Those mystical moments at conferences

A few years back at the WCCD in Rome, I met Baba Ziad. A clear connection, both sides felt despite not really being able to explain. Tales of White Robes and ancient temples. Baba, Samsara ey? Yes. Not explicitly, but letting myself be drawn in instead of overstanding. I owe you an update, despite not having donned my white gown, and recent events below again make me wonder.

Another similar but dissimilar situation at eLA just gone.
A man familiar to me from previous encounters stops to talk. His long white beard and stooped composure makes him a sight out of the ordinary at this gathering. He walks past and stops to mid-path to converse with me. My name inspired him to stop, and meander over mental paths to arrive at a monologue hinting at the role of muses in painters' art and life struggles, via black and white film history that caused him to accuse me of cinematic ignorance, to the ill-fated piece of cinematic history I, Claudius , another from Alexander Korda's hand, and onward to places, images and names I had never heard before. With the bustle of conference comings and goings around me, listening to him produce facts and anecdotes of topics so far removed from our collective matter-at-hand, I let him induldge in his flights of fancy, touched yet removed from his emotion that came over him when talking of the role that Saskia played in Rembrandt's life. A cheeky grin indicating that he knew he was taking me to far removed themes, and expectantly yet playfully watching for my reaction. He left me standing with many stories fed into my reality, all left dangling and incomplete.
The evening of the next day I found him on the terrace of my hotel, a little lost and inebriated, but whether from alcohol or his natural unearthly state, I don't know. He sat me down seriously for a few minutes, recalled our previous day's encounter and the momentary yet strong wave of emotion that had come over him while speaking with me.

He started speaking of Robert Grave's The White Goddess, and the power that some women carry, often unconsciously, that inspire men to great works - think Saskia van Rijn for Rembrandt, think Merle Oberon for Charles Laughton. He alluded to many things, and simply asked me to ponder over what our encounter brought up in him, what has been said, and what might resonate, regardless of discipline. It need not be a romantic liaison, it could be in friendships, in development work..
He shook my hand, said that I might remember what he has told me a few years from now, and took his leave.
And I went back to the matter-at-hand. Integrating ICTs in Teaching and Learning.

I tend to ignore what synchronicity brings me, fearful of its potential revelation.
Yet this seemingly unlikely encounter, adding on to synchronicity's history with me, will be pursued, at least in passive absorbtion form - as literary explorations of mythology and Godess history has come across my path time and again. Uncanny it is. Maktub.

The White Goddess

All saints revile her, and all sober men
Ruled by the God Apollo's golden mean -
In scorn of which we sailed to find her
In distant regions likeliest to hold her
Whom we desired above all things to know,
Sister of the mirage and echo.

It was a virtue not to stay,
To go our headstrong and heroic way
Seeking her out at the volcano's head,
Among pack ice, or where the track had faded
Beyond the cavern of the seven sleepers:
Whose broad high brow was white as any leper's,
Whose eyes were blue, with rowan-berry lips,
With hair curled honey-coloured to white hips.

The sap of Spring in the young wood a-stir
Will celebrate with green the Mother,
And every song-bird shout awhile for her;
But we are gifted, even in November
Rawest of seasons, with so huge a sense
Of her nakedly worn magnificence
We forget cruelty and past betrayal,
Heedless of where the next bright bolt may fall.

Robert Graves

P.S. Baba, your name is Greek for Muse?

Nehalennia
Protector of Travellers

Where the rivers flow into the seas, may the dolphins protect us, in this life and crossing to the hereafter

Apples, fruits and loafes of bread, May Mother Earth provide us with abundance

Attendant dogs and prophetic ravens watch over our travels on land

Oceans, rivers and sacred springs, may our life force always flow freely

Votum Solvit Libens Merito
the promise fulfilled, with pleasure and reason.

re-visiting

images earlier encountered
stories earlier found
symbols earlier examined
mysteries earlier longed for
how could i have lost touch with it all?
it's been coming onto my path for years
a decade later, what am i to do with it..
Plunge?

honest comments
honest critiques
honest listening

we all have our part to play

Checks and Balances

all things that have given my life shape
seem to have just come to me

the shell was given
i am my struggle

in my field
i now see
my bale
full of
balances

No Hidden Path

Sometimes when I go walkin’
Among the tall trees
I feel the light comin’ down on me
Under moon, under sun
I feel the chosen one
Through the mist, come walkin’ here with me

And the leaves on the ground
Make a rustling sound
In the wind now blowing in my face
It’s that cool wind again
And I feel my missing friend
Whose counsel I can never replace

Show me the way and I’ll follow you today

Show me the way
No more darkness. No more wasted time
Show me the way
Let me stay here with this heart of mine
And with you I feel no hidden path
No hidden path

How you change, how you change
And how you rearrange
Everything that touches me

Now you’re her, now you’re her
And she’s sleeping here with me
Everything that touches me

Ocean sky, sea of blue
Let the sand wash over you
Giving all that you can give

Will the northern lights still play
As we walk our distant days
Giving all that we can give

Show me the way and I’ll follow you today

Show me the way
There’s a cold wind, blowin’ through my mind
Show me the way
But I’m holdin’ on to the threads of time
And with you I feel no hidden path
No hidden path

Will the northern lights still play as we walk our distant days
Ocean sky, sea of blue, let the sun wash over you

Will the northern lights still play as we walk our distant days
Ocean sky, sea of blue, let the sun wash over you

Will the northern lights still play as we walk our distant days
Ocean sky, sea of blue, let the sun wash over you

- Neil Young, Chrome Dreams II

Space to face
myself

‘Ithaca’

When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.

The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the angry Poseidon—do not fear them:
You will never find such as these on your path,
if your thoughts remain lofty, if a fine
emotion touches your spirit and your body.

The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the fierce Poseidon you will never encounter,
if you do not carry them within your soul,
if your soul does not set them up before you.

Pray that the road is long.
That the summer mornings are many, when,
with such pleasure, with such joy
you will enter ports seen for the first time;
stop at Phoenician markets,
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
visit many Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from scholars.

Always keep Ithaca in your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.

Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.
Without her you would have never set out on the road.
She has nothing more to give you.

And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.
Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what Ithacas mean.

- Constantine P. Cavafy

I polarize in order to know

Stabilizing healing
I seal the store of accomplishment
With the lunar tone of challenge
I am guided by the power of self-generation

Learning from Flowers
..the story of a rose that longed for the company of the bees, but none would come to her...

Even so, the flower was still capable of dreaming. When she felt all alone, she would imagi­ne a garden filled with bees that came to kiss her. And so she managed to resist until the next day, when she opened her petals again.

“Aren’t you tired?” someone must have asked her.

“No. I have to go on fighting,” answered the flower.

“Why?”

“Because if I don’t open up, I wither.”

source

The Sanctuary, in Poetry and Music
i haven't been posting, and there's no real reason.
Perhaps i haven't been delving too much.
Perhaps that shouldn't say Perhaps.
Yesterday night found me reading a few rubaiyat by Khayyam, in the flicker of candlelight, and in the warmth of sounds from my stereo.

My eyes were letting in:

No one can understand
that which is full of mystery. One cannot
see what is hiding behind outward appearances. All
our dwellings are temporary, except the last: the earth.
Drink wine! Stop your superfluous reasoning.

And my ears were letting in:

Don't let your mind get weary and confused
Your will be still, don't try
Don't let your heart get heavy child
Inside you there's a strength that lies

Don't let your soul get lonely child
It's only time, it will go by
Don't look for love in faces, places
It's in you, that's where you'll find kindness
Be here now

Don't lose your faith in me
And I will try not to lose faith in you
Don't put your trust in walls
'Cause walls will only crush you when they fall
Be here now

Oh what beauty in such a night. from my Sanctuary to yours.
thinking of you.
with an s.

...Wishing you all a good End of Summer ...
Samhain

the final harvest done, bring in what you have collected,
stop your hunting drive for the months to come..
a time of rest, reflection and enjoyment of the fruits you have gained
elves, pumpkins, fire, the night and the blood of a plum.

set a place for your dead at your table tonight,
tell me tales of your ancestors and i will tell you about mine
slaughter that which you think will not make it through the winter
transform it into what will feed and nourish you, make it your shrine

let's extinguish our individual fires and come together in one
take a light from our common fire and relight your hearth
bond me to you and you to me
walking hand-in-hand, purify me

throw apples and nuts into the air high,
show me where they land
who will be my Lover, my Spouse?
how many children will descend in me from the sky?
tell me tonight, tonight i can understand.

run after the crows my child, show me in which direction they flew
Divine for me, tell me please - what will be new?

what to strive for in life..
Arundhati Roy, excerpt from her Come-September speech
thanks for pointing me to it Redz.

"The only dream worth having [...]is to dream that you will live while you're alive and die only when you're dead. [...]



"To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never, to forget."

i just can't shake these words off me, they're not mine,
but how i wish they were, they speak for my soul, which i hear speak far too little.

Lay your head where my heart used to be
Hold the earth above me
Lay down in the green grass
Remember when you loved me

Come closer don't be shy
Stand beneath a rainy sky
The moon is over the rise
Think of me as a train goes by

Clear the thistles and brambles
Whistle 'Didn't He Ramble'
Now there's a bubble of me
And it's floating in thee

Stand in the shade of me
Things are now made of me
The weather vane will say...
It smells like rain today

God took the stars and he tossed 'em
Can't tell the birds from the blossoms
You'll never be free of me
He'll make a tree from me

Don't say good bye to me
Describe the sky to me
And if the sky falls, mark my words
We'll catch mocking birds

Lay your head where my heart used to be
Hold the earth above me
Lay down in the green grass
Remember when you loved me

Laat zien wat er in jouw hart omgaat en verberg het niet, opdat ik kan laten zien wat er in mijn hart omgaat en kan zien waartoe ik in staat ben

(Roemi)

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field.
I will meet you there."

~ Jalal ad-Din Rumi

and when i'm at the lodge, and not engaged in conversation at the bar..

i find myself meandering through cyberspace again, moving ever further away from the open Word document in my task bar, and discovering new, to me, unknown worlds, of lyrics, of poetry, of mythology and mystical 'heresy'.

i'm not sure whether it is my state of mind or heart, but the random function on my latop media player seems to be churning out not-so random tunes.. a few songs it keeps throwing at me, and, as they are pleasant and pull at my at-the-moment-not-so-joyful heartstrings, I allow myself to indulge, and even dream up meaning in the lyrics or associations that the songs put forward.

some examples:
from the earthly John Legend with his 'I don't trust myself with loving you' (thanks Haim for sending me that and sensing some possibility for identification..)

Hold on to whatever you find baby
Hold on to whatever will get you through
Hold on to whatever you find baby
I don't trust myself with loving you

I will beg my way into your garden
I will break my way out when it rains
Just to get back to the place where I started
So I can watch you back all over again

..to repeatedly pushing a more ethereal Branford Marsalis 'Reika's Loss' off an album called 'Eternal'. Marsalis himself apparently said that this collection of ballads 'is an expression of emotion... In particular it's about the expression of melancholy. [...] All of the songs reflect the idea that there is beauty in sadness" and the reviewer goes on to say "Eternal is the perfect compliment for pensive moods. An excellent soundtrack when you are musingly thoughtful and a welcomed friend when you find your spirits depressed. I recommend it for rainy day afternoons of contemplation when you want to shut out the outside and immerse yourself inward."
How does my media player know? I think i may be spending just a little too much time with my laptop.

Another time it throws songs at me that i don't even know are on there, where the sound and melody intrigues me and triggers a search for further meaning. So it was with Nick Cave's 'Nature Boy'. Variations on:

And she moves among the flowers
And she floats upon the smoke
She moves among the shadows
She moves me with just one little look
She moves among the sparrows
She floats upon the breeze
She moves among the flowers
And she moves right up close to me

are lovely enough, as is:

Years passed by, we were walking by the sea
Half delerious
You smiled at me and said, Babe
I think this thing is getting kind of serious
You pointed at something and said
Have you ever seen such a beautiful thing?
It was then that I broke down
It was then that you lifted me up again

but what got me investigating new lands was the following:

Later on we smoked a pipe that struck me dumb
And made it impossible to speak
As you closed in, in slow motion,
Quoting Sappho, in the original Greek

Who was Sappho??
So i looked up Sappho, and was mesmerized by the fragments of her poetry that remain to the world, sometimes just fragments, just two or three words here and there, but such a rich history of myth and lore, of Love and suffering, of passion and fire, with poets like Lord Byron, Ezra Pound, Baudelaire and others enthralled by her being and her words. how is it that i was never consciously aware of her until tonight, and came to her so indirectly?

Then through reading various references for Sappho i stumbled upon a French mystic, Marguerite Porete, who was burned at the stake in Paris in 1310, for a work of Christian spirituality dealing with the workings of Divine Love..
here we go again i thought. What's been getting me in this pensive melancholy mood is exactly that - Divine Love, and wordy discussions and misunderstandings on the same. Moving from Eros or sexual love to Divine Love, whatever that may be, however it may feel, and if ever it is possible between lovers infected with the supremacy of erotic love in our times. Although Porete's writings and beliefs have a distinct Christian focus on God's love (as appropriate to the times she lived in, exploring in poetry and prose the seven stages of 'annihilation' the Soul goes through on its path to Oneness with God through Love), it nevertheless resonates with Barry Long's conviction that love (and love-making) between man and woman, the divine way, leads to spiritual union which is the manifestation of God/Love on earth.
Uncanny timing.

This is where I am now in my journey, sailing from song lyric to ancient poetry to medieval christian mystical texts, and i am amazed at what i encounter, how it all resonates, and how little time i take to let myself flow to distant themes, words and writers in my 'normal' life. Yes, it feeds my melancholy, but it also feeds the fire. The fire of my imagination, the fire of my longing for knowledge and inspiration, my desire to understand and practice what is beautiful and good, and to grow through it.
But yes, I agree, the danger is that i get too caught up in words, in the realms of my head and imagination, that my spirit wants to soar, and that my unrealistic expectations will end up chaining me to the ground.

Enough for now. I really should turn off my media player.
A song just came on that goes 'Gravity is working against me, And gravity wants to bring me down ... Just keep me where the light is, Just keep us where the light is.'

Where is the light?

Cleaned up for public display.
I looked at those around me,
And when they looked at me,
I let them see my soul that day.

Are you scared of it?
Do you wish that it would stop?
Does it bother you
when you hear your spirit talk?

(neil young)

Lore of the Snake
The image of the snake has arisen in my life recently and set me to wonder about its symbolism. Thus far I didnt get much further than the practical Tuareg/Niger interpretation that when you meet a snake on your path, or should you be bitten by one, it indicates that a child is coming into your life, or that you might fall pregnant in the near future (hoping that the snake bite wont be the end of you..)
My current favorite reading gave me a lot more the other night, in Ilan's words, it appears the book is coming to meet me, meet my needs..
Follow me to the lore of Africa and Australia, and let me know any (symbolic) association you have or know of with snakes.. my comments box is eager for your thoughts!

"In Nigeria, in many countries of Western Africa, in Mozambique, Namibia, and Natal, there is a story of a great serpent that brougt the Earth Mother to this world, and how that snake was shooting rainbows out of its body. In Western Africa they say that the Godess travelled through the world in the mouth of a great rainbow serpent, creating mountains and valleys and stars. The serpent is sometimes depicted as a great Python. The Vedaps of Northern Transvaal say that it was this python who first taught men and women how to make love.
You see, sir, it is very different from the book of Genesis, in Judeo-Christian culture, where the serpent is the principle of evil (and i think they don't like sex very much either, sir, if you dont mind me saying so). But in African Mythology, making love is one of the greatest of blessings, and so we say that the serpent is the source of blessings, not of evil. He is called Nyoka, 'the instructor'; and so the serpent is identified as an 'expert', the one who knows what is going on, what the truth is.

Likewise I know that for the Australian Aborigines, there is a great rainbow serpent who is often encircling the Earth or bringing the people special blessings, and i also know their sangomas,who are called 'clever men', ride on the back of this serpent, or climb up on rainbow serpents to enter the heavens or the upper realms (Footnote: Such serpents, called brimures, play a very active role in Australian shamanism and may be introduced into the body, or extracted, and are important in initiations).
So in the legends of of the Australians too the serpent is a very benevolent creature, and not at all to be equated with anything evil. "

(p.155, Zulu Shaman: Dreams, Prophesies, and Mysteries; Chapter 6: The Common Origin of All Humanity)

On Idols & Missing the point
(orignially written as a comment to a Firefly post)

never touch your idols, the gilt wil rub off on your hands?

or should we refrain from idolising altogether? we know better than to invest such expectant adoration in human beings, fallable beings.

To love, and not to put another on a pedestal, thereby creating distance, and no longer standing level footed on common ground.
To love, and not to allow intimidation by the perceived perfection of idols made by your own hand, heart and reverence. and insecurity.
To love.

In wise books of old, idolatry is a said to be a Sin.

I dont believe that 'idols' in the gnostic sense refers to statues of silver and gold, that are worshipped above an external allmighty god, but rather any being or object that you put higher than the godliness in yourself.

I don't believe the orginal meaning of 'sin' is "transgression of the law of God (1 John 3:4) and rebellion against God (Deuteronomy 9:7; Joshua 1:18)", but rather in its original (greek?) meaning to refer to "to miss the mark, or "to stray from the path".

And that makes sense to me.
By placing someone or something else above your own Godliness (see Krishnamurti and so many more) you miss the mark, you are bound to stray from the path to self-knowledge and truth.

We shouldnt idolise others, its not good for us, and its not good for those on the pedestal. When they fall off, either by their own doing or by the other's unmet inflated expectation, its hurts. On both sides.

When both parties idolise the other, for whatever reason, as has been known to happen, it can only lead to pain.

I have over the years created a large part of my identity around someone i have idolised, and with sustained physical distance, i have kept the idol on the pedestal, and polished and polished and polished her shine. it has increased my reverence, and decreased my comfort to share daily earthly human fallacies; it has increased distance and insecurity on my part, and decreased the truthful and realistic foundation for friendship.

I don't want to idealise or idolise.
I need to learn to work with what's real.
Because what is real is good, and has enough godliness in it to feed my need for reverence and beauty.