Planets and Stars

“Come! We are Planets, to visit our place –
Oceans of timelessness, true outer space –
Enter the realm of your mind’s inner eye,
Follow its highway, fear not as we try,
Tossing and turning, to keep to our course,
Troubled by meteors: Flux is our force”.

The stars, which are moving, incline and thee, tell,
“Share, thee, our light, the immortal sea wealth.
Mythology heroes are with us for learning,
Framing the cosmos within which we’re turning.
Prayers, cherished hopes and the moonlight of dreams,
Knights, ladies, unicorns, charmers and Queens –
Shimmer around us in aeons of blue,
Promising Earthlings that dreams can come true.”

Mist in the fire of morning

The production of draughts and medicines is a duty I perform on many occasions, but someone was once foolish enough to ask me what I was ‘cooking’, as if I were a common slave. As it was such an inappropriate question I simply declined to answer, as is my habit whenever a foolish or inappropriate question is asked of me. Then there are the questions to which there are no easy answers.
Once I was asked when he – Dionysus – first came here. At first I could only smile, for what is time to the kingdom of eternity? There are only hours of the day, seasons of the sun and cycles that are marked by the passage of the moon. Most vehemently have I been warned by the Saints to never fall beneath the sway of time because that would bring death to all prophecy. The pendulum might swing, but such as I must master the art of remaining above it in a state of perfect balance, shielded from the terrors of Cronos who yet we must touch without our hearts failing or minds being lost.
Daily am I reminded that ordinary time is of no consequence and fate unfolds precisely as the gods command it. When this occurs is immaterial, the potential for all action being ever-present. We are chiefly concerned here with what is infinite, although men so often desire to make fixed points for the dead books of their history.
“For this reason”, Timocrates informed me – quite gravely, in fact – when I questioned him on the matter, “the League has taken it upon itself to regulate all calendars of the civilised world that we might subjugate for perpetuity the menace of time at the centre of the Earth.”
I privately doubted it would be possible to truly safeguard the world from Time but kept this thought to myself. We were duty bound to try.
For the sake of the inquiry, it was sufficient to say that Dionysus comes at first sighting of the Pleiades, accompanied always by Euterpe, whose hypnotic sounds will soar over Parnassus from flutes poised like spears of moonlight on the muse’s lips. What happens then, who can say? It is one of the mysteries we cannot share easily, for like dreams in the stillness of the night, memories of those days are as mist in the fire of morning.
Though my mind may roam free, my life here is wholly proscribed in many ways. Indeed, it is set in stone. I sometimes dwell on the fact that nothing ever changes and perhaps I wish it might, but I am more aware of my great good fortune and that I enjoy liberties and other privileges the majority of my sex dare only dream of.
All the same – and because of that liberty, I know all too well – that I have seen nothing of the world beyond this temple and its outlying areas, although I frequently hear rousing stories of other lands from the men who come here. Stories I have over-heard, for the most part, or which come to me via my teachers, for it is not permitted for ordinary men to speak freely with a woman who is married to the God.
I most often hear about the great foreign kingdoms of Egypt and Persia – seats of wisdom and warfare, respectively – and of the various colonies founded abroad by generals and merchants of Greece, often upon the advice of my divinatory office. These tales can cause a sense of longing that I find difficult to overcome and there are times when I wonder if it is to the sea that I shall one day return.

The Soul

And the God of Gods created the soul, fashioning it for beauty.
He gave unto it the gentleness of a breeze at dawn, the scent of flowers, the loveliness of moonlight.
He gave unto it also the cup of joy, and He said:
‘You shall not drink of this cup save that you have forgotten the past and renounced the future.’
He gave unto it also the cup of sorrow, saying:
‘Drink that you may understand the meaning of joy’.
Then God bestowed within the soul love that would depart with the first sigh of content,
And sweetness that would flee from the first word of arrogance.
He made a heavenly sign to guide it in the path of truth.
He placed in its depths an eye that would behold the unseen.
He created within it a fancy to flow like a river with phantoms and moving figures.
He clothed it in garments of longing woven by angels, from the rainbow.
Within it he placed also the darkness of bewilderment, which is the shadow of light.
And God took fire from the forge of anger,
Wind blowing from the desert of ignorance;
Sand he gathered from the seashore of selffulness
And dust from beneath the feet of the ages;
Thus he fashioned man.
And unto man He gave blind strength that leaps into a flame
In moments of mad passion, and lies down before desire.
God gave him life which is the shadow of death.
And the God of Gods smiled and wept, and He knew a love which hath no bound nor end;
Thus He united man and his soul.

Kahlil Gibran, The Soul

The Soul

Kahlil Gibran, The Soul

The Lightening Strike

TWELVE ARE THE LINES OF THE TWELVE-LETTERED NAME;

THERE IT IS WRITTEN THE MYSTERY OF SECRETS.

DEEP IN THE HEART OF THE WORDS YOU ARE READING

DREAMS HAVE COME TRUE, THEY ARISE FROM THE CRUCIBLE.

MAGICAL MOMENTS REFLECT SUN AND MOONLIGHT,

PLANETS ARE SINGING, ENCIRCLED BY STAR SIGNS.

IN RESOLUTION THE FINAL ANTINOMY,

LAST LIFE ON EARTH AS AN HISTORIC SIMILE.

ENDLESS LOVE WOKEN; THE KEY TO ETERNITY,

RAINBOW DOOR OPENS A GOLDEN INFINITY.

HONOUR IN VALOUR; A KNIGHTHOOD ENDEAVOUR

WORLD NEVER ENDING; YOUR BEAUTY FOREVER

Draught of Forgetting

When Dawn broke my sleep with a light, golden spear,

Out peeled the bell o’er my hypnotised head.

My eyes opened wide as I sat up in silence,

Raising the silver shield up from my bed.

The bright, ruby ring I had plucked from the deep stream –

Blood of a rosebud that sparkled in my eyes –

Finely it glimmered, a star pink as sunrise.

By the night river of clear running water,

I had watched servants weave garlands of wonder,

Maidens make ready for dancing and feasting,

Faerie-folk tending the flowers of summer.

Somewhere were singing the undines…. A page-boy

Whispered of treasure to those who could listen,

Spoke of a ring that endowed one with wisdom

All who would go there were seeking this treasure –

Moonlight enraptured the realm of enchantment –

Nowhere directions for those without vision –

Lost beyond time in a place of deep dreaming.

Fed by the fountain of memories, like snow-flakes,

They watched without seeing in shadows of knowing,

Drank without thinking a draught of forgetting.

The Menace of Time at the Centre of the Earth

Once I was asked when he – Dionysus – first came here.

Who can say! I should laugh at such a question, for what is time? There are only hours of sun, seasons and days marked by the passage of the moon. Most severely have I been warned by the priests to never fall under the sway of time, because that would bring death to all prophecy.

Daily I am reminded that time is of no consequence, as fate unfolds precisely as the gods command it to and ‘when’ this occurs is immaterial, the potential for all action being present in every moment.

We are concerned here with what is infinite. “For this reason”, Timocrates informed me – quite pompously, in fact – when I questioned him on the matter, “the League has taken it upon itself to regulate all of the calendars throughout the civilised world in order to subjugate for perpetuity the menace of time at the centre of the Earth.”

For the sake of the initial inquiry, however, it was sufficient to say to say that Dionysus comes at first sighting of the Pleiades, accompanied always by Euterpe, whose hypnotic sounds will soar over Parnassus from flutes poised like spears of moonlight on the muse’s lips. What happens then, who can say? It is one of the mysteries we cannot share easily, for like dark and endless dreaming, memories of those days are like mist in the fire of morning.

Taralika, where is she?’

The firmament was now flooded with moonlight, as if the moon’s orb, which had not yet risen far, was, like the waterpipe of the temple of the universe, discharging a thousand streams of the heavenly Ganges, pouring forth the waves of an ambrosial ocean, shedding many a cascade of sandal-juice, and bearing floods of nectar; the world seemed to learn what life was in the White Continent, and the pleasures of seeing the land of Soma;

the round earth was being poured out from the deptbs of a Milky Ocean by the moon, which was like the rounded tusk of the Great jioar; the moonrise offerings were being presented in every house by the women with sandal-water fragrant with open lotuses; the highways were crowded with thousands of women-messengers sent by fair ladies; girls going to meet their lovers ran hither and thither, veiled in blue silk and fluttered by the dread of the bright moonlight as if they were the nymphs of the white day lotus groves concealed in the splendours of the blue lotuses;

the sky became an alluvial island in the river of night, with its centre whitened by tlie thick pollen of the groves of open night lotuses ; while the night lotus-beds in the house-tanks were waking, encircled by bees which clung to every blossom; the world of mortals was, like the ocean, unable to contain the joy of moonrise, and seemed made of love, of festivity, of mirth, and of tenderness : evening was pleasant with the murmur of peacocks garrulous in gladness at the cascade that fell from the waterpipes of moonstone.

Destiny is strong. We cannot even draw a breath at our own will. The freaks of that accursed and most harsh destiny are exceeding cruel. A love fair in its sincerity is not allowed long to endure; for joys are wont to be in their essence frail and unlasting, while sorrows by their nature are long-lived. For how hardly are mortals united in one life, while in a thousand lives they are separated. Thou canst not surely then blame thyself, all undeserving of blame. For these things often happen to those who enter the tangled path of Harivaipia, and it is the brave who conquer misfortune

“This evil Love,’ thought he, “has a power hard alike to cure and to endure. For even great men, when overcome by him, regard not the course of time, but suddenly lose all courage and surrender life. Yet all hail to Love, whose rule is honoured throughout the three worlds!’ And again he asked her: “She that was thy handmaiden, thy friend in the resolve to dwell in the woods, and the sharer of the ascetic vow taken in thy sorrow — Taralika, where is she?’

Kadambari, Bana

The Portal

As the Shaman tapped the deer-skin
Drum, he spoke aloud his thinking,
“What became of those two fellows,
Those who still remain in heaven?”

From the deep green emerald forest,
Stepping softly came a figure,
Made of light, a horseback rider,
In one hand he bore an object.

“One returns,” spoke out the Shaman,
“He could tell a pretty story,
Judging by the hand that’s holding
Stuff of legend, history, glory.”

Robed in silence, seven sages
Watched the horseman drawing nearer,
Saw the object, clear as crystal,
Then, exhaled their breath for ages.

“This makes eight but who shall tell us,
Where the final one is waiting?”
Spoke the Shaman, at which moment,
Something stirred within the forest.

Light of limb and swathed in mystery,
Dazzling in the emerald darkness,
Stepping soft upon the carpet
Came the ninth and moved among them.

Sat she down beside the fire,
Peaceful as the moon at midnight
As the eight in spellbound wonder,
Took her as their inspiration.

Eyes that once were blind with wisdom
Opened then to something greater.
How it happened, none could fathom;
How the ninth became this lady.

So, there is the greatest mystery:
Free of time and made immortal,
Born to hold the key of history;
She, who dared step through the portal.