Integration

Integration: matter assumed a spiritualised human body. It must consequently abandon its autonomy and hence its most sublime manifestations: storm, fire, sea….

Once in a human body, matter becomes wholly “invisible”. And yet, its beauty is here unsurpassable, by the grace of the descending form.

It was God’s boldest plan to predestine individual spirits as matter for the highest kind of molding. Here too, by becoming a member of the Mystical Body, the spirit in a true sense gives up its highest natural manifestations:

It must in some sense decline in order to enter into unity. But at the same time, through grace, it gains an unsuspected supernatural beauty.

Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Grain of Wheat

Tokens of unchanging truth

Rich in blossoms many tinted, grateful to the ravished eye,  Gay and green and glorious Kanka was like garden of the sky,

Rich in fruit and laden creeper and in beauteous bush and trep.  Flower-bespangled golden Lanka was like gem-bespangled sea!

Rose a palace in the woodlands girt by pillars strong and high.  Snowy-white like fair Kailasa cleaving through the azure sky,

And its steps were ocean coral and its pavement yellow gold . White and gay and heaven-aspiring rose the structure high and bold!

By the rich and royal mansion Hanuman his eyes did rest,  On a woman sad and sorrowing in her sylvan garments drest,

Like the moon obscured and clouded, dim with shadows deep and dark,  Like the smoke-enshrouded red fire, dying with a feeble spark,

Like the tempest-pelted lotus by the wind and torrent shaken,  Like the beauteous star Rohini by a graha overtaken!

Fasts and vigils paled her beauty, tears bedimmed her tender grace,  Anguish dwelt within her bosom, sorrow darkened on her face,

And she lived by Rakshas guarded, as a faint and timid deer,  Severed from her herd and kindred when the prowling wolves are near,

And her raven locks ungathered hung behind in single braid,  And her gentle eye was lightless, and her brow was hid in shade!

“This is she! the peerless princess, Rama’s consort loved and lost,  This is she! the saintly Sita, by a cruel fortune crost,”

Hanuman thus thought and pondered: “On her graceful form I spy,  Gems and gold by sorrowing Rama oft depicted with it sigh,

On her ears the golden pendants and the tiger’s sharpened tooth,  On her arms the jewelled bracelets, tokens of unchanging truth,

On her pallid brow and bosom still the radiant jewels shine,  Rama with a sweet affection did in early days entwine!

Hermit’s garments clothe her person, braided is her raven hair,  Matted bark of trees of forest drape her neck and bosom fair,

And a dower of dazzling beauty still bedecks her peerless face.  Though the shadowing tinge of sorrow darkens all her earlier grace!

This is she! the soft-eyed Sita, wept with unavailing tear,  This is she! the faithful consort, unto Rama ever dear,

Unforgetting and unchanging, truthful still in deed and word,  Sita, in her silent suffering sorrows for her absent lord,

Still for Rama lost but cherished, Sita heaves the choking sigh,  Sita lives for righteous Rama, for her Rama she would die!”

Airs of a beautiful kind

I lifted up skyward the crown of the faeries,
Tarnished by oceans of sea-crossing time.
Forged in the fire of golden-days dawning,
Lit with a halo of stars in the night.

Who now shall wear it? I wondered in silence
Una is resting with Duessa at play.
Gwenevere wanders in halls of forgetting,
Deep in the summer of dreaming this day.…

On her feet sandals of gold, steps the princess,
Floating on air through the green garden grass,
Walking alone by the castle of ether,
Seen but unseen by the world through a glass.

The seal of the nether-world opened up freely;
Through the dark tunnel with reason behind,
Following meekly the one with a mission;
Perfect in will and a reader of signs.

Once past the stream of the guardian lizards,
On through the gate to the bright other place,
Land of reflection and fathomless knowledge,
Home elemental of alchemic race.

Where do we go? I looked left and then eastward,
Somehow forboding the place that I saw.
Life’s university, building of sandstone
Burnished and gleaming, a prison by law.

Silent, but knowing, did reason stand sweetly
Holder of mysteries, the teacher and guide.
Younger and wiser and older all-seeing,
Dressed up in white and demure by my side.

Then came a voice – and as if out of nowhere –
Do you need help, you seem lost in this realm?
There stood a faerie, bewitchingly golden
Silken and spun was her hair from the sun

Stepped forth the reason – seduced by her magic –
Stretched out a hand to her beautiful hair.
Won’t you come with me? The faerie enticed us,
Stop by the hearth of the potter this day...

Brooding I pondered, could faeries be trusted?
Should I be swayed from the pathway assigned?
Yet I had watched how my reason surrendered
So before airs of a beautiful kind….

Loathe to offend such a glorious being,
One who had offered with kindness and grace,
Help just when needed. I bowed to the faerie;
Take now your highness my reason away.

Then the wind changed as a wandering mistral,
Warm as the breeze on a meadow of wheat,
Swift, warm and golden the faerie-bird air-borne
Flew o’er myself that fell under her wing.

Passed by all time as I sailed down the sleep-stream,
Far to the land where the doe and stag graze.
Home to the garden that blooms East of Eden,
Land of the ancestors covered in praise.

Opened my eyes as I reached the cool garden
Wonder-filled, wide, as memories unfolded.
Looked up the stag and the doe from their incline,
Wakened my self from the river of time.

Safe in the knowledge of paradise tended,
Turned I my thought to the reason once lost.
So in a blink of my eye I went searching,
Straight to the hearth of the faerie-bird’s host.

Artemis

‘Artemis, with bow and quiver,
Stands aloft on Mount Olympus,
As the doe and hind, in silence,
Jump the clear and Star-lit river.

‘Swift they run. Like magic carpets
Are the green and silver forests.
Watch the bears – and bees with honey –
As the Goddess hits her target.

‘“Bravo, Sister!” beams Apollo –
Gazing at the sea below them –
“Never did you miss with arrow!”
Sinks the form of bold Orion”.

‘Lord Apollo watches, silent,
As the virgin’s beau drifts skyward.
Watches as the only question
O’er her virtue learns his lesson.

‘By a cedar stands she grieving,
Bows her head in shame, a-weeping,
Cries upon the smelted moon beams,
Chastens, then, her ruthless sibling.

‘“King of priests, my Lord Apollo,
‘Reasons for his death ring hollow.
While the muses – nine that love thee –
Contemplate their selves, you’d fool me!”

Laughs the god: “Your love’s a martyr,”
Facing fear the charging Taurus,
“Tempted by the Atlas daughters,
Girls who shine on lucid waters.”

Neptune’s Trident

‘From the swelling seas, un-silent,
Rising from the salt, through ether,
Neptune holds aloft his trident,
Cries: “The Spring has come; be patient!

As the centre of his offspring
Glows – outraged to so be lectured –
So much wisdom of the ages
Flows from father-ocean’s lectern:

‘“Take some good advice, Orion:
Watch and learn the way of heaven;
Time just moves around in circles,
From the fish becomes a turtle.”

“Onward then in time, a deluge
Caused a boar to swim the ocean;
Then the lion, Narasimha
Came before the dwarf Vamana.

“Then to life a noble hero
Sprang and rid the world of tyrants.
This made way for Rama’s charm,
Which came before the Bhagavad Gita.

“In this way the prince of paupers
Broke the wheel of earthly suffering;
Maybe, son, you’ll hear him teaching
In the realm of endless loving…”

‘“Thanks for nothing! Shouts Orion,
Show to me my loving mother.
She, at least, would save her scion.”
No; alas: She’s with his brother.’

‘Peering through the velvet darkness,
Seeks the Starman souls like-minded.
Souls who cry for freedom – ‘partners’ –
Ones to rend his endless bindings.

Halcyon Birds

King Ceyx thinks only of Halcyone, no other name is on his lips but hers: and though he longs for her, yet he is glad that she is safe at home. Ah, how he tried to look back to the shore of his loved land, to turn his last gaze towards his wife and home.

But he has lost direction. The tossed sea is raging in a hurricane so vast, and all the sky is hidden by the gloom of thickened storm-clouds, doubled in pitch-black. The mast is shattered by the violence of drenching tempests, and the useless helm is broken.

One undaunted giant wave stands over wreck and spoil, and looks down like a conqueror upon the other waves: then falls as heavily as if some god should hurl Mount Athos or Mount Pindus, torn from rock foundations, into that wide sea: so, with down-rushing weight and violence it struck and plunged the ship to the lowest deeps.

And as the ship sank, many of the crew sank overwhelmed in deep surrounding waves, never to rise from suffocating death: but some in desperation, clung for life to broken timbers and escaped that fate. King Ceyx clung to a fragment of the wreck with that majestic hand which often before had proudly swayed the sceptre.

And in vain, alas, he called upon his father’s name, alas, he begged his father-in-law’s support. But, while he swam, his lips most frequently pronounced that dearest name, “Halcyone!” He longs to have his body carried by waves to her dear gaze and have at last, entombment by the hands of his loved friends.

Swimming, he called Halcyone—far off, as often as the billows would allow his lips to open, and among the waves his darling’s name was murmured, till at last a night-black arch of water swept above the highest waves and buried him beneath engulfing billows. Lucifer was dim past recognition when the dawn appeared and, since he never could depart from heaven, soon hid his grieving countenance in clouds.

Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book XI, Ceyx and Halcyone

In Hours of Ebbing Tide

In hours of ebbing tide, oh trust not to the Sea!
It will come back to shore with redness of the morrow;
O don’t believe in me when in the trance of sorrow
I swear I am no longer true to thee!

The waves will roll again in dazzling ecstasy,
From far away, with joy, to the beloved shore;
And I with breast aflame, beneath thy charm once more,
Shall haste to bring my liberty to thee!

Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy, In Hours of Ebbing Tide

Walking on Water

When evening came, his disciples went down to the sea, got into a boat, and started across the sea to Capernaum. It was now dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them. The sea rose because a strong wind was blowing.

When they had rowed about three or four miles, they saw Jesus walking on the sea and drawing near to the boat. They were frightened, but he said to them: It is I; do not be afraid. (John vi, 16-20).

And Peter answered him: Lord, if it is you, bid me come to you on the water. He said: Come! So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out: Lord, save me! Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying: O man of little faith, why did you doubt? (Matthew xiv, 28-31).

Jesus Christ walking on water reveals still another mystery than that of the sun of the spiritual world, the centre of celestial gravitation. For not only did he stand on the water – which would suffice to reveal and demonstrate this truth – but he also walked on the water, ie, he moved in a quite definite direction in the horizontal sense. He walked towards the boat where his disciples rowed.

There, in his walking towards the boat, it is already contained in germ – essentially revealing it – his whole work, temporal and eternal, ie, his sacrifice, his resurrection, and all that is implied in his promise: “Lo, I am with you always, until the end of the world: (Matthew xxviii, 20).

The boat with his disciples is, therefore, and will be until the end of the world, the aim of the I am walking on the water. His enstasy, his profound centreing in himself, does not distance him from the navigation of the agitated sea of history and evolution, and does not make him disappear into the other sea – the calm sea of nirvana – but rather, on the contrary, it entails that he walks, until the end of the world, after the boat with this disciples.

Unknown Author, Meditations on the Tarot, Letter XII, The Hanged Man

Souls of the Dead

“Tell me, Circe, who is to guide me on the way? No one has ever sailed a black ship into Hell.”

“Odysseus,” the goddess answered me, “don’t think of lingering on shore for lack of a pilot. Set up your mast, spread the white sail and sit down in the ship.

The North Wind will blow her on her way; and when she has brought you across the River of Ocean, you will come to a wild coast and to Persephone’s Grove, where the tall poplars grow and the willows that so quickly shed their seeds.

Beach your boat there by Ocean’s swirling stream and march on into Hades’ Kingdom of Decay. There the River of Flaming Fire and the River of Lamentation, which is a branch of the Waters of the Styx, unite round a pinnacle of rock to pour their thundering streams into Acheron.

This is the spot, my lord, that I bid you to seek out. Once there, dig a trench about a cubit long and a cubit in breadth. Around this trench pour offerings to all the dead, first with honey mixed with milk, then with sweet wine, and last of all with water. Over all this sprinkle white barley and then begin your prayers to the helpless ghosts of the dead. Promise them that once you are in Ithaca you will sacrifice in your place a barre heifer, the best that you have, and will heap the pyre with treasures and make Teiresias a separate offering of the finest jet black sheep to be found in your flock.

When you have finished your invocations to the glorious fellowship of the dead, sacrifice a young ram and a black ewe, holding their heads down towards Erebus while you turn your own aside, as though about to recross the River of Ocean. Then the souls of the dead and departed will come up in their multitudes and you must bid your men make haste to flay the sheep that that are lying slaughtered by your blade, and burn them up while they pray to the gods, to mighty Hades and august Persephone.

Sit still yourself, meanwhile, with your drawn sword in your hand, and do not let any of the helpless ghosts come near the blood till you have had speech with Teiresias. Presently the prophet himself will come to you, my lord king. And he will lay down for you your journey and the distances to be covered, and direct you home across the fish-delighting seas.”

Circe finished, and soon after the Dawn enthroned herself in gold.

Homer, The Odyssey

Key Words

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meditations

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sea secret silver sky

soul spirit spiritual star

sun time truth vision

water wind wisdom world