A
Work In Progress
One night I dreamt that I was a
Hollow Man and dwelt I in a harsh,
Alien and most uncaring land.
Hungry, weary, battered and worn,
Haunted by my world of unrelenting
Misery, cruelty and fear,
I lay me down upon my bed
To take a little ease and
T’was but moments before,
Though hard was the board
Upon which I nightly slumbered,
Into a deep sleep I fell,
(An escape at times;
In others the nightmare continued.)
And had me a dream within a dream.
I dreamt I was walking in a great forest;
The trees dwarfing even cedar
giants,
The ground clear of all entanglement,
No bushes, weeds or saplings here,
Just grass and moss, lawn-like and soft,
So it was walked I on with no thought to my
footfall.
Neither bird-song nor insects hum was there
To be heard, nor high dog-fox bark,
Just an Owl, a silent presence, ghost white,
Beckoning somehow that I might follow.
This did I with alacrity, for there was naught
else,
And soon it was that I stood before
Such a mighty oak as it is hard to imagine.
Set within the massive trunk was a door,
And a strong, chasm deep voice
Reached gentle-like, but most firm,
Into my mind and spake thus:
“Enter thou unto me for I am
The Tree of Knowledge.”
And this I did and for three long years.
I studied all my mind could grasp,
All the tree would offer,
Of philosophy and the words of poets,
Religion, art, ethics, morality and science.
Psychology too was mine, fascinated as am I
By the minds of my fellow creatures.
Sociology was there, music, mechanics,
The study of animals, of friendship
And warfare, both, and sport in lieu.
On progressed my learning,
The broad reach of the stars,
And other things astronomical.
Physics, history and the arts filled my mind,
Biology, theology, archaeology fascinated –
There learned I all I could understand and
At times a little more!
Then it was that I left,
That place of wonders for my intellect,
And once more the phantasm,
The silent and ethereal Owl,
Beckoned that again I should follow,
And, puzzled I, possessing all my knowledge,
Did so, through the hushed forest,
Wanting to know the why and how of it.
At the last, stood I before
A vast waterfall of tears, a willow,
And a voice, melancholy beyond measure,
Spake direct unto my heart,
Calling me to enter in,
She being the Tree of Sorrows.
This did I, with much of foreboding,
And for five anguished years studied I there,
Learning of the searing pain of betrayal,
The burning of hatred seeking revenge,
Of internal torment, loneliness,
Being utterly unloved, hopelessness,
Emptiness, and the immeasurable anguish,
Tearing and ripping at the heartstrings,
Of the death of thy beloved, or worse,
At the senseless death of child.
There too was I taught about the casual taking
of lives,
Of complicity in the plight of suffering masses,
Of voracity and cupidity which had no thought
of other,
Of grief, of lost opportunity, dreams
shattered,
Chances not taken and everlastingly regretted,
The slow drip, drip, care-less erosion of hope,
Dying with awareness of one’s life wasted,
The terrors of war, inequity, torture –
An almost endless catalogue of horrors
That is the cruel and unjust lot of the losers,
Oh so many, they, in the lottery of life.
And the day came when my heart knew
All that there was to know of anguish,
Torment, revulsion and wretchedness,
And truth be told,
I could stand no more
And maintain some form of sanity.
Slow though left I, uncertain now of the world,
Despite my gift of knowledge,
From the mighty Oak.
Entered I once more the silent forest,
Dressed now as it was in darkness,
Kissed by strips of moonlight
Dancing in the glades,
And there once more
The familiar, wraithlike bird
Flew, soundless, to lead me to
What mystery I knew not,
But unquestioning followed I,
Weary beyond comprehension,
My heart almost rent in twain
By the copious, oft endless
And senseless sufferings of
Unnoticed, and over and again uncared for,
Battered, humiliated and abused humanity,
Living and struggling in tormented lives,
Dying in sad, unremarked, obscurity,
Their skills and potential forever lost,
An unseen tragedy for all unaware humanity.
I know not for how long followed I thus,
So smart of mind, so heavy of heart,
But in a timeless time later came I
To a glorious jasmine tree,
Fragrant white blossom, soft upon my eyes,
Their trumpet forms blowing forth
Its sweet, rich fragrance,
A balm for my aching heart,
And my step more of a pace showed
As forward walked I and called she to me,
Called to my bruised, sorrowful heart,
And learned I that she was the Tree of Love.
There entered I in with no thought of other,
And thus remained full eight charmed,
Yes, and truth to say, enchanted years,
Learning and feeling all that love can bring.
Touched, was I, by tenderness, selfless
devotion,
And the loving sacrifices made by some;
The screaming longings of love,
And longings satisfied.
The ecstasy two loving bodies can enjoin,
And a desirable belonging, melding,
Being one in two and
Two in one, with lives entwined;
The sharing of beauty,
The sharing of dreams,
And companionship love, grown over time.
There, too, learned I of a Mystery Love,
That Love from which we came,
And that eternal Love to which we return.
Learned I too of love of learning,
Love of life, be it large or small,
Long or fleeting,
If well lived,
Respecting the gift
Of new days, plump with possibilities.
As said in the ancient tongue,
‘Carpe diem!’
And after those years my heart was full
To overflowing, sated by love at the last,
And wandered I forth
Into the soft lit silence of the Forest ,
And once more the Owl was there,
To lead me yet again;
And thought I with foreboding
It would be to the Tree Of Hate,
But no, not so, for that was borne
In every terrible facet in the Tree of Sorrow.
It was thus with surprise arrived I at
That which is called, also in the olden speech
Araucaria araucana, an immense Monkey Puzzle,
With a door now faint, now firm of image,
And a voice both kind and cruel,
Joyous and pitiful,
Loud and soft,
Making welcome;
And entered I accordingly
Into the Tree Of Chaos.
There it was sojourned I
For full ten bizarre, demanding years,
And learned I to backwards think
From hurricane to butterfly,
And of the quantum world
Which behaves not as once expected;
Of particle entanglement and
Superpositioning, making what
Once certain was assuredly not so,
And the speed of light
The limit no longer.
I learned about the cosmic joke
Relating to the best laid plans of man,
And unintended consequences,
Of love that turns to hate,
And hate that to love turns,
Of much overrated sincerity
To savagery leading;
Too, the kindest of intent,
The most compassionate of action
Leading to vast tragedy unseen.
Learned I how knowledge
Sorrow, pain and love,
Can seem naught but chimera
In the world of chaos.
But so from chaos
The Universe was formed,
And chaos cannot be
Without sentient perception,
And their participation;
For a tree within the forest,
If truth be told, maketh not a sound
If it should swift-like fall,
Unless there be ears to hear it.
I learned that chaos is the natural state,
That only by backwards thinking
May it be fully understood,
As strive we to surround ourselves
With islands of certainty;
And oft it is, seeming we to win,
But these tiny motes of tranquillity
Too small for measurement are,
In that which we call time,
And think an absolute when it is not,
When from a different vantage point,
Time dilation occurs,
In a relativistic universe,
Or from all eternity it is seen.
And thus the belittling lesson
Of insignificance and uncertainty acquired I,
And dispirited and more alone
Than ere had I been afore,
With conflicting logic,
No absolute truths,
Paradox and no certain
Place to stand my intellect,
And all my learning of things,
And of love, hate and sorrow,
Staggered I forth reeling into
The silent wood once more.
My spirit, unsettled by feelings of
Profound insecurity in a chaotic and oft
Incomprehensible, ever-changing world,
Searched for the certainty of the Owl,
And instant it was that my disposition lifted
As it called soft unto me,
Breaking at the last the silence,
And followed I, more spritely,
The bird now wearing a cloak
Of feathers, shimmering
As does a rainbow in the dawn light.
Long, it seemed, I walked thus,
But saw I naught of life
Other than the mighty trees
And my scintillating guide.
Surprised then was I to behold
A tree much different from the rest.
Large it was, certes,
Larger by far than those
Which stood as its companions,
But it was alone,
The only one I beheld
Within that endless, silent forest,
An indomitable, enduring sequoia.
The door within its vast trunk
With colour coruscated,
Matching thus my feathered guide,
And instant, it was, that I knew
This was to be my last and longest sojourn,
Though in my confused innocence
And knowledge of that which knowable was,
I knew not that from there I would depart
To mine own world of love and hate,
Of sorrow, pain and oft impotent knowledge,
With an armour, a sword and shield,
With which to make it mine;
And entered I then within
The Tree of Hopes and Dreams.
It was here I tarried more years
Than my aged brain can recall,
And filled they were with
Wild and wonderful imaginings,
The glories of what might be,
Could be, and sometimes was.
Here I met the most beauteous,
The most seductive,
The most alluring Pandora,
And it was she who me told the story of
A butterfly not born for chaos
And wild, destructive winds,
But for Hope,
A light after the dark and savage storm,
An unexpected and lingering kiss,
A tender touch following rage,
A caressing smile in the rain.
It was within this place of enchantments
Met I also, most miraculous Morpheus,
He who to sleepers blows charms
And marvellous magics;
Dreams of high castles set
Like eyries among the rugged crags,
They, snow-capped and lustrous,
And low, lush valleys with sparkling ribbons
Flowing languidly, silver shards of fishes
Darting in the clear waters;
Too, made he visions of lovers reunited,
The warring finding peace,
Fearful folk discovering courage
And the wicked, redemption.
All things were possible.
I know not how left I there or,
Truth to tell, why.
Of all I had learned,
Aye, learned and felt,
In my head, my heart and bowels,
This place charmed me the most,
For saw I at the last that in a world
Of knowledge most extraordinary,
Pain most savage, most poignant,
Most ghastly, most purifying,
And love, lost and found,
Sorrow most deep, most high,
Chaos most unutterably complex,
Deterministic by backward thinking,
And redolent with potentialities,
That all these contributed to
Hopes and Dreams.
And through Hopes and Dreams it is
That humankind will overcome all
Obstacles; live they through terror,
Horror, pain and sorrow,
And use they the power
Of knowledge, oft hard-won,
The sharp, clawing lessons
Of hatred, backward thinking
And certain uncertainty,
Failure and fear,
Their bellies filling with fire,
And love to bend chaos
To their will, and through triumph
And disaster both, reaching out,
Reaching out to each other,
Reaching out with Hope,
Reaching out, chaos to control,
Their Dreams to pursue,
And the future to make their own.
And when awoke I to the harsh
World of my dream outside a dream,
I rose from that hard board
In one flowing movement,
Assured as was I of a fate
To be of mine own making.
Glanced I at my belongings,
Those things which had so mattered,
Pathetic now, and meaningless;
All there was of no consequence;
And walked I from my abode,
Set my eyes upon the far peak
Of the curved mountain,
That which called we
The Lady, and that which
My life long wished I to climb
And stare down on the hidden
Lands and peoples beyond.
And took I then, unhesitant,
My first step into my future.
What ere the consequences,
This was my life, my route,
My eternal soul,
My chaotic potentialities,
My Hopes and my Dreams
For better, for worse, mine!
And behind me heard I such a clamour,
Wild shouts, dire warnings and
Shots were fired. The pain was
Sudden and anguished. I felt
As though to fall but it was not so
And swift it was I straightened up
And stepped forth on my route again.
The sun brighter shone, the grey
Sky, now blue and many birds
Flew and sang, with insects too
Contributing to the carolling of the choir.
And an White Owl flew to me,
And upon my shoulder sat.
And knew I the Owl,
As she knew me,
Having sat thus, always,
Cosy upon my shoulder,
But by me unseen,
My better angel,
Banishing at the last,
The Hollow Man.
She hooted soft,
Gentle nibbled my ear,
And the road rose to meet me,
The gentle wind at my back,
The sun warm on my face,
As went we to seek mine own true destiny,
My eternal soul yearning yet to know more,
To grow in giving, kindness, love and grace;
A work in progress.
