CCXXVI
The idolatry of form is no substitute for truth.
* * * *
The lion and antelope, the eagle and rabbit,
The king and pawn, the sage and fool.
Each must endure the outcome
Of their given function
For the theater to carry on.
* * * *
That you would expect this realm
To be any different, to be any ideal at all,
Is the source of your disappointment, anger and fear,
And, ultimately, these passions will bring about a world-weariness
That may well consume mind and body if you do not discern
The ultimate perfection from which they spring.
* * * *
Shuffling the cards does not change the game.
* * * *
You are promised heaven and hell
In exchange for the false gold
Middlemen so badly crave.
* * * *
Another day, another change,
Another problem, another solution
Rippling into the unknown.
* * * *
Science can only be as accurate
As the instruments used to measure
And the mind brought to bear.
* * * *
The presumption
That life is inviolate
No matter the situation
Is a dubious position.
* * * *
When asking a question,
And truly listening for an answer,
Your comprehension can still really only be
Whatever you are ready to hear.
* * * *
The appearance
That there is either
A traveler or a destination
Is an enticing delusion.
* * * *
A truth is a truth no matter the source.
Whether it comes from the devil or god,
Your discomfort with one or the other
Is an issue of your own making.
* * * *
In the animal world,
Chameleonship is the art of survival
Not an issue of pride.
* * * *
You make up so many claims to be this or that.
All self-deception, all ultimately false conjecture,
Delusional fancy, imagined conceptual trickery.
* * * *
You can surrender to whomever or whatever you will.
But until you surrender to the formless essential nature,
You are merely dancing with an infinity of enticing mirages.
* * * *
That any other bothers to gossip,
Or think of you in any fashion whatsoever,
Need not be of great concern.
* * * *
Desire is incredibly enticing
Until you eventually realize how painful
Its inherent discontent truly is.
* * * *
False pride, false humility,
Is there really a difference?
* * * *
We are each conditioned to be attached
To the culture of our origin.
And relatively few
Ever wander outside the cave.
* * * *
What form or concept is sacred
When none have eternity
As their foundation?
* * * *
Real detachment
Implies an unconcern
Prior to all desire for more.
* * * *
Is all your movement, all your busy-ness
Really only a indication of your dread of oblivion?
The corporeal demise is an inescapable fact.
No point in White Rabbiting to and fro.
You may as well become aware
Of the eternal reality.
After all, it is your true home.
* * * *
Joy and sorrow
Are not a concern
For an uncarved block.
* * * *
A separate personalized god is the make-believe
Of those still caught in the division of the mind,
The dilemma of the dualistic sensory illusion.
* * * *
Hate is a lazy, ignorant, isolating way.
Love is a journey of good intentions.
* * * *
Will you spend eternity trying vainly to quench your desire?
* * * *
You are truly liquid dust.
* * * *
Impossible.
* * * *
No point debating with those who see,
You must do as they did.
Investigate your Self.
* * * *
Trust god?
Only that he/she/it
Will inevitably squash you
Like a windshield does an insect.
And if you are very lucky, for the last time.
* * * *
You are not reading these words
Because you’re an angel,
You scalawag, you.
* * * *
[sic]
* * * *
Do you believe
The costume you wear, or the mask you bear
Really matters to anyone but you?
* * * *
The first of many unfair calamities in your world
Was that you were born at all.
* * * *
Those who really believe
They truly know what is going on here
Certainly are fooling themselves.
* * * *
Only you can heal the rift within.
You must become your own physician.
* * * *
How infatuated we are with the superficial.
* * * *
The nowness you can never see,
Touch, taste, smell, feel,
Or know in any way,
Is your eternal nature.
* * * *
All dreams are witnessed equally
By the same detached essence.
* * * *
When you become unsure
Who or what you are anymore,
You may almost be at the front door.
The trick to getting back to Kansas
Is to be beyond-a-doubt unsure.
* * * *
Wrong assumptions can get anyone
In serious bother pretty danged quick.
* * * *
Eternal life, eternal death.
Is there really a difference?
* * * *
Eternity has neither time nor space for abstract conjecture.
* * * *
The obviousness of oneness
Is an absurd joke upon any
Who ever think otherwise.
* * * *
Assume nothing.
* * * *
These words speak well enough for themselves.
They require no priests or organizations,
Merely seekers of what is true.
* * * *
You will continue
Finding whatever you seek
Until there is literally nothing left to seek.
* * * *
So many interesting ways to live.
So many interesting ways to die.
Hard to pick just one.
* * * *
Is judgment any more than unreflective projection.
* * * *
Everything everywhere, smoking.
* * * *
Is it idealistic to be weary of bullshit?
* * * *
Regarding the ultimate nature,
Any given answer, any given conclusion
Is only conjecture and delusion.
* * * *
The world will always beckon you join in
As the alluring sirens did Ulysses,
But it is you who chooses
To be possessed,
Or not.
* * * *
It is always the first time in the eternal sense.
* * * *
There is no resolving this mystery,
Which is why minds across the human epoch
Have resorted to fabricating every delusion imaginable.
* * * *
Do not allow delusion to be confused with reality.
* * * *
Me, myself, and I,
The source of all experience,
All ignorance, delusion, agony and ecstasy.
The personal mystery of existence
From which all springs.
* * * *
Absurdity is at home in every geography.
* * * *
If you believe in anything,
Imagination has gotten the better of you.
* * * *
Religions are merely well-established cults.
Tradition, ritual, and idolatry are not truth.
* * * *
Anonymity within and without is the finest freedom.
* * * *
Blaming any given situation
On deities or demons
Is a convenient delusion.
* * * *
Prayer, n, A condoned way to babble to an imaginary friend.
* * * *
We are all the only witness there is.
* * * *
You are the bound link
To that which has no bounds,
The perjury to that which is only truth.
* * * *
Your attachment to that which is unreal
Is all that holds you back
From discerning that which is.
* * * *
One in the same.
* * * *
These words are a gift
To the epoch of humankind,
Wherever the mystery may wander.
* * * *
Over and over, the blinding lights
Of power, fame and fortune,
Of excess in any form,
Draw moths to their fiery doom.
* * * *
How bittersweet the tang of ironic doubt.
* * * *
Myths are the make-believe of time.
Be wary lest they betray you further.
* * * *
Though you are but a droplet of the immensity,
You are a reflection of the infallibility
Of its essential reality.
* * * *
What is not fabrication?
Is there anything concocted by mind
Which is ever truly real?
* * * *
Glory is a shiny bauble
That entices all who would seek it
Into the voracious quicksand of arrogance.
* * * *
Standing before your mirrored reflection,
Can you ever truly envision your Self?
Or merely another passing scene
Truly no more distinct than any other?
* * * *
Who are you but the wind of the mind
Existing not but for the sensory illusion
Of partitioned spaces drifting through time.
* * * *
You cannot ever fully comprehend
What the many mystics of this world
Over and over in so many ways declare
Until your own ear is at last prepared to hear.
* * * *
Free will is illusion.
You really have no choice
But to accept the caprice of fate.
* * * *
Identity is the pride.
* * * *
The I am this or that ends.
* * * *
To realize completely that it is not you,
But the whims of consciousness
That act out all this silliness,
Is the liberation of Soul.
* * * *
Do not feel bothered that you are not an expert,
Or that someone else pretends to be.
As least you are candid
About really not knowing anything.
* * * *
Every so-called problem
Has as its source the mind.
We and we alone have created
The disarray of the human theater.
There is no outside influence
Upon which reproach
Can be placed.
* * * *
All philosophy is essentially nonsense.
To be or not to be is the only question.
* * * *
Your body gradually withers away.
Your self-concept alters from moment to moment.
You endlessly attempt to rein in the irrevocable passage of time.
Take pause and ponder, what will your self-concept be
When the body to which you are so attached
Has returned into its dusty origin.
* * * *
Absurdity hath no bounds.
* * * *
Whether or not this manifest dream could ever be any different
Is the question any thinker must eventually ask
In the quest for the truth of it.
* * * *
The truth of god’s so-called plan may be
That there has never really been one.
* * * *
The quest for fulfillment is the monkey’s dream.
* * * *
Scientists pretend they are so objective, but how can they be?
Observer and observed are linked in eternal relativity,
And intellectual assumptions to the contrary
Only blind them to their collusion.
* * * *
For surrender to absoluteness to be complete
Is not just about one’s negative attributes,
But the so-called positive ones as well.
Your pleasure as well as your pain,
Your glory as well as your despair,
Your confidence as well as your doubt.
Because, in reality, all the you think of as you
Is merely an invention of the same cradle of delusion.
* * * *
If you truly understand your seeking godness
Will annihilate the you, you know and daily cultivate,
Only the most determined will not cast these words away,
And with great determination, turn even more vainly to the world.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Stillness Before Time (Compendium)
© Michael J. Holshouser 2009
World Rights Reserved