January 26, 2020 - January Thaw

In the January thaw, more than just the ice melts.  The people melt, too, and Pandora’s Jar is taken off the shelf, polished again, and peered into when no one is looking.  There is no fear of releasing any evil, since it has all long since been released, and the world is already rife with it.  There is, instead, the timid and secretive search for hope, the very last and only thing remaining in the jar.  But it is always done in secret because sacred things require silence.

What wisdom the ancients must have had to design a “myth” that matches our lives so perfectly.  For which one of us has not hung his or her head in shame or sorrow or utter defeat when the full burden of life falls upon our shoulders?  It is only hope that does not fly away from the jar.  Perhaps your jar has been frozen again this winter?  Open it quickly in this thaw, then, and you will find hope residing within.  But you already knew that.

It is not a trick.  It is real.  The ability to dare to hope for something better, something more solid, something more loving is, I think, what is best in mankind.  It is that ability to stare into the face of the abyss with not even the tiniest of candles to light the way and to say, “I will keep going.  I will keep trying.  There has to be something better out there for me.”  Faith is the substance of things not yet seen.

And woe to him who never opens the jar to search for hope or, even worse, has foolishly left the jar open and unattended and hope has slipped away forever.  There are also some—perhaps you know one?—who cannot access Pandora’s Jar at all or who cannot even fathom its existence.  Their number is legion, and even now, they seethe with jealousy over the alabaster jar.  It is one thing to not know of the jar’s existence, and that is bad enough, but it is quite another thing to know of it, to know it cannot be accessed, and to want to stop anyone who can access the jar from being able to do so.

Yes, their number is legion.  You can hear their howls in the night.

What is hope?  It is that tiny spark that cannot be doused, that tiny ray of sunshine shrouded in the soul.  It is the January thaw, the reminder that things were better and can be better again.  Come, you Angels of Hope.  We know what has been taken from us, but we also know that the Adversary can take as much as he likes and it does not matter.  He can take it all, but he will not hold it for long.  He can only lust after the sacred flame, but he cannot touch it because it will burn him to cinders.  No matter how or where he tries to imprison it or douse it, it will always come back to Pandora’s jar.

Hope springs eternal.

January 22, 2020 - Omega

His hand was reaching toward the door on the passenger side of the car.  Another hand from within the car was grasping his hand.  He stood patiently, erect, stoic, his hand firmly holding her shaking hand.  He did not reach down to help her out of the car because he knew she did not want that.  He offered stability only and let her handle herself in her own way, which she worked so hard at doing.  Her hand was shaking considerably, but his firm grasp did not let go, and his patient face never betrayed or acknowledged her difficulty. 

I continued on my way.  Had I witnessed any further, it would have been rude.  I knew eventually she would get out of the car of her own accord, firmly in his grasp but without any other help from him.  She would slowly walk to the store with him, and they would shop and do what they have always done.  It was a ritual, and rituals must be performed exactly or they lose their meaning.  This particular ritual had been performed for a very long time, and when done properly each time as it always was, it added to the Power.

This is winter.  This is what winter is.  This is what winter does, and it does not matter if a hand shakes from the cold or shakes from age.  The result is the same—a tremulous acknowledgement of an advancing situation that each of us must face.  Sometimes a hand will shake from violent emotion at the ending of a relationship—the winter of the liaison.  Sometimes a hand will shake from disease—the winter of the body.  But the hand always shakes in the winter.

There is a beauty to the ice and snow, a glinting surface of diamonds reflecting the tiniest light.  In any other situation at any other time of year, a tiny wisp of light would be lost and, indeed, never even known, having no surface upon which to reflect.  But winter knows how to find the tiniest of lights.  It knows how to reflect the gentlest and weakest of lights and turn them into brilliant diamonds of exquisite beauty.  Winter knows the glory of the end.

And there is glory in the end—in a job well done, a life well lived, a body braced in pain and determination, a love found and lost forever.  There is glory in moving forward proudly with one’s head held high, hands shaking.  There is a shining brilliance in the gathering of one’s dignity, even if it must be picked up piece by piece from a dirty floor.  There is a tiny, undying light in facing winter head on, a light that would be lost at any other time.  There is immortality in the steadfast courage of the one who faces winter squarely.  There is a hidden reward.

I am the Omega.  I am the last one standing.  I am the final warrior.  After me, the cycle starts all over again at the beginning, only to end once again in me.  I am the termination.  I am the gift at the end.

January 18, 2020 - Winter's Sorrow

Was it you?  Were you the one laying on the floor with your face pressed against the wooden hardness?  Your chin pressing down with more and more force, as if to break through the floor and find yet another level of endness to which you could sink?  Laying on the floor because there was nowhere else to go.  And was it you who said silently in the depths of your soul….I cannot fly, I cannot walk, I cannot even sit.  My legs cannot support me.  I am done for.  I cannot go on.  I cannot be here.  I am no more. 

Was it you who sunk to your knees?  But then that was not good enough.  It was not far enough.  It was not low enough.  There was still an element of the body left.  It gave the idea that maybe you could stand again if you needed to.  So then you pressed yourself to the floor?  And there you lay on the hardness and coldness, tears streaming from your eyes, salty wet warmth falling to the unyielding floor, tiny splashes of you landing on an ungrateful, unfeeling hardness.  I cannot do this.  I cannot.  I am done for this time.  I can go no further.  I can go no lower.  I am nothing.

And there was nothing.  Nothing that could help you.  No words that were spoken.  No gentle tap on your shoulder, no pat on your back.  You laid there—cold, empty, alone.  There was nothing.

And God damn it!  Why was there nothing?  Why was there never any help?  Why was there no hope?  Why was the world so mechanical and empty?  Why??  Why now, when more than ever you needed there to be someone or something out there?  Couldn’t just once—just once!—couldn’t there be an answer?  Why not?

The tears finally ended.  Was it you on the floor who was completely empty?  Your rage had left you icy and weak.  You could swear that if you closed your eyes, this time—this time—you would not open them again.  But instead you arose, sore and tired with swollen eyes and a head that felt as though it might be splitting.  Good, let it split, then!  But it did not.  It was time to get up again.

I am a machine.  I am made of wood with moving parts, oiled and painted and pretty, with strings and wheels and gears….

Outside it is cold, so very cold.  It is January in Maine, second only to the emptiness and coldness of February.  But I can wait for that.  First I must deal with January and her empty wolves who come to the door, boldly baring their teeth and trying to enter my tiny house.  The doors do not seem strong enough to keep them out.  Perhaps this is the year they will finally breach the hull and devour me.

It is a paradox.  I said that I loved the cold, and so it is true.  But can you read love in that?  Is there love in the coldness and the emptiness and the hungry wolves?  Is there love for you who lay on the floor in emptiness with salty tears, waiting for the sound or the touch that never seems to come?

We want the guarantee, the contract, the signature on the dotted line.  “You will give X amount of your soul, and in return you shall receive this purse filled with jewels.”  Let it be signed in blood!  Who cares if it is?  Who would argue with it?  But it is not to be.  There is no contract.  No signature.  Not even any blood.  There is nothing.

So how do we go on in life in the emptiness that is the January of our souls—which can occur at any time?  Shall I tell you the story of the seed?  But I have already done so, and here we find ourselves on the cold floor, surrounded by our salty frozen tears again.  What good did the seed do for us?  Was it all for nothing?

Outside in the breaks between the icy storms, the Sun rises weakly in the morning in an exquisite rosy glow that lasts only a few minutes.  And then the greyness swallows it up again, swallows it whole like a shiny goldfish in a dirty pond, searching for the last bit of oxygen.

But it was there.  I saw it, however briefly.  If you tell the truth, you know that you saw it, too.  And for all I know, that is what hope is, that is what the seed is.  That is the gentle hand under your chin that lifts your face upward ever so slightly and gives you the courage to look into eternity and say, “I am.”  That is the secret voice that whispers in your mind—the one you have longed to hear for all of time—“I am here.  I have come for you.  I told you I would never leave you.  I have come.  You are mine, and you are precious to me.  I have loved you since the beginning of time.  I will never abandon you.  Oh, how I love you.” 

The secret voice.  The secret hope.  No contract.  No signature.  No deal.  No guarantee.  You are on your own.  But you are off the floor now and the tears have abated.  And somewhere under all the ice outside, there are seeds.  And who knows?  Maybe there will be a spring after all and they will grow again and you along with them?  Do you think there is any chance of it?

January 12, 2020 - The Yellow Ribbon

There is an old cemetery not far from where I live.  No one goes there anymore, and it is not accepting new guests.  In fact, it has not accepted new members for a very, very long time with the newest grave being from the late 1800s and the oldest from the very early 1700s.  Here in Maine in the far north of New England, there is a lot of forgotten history.  Most Americans are taught that the first pilgrims came on the Mayflower in 1620, but perhaps their teachers were never told about the Popham Colony that came to New England in 1607 and settled in what is known today as Phippsburg, Maine.  No matter.  People will adopt the stories they choose.

But this is not a story about Phippsburg or colonists or quaint pilgrims—or who settled where first and never lived to see the rising sun.  It is a story about a yellow ribbon on a tree at an old forgotten cemetery in Maine.  You know the old custom?  A woman waits for her lover to return from far away—in place or mind or heart, it does not matter because distance is distance.  She displays a yellow ribbon so he will know that not only has she been faithful but she wants him back as well.  Thus, she begins her vigil.

Je sais que tu m'attends.

I have often wondered who ties the ribbon on the tree at the cemetery.  I have always hoped I might somehow catch her in the act.  Every now and then when the ribbon becomes too ragged, it will be removed and a new one will be set in its place, so I know she is out there with her ribbons.  She is waiting for his return.  Faithfully.  And I am waiting for her, just as faithfully.

What an odd place to carry out this ritual, though, a cemetery that has not been in use for well over 100 years.  Surely the man is now dead?  And the woman who waits for him, surely she is dead as well?  But the ribbon says no.  She has put it in a place where he is sure to see it.  Of course, you know this is how it must be done.  It would not do at all to place it where he cannot see it.  No, not at all, and I am quite certain the ribbon is in the perfect spot.  It is just a matter of time.  We must be patient.

If I could have begun my life at the beginning of my life, I might have saved myself a lot of time.  But this is not how the Universe works.  It took a long time for my eyes to fully open, and I am given to understand that I am quite lucky since the eyes of most people never open at all.  I had many lessons to learn, though, not the least of which is that true love anchors one soul to another soul throughout all of eternity.  In the end, I have been an unwilling but very good student.  But, oh, the time that was wasted . . .  We always have plenty of time to do it all, until we find we have not a moment left to waste.

Now that I am older and have long since passed the halfway mark on the road of life, all the pomp and circumstance seems to have faded away.  It was just faerie glamor anyhow.  The road is as stark as ever it was, only now I can see it for what it is instead of being distracted by the merchant’s shiny baubles and Caesar’s golden counting house.  I used to run from the emptiness and plainness and hard work of it all.  Now I find it gives me great comfort to continue on that seemingly bleak path and to know the truth.

Which does set one free, after all.  Things have ended up being much simpler than I thought they would have.  Above all, patience is the key to unlock almost anything.  Pushing, pulling, ranting, raving, lying, dishonesty, and betrayal—these are all for the once-borns.  Thankfully, that is not my path and never was. 

So when the twilight comes on certain days, I will quietly leave my house in a semi-trance and walk down to the old cemetery.  I will remove the worn old yellow ribbon and put a new one in its place, as I have always done, because I know he will see it.  Even now he sees it, because death has never stopped love before, not in all the history of the world has it been able to do that.  And he is not a once-born either.  As eagerly as I hang the ribbon, so too has he searched for it.  Patience is Power.  The ritual stands.

January 4, 2020 - Crystalline

If you are going into battle, you might as well saddle up and head straight in without waiting and without any excuses.  The fight is going to come to you anyway.  Meet it with intention and fire in your eyes.  That is the way I look at it, but then, I have never been afraid of a fight.  I might not win every battle, but I do not lose them either.

The land is frozen now, and the ice is beginning to grow.  The snow is nothing—that, I can cope with.  It is the ever-advancing, ever-growing ice that makes Maine a difficult place to live in winter.  I find the challenge to be stimulating.  So then, no games, right?  I head straight out into the cold and snow, looking for Him.  I know He is there.  I am not afraid.

But that is the warm fire talking.  It is easy to be unafraid when you are sitting before a warm fire, a hot toddy at hand, with a flickering candle and a steady oil lamp to light your dreams and watch them dance upon the walls.  Then, life is simple and life is good.  Then, we sit back and smile at our foresight at having planned for the cold winter.  Then, we are brave.

It is quite another thing to head right out into the thick of it.  But if you must meet with the Lord of Winter, that is the only way to do it.  And we all have to do it at some point.  So then, as I said, I set out to find Him.  Walking and climbing through the woods can be taxing in summer, but it is downright dangerous in winter.  Good.  The more danger, the better.  This is a New Year, after all, and I told you the mask is now off.

But….I could have sworn I passed that stand of trees before, and that rock overhang with the razor-sharp icicles, surely I passed that, too?  And are those not my own footprints I see ahead of me?  Ah, yes, the uncertainty of it all.  That at least is familiar.  Come for me, Fear.  Sink slowly into my mind and whisper your poison.  Tell me, old adversary, how wrong am I.  Fill my mind with visions of terror.  Dissolve my strength.  Tear down my defenses.  Leave me vulnerable and open.  Presently, Fear obliges me.

And then I know.  I can feel Him.  I know He is there.  Will He show himself this time?  I think He will.

“It is the crystalline perfection of the ice that I so love,” He says behind me.  I do not turn around.  Not yet.  I say nothing, but the hair on the back of my neck stands up because I know He has come closer.

“It is so like to the mineral kingdom I love deep in the Underworld,” He continues.  “There I find perfection and exactness.  There I find structure and regimented beauty.  There I find pristine immobility, perfection carved in stone, in crystal, in the cellular structure of my perfect minerals.”  Still I say nothing.

“There I find darkness,” He says, “Uncorrupted by Light.  There I find perfect mathematical formulas, everything crystalline and exact, everything intact, everything immortal.”

“Immortal?” I say, because I can no longer keep my silence.  I turn around to find Him smiling.  He is as I remembered Him, a hardened warrior, angular, fair, almost ice-like Himself.

“Death cannot touch my world,” He says simply.

“Are you mad??” I blurt out.  “Your world IS death!”

“And yet, when you are gone, I and my world will still be here,” he says.  “But just look at you:  Blood, fluid, waste, constant craving, constant need, constant hunger.”

Now I am angry.  It was the same old story, over and over.  But as I told you, I came ready to fight.  I smile at Him, taking a step backward all the same.

“You have just miscalculated,” I say.

“Oh?  How so?”  His amusement buys me time.

“The plant that grows from the seed,” I begin, “You remember the seed, right?  That tiny bit of God-like magic that you cannot duplicate in your crystal world?  The plant grows and reaches far into the Earth, pulling up the lifeless, immobile minerals and incorporating them into its structure.  I eat the plant or I eat an animal that has eaten the plant, and now that which was dead, immobile, crystalline—now it comes to life in the body of the filthy living.  You know?  The blood, fluid, and waste that you spoke of?  Now the lifeless minerals become animate and breathe and dance within me.  How am I possible?”

That was a direct hit.  His mouth is lined with anger, and He stands up.  He is taller than I remembered.  Imposing.  I back up a few more steps.

“You will someday return to me every single thing you have taken,” He says.  “I can wait.  I have time.  But just look at you.  I think the sands in the hourglass go ‘pit pat, pit pat’ and will come to an end all too soon.”

Does He know He has miscalculated?  Or is He playing a game?  Is it all just a trap?

“Return every bit?” I ask, mockingly.  “It will have my essence in it.  You are within me now.  I have consumed you.”

“And I told you, I will extract every piece from you.”

“You mean you will consume me?  Devour me?  Incorporate me?  Possess me?  Own me? Become me?” I ask, mocking further.  It is a dangerous game I play.  “Do you lust after me?  Your desire sounds a great deal like LIFE to me.”

“And your ultimate decomposition back to crystalline structures,” He counters icily, “Sounds a great deal like DEATH to me.”

I continue to back up, realizing that I may have gone too far, but He does not follow.  He stands tall and sure, smirking at me.  He is right.  Time is on His side, and the sands in my hourglass do continue to fall steadily through, the supply dwindling.

Life reaches into death and pulls it up into the land of the living.  Death reaches into life and retakes its primal substance.  Back and forth they go, swinging like a pendulum.  Now I am alive.  Now I am dead.  High up in the sky, the old crow flies and watches us as we talk, two sides of the same coin.

It is winter, and death is all around us.  The raw material is right before our eyes.  We need not reach deep into the Earth to find it because we are surrounded by it if we know how to see.  Now is the time to tap into the Earth cycle, into the subconscious mind, into the perennial heart.  Life is filthy, dirty, impure.  It grows and swells and bursts and lusts.  Death is orderly and structured and calculable.  Neither can exist without the other.  The old crow knows this.  He flies high above as he watches me retrace my steps back home.

The first thing has to be desire, though.  It has to be lust.  A longing for the other.

December 29, 2019 - Year's End

It only lasts for a minute or so, and it only happens in winter.  There are some days when the Sun rises just right, and it turns the jutting white bones of the old Birch tree to a delicious shade of pink.  I tell myself when it happens that it is going to be a good day.  I guess that’s how local legends and superstitions get started, but you’ve got to start somewhere, and it might as well be with a Birch tree lit up like up fireworks.  But you can still throw salt over your left shoulder if you choose.

That makes it honest, you see.  You can’t trust the trees in any other season but Winter.  In the Spring, they’ll say anything just to leaf out—liars, every single one of them.  In the Summer, they blend together like a pack of wolves, hiding everything, plotting and planning, tricking the hapless traveler who is foolish enough to go through the woods.  In the Fall, they paint themselves like forest prostitutes, giving that come-hither look.  Best to run then if you know what’s good for you.  The leaves conceal, hide, fool, and manipulate.  They are a living, breathing screen that hide the bare bones of the woods.

But the Birch, she doesn’t care.  Her leaves are plain and boring in Spring, small and unassuming in Summer, and dull as can be in Fall.  But come Winter, everything changes for our Lady Birch, because that is when the masks are all off.  And while the rest of the trees are hiding in ugly bony greyness, she juts her white bones right out for all to see….mesmerizing and terrible at the same time.  My mother always used to say, “Beauty is skin deep, but ugly goes clear to the bone.”  The old Birch is damn pretty clear to the bone, so I think I can trust her, unlike the other trees.  Don’t ask her any questions if you don’t want the truth, though, because she’s just stuffed right full it.

And speaking of truth, it occurred to me that I ought to have waited the other day for the man who was praying to finish.  Then maybe I could have asked him a few questions.  I didn’t know what those questions would be, but I knew I had them just the same.  I figured the best way to find out would be to backtrack and go back to land’s end and look for him, so that’s what I set out to do today.  I took the alabaster scabbard with me, of course.  I rarely leave without it.

This time there was no crow flying above to mock me, nothing by which to gauge my intentions.  Now I almost wished he were there, high up in the sky, laughing at me and calling me names.  Having an enemy, real or imagined, is a good distraction.  I know just what he’d say if he were there:  “Caw!  Caw!  I’ll wear you down to the bare bones!” in that raspy, terrible voice of his.  Scraping and scratching and bleeding.  Mirror images, indeed.

So I kept walking, and the land ended again just like it did last time.  But the man on bended knee was nowhere to be found.  There was no figure in sublime gentility, unpretentious and unassuming.  There was no glow from the sunset, just a cold wind.  He hadn’t left any tracks either, and I started to wonder if maybe I’d imagined the whole thing.  That would certainly make things easier, because then I could go back to haughty expectation and victimhood.  And the world’s just full of that today, isn’t it?

But as I turned to go, I felt a presence.  Just as I had been watching the man on bended knee earlier, now someone was watching me.  I had felt this presence before.  I knew who it was.  I turned around to find the man I had seen on the road at night in the earlier part of the month, the one with the big pack on his back, the one who had told me that if I thought I was stronger than him, I should come across the road.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.  “I thought you said you had to turn around because the thing you feared had come upon you?”

“That is correct,” he said.

“Then why are you back here now?”

“For the same reason, it would seem.”

Damned peculiar.  I still felt the invisible barrier between us.  We both knew it was there, and as before we both behaved accordingly, although I believe it was a matter of courtesy on his part and not any force that kept him at bay.

“I will keep on going,” I told him, “because I haven’t really got a choice.  Well, I suppose I could curl up in a ball and refuse to face reality and shut the world out forever.  But that seems to have lost its luster, so I will keep walking into the next year.”  I did not know that was my intention until I had said it.

“A wise choice,” he said, and I thought I saw the hint of a smile.

“You knew I was here looking for the praying man, right?”  The smile vanished.

“My brother ends up in the strangest of places,” he said, “But as you can see he is not here now.  It’s cold and getting dark again, too.” 

And that sounded more than a bit menacing to me.  It was past time for me to go.  As usual, though, he seemed to read my mind again.

“Watch out for those Birch trees,” he said, “Because the forest is just thick with them this time of year, and you don’t want to get caught up in a prison made of bones.  It’s no better than any other prison, you know.”  And as he said it, he looked at my alabaster scabbard.  Yes, it was definitely time to go.

“Are you with me or against me?” I asked.  I’ll never know what possessed me to ask that.

“Against you,” he said simply.

I thought he might come across the imaginary barrier at that point, but he didn’t.  I turned and walked away, slower than I wanted to because I didn’t want him to know I was afraid.

The year is turning quickly now.  Like the old Birch tree, I have stripped off all my leaves and left my camouflage behind.  I will do the same to you, if you will let me.  Let’s throw off these costumes and rid ourselves of this foolish posturing and political correctness.  Caesar and the merchant be damned.  Let’s have it be a New Year’s resolution:  GIVE ME TRUTH.  I know what my old bleached bones reach for.  So what are your bare bones reaching for this time?  It had better be your homeland and the Sun.  If you have any sense at all, it had better be your homeland and the Sun.

December 21, 2019 - Winter Solstice

A crow was flying overhead, following me and cawing incessantly with his raspy crow voice.  You know the sound they make?  That scraping of the back of the throat, that mocking tone, that derisive sound.  I continued to walk, pressing further to the end.  The crow was the only creature in the sky, and I was the only creature on the land.  Mirror images.  Knowing he was an opportunist and a shape-shifting carrion bird did not help my situation.  What did I do to deserve such a harsh mirror?

Presently, the land came to an end, as it has a habit of doing here in Maine.  Now what?  Was this it?  Was this all there was?  Was this the so-called gift at the end?  I saw nothing but the tracks of the icy wind on the half-frozen water, and I pulled my cloak closer about me.  It would be dark soon, and at least the wretched crow would find a quiet harbor for the night.  Then I would be alone with my thoughts.  What a terrible thing that would be.

I was angry.  I have pushed on and I have fought for far too long.  When I wanted to sit, I stood.  When I wanted to rest, I had run instead.  When I wanted to quit, I pressed on in pain.  I had met the Adversary at every step of the way, and I had met him with equal force that cost me more than I could admit.  And now here I was at the end, and the Promise was nowhere in sight.  “You lied to me,” I whispered.  And the crow just laughed and laughed, high up in the sky, his raspy caw ripping into what was left of my heart. 

As I turned to go back—I did not want to, but it was the only way left to go—I saw a man not far from me.  He was on one knee, facing the setting sun with his hands held together.  His right hand was in a fist, and the left hand was cupped over it.  His eyes were shut tightly.  And he was praying—that much I knew.  He was praying at the end of the road.  When there was nowhere else to go and no hope left, he was on bended knee praying, a look of fervent serenity and faith on his lined old face. 

In this cold and desolate spot at land’s end, knelt a man in prayer, in sublime peace and belief.  I could tell he was a strong man, the kind one gives a wide berth to in Caesar’s world.  Yet here he was in humble prayer, whereas I just moments before had been in haughty expectation, angry that the Promise had not made itself known to me.  The raspy old crow was right about me all along.  “Caw!  Caw!” he shrieked, scraping his throat in victory.

My heart melted.  In another lifetime I might have thought the look on this old knight’s face was the glow of the feverish fanatic, of the religious fool.  I might have laughed at him because I did not know the love of the soul back then.  But that was another lifetime, not this one.  Here we were together, although he did not know it.  Two lost souls at the end.  “Oh, how I wish you were here,” I had said so many times into the inky darkness of the night, only now to see my desire in fruition.  At the end.  Always at the end.

I felt a momentary stab of jealousy because I worried that he had found something I had not, but I quickly dispelled it.  The prayer on his old lined face was enough to quell the most savage heart.  Had I sought to interfere with this?  Did I think I would come between him and his heart’s desire?  No.  Even though I was not worthy of witnessing his supreme act of humility, still I could bow my head and give thanks for this gift.

Silently, I left.  I do not know if he was ever aware of my presence.  The crow continued to follow me.  High in the sky in his cold and raspy voice, he scratched out the words, “You are near and dear to me.”  Even the old carrion bird knew.  We are naught but two lost souls.

I made it back home just as true darkness was stealing across the landscape.  The house was cold and dark.  I lit the oil lamps, as always, and started a fire.  First with the tinder, then the kindling, then the wood—hard and sure.  It occurred to me as I watched the flames lick up the side of a piece of birch, that the energy the tree had stored within was finally being released in the form of fire.  One way or another, the energy is always released—decay, consumption of food, fire in the pit.

And where did the energy come from to begin with?  Yes.  It was Him.  All along.  The tree had stored the Sun within as a gift for me.  On this cold and lonely day.  A gift for me.  Surely, I could do the same for someone else.  We are not marionettes in a cold world, moving haphazardly according to the merchant’s hand.  We are precious beings loved beyond measure, even through our pain.  Especially through our pain.  We are condensed sunlight, reflections of the divine, mirror images. 

The King is dead.  Long live the King.

December 18, 2019 - Virgin

I am pressing onward toward the secret, and it is growing in intensity.  When I think about it, my heart pounds and I breathe heavier.  How can you not see it?  Soon it will be upon us all, hidden as always in absolute plain sight, as are all of the greatest secrets known to mankind.  The plainer and clearer it is and the louder it is proclaimed, the more of a secret it seems to become.  Because man can never see what is before him as he is always too busy reaching for the next shiny bauble purposely dangled before him by the merchant.  And he misses the prize of a lifetime.

Six days from now, I will quietly leave my home in the dark of night when it is very late.  I am not afraid because I know the path well.  It will be cold, though, so I will be wrapped up in a thick cloak.  I will have the alabaster scabbard with me, as always, with the tiny candle lit from the fires within.  I will protect it like my life.  No one will see me leave, and no one will know where I am going because the night will have veiled the pole.

Like a sentry, I will stand watch and look toward the east.  And there at midnight I will see the constellation Virgo as she rises high in the sky.  The Virgin will be visible along with her barnyard companions, the ox and the lamb (or the bull and the ram, if you please).  She brings the Promise with her, and when she rises the Sun will remember, and He will stop in His tracks and will start His move northward again.  With Him, He will bring the promise of renewed life.  Each day He will climb higher until He crosses the equator in a few months and all of Earth will rise again.  But that is for the ex-pressed future.  On this particular night, however, we are concerned with the Virgin.

The secret is based upon the heavens.  I told you it was right there in the open all along.  The ancient magi knew that the heavens are reflected downward.  Like the great Seal of Solomon, they proclaimed, “As above, so below,” with Hermes Trismegistus illuminating the way.  Allow me to explain, and once I do, you will see how simple it all is.

Deep within the mind of man lies his unconditioned consciousness, and there we find the seat of the Watcher, as was explained in the last article.  The Dove, the Raven, and the Judge make up the conditioned consciousness, the ego, what you identify with, who you believe yourself to be.  The Watcher is the UNconditioned consciousness.  He does not concern himself with the trappings of mortality.  He is not what you believe yourself to be.  He is what you ARE.

In the realm of the Watcher, there is a fertile field, and this field is virginal.  It is within every human being, and no one else may enter this field.  Caesar cannot touch it, and oh, how he hates mankind for it.  This field contains all potential and all possibilities, and it desires the plow. 

Now as the Earth goes into its deep sleep, so too can mankind go into a deep sleep or a state of meditation.  Putting all things from my mind, I drift further and further into myself, echoing “I AM” as I settle into a meditative trance.  Now all things are possible in a vast field that cries out for fertilization. 

Then when I see the golden rings, I reach into my heart’s desire and pull out that which I have secretly loved and wanted.  I take it and I plant it by IM-PRESSING it upon the virginal field with my complete obsession and emotion.  I impregnate the Virgin within with my own thought, and the seed goes deep into the fertile field where it immediately takes root.  And I will say, “It is done.”  And a secret life will begin to grow, virginal, untouched by man.

Then I will awake and return to Caesar’s world, where I will say nothing to anyone of my secret desire.  Caesar will sense that I am different now.  He will know that I am more than I was.  He will try to reach for me, to get me to talk, to get me to explain, to coerce me into giving up my secret and exposing the Virgin.  All so that he might immediately pounce upon her and fill my mind and spirit with doubt.  So that he might introduce the Old Adversary, of whom he is a friend.  I will not give in to Caesar, for he cannot touch the Virgin, not with a thousand spears.  Oh, how he hates me.

And the seed will grow, and I will secretly nurture it with loving thought and emotion and desire.  Soon it will become too big for the hidden field within.  One day, that which was IM-PRESSED will suddenly be EX-PRESSED, and the Virgin will give birth to her Holy Child.  Thus, the desire will be born and made manifest.

Now, my friends, you see the secret that has always been in plain sight.  Now you see how the entire world teeters back and forth, dangling from a tiny thread, suspended from a “myth” about which it knows nothing and has, in fact, completely misinterpreted.  Millions and millions of people blinded.  Alas.

Look to the eastern sky in the dark of the night six days from now and remember.  Then behave accordingly.  Do not be afraid, but do keep silent—always.  Within silence is great power and protection and fecundity, and Caesar cannot touch that, not with all of his generals and all of his troops.  He lies impotent before the Virgin.

December 15, 2019 - The Four Principalities

There are always four.  Most people pay no attention to their existence whatsoever, let alone their influence.  For most, it is enough to eat and drink, to sleep and work, to live and die.  And even that is often too much.  Having enough can be burdensome when one lacks in gratitude and understanding.  The lack of pain in life tends to dull the senses, it would seem.  (The implication here would be that pain somehow bestows a deeper sense of self, and though you may argue passionately against this, you cannot disprove it either….  How I long for the simpler days of my youth.)

But no matter.  For the sake of posterity both now and forevermore, we shall discuss the four principalities of the mind, and if it be too much pressure to bear for the dear reader, I would remind you that indulging in the chemical erasure of such knowledge is a common pastime.  Having said that, let us bravely and stoutly move on to a discussion of the four principalities.

First we have the two “sides,” and we shall herein call them the Dove and the Raven.  We will find them endlessly portrayed in life.  They are the “pros and cons, ups and downs, good and bad, conservative and liberal, etc.”  They fight against one another for dominance in our mind.  Whenever you have a decision to make, you can bet that the Dove and the Raven are feuding in your mind.  Some simple examples:  Shall I move out of state?  Shall I take a new job?  Shall I marry and have children?  Some covert examples:  Shall I take what is not mine?  Shall I hinder another’s advancement?  Shall I exult one friend and damn another?

In the case of the simple examples, we easily allow the two to argue it out, and the one with the strongest and best arguments wins.  In the case of the covert examples, we often do not consciously acknowledge that the “fight” is taking place in our mind at all.  But that does not mean it is not taking place.  It merely means that we are either too daft to admit to our own dark side or too cunning to allow it a foothold in our conscious mind (and so it festers in our subconscious mind).  Those who are daft are the lucky ones. 

In any event, the two opposing “sides” (of the same coin, mind you) are the first two principalities.  Then there is the third, and we shall call him the Judge.  The Judge sits back and impassively listens to both arguments.  If he is a good Judge, he will not favor one side over the other.  If he is a bad Judge (easily bribed by that which has gained a foothold in our subconscious), he will play favorite, and the poor unsuspecting individual might know nothing of it.  Alas, youth is wasted on the young.

It is the job of the Judge to encompass both sides and, hopefully, come to an understanding.  When we put on the Judge’s robes, we can actually feel a difference in our thoughts.  They become heavier as we weigh now this idea and then that, now this good point and then that dark promise.  The Judge has an intelligence that goes beyond that of either the Dove or the Raven because he must project himself into the future to gauge his choice while simultaneously plunge himself into the past to compare prior similar arguments and their outcome. 

The Raven and the Dove place themselves entirely in the jurisdiction of the Judge and will abide by his decision whether they agree with it or not.  This is a prerequisite for sanity.  Those who cannot abide by the Judge’s decision will soon find themselves held in a detention center of their own making, and they shall slip slowly into absurdity and hysteria until they can correct their witless delirium, make a decision, and move on with their lives.  I decree that we shall have no fence sitters.

For many intelligent people who function quite well in Caesar’s world, that is where it ends—with the Dove, the Raven, and the Judge.  And there is nothing wrong with that.  In fact, I envy the surety of those people at times, even if that surety proves false, because sometimes it is enough to simply “know” what you want and not realize that all knowledge comes with a price.  A person can get by quite well in life with the first three principalities, without ever acknowledging the fourth.

But there is a fourth, and once I point him out, he will seem obvious.  So you have the Dove who pulls in one direction and the Raven who pulls in the other, and you have the Judge who sits between the two, listens, evaluates, and decides.  Behind the Judge you have the Watcher.  He sits and observes only.  Surely you know him?  How could we even discuss the Raven, the Dove, and the Judge, if there were not a fourth to point out the existence of the first three?  We know of the Judge because the Watcher has told us about him.  If there were nothing standing behind the Judge to define him and expound upon his parameters—to explain the reason for his existence—we could not know the Judge.  How can you know something you cannot think of?

So there is the Watcher.  He sits back and watches everything.  He never judges—ever.  He would never lower himself to do so.  That is for the realm of simple flesh and blood.  He watches dispassionately and keeps exquisitely fine records of every single thing that ever happens in our life.  He watches us as we live and move and breathe and love and die.  He experiences the joy of every triumph and the agony of every defeat.  He is our unconditioned consciousness whereas the other three are our conditioned consciousness. 

He is the shard, the spark of the Great Unmanifest, who manifests through each individually expressed channel and ultimately experiences Himself.  He is the same as the Source, but never forget that He is still on a much lower level.  The apple is not the tree, but it comes from the tree and ultimately will express the tree when its seeds are allowed to experience final fruition.

These four principalities, then, make up the mind of the individual man.  Behind them is the backdrop of the Great Unmanifest (the fifth).  We will save this for another time.

But understand, please, that there are those shrewd individuals out there who know this all too well and who take advantage of others who cannot grasp their own complexity and divine nature.  Know that the wily merchant and his ilk are always circling like a pack of coyotes, looking for the weakest member of the flock, exploiting the minds and bodies and labor of the sheep, siphoning off their fine wool.  And we hear them growl in their guttural tones, “Baa baa, black sheep, have you any wool?  Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full!  One for the master, and one for the dame, and one for the little boy who lives down the lane.”  One for the Dove, and one for the Raven, and one for Judge who sits on The Bench (from which three the merchant shall extract his greedy share).

December wants me to finish up these loose ends for you, so that we might plunge into the great unknown together and begin again.  I am weary of the fight, and my armor has certainly seen its better days.  But I expect I shall rise to the occasion just the same.  Let us continue on, then, in what we shall call a choice.  Ashes, ashes, we all fall down.