Between the conscious and the unconscious, the
mind has put up a swing:
all earth creatures, even the supernovas, sway
between these two trees,
and it never winds down.
Angels, animals, humans insects by the million, also
the wheeling sun and moon;
ages go by, and it goes on.
Everything is swinging: heaven, earth, water, fire,
and the secret one slowly growing a body.
Kabir saw that for fifteen seconds, and it made him a
servant for life.
Kabir
(translated by Robert Bly)
This poem reminds me of an epiphany I had one fall day, 30 years ago. Driving slowly down the winding dirt road from the top of the hill, a sudden sensation of time, my place in the world and in time, unity with all there is and my happily discovered insignificance in the scheme of things, washed over me. I felt reassured, comforted and centered, then, and ever since then. And no, I was not on any drugs.
this formulation of the connection as a swing is helpful to me. I have been thinking about it a lot because of my dream work. The way a swing moves fits my own experience that I live in a place that is in the movement between dream and so-called reality, and that is constantly creating itself.
This world they say is an illusion….a dream. Our thoughts and actions are like threads of a net that we weave around ourselves. A veil has been drawn over our mind’s eye and we live out our lives bound and blind folded. Life, they say is a play of shadows through which most of us sleep walk.Few have awakened from this sleep and have tried to show light to the rest of humanity. They succeeded only partly, passing away, leaving behind empty forms to be distorted and misused by their followers.Holy books, sacred messages, rites and rituals, they say, are mere shells. The spirit within, having long departed, along with the Messenger. These shells and forms are mere signposts for those who seek the formless…..and only the true seeker, they say, will find the Path.
Thank you for stopping in Ashodara. I was very moved by your comment.