Pathless

I breathe in darkness, breathe out light, but pranayam is not my way. I bend and bow and honor the tides in my spine, but asanas are not my way.

 

I savor the name of God, but the Word is not my way. I honor the Guru, but my path has no master. 

 

Though I listen to the songs and suras of the wise, I follow not the Vedas, the Torah, the Qur'an.

 

I give to those in need, but the path of seva is not for me. I surrender, Lord, but even You, even You, are not my way. Parasam Gateh, “beyond the beyond,” is wherever I am right now. 

 

With no chant, no alter, no eucharist or puja, I wander in the forest, offering the silence of cedar, trillium, fern.

 

At midnight, soundless owl wings, bright knives of un-knowing, slice through the glory of darkness. Coyote howl is my song.

 

And because the light of primeval stars is only now arriving in my body, I am awake. 

 

Each electron bathes in the glory of its origin. Every photon collides with the darkest particle of its other self. I follow the wordless path of this breath Om.

 

But my way is not a journey, it passes neither in nor out, but shatters every window between seer and seen, sinking every vessel in the ocean of transparency.

 

I have trillions of eyes, gazing into the well of eternal aloneness, where past and future kiss, annihilating time. This very moment is the diamond of my awakening.

 

 I achieve the beatific vision of celestial mansions, simply by gazing at the motionless explosion of a rose.

 

Every religion a blood-colored petal of this, but I would offer the whole flower, the wounded bud which opens in all directions at once.

 

Where I Am there are no steps, no degrees of initiation, no levels one to seven: only fragrances, only dissolving.

 

Each lineage of masters is a pollen mote, but I have sticky feet. I visit the center, where the nectar is made in secret darkness. 

 

Down where pistil and stamen touch in a throb of stillness, I make honey. Come, drink from my heart.

 

Photo by Aile Shebar