Part IX

Can rank betrayal be a Way of transcendence;
How many songs have I known with words to that dance? 
What we had conspired to weave as a Mystery,
Has only now served to tangle our mutual history.
Penultimate reflection makes my spirit’s heart sing,
But this song has now turned into a dirge with doleful ring.

Romantic contemplation should consist in realizing beauty;
Realized elsewhere we pretend we are not remiss in our first duty.
After uncountable banquets of bliss-filled adoration,
Without any warning you reached a self-defined saturation.
Where angels fear to rest their weary heads,
Is sometimes where we make our karmic beds.

Do you still want me, or just absolution?
Count me out of your so-called spiritual revolution.
First you naively lie about the romantic complication,
Then do a full one-eighty and seek total expiation.
I’m surrounded by images pretending to be love incarnate,
Which “two easily” evaporate in mist, leaving me disconsolate.

There is no future in breaking a soul bargain,
“Fly now, Pay later,” buying love on margin.
The cruel consequence of duality is belief in shutting love out.
Reversing all the sacred values we so self-righteously tout.
Hidden on the inside is a deep lack of tenderness,
Which acting out on me can hardly redress.

Love is a force as real as gravity...
And sometimes leads to downward depravity.
Our unhappiness is due to the gods who couldn’t bear our truth,
Or let us reach the threshold of old age nor share the joys of youth.
“From Pure Joy springs all creation.  By Joy is it sustained, 
Toward Joy it proceeds and to Joy it returns,”*  unstained.

In the beginning, I was with him;
When he furnished the Heavens, I was with him;
When he set himself apart, I was with him;
When he set sail on a new sea, I was with him;
When words passed not his mouth, I was with him.
I was harmonizing with him, was the one in whom he delighted;
I was daily gladdened by his presence on all occasions, even unrequited.

* from the Sanskrit

Love reflected from another has its source in your own heart,
Only illusions of duality first set you apart.
When I loved you less, you loved me more;
When you loved me less, I loved you galore.
Only that which is separated can be properly joined,
Only the metal that is tested and melted can be coined.

There is only you and the love you bring to yourself as blessing,
Not the flood of ideal imagery, real or imagined caressing.
I steadfastly keep the company of otherworldly recluses and saints,
In the only unconditional acceptance of that love my soul faints.
Compared to this grace which is so precious,
All mortal love and attachment is merely specious.

How does your half of the apple taste today?
Can you take that forbidden fruit, let it rot to throw away?
Romance and spirit are states of inner truth,
Deceiving ourselves won’t stave off the proof.
For when you eat the apple, you must get down to the core,
And into your own innermost workings deeply bore.

These apples drop on us from Heaven, not sold by the pound.
Because you’re enthralled with the way I look upside down
Doesn’t give you the right to turn my life topsy-turvy.
What have you ever really done to deserve me?
Driven me somewhere I never really wanted to go,
All the while complaining that we’re moving too slow.

Why weren’t you looking for what was right, rather than wrong?
As a man from Mars, you assured me your love was strong.
When both libidos are Hermetically sealed,
Then the transformation of both into One can be revealed.
Ah, you’re back, but it’s not over yet,
Maybe this is just as close as we can ever get.

From betwixt and between to secret kingdom’s restitution,
Is this a tonic for the weakness of my emotional constitution?
Now you’ve contrapuntively offered me loving indemnification,
Whilst I silently continue my quiet de-liberation.
You’ve tried to reassure me it’s as it should be, comme il faut,
Only more to discover, no matter which way we go.

Now hearts and souls play a reborn love song, con amore,
“Blow the coals, come closer, please continue to adore me.”
Confusion is worse confounded with prescience,
Convened and judged deep within the high court of conscience.
They say that apparitions vanish at cock-crow,
But some ghosts still haunt us, this we tangibly know.

Let us not speak of personal sacrifices made;
All good things in life require a fair and fated trade.
There’s no debating timing, mischance, inopportune contretemps,
Can alter the course of our own vain attempts.
Against the world at large lovers struggle, contra mundum,
Valiantly striving to preserve their mysterium tremendum.

The earth orbits around the Sun, according to Copernicus;
But unlike heavenly bodies, we revolve around each other--us.
Holy sound and light, again we sing the song of the blessed,
Paid restitution to one another, even though we both transgressed.
What was once my bete noire has been restored to beatific vision,
It’s hard to treat the beaux esprits with harsh derision.

This new balance of accounts is well-invented, ben travato,
But is the debt truly cleared or just forgiven, my inamorato?
Cui bono; who benefits thereby, to whom is it a gain?
For what good purpose, for it seems to me it's just more pain?
There is truth in the statement but cautiously accept what is;
It is not wholly palatable as it is, so take it cum grano salis.

The theme of the Quest contains one over-arching meaning,
So much more than symbolic imagination or metaphors teeming.
Only by crystal-gazing within do we become self-aware,
But this encounter is not for faint-hearted, only those who dare.
To will to know the crossroads of life, the Crux Ansata,
To be silent in the compassion and raptures of Chakra Anahata.

The pain and fear isn’t any more than we can handle,
Not worth a conjured curse by bell, book, and candle.
Time to once again brew and drink the Comet Wine,
If not now, when?  There will never be a better time.
We must drink the Cup; there are no impediments,
To this endless desire to partake of our sacraments.

We forge our way through acres of diamonds on this quest,
The Vere Adeptus reclaiming our god-given Alkahest.
Anointed with ancient lights we become illuminated, alumbrado,
Beyond the transitory ego there is no question of vain bravado.
Penetrating Adytum, distilling Azoth, creating panacea medicatum,
“The cowl does not make the monk, cucullus non facit monachum.”

Our bodies become only a writhing river of sensations,
Enduring the compelling embrace of heavenly penetrations.
Tremendous sparkles, floating, chills, lights;
Heat, pulsations, tingling, delightful divine sights.
Prickles, shivers, crucial waves of pleasure,
Quavering vibrations, kinetic rapture beyond measure.

Meet me in the field of luminous consciousness absorption,
As wave patterns of light in space in that consuming ocean.
As other creatures, in other bodies, in other realms and times,
The whole emotional body opens the floodgates of heart’s chimes.
Waves of rapture and effervescent vibration, choruses of sound,
Trees mate with the sky, we spin through dreams profound.

Hardness and softness, each mirrors the other in parody;
Letting go--purifying--opening--made light, crystalline clarity.
Seductive voices; all sweetness and love fill our infinite being;
Just one single eye left, only golden and white light seeing.
We’ve paid for admission the price of attention’s tribute;
Bathed in the Grace of deepest inner sanctum, all stand mute.

Lotus of the Self, opening one flawless petal at a time,
Explosions of feeling; thoughts instantly stop on a dime.
We encompass the whole universe with love and compassion,
Future tense and past pluperfect in our tantric fashion.
A whole panoply of spiritual side-effects and missions,
Dazzling insights, radiant lights and illustrious visions.

Powerful release of rapture and energy, final surcease,
Expanding and dissolving the self--sure heart’s release.
Absorption into true liberation of our being in every realm;
Without resistance or grasping--Peace and Ease. . .Calm.
Selfless Freedom.  Only three things can happen beyond trance:
It will go away; it will stay the same; it will get more intense.

Lotus of No Self reborn, Lotus heart being timefree at last,
Unraveling the whole mysterious process--present/future/past.
Arise and pass...arise and pass...arise and pass...
Arise and pass...arise and pass...arise and pass...
Arise and pass...arise   and   pass. . .arise     and     pass. . .
Arise       and       pass. . .Ahhh-ri-isee.  .  .

Breathtaking luminosity beyond all identity,
Beauty shows itself in silent tranquility.
Like a crystal goblet, clear as the sky,
Dissolving ourselves, daily we “die.”
Everything and Nothing, silent emptiness;
Just space-revealed nature as consciousness.

The universal drama is contained in tail-biting Ourobouros,
Living embodiment of the serpentine quality of nature’s full course.
Demiurge, cosmic surge, bending-back cycle of infinite mystery,
Counterpoint to mankind’s shortlived and checkered history.
Whatever attracts our attention is the star of our cynosure,
Goal of our guidance-seeking to limit our sense of exposure.

Every moment we find ourselves in exceptional circumstance,
Results of actions, not the random results of mere happenstance.
Journeying beyond death like Osiris in Egypt’s underworld Amenthes,
We may find ourselves locked in a dim limbo, as if in parentheses.
Awaiting resurrection of the winged Uraeus, indicating illumination,
Kiss of the serpent, awakening Ba and Ka from aeons of meditation.

Apollo slew the primal serpent on the green slopes of Parnassus;
Delphi’s temple hid the Pythia whose cryptic words still haunt us.
The cavernous temple became the “navel of the earth” entire,
While deep within the oracle uttered and tended sacred fire.
Truer words were never spoken than through her sacred delerium,
They have withstood the test of time, lasting a hoary aeternum.

Hermes is the guide of the dead and leads with his Cadeusus,
And we are the led, just pawns in the game of gods who use us.
Dreams come from the underworld, with the healing of Asklepios,
Whose python migrated by sea unto Rome to bless and renew us.
Apollo’s sky and underground joined in the god who heals by dream,
Union of earth and sky, body and spirit, whose great virtue we esteem.

Reconciling the opposites is also the alchemical power of kundalini,
Vital spirit-substance energy, a winged serpent within you and me.
It shakes us to the primal core, just hold onto the slithering serpent,
During its awakening and the divine influx of awesome current.
But this cure is a poison, and death lies in that exquisite clarity;
It stings from first kiss to last sigh; surviving that Light is a rarity.

First comes the death of the shortlived delights of mankind,
The fate and folly of all of humanity to which we are resigned.
From day to day we continue until the unending task is completed;
Life begins to feel like quicksand, we are never quite extricated.
Feel the end of each moment, feel the end of each experience,
The dissolution of life, total loss of all sense of any reference.

The end of conversations, the end of music, the end of all relations,
The end of encounters, the end of desires, the end of all sensations.
All of it terribly fragile and subject to immediate, permanent loss,
Slough off the old attachments--let go--consider it just dross.
Dying all the time: unbearable pressure, claustrophobia, oppression,
Flat, arid, lifeless tightness, restless struggle--no exit, just suppression.

Serpent’s cycle pays the debt of nature; life is a loan paid by death.
We pay the toll by constantly dying with each and every breath.
But breathe again and join the dance without any separation;
Everything singing one song of emptiness and fullness in preparation.
With high equanimity all appears unhindered, calm after the storm;
We become completely transparent beyond limitation and form.

Only dead to the world, once again the serpent has shed its skin;
When we pray for death we really desire a fuller life to begin.
Death is more universal for we all die, but not everyone lives,
The transformative life is a restorative gift that only God gives.
Death is a law, not a punishment nor ever-after torture; 
Death, like cyclic regeneration, is a subtle secret of Nature.

Apprehend the freedom of deathlessness beyond all existence,
Take a transition retreat, bypassing all restless resistance.
True liberation in the very midst of life clearly burns,
The axel moveth not, though the World chaotically turns.

We are the Reality we are seeking beyond futile striving,
Open the core, widen the limitless circle without contracting.
Filling with silken purity and inexhaustible sweetness,
Everlasting essence creating and containing consciousness.

Jewels pouring out like galaxies from the core of experiences,
The heart of loving attention opening spacetime nuances.
Free now of the timely tricks of personal identity and creation,
One continuum from universal conception to maturation.

Illusions of separateness arise each moment in motion;
Each wave dissolves in vast expanses of the infinite ocean.
Find ultimate freedom in the sure heart of understanding,
Journey within, the terrain of life and death traversing.

Original nature of the bornless universe unmanifest,
Now let go and cast aside embellishments; we freely divest.
Sense the boundless spirit of the Know-Naught mind,
What is beautiful shows itself in Silence of the purest kind.

Finally present--no more searching far outside ourselves;
No more introspection like reading books from dusty shelves.
Wide open Eye, abundant wisdom of the cosmic Heart,
The whole Truth of life itself eternally blooming apart.

Beyond the peacock of reason and the world of many gods,
Into the emptiness of Jeweler’s velvet, embracing unknown fogs.
Past this misbegotten dream, all attachment nakedly forsaking;
Retreat each precious moment into the realm of clear awakening.

Ecce Signum!  Behold the unsullied proof:
A diamond of the first water, pure-shining Truth.
The initial swirlings Primum Mobile can bestow,
Are not bright from above nor dark from below.

In that silent ocean can we kill unconquerable time, 
Abide in love, and not betray eternity’s prime?
Sensory transcendence runs the gamut from doldrums,
To ineffable higher meanings, paroxysms of conundrums.

Unborn within Orphic Egg are unpenetrated initial causes,
Home of Brightness, immune to temporal excitation or pauses.
Die in harness, indifferent to awesome wonder or admiration,
Accept joyous entry into realms beyond rational penetration.

Kiss the dust!  No grief; remember you must die,
To a way of living done before you even begin to try.
Nunc dimittis--grant me intangible permission to depart,
Still and transparent, beyond beating cosmic heart.

Brighter than burning snow of midsummer moon--Empyrean;
Energy in excitation is our spiritually destitute delerium.
I set sail for a veil of actionless potential at my peril or risk,
Finding Naught beyond the Gate of the Sun’s shining disk.

Slay the undulating serpent of Lilith’s primal revenge,
With sword of ice-brook temper, older than Stonehenge.
Become the quiet curtain-raiser on eternity’s prominence,
And behold the liquid firelight of the divine countenance.

No coherent oscillations, modulations cast beyond the moon;
No action potentials in that finality, temple’s Upper Room.
A modus vivendi, where simultaneous concerns touch me not;
An unbroken thread, null and void before I was ever begot.

Into the Great Unknown, how deep do our roots go;
What, if anything, can we truly experience or know?
Through who does the world continue to exist,
Will we break our thread of destiny if we resist?

That which dwells or resides begs the question,
Whether it deserves reply or scarcely a mention.
The power of inactivity in the reductio ad absurdum,
Leads through meditation to the far end of the spectrum.

All of our efforts are finally rendered nugatory,
Once we freely enter our initiatory purgatory.
The only means we have to focus is neural coherence,
The only means of completing devoted perseverance.

Beyond towers of silence, the mute kiss of peace,
Bringing blessed visions of surcease and release.
The Abode of Love is final home of thaumaturge,
Embodying the limitless expansion of exquisite demiurge.

And what is the source and goal of this primal volition,
That fires the soul and blood of mystic and metaphysician?
Even stupor mundi--amazement of the world at large,
Can’t explain the forceful power of that crucial charge.

Self-transformation, sacred fountain of all my joys,
Whose power erases all grief and sorrow destroys.
Motu proprio--of my own accord a resolute recreant,
Now seeking liberation as uncreated revenant.

It’s an open secret--truth loves to go shimmering naked,
Those with serpent-licked ears have foresight and hear it.
Engrossing--multum in parvo--there is much in little,
And the dynamic Word can’t be altered a jot or a tittle.

I am stupified, planet-struck, by sublime unknowns;
Reason’s quicksand, vanity, now luminous Self dethrones.
Son et lumiere--sounds and lights, engaging bell’s true ring;
Even pharaoh’s serpent has lost aeons of cryptic sting.

Hence these tears for Comforter or calming Paraclete,
Whose grace at last will purify and separation delete.
Ambrosian nights--sub divo--naked under the open sky,
Reinforce where raison d’etre, mandate and dispensation lie.

Beyond tragedy and comedy, finding oneself as nothing,
That which can do without success surely needs no clothing.
Naked experience teaches us if we pay with our illusions;
What was empty becomes quite full of potential infusions.

Tearful infusions are my only drink,
Which I quickly quaff before I think.
Dewdrops of morning, tears of Eros,
From this vale of tears, dear God, spare us.

Is the spiritual identity of lovers really a worldly illusion,
Another endless variation on the theme of ubiquitous delusion?
Even taking fate into our own hands we can’t change destiny;
Multitudes of musical humanity have sung unvarnished testimony.

Silken phrases, “Just because you believe it, doesn’t make it so.”
Even re-enchantment of the world is subject to ebb and flow.
Divine comings and goings, compassion flowing in liquid form,
Dazzling as Egypt’s sun, the brilliant force of love reborn.

You can only meet the eyes of God in a love that’s absolute,
No spiritual restraints--interminable light and ripened fruit.
Like blood from stones, all beliefs foreign to love eliminated;
The divine undercurrent of mortal life, deeply felt and sated.

In the temple of double joy, I spared an ant on my pillow.
Was it compassion or spiritual pride; is it in conceit I wallow?
Split decision--I couldn’t decide no matter how hard I tried,
To finally determine in which alternate universe I even reside.

I conjectured the only way was to see what comes with it--
Solitude, desolation, desecration, curse of mankind’s habit?
While we enjoy a golden slumber, we sense a desperate danger,
Which rouses us to greet the Moon and drink ambrosia with her.

Fate has twelve stations, revealing eternity in everyday myths,
Which are the source of an endless repetition of sacred trysts.
Fires of rapture expose secrets behind the parted golden door.
Come now beneath the veil; feel cool delight on my alabaster floor.

Dip into the Holy Well, your soul’s your esoteric passport;
Find planets within through surrender to this mystic transport.
Memories’ ruins of the hidden past, irridescent House of Eternity;
Reverance and rites unfold like layers of nacre, leaving serenity.

Is she in truth, your Muse, your love?  Which gives the greater pain:
Belief or disbelief?  Many a poet and lover breaks under the strain.
The function of the Goddess is to beguile and betray the entwined,
And thus we forfeit the elusive glory which we in the other enshrined.

BARAKA!  Blessed lightning of divine inspiration,
Born of a slip of God’s tongue, theophoric evolution.
It is mirrored in perpetually raining diamonds on Neptune,
Starward streaming diamonds in space resonate to its boom.

Artifactual meteors, objects of art for unknown kings,
Paleolithic relics, glistening stones to go with Saturn’s rings.
The discharge of spark that marks the bond of heaven/earth,
Conjures natural brightness that heralds spiritual rebirth.

Why bring forth another terrestrial prisoner of conscience--
Are clear synthesis and quiet mind counterpoint to arrogance?
Compassion fatigue is no excuse for what remains to be done,
Our work is not complete until our final thread of fate is spun.

Spirit permeates and informs the immobilized mind;
Divine co-ordination confers succor of a most sublime kind.
But of what value is this ecstasy, widely sought and urged,
Compared to the use made of a mind thus stilled and purged?

Lightning-struck like a plucked string of God’s own lyre,
Fire kindled in awakened soul, burning with devoted desire.
Miracles of ecstasy justify the journey to divine perception,
From which the mind returns reborn to act without deception.

Observe endless moments of miracles from endless vantage points,
Forming nuclei which suddenly appear extinguishing constraints.
As lightning urgently struggles and strains to kiss the ground,
Thus informed, our light reaches forth, suddenly heaven-bound.

Once struck, wrestling against greedy embraces of serpentine coils,
Penetrated by God’s hidden presence, that for which a mystic toils.
From upward striving, reverse polarities and ground out the charge,
By embracing heaven’s fire, abide as universal spirit, now at large.