The Poem
For Robert Thurman

In righteousness of truth come near.

Seeing the archetype of being,

I stand before the mystery now,

Unutterable but for this stutter.

Where do I come from, and where go?

What is this place in which I dwell?

These questions but for centuries remain

An empty space within my shell.

My eye pierces the truth, but I,

Homonym profound and telling,

Know not the knower, being bound

By non-being, being’s illicit lover.

I seek within, and not beyond,

Perceive what is, for I am being

And non-being both, eternal tryst,

Twisting in a wild cacophony.

Consciousness empty and amiss,

Seduced by ignorance and bliss,

Tortuously seeking its own happiness

In the antithesis of this,

Conceals within itself the truth,

That all is void, that wrong is right,

That folly is wise, desire pain.

Seeking yet seeking it again,

I fall into the night inane.

Life after life, death after death,

The I that is not the eye that sees

(Nor even anything at all)

Passes its daze in the light of the moon,

Reflective orb, sterile yet bright,

While all around the true life slumbers

Awaiting the awaking of delight.

I am, that which perdures.

Like an uncarved stone

The simple fact of my mortality

Drops away like sleep,

And the dream that is I

Awakes into the sky,

And rises, ecstatic, into space.