I dreamt that I was out walking over the moors on a very bright starlit night. There was no moon but the stars were so bright and so abundant that I could see well enough to the top of the hill towards which I was walking. I knew the path even though the path itself was dark and not well seen as such; but the illumination from the sky made the top of the hill stand out in silhouette and quite clear to vision. I knew that there were no hazards underfoot and thus I could walk in confidence.

 

All of a sudden somebody switched on a searchlight. I had been walking quite slowly, both hands in my pockets and whilst whistling to myself as I walked. At the event of this light being switched on I was thus taken by surprise; for I knew that it was a searchlight and yet there was no war on. So who the hell was looking for what out here on the barren moor at this time of the night with such a bright light? It then occurred to me that something was wrong; the damn light was upside down! I had seen enough search lights during the war and knew well enough what they looked like; and this bugger was upside down. I began to hasten my steps, for the light was in the direction I was walking toward anyway; and I was intrigued to find out what it was for, and as to what they were looking for at this time of the night. But on realising that it was upside down I guessed that it must have been a slow moving aeroplane or a helicopter with a new silencing method; for there was no sound whatsoever.

 

Moreover, the light was not moving. It became obvious that the point of the light was up in the sky and that the wide bit was on the ground. But some sod up there was looking for something on the ground; yet there was nothing but barren moor out here. Then the light began to move. It began what one can only describe as a scanning action. The point at the top was stationary and the beam itself was moving slowly across the moor in a straight line. It then stopped; shot back instantly to a point in the opposite direction where it had begun scanning and then started scanning a little lower down the hill; just enough lower down that it would not have missed anything. I became even more and more intrigued. I took my hands out of my pockets and began walking a little faster toward it. I arrived at a point where I could ascertain that the diameter of the beam on the ground was about six feet; and indeed very bright.

 

The scanning had continued... slowly across, fast back, a little further down and then slowly across again, time after time. These buggers were resolute if nothing else. I reached a point where the beam on the ground was only about twelve feet away from me; but there was still no sound and no sign of where the light was coming from in the sky. At that point I simply stopped walking and just continued to watch the event. On the next scan the beam passed by where I stood by about four feet or so. It did not even occur to me that if I did not move out the way then the next scan would cover the point where I was standing; or if it had occurred to me then it did not bother me at all; for I just stood there and watched it; for it was fascinating. As predicted by past events it got to the end of that scan, flashed back to its original point of movement and slowly began its next scan again. It had not stopped in its movement since all this had begun. As it approached I saw that its path was coming straight toward me as I had assumed; but when it got where I was standing... IT STOPPED DEAD!

 

I was panic struck. I could not move. I was transfixed to the spot. I instantly looked upward but although the light was so dazzling I knew that the upper end, the narrow point end was something to do with me; but I had to turn my eyes away for the brightness was too much; and in looking back down I did not see myself—but I saw that ugly bent twisted tree which I had seen over the moors some seven months back; I was that useless tree.

 

I did not wake up, it was as though I had never been asleep at all. I was flung out of bed and crashed into the wall which made my nose bleed. I had never known panic before in all my life. I was sweating buckets and bleeding. I rushed downstairs like a bat out of hell and made a series of strong cups of coffee. I could hardly stop shaking in panic; yet I did not know what I was even frightened of; for the dream itself was a soft and pleasant dream; and I did not frighten easily by anything anyway. It was my reaction to it which was the nightmare.

 

I eventually relaxed a little after about five cigarettes and three cups of coffee. I grabbed a book out of the bookcase and began studying some weird and wonderful opening variation on the Sicilian defence Dragon variation to take my mind of it. It was about three in the morning by now, and there was no way that I was going to go back to bed that night. Thus it was not the dream itself which was the nightmare but rather my reaction to it which was the nightmare; and fear of I knew not what. I just did not understand. How the hell could the mind throw up a wondrous scenario as I had experienced those few months back and then tonight... this!? It got me asking questions again and that is for sure. It worked! It was as though the dream was somehow symbolic. After transcendence I somehow knew that I knew something which I could not know now, or consciously know now anyway, but that it would come, whatever it was—a kind of answer or synthesis to the events. But that was somehow intuitive understanding and thus questionable. I did not really KNOW it for absolute certainty.

 

When one settles down again the thinking and questioning then starts in earnest, and in a calmer action from hindsight. Strange that we can be moved into action by bad events and forget the good ones! OK then, these things do happen; so what is going on then, how and why? And what the hell does whatever it is really want? Where is all this going to, and why, and how? And why me? I cannot go into any detail of the events which occurred over the next twenty years for it would take forever. But what happened shortly after that dream was most odd. It was as though that every time I came to be motivated by a certain topic I then contemplated upon that topic of thought, then within a short while, sometimes weeks and sometimes months, I would have some very strange kind of psychic experience which could be seen as a direct answer to the very issue I had been contemplating upon—like an answer. This is ridiculous I thought; and yet it is damn well happening. This involved all kinds of experiences, but never quite the same kind twice. I did not even want them, this was not my kind of ‘thing’; not me. I did not want to see past and future events as pictures flashed up in my mind. I did not want deep inner empathies with people. I did not want pictures flashed up in my mind as to what they were thinking or what they had in their pockets even. What the hell was going on and what was the point of it all? I did not want any of this stuff. I just wanted to be left alone to get on with my life and normal daily reality.

 

These experiences however, were much different from that first big event, the transcendent event; and anyway these other ‘psychic’ or whatever they were experiences did not answer questions about that other reality as such, but simply seemed to show me various potentials which the mind could somehow come to do at times; and god only knows how or why. But that first experience was not so much about what the mind could come to do but rather—what it indeed was in essence! And assuming it was true of course. However, these other things were always proved at the time that they WERE indeed true, for they could be proved; they were proved; and they were never ever wrong, not a one of them. Is something trying to tell me something—if so what and why!? And why indeed me; for I asked for none of this at all?

 

These things continued on and off for nearly eighteen years. By this time, or long before it in fact, I had got used to them, and simply smiled about them. It was not as though these events were happening every day: far from it; and life, as it had always been, was reasonable enough; good times and bad times the same as anyone else has, but not extremes of anything. Then for a while nothing happened at all, not a jot. I began to think and accept that all these things were now over for me in this lifetime, and that perhaps I had seen far more than enough anyway. Yet many claimed to understand their experiences (or so they said), but I was damned if I could. I felt a deep inner gratitude for having been so fortunate to see such wonders, and yet somehow, and by virtue of it, I felt some how ‘left up in the air’. As though somehow, like a pistol, I had been cocked but not fired; unresolved. It was all still unsynthesized in rational comprehension. No final synthesis to the flow and understanding of it all, and the why. A half-baked understanding.

 

A little learning may well be a dangerous thing but it can also be damned frustrating as I found out. For an inner part of me knew things somehow, even understood them some how in an emotional understanding, yet the outer and rational part of my mind did not accept them or even want to know. Imagine listening to the most beautiful song in creation and then the singer skips out the last chord, the resolution to the harmony, the last amen—that is how I felt. But luckily my own personality could still laugh at it. It created no hung up as such; but more a kind of rational annoyance than anything. I began, on black days, to wish that I had seen nothing of all these things at all; and yet I knew that I did not really mean that; just that dark cloud that can pop up at times I guess. By the time I reached forty years of age I thought all such past experiences beyond the normal range of sensory data had now finished in my case. I had even accepted and become used to the idea that no more was going to be seen and that no full synthesis of understanding would ever come. My degree of intelligence, or lack of it, could not work it out. Anyway I did not even want to work it out now—I damn well wanted to KNOW!

 

Life was ticking over OK. I was now married for the second time after my first two children had grown up and were doing there own thing; and now with two more young ones in the second marriage (with one more yet to come—another surprise!). I had what seemed like two full lives in one as it were; five children in all and one foster child which we took on from the deprived area of inner Bristol. I often chuckle when I read of these academics who inform us how best to bring our children up; the sociologists with bits of paper and Ph.D.’s (Piles of Hybrid Dribble, or Medallions of conformative potential), and often they have not even had any children. Their ‘knowledge’ is all academic, not direct hard earned experience. Ignorance is bliss!

 

If I had another five hundred children then it would still be guesswork and instinctive reactions for the large part. (Plus the fact that they are all very different and with different needs and personality; children are not clones that conform to rules of convention.) But if they are loved, they will not go far wrong it seems: either in wealth or in relative poverty. But having them if they are not loved and wanted is the greatest tragedy in the universe of mankind and the existing human condition. Children know whether they are loved or not intuitively; and not simply by words. Too many people say ‘I Love you’ in this world; but do they really know what real love (not need) and deep passion really are I wonder?

 

However, one spring morning when the kids were at school my wife and I went out with our dog to the hills overlooking the Chew Valley lakes near Bristol where we lived for eight years: for she had been attending Bath University for three or four years. We thought it was such a nice day that we would take a picnic and she could study some papers she had to deal with whilst taking in the fresh air. The view was crystal clear that day and the sun was soft and warm with just a pleasant fresh occasional breeze; it was perfect weather. After our sandwiches and a drink my wife settled down to her studies whilst I was playing with the dog; he loved the ‘fetch’ game, for he was a Springer. After a certain amount of chasing around, I, getting a little older and less energetic than I had been, eventually slumped down on the grass for a rest whilst the dog chewed on his stick. I was in a position about eight feet away from my wife and behind her. She was lost in her work; the dog was lost in the joys of his stick and his earlier chasing, so I simply began to look around me to admire the view.

 

Within a few minutes or so something strange began to happen. It was very, very peaceful. There were no other people around, and there fell a kind of hush that one experiences at rare times, as though all sounds were muted a little. Like one of those days when walking on air or cotton wool, or on soft new snow; a unity of peace which is rare on earth. Just at that point the dog trotted over to me with his stick, he wanted me to throw it again for him. But I could not be bothered to get up so I simply threw it whilst reclining on the grass. As the stick flew though the air it began to sparkle so it seemed. Perhaps it was the reflection of the sun. But as the dog was leaping through the long deep grass as it was at that part of the field the dog also began to ‘glow’ with a strange inner radiance. As I looked around me, my wife (I could only see her back and her hair), was also glowing. The grass was glowing, and the trees. I looked at my hands. They were glowing with an inner light of pure radiance. I began to think I was perhaps not very well or something, yet I felt fine, tremendous; never felt better. I scanned the whole vista around me. Everything was glowing with an inner light, the world was different than I had ever seen it before. The lakes way down below us, the sky, the trees, the few puffs of small white clouds, the grass, my shoes, everything, was shimmering with this inner light and a wondrous radiance; and it was all becoming more so and more so—what on earth is happening? Then the ‘hushed-ness’ of sound which had existed turned into a kind of ‘hum’. Not a hum as such but a kind of unified ‘song’ or symphony of sound. I could hear the ants, the bees, insects in the grass, the dogs breath, it was almost as though I could hear all our own hearts beating and blood pumping. And yet it was a unified kind of sound, almost like music in fact. I was dumbstruck and amazed, for I had never seen anything like this before. It was as though the physical senses had been liberated from a sleep and come alive to a greater spectrum of creation itself; the world was different; and amazing. And then it happened! It is indescribable; ineffable. I can describe the journey to that transcendent paradise; annihilation; the resurrection; what it is like in that paradise, and what it looks like and feels like; but my god almighty I cannot describe this for the love of trying. It was as though a hole had opened up in creation itself. As though there had been a blockage up the pipe-line which was now cleared by a flue brush clearing out the muck of the senses.

 

There was no ‘gap’ between the transcendent paradise realm and this earth, for they were ‘joined’, directly connected; a blockage had become unblocked. For I now recognised those shimmering lights, I had seen them before when in that ‘nothing’—Limbo, all those years ago. I realised only now, and for sure, that those lights I had seen on the journey to that paradise dimension whilst in ‘nothing’ were the naked face and wave front of the act of creation itself. I had wondered about it on many occasions—but now—now I knew it. That which was within; the Divine Implicate Order, is now out there, in the world also, and on a new ‘wave front’ of my own minds interaction with objective reality itself. Good grief almighty. And just at that point I began to be bombarded by what one can only call chunks of ‘data’, understanding and comprehension. As though a million pieces of Jig-saw-puzzle were being tossed up into the air and putting themselves together in the finished picture of comprehension. It pounded and pounded and pounded with relentless velocity and increasing frequency. It was as though my I AM in transcendence and the personality incarnate became one on earth in a gusher of a union. In transcendence the outer I had gone to IT: but here and now, on earth, IT, the implicate inner reality, the child of that Divine realm had come out to me. We danced again in a swoon of unified passion and delight, as it had been in paradise those long twenty years ago then so too was it again, now, on earth; the inner had become the outer: the below as the above.

 

When I went to IT the outer consciousness had gone to and become as the inner consciousness. But now the inner child (of mind at root) walked upon the face of the earth—the essential spirit of being was liberated... ON EARTH through me! I gave myself up and let that consciousness walk in my body—to see the trees, to feel the breeze, to show it the finished product of creation in the outer multitude; the synthesis of the vortex of emanation. I had shared paradise... and my love, I give the world to you now, through me! In transcendence there had been a union in the Mutual Convergence, (in annihilation and resurrection) but this was a reciprocal event, the Reciprocal Convergence, Paradise on earth, the Consummatum Incarnate! Good god almighty I cannot take much more of this reality! And yet it kept coming, more and more, stronger and stronger, I thought I was going to burst with passion and explode like I did once before. But not so, I was just engulfed in, and surrounded by a love, a wisdom; all knowledge, all comprehension, all affirmation, all at the same instant and in ultimate dosage—and in a physical world unimaginable. And then... and then it came to me, revealed and comprehended in one shocker of a blast: something had once given me the understanding... “It is now time to go. Do not fear, for it is all well that you must go now, for something out there is in need; and you must now be with it; do not fear, go now; be with it”! In twenty years I had never understood that bit; I had never come to understand it and I assumed that I never would come to understand it. But now, twenty years almost to the day later, I understood it implicitly; and it was the first time in my life that I wept; and albeit on the inside; for it was the soul that wept. Good god almighty—I knew what was in need—it was the world itself; the trees, the flowers, the sun and the sky, the stars themselves—that they might become like this: and it is mine to give, through the love; through me... TO THEM!

 

Normality slowly began to return. The ‘music’ gradually turned back into the normal sounds of the bees and the breeze. The inner lights of the emanation of being slowly dimmed back into the colours of normal matter and things. The ‘hushed-ness’ faded into normality, and the gates of paradise closed again. No doubts, no questions, no dichotomy, no unfinished song; the last amen had been sung and danced—ON EARTH. The last chord made whole and finalised—and this—is creation done; the finished product. The synthesis of paradise and earth; the purpose and function of creation and being. And I was never the same child again, for the child had become a man. Somebody else walked out of the field that day; somebody very different; and the twenty year wait was over. Twenty years in the wilderness of the resolution of the paradise event. But to have waited ten million years would have been worth it. There is nothing one can say, except that it is now achieved; Consummatum Est! And I now Understand.

 

*

 

My wife did not even know that anything had happened in that field during that hour or so; and I did not say a word. I was worn out, wrung out, drained, and mind-blown yet again; yet so very different from the last time when returning from the transcendent event twenty years earlier. Had I not have seen that transcendent paradise twenty years ago then I would never had understood this event at all. But now I did. I read somewhere once that the young would have visions and that when old they would dream dreams. How strange, how very strange. All I can do now is to dream dreams of a better world for young minds to come into; for this one seems to be spiritually dead. It would seem to me that there must come a time, in one incarnate lifetime or another, when a soul must walk these paths for themselves. It is more to do with the evolution of the individuals soul than that of the existing temporal manifestation of that souls incarnate mind as such. It is plain enough that not all human beings on earth undergo such events during this lifetime; and yet they must do so eventually, for it is the evolution of the incarnate soul itself. There is no evolution in paradise, but only in extension of it. We were not made FOR paradise (we were made IN IT); but we were made for freedom in a temporal world—a world in which we are given the freedom and power to make by way of our own desires and efforts. How incredible! “Here is the ‘stuff’ my love, make with it what you will!”

 

 

 

*    *    *

 

 

THE DARK SIDE

 

Dedication to Omar Khayyam

 

Would that I could sleep tonight

and ne’r awake again;

and shackled to my soul, could take

the harbinger of pain;

that catalytic virus now

which burrows like a screw,

entwines itself like poison

on what was pure as dew.

For if I did not love you,

then I would never care,

and never would I worry,

or your pain then have to share;

but it is done... I love you;

and the dark side I must know

until the temporal course is through;

when all the pain will go.

Why is it thus, that love must have

its dark side like the Moon,

or rust beneath a painted sheen

which shows itself so soon?

Ah love! Could we conspire

to grasp this sorry scheme,

and mould it in a fashion more

conducive to our dream !

 

 

 

*    *    *

 

 

DICHOTOMY

 

Thus it is, the analogy,

that the ‘Cave of shadows’ is true;

but alas we never know it

until we see the other view

of light beyond the light we know,

and in temporal fields returned.

And whence comes such a time on Earth

when the inner light so true,

by each and every being

is prominently in view?

 

But still I say, dear Omar,

and unto you my love,

me thinks it’s not the time on Earth

where such truth fits like a glove

while the sacred Cow of profit

rings its hollow bell;

exploits through fear and violence,

and intimidates then of hell.

 

I understand that in due course

such things will come to be

when the seed of inner movement

engulfs temporality.

But the climate of the temporal mind,

me thinks is not yet ripe,

but wallows still in Somnus,

in a depth which is unripe.

The time is not yet ready

to reap the Golden Fleece:

return then, to your magic realm;

and rest... in Heavenly peace!

 

 

 

part two

 

 

 

Sometimes I’ve cursed the day I saw

beyond the temporal tree,

and the innocence of beauty

amid this world’s poverty.

 

Life could be so simple

if such things we never knew;

or observers of such wisdom

at least were not so few.

 

Where knowledge is but second hand

at best it makes one think;

but when you know; you can compare;

and that is pain... to drink.

 

You cannot be affected

by what you do not know;

but that which you have been in

which set the heart aglow

can never be forgotten,

negated or put down,

and that is why the mystics weep

when this world they look around.

 

Think not such knowledge is all fun

while on this world we dwell;

for if you care to sup of truth

then you must drink it well.

 

Knowledge which is second hand,

like an angelus that rings,

offers knowledge of the truth,

without the pain it brings.

 

 

 

part three

 

 

 

Enjoy your time among the trees

when next the gate swings in the breeze!

But times there are, which sometimes come,

tis easier said, my friend, than done.

 

Thus, I would cast such Wisdom

many fathoms deep;

that only those who long for truth

its knowledge would then reap.

 

But neither do I have to,

for it is already done,

by one that is much wiser,

and to which all things must come.

 

But knowledge which is second hand,

like an angelus that rings,

offers knowledge of the truth

where the child of Wisdom sings.

 

But to seek within religion

for the singer and the song

is much like opening vintage wine,

with the aid of a nuclear bomb.

 

And when at last your reason knows

no more then can be done,

and offers up its being.....

 

“When you need Me... I will come!”

 

 

 

*    *    *

 

 

 

SILENT NIGHT

 

A Song of Remembrance.

 

Acknowledgements

to Franz Gruber and Joseph Mohr.

 

Silent night, Holy night

all is calm, all is right;

rests the child of loves virgin light

in that heavenly womb so bright.

Rest there in heavenly peace,

Rest there in heavenly peace.

 

Silent night, Holy night,

gone the World, hid from sight

while the glory of loves sweet child

bathed in wisdom so tender, so mild,

reaping thy heavenly peace,

reaping thy heavenly peace.

 

Silent night, Holy night,

realm of love, Oh so right,

guide their spirit to thy side

so in truth we all may abide

singing of heavenly love,

singing of heavenly love.

 

 

 

part two

 

 

 

Still the night! calm the night!

for the child of heavenly light

from the womb of eternal abound:

in remembrance of loves silent ground,

where thy true love is born,

where thy true love is born.

 

Silent night, Holy night,

all is calm, all is right,

where thy truth redeems my glow

spirit falls like snow upon snow

and rests there in heavenly peace,

rests there in heavenly peace.

 

Silent night, Holy night,

gone the world, hid from sight,

while the glory of loves sweet child

bathed in wisdom so tender and mild,

rests there... in heavenly peace.

 

Rest there... in heavenly peace!

 

 

 

*    *    *

 

 

ENTELOS EPINIKE

 

There is one thing you ought to know

if one would advise you which way to go;

so heed a word, and mark it well,

lest your mind may fare unwell.

 

In order that you truly see

words of truth that come to thee,

distinguished from a word untrue

of things which are so close to you.

 

Remember that a one who knows

the restitution of repose,

and truly seen the wondrous thing;

their poetry will dance and sing.

 

So if there is no sparkle there;

but words of doom, and dark despair,

then let your mind not linger long;

for theirs is not the actual song.

 

Hence, be alert, where greed may dwell;

which brings a cloud, a hollow bell;

and thus a darkness long in time;

for theirs is not the actual rhyme.

 

 

 

*    *    *