The Two Books

In a dream you went to heaven and stood

   in a room of light and mist

Nothing else was in the room

   but two tables of stone

Upon each table a thick book lay

   ready to be opened

The Angel of Truth came in and stood

   between the volumes both

‘What are these books you guard so close?

   and why are they bound so thick?’

‘They are books of truth. In them

   you will see events, none false!

‘All recorded exactly as

   they happened, as they are!’

Your eyes, they glowed—to see the truth!

   To understand what’s REAL

To know what had happened in the world

   untainted by man’s emotion

‘It is, however, given to you,

   to read but one, but one’

Hesitation. Only one?

   ‘What is the difference between?’

‘One book has every word

   of hate, of spite, of ill

‘spoken by men concerning you

   hid from your eye and ear’

The blood, it flowed into your neck

   Surely there’d been many

‘The other has every word of good

   men spoke of you in secret

‘The both are true, by my right hand

   inscribed. Now you may choose’

Your mind a swirling mess of thought

   If I open the first one at last

I will know the liars who smile to my face

   and scorn behind my back

Oh, the power! I would know

   those bastards for who they are!

Finally the covers would be removed

   And what’s in the second book?

Only the good? Why even bother?

   Yes, it would be lovely to know

the nice things they say. But how naïve

   to want to see only the good

‘Think well upon it,’ said the angel

   'Those quoted in each book

'may not be whom you expect

   the words to have come from

'For know! the human mouth is weak

   as is the human heart’

If I open the first, I will likely find

   my dearest friends, my mates

And know the words they spoke in shame

   but spoke none the same

But in this knowing my heart will turn

   each word a seed of angst

Planted in hurt and volatile ground

I will be turned against all I love

   and against all who love me

In the second the voices will be the same

   but quoted in moments of courage

For isn’t a kind word more difficult to speak?

   Their words will be food to my soul

To know that even the antagonists

   have stood up in my favor

But… your eye still lingered on the first

   will that tome not serve me better?

The angel saw your thoughts and strife,

   and spoke in gentle tone,

‘You want to know the absolute?'

   Your eyes said, ‘Yes, yes, yes!’

‘The problem lies in what thing

   you consider to be “true”.

'For in the mind-bound earthly life

   of inconsistency,

'of fractured thoughts and paradox,

   there is no WHOLE truth'

‘All is split in two, as you

   see these volumes twain

'The good is true, the evil is true

   to either you can subscribe'

‘The REAL truth is not forcibly

   that which happened so or not

'TRUE are those things which draw your heart

   to the Father of it all'

‘For to know the ill, it may be real,

   but, how does it serve you?

'It will cause only a further ill,

   and further evil still

‘But to know the good, if only half

   your heart will fill with strength

'to change even the other half

   into good for your own sake

‘In either book is power,

   the power of knowledge unknown

'But one of them will dry your soul,

   the other make it grow

‘Now choose.’

I didn’t see which book you cracked,

   the choice was terribly hard

But I hope you missed the things I said

   against you on the side

Though it is true, I said them all

   still somehow it is not

I spoke them in a moment of

   falsehood to me and you

The truth is that no matter what

   deep inside, I love you

Civilization

They never have
   the earth beneath their feet
And the sun
   above their heads
So sheltered are they
   by the cocoon of civilization
This egg of concrete
When will they hatch?

What is More?

And the human consciousness
so beautiful, so vast
Too great to be destroyed by a body
Doth hover over us
Like a great iceberg in the water
Inverted, where sky is water and water is sky

Peering out beneath the surface
Only a splinter of itself into the air
Concealing its wholeness above that filmy passage
In the thick and darkly waters above

So exists a splinter of the human being
inside a brain, inside a body
The rest, who knows?
The rest is more
And when one dies they are born into the more
And begin to live in that incomprehensible more-ness

And when THAT life is expired
They are born into even more
Further and further
As the universe
Self-creating
Unspiraling
Unraveling
Endlessly

And this is the mystery of infinity
This is the meaning of forever--eternal

"But shut up your pen, for it writes only emptiness"

"It tries to express what is more, the eternal"

"Has not religion done this?"

"All the sacred writings, how feebly they express this"

"Will man do better?"

"Never"

"If you know the secret, will you not pass it on?"

"Will I invent a new religion?"

"Will you?"

"That is impossible, for as feeble as it is
it is the highest form of expression of the secrets
It is the door"

The Dialogue

There are two versions to this story. A boy came to the city looking for a renown house of wisdom, but he was misinformed and wound up at an institution for the mentally unwell. Still thinking it a house of wisdom, and not having the courage to approach the great sages, he crept around the back and overheard two of the patients have the following conversation. He sat under the window long after the conversation finished, in deep reflection on what was said. He returned to his village and opened up a center for learning, and the masters he taught are still read and quoted to this day, while both the original house of wisdom and mental institution are long forgotten.

The second version is that a boy came to the city looking for an institution for the mentally unwell as his father was becoming feeble. He was misinformed and wound up at a renown house wisdom. Still thinking it a mental institution he crept around the back to spy on the situation there before admitting his dear father. Two of the greatest philosophers were sitting at a window discussing profound matters and he eavesdropped the following conversation. When they had finished he dashed home to tell his mother that they would never admit father to a place where people with such levels of dementia freely roamed and held conversation, it would certainly worsen his condition.

I'm not sure at this point which version is true, but I have reproduced here the dialogue in its entirety for your reference.

***

What is the meaning of life?

Ask not what is the meaning
ask, what is 'life'?

What is life?

Life is to live.
but what is 'to live'?

To live is to be
but what is 'to be'?

To be is to be seen
but what is 'to be seen'?

To be seen is to exist
to speak and be heard, to touch and be felt
but what then is 'to exist'?

To exist is to reach, to depend
but what is 'to depend'?

To depend is to be bound
to exist, to live, to be, all is bondage of the sight
but what is 'more'?

More is more-ness
more-ness is that which is not bound by existence
but what is freedom?

Freedom is existing beyond existence
freedom is invisibility, freedom is oneness
but what is 'oneness'?

Oneness is to come back to the breath
but what is 'the breath'?

The breath is the beginning
and the beginning is the end, and the end is the beginning
but what is both 'the end' and 'the beginning'?

The end and the beginning are meaning
but what is meaning?

Meaning is life, and all life is meaning
but what is 'life'?

Life is that which is different from the dead
but what is 'the dead'?

The dead is that which has no meaning
life is that which has

And those who ask 'what'?

Ask not 'what' but 'why'

And those who ask 'why'?

Ask not why but 'how'

And those who ask 'how'?

Ask not
simply be

The Children of God

We wept for an age that had
   gone by

We wept for a world of marvel
   lost

A door to paradise
   closed

A message
   forgotten

We mourned the loss of a culture
   our culture
   our nation

No longer. We, refugees
   among the people of the world

A race in extinction
   slowly fading
   like the day
   from minute to minute
   disappearing

We would not exist

Is that what we were born for?
To leave nothing to posterity?

We mourned the loss
   how will we be comforted?

Who will bring the deceased back from the land of spirits
   the land of whispers
   where exist the echoes, the shadows, the ripples
   gone out eternally
   into space
   who will bring them back?

Do no weep said the voice
As long as you are alive
It shall be alive
It shall be passed to posterity

How? I said

It shall

The Beloved

The Beloved came unto me
He spoke not a word
But what we shared was greater far
   and deeper, than words

I could speak naught but his name
I was in love with him but could not express it

He drew me into his embrace
And I was his
My individuality
Independence
Self-will
Free choice
All like dirty clothes
Were stripped away

This fixation on life
The fear of death
The desire to be
To achieve
To matter
It all melted away
In this moment of nakedness

He was life
He was desire
And I was in his arms

He left me, as he usually does
And all such earthly things came back
   slowly, greyishly
Like the dawning of a drizzly day
He left only a longing in me
He left in me the imprint of him

A deeper sense of separation, my love!
Why then did you come unto me?
To give one sip to a traveler lost in the desert?
I can't understand you, my dear

Why do you neither give your full presence
Nor take it away?
Do you taunt me?
Do you make me dance the dance of love unrequited?
What a bitter dance

Or do you feel the same?
The pain of separation
Of this something which severs us from each other
Makes us wonder in the back of our head
   if indeed the whole affair really took place
If we are real, or a dream one to another

A figure remains in my mind
I see the day when breath expires
When brain and flesh finally rest
When flies the soul
That day is called "THE RETURN"

I see me saying
"My love, I have been away for so long
I was lost and couldn't find my way back"

And I see you saying
"You have been gone for so long
I have longed for you every day of the journey
But now you are home
Come, leave no more"

That is the day of our marriage
I see it, and don't know if it's real
But I see it, and it lives inside of me

My words! I chew on my tongue
But still they don't come
The words to say what is between us
To say what your love is
My dear, I can't say it
My Beloved, I can only say your name
I can only say your name

Ransom

They said to gather material wealth
But it all seemed to vanish so quickly?

They said to accrue sums of knowledge
But no sooner it grew obsolete?

They said to acquire bodily beauty
But the body was eternally withering?

They said to pursue fame, acclaim
But the people were first to forget?

They said to find acceptance and love
To be given and taken on whim?

Then spoke one who had been quiet throughout
Find the wealth of the self, he said
All else will be lost to time and event
But when will you be without your self?

Money, mind, body, repute
All bandits
Waylaying the pilgrim
Holding him hostage

And all the while
He had the ransom inside
He just didn't know