Again and again, however we know the landscape of love
and the little churchyard there, with its sorrowing names,
and the frighteningly silent abyss into which the others
fall: again and again the two of us walk out together
under the ancient trees, lie down again and again
among the flowers, face to face with the sky.
Again And Again, However We Know The Landscape Of Love, Rainer Maria Rilke
‘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.”
‘‘Forwards backwards, time is taking
Cosmic steps through every section.
Herein find the secret waiting:
Future from the past; reflection.’
‘Then Osiris, fully risen,
Calls to life, renews gestation,
Metes out Time with fate’s precision,
Orders: ‘Scribe, divine creation.’’
So is seen the mythic cycle,
Turning ever on its axis.
Each was placed upon its system,
Fixed was each by one, another.
One drew out another’s mystery,
So they grew to greater wisdom.
Set were they on points of psyche’s
Evolution, flowering moments.
When to heart and soul one listened,
Heard and wrought it for one’s vision,
Out of that which never dies;
Springs, eternal, the story of the sky.
Charlotte Cowell, The Myth
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
Some say that all gods and all living creatures originated in the stream of Oceanus which girdles the world, and that Tethys was the mother of all his children.
But the Orphics say that black-winged Night, a goddess of whom even Zeus stands in awe, was courted by the Wind and laid a silver egg in the womb of Darkness; and that Eros, whom some call Phanes, was hatched from this egg and set the universe in motion.
Eros was double-sexed and golden-winged and, having four heads, sometimes roared like a bull, or lion, sometimes hissed like a serpent or bleated like a ram.
Night, who named him Ericepaius and Phaethon Protogenus, lived in a cave with him, displaying herself in triad: Night, Order and Justice. Before this cave sat the inescapable mother Rhea, playing on a brazen drum, and compelling man’s attention to the oracles of the goddess. Phanes created earth, sky, sun and moon, but the triple-goddess ruled the universe, until her sceptre passed to Uranus.
The Homeric and Orphic Creation Myths, Robert Graves
Thrown down from my origin, I have been nursed in this miserable world by a presence embodied in the motions of the sky.
She the same who cared for Adam, and led his children up through the scale of consciousness according to their capacities.
She is the whole within which all things grow, and the natural propagative power.
She calls to the cypress, and it rises up straight. To man, and her living fluid moves to make him erect.
So I was formed and wandered in the desert, and through the mountains haunted by wild animals around me and inside me.
Then a clarity woke in me, and I saw my soul’s face, and felt drawn upward, but I pulled down still too, by the other, contended for, bewildered, and without guidance, as I ran, as from a burning house, onto a narrow, upward-spiraling, path.
Dangerous cliffs, the summit far off. My only hope was to die.
Then, through that dim murkiness, I saw an old man with a radiant face.
“You are the moon!” I called out. “Where did you come from?”
“I am beyond substance and space. I am creation’s cause, here to lead you back to your home. Hold close, and let my fire consume you. Don’t be afraid of losing your strength here. This fire is one which has a spring of eternal water inside it. As your animal-soul dies, your new soul will be born. Live humbly with me, and I will raise you into majesty.”
He talked more to me in silence, without using syllables. He gave me love and light and eyes to see, and together we set out.
A Soul’s Journey Through the Time-Worlds, Sanai
abyss air apollo artemis
beauty blood dawn divine
earth fire future god
gold golden heart heaven
human light love magic
magical
meditations
tarot mind moon mystery
nature power prayer reason
sea secret silver sky
soul spirit spiritual star
sun time truth vision
water wind wisdom world
Feminine forms are dancing
Beneath the red-robed figure in the sky,
Who walks with a retinue of wisdom.
From the wedding of water with fire
Breath takes the air of inspiration,
Watery fire fills with life,
Vivifying the dark Earth station;
Bringing from the deep space light.
I went to bed around midnight and no sooner had I lain down when I realized I was being drawn out through my inner eye, as happened very often during that era, until it was happening at almost all times.
During the initial stage of the journey I was not really conscious of it being either an ascent or a descent, as the world is round, but I later realized it had probably been a descent. Very near the start I seemed to be travelling through a vast tunnel of ‘cloud’-like gaseous material that was not black but was dark – like ink in water – and seemed smoky.
At the end of this very large tunnel was a blazing orange light which looked incredibly fiery, like the sun or a furnace. I let myself be drawn up the tunnel without thinking too much about what was happening, dispassionately, you might say.
I do not know what happened next, for all went blank, but I do know that when I emerged into the next ‘scene’ I was no longer ‘one’, but was split in two. My consciousness and reason – ‘me’, the part with my mind – was in a high up place watching for my ‘other’ (etheric, soul, spirit?) self, although we did not realise this until we actually saw this ‘other’ part.
All around me was very clear, pale blue sky – all was airy and light – and I realized at once we were very high up. Below me was a large platform – basically a flat, white cloud – and I observed ‘my self’ arrive at the base of this platform and cling to it as if for dear life, looking not just exhausted, but on the verge of death.
I must have been given some kind of ‘prompt’ as a thought/word sprang into my head in that instant and I spoke it gleefully, like a pupil who’s cracked the exam, a bit like with ‘Capricorn’:
“Gabriel!”
A split second later, with barely a breath between them, another word was said very quietly, from behind me. This was, ‘Satan’.
The voice which had whispered this last attempted to tell me I’d ‘failed’, that I was lost, but I was not in doubt because it was very plain to see that my first thought had been of ‘Gabriel’, which I reasserted this very firmly. I was not for having my mind poisoned and at that point in time was able to resist this kind of pollution.
Then the pagans pressed to vino
Bowls of grapes and drank the contents,
Chewed the leaves which brought the dream world,
Through the skies their wakened souls sent.
Next up went the Persian preacher –
He who knew the truth was deeper
Than the other side of reason –
Flew he swift to find his teacher.
On their cloud the grail men bonded
In their wish to not be tempted,
Then, at last, was one persuaded;
As he left, the clouds were emptied.
With a palm pressed firmly downward
With his legs both crossed at centre,
Did the prince – a pauper – summon
Earth to witness; heaven entered.
Laughing with delight the Veda
Sang into the air a summons,
Brought a vehicle named Vimana,
Flew at once upon the sunbeams.
By the ray which crossed the cosmos,
Did the moon and he who loved it
Find in space the Truth Dimension,
Past the dipper, starry seven.
Seeing how the rest succeeded,
So the ninth himself was certain,
That he’d reach his destination
Up beyond the sky-drawn curtain.