The Secret

 

The secret

of meditation

could not be hidden.

A seamless succession

of gurus,

an army of monks,

the unbroken lineage

of a hundred popes

and a thousand lamas

could not keep it.

Inaccessible ashrams

and distant mountain caves

could not contain it.

The secret of meditation

could not be obscured

by esoteric doctrines,

hidden beneath

extinct languages

in advanced initiations,

decontextualized

by theologians

in urban universities.

The secret of meditation

is out now, revealed

by the first kiss

of the morning breeze,

and the indiscretion

of a tree frog

in the vanishing mist

of a golden dawn.

It is revealed

by the scent of rain

in hay grass, the outburst

of a purple crocus.

The secret of meditation

has been given away

by the gaze of a baby

in a shopping cart

as you stand in line

at Bartell Drugs.

The hidden face of a god unknown.

A mouth that could not speak.

A spell that needed breaking.

That silence is over.

Now is the time to take off the mask

and sing.

Lithograph: The Clown by Pablo Picasso