Light on the Page

There is no other form of speech as gentle as a prayer. In fact it’s the only form that can be spoken without words. It knows it will receive its reply although there is nothing audible there. Nothing is there at all. And yet the prayer grows in sound and silence. The answer is equally gentle – as gentle as the dove. And as the prayer may be unspoken and goes into nothing so the answer makes no command and asks for no return. Only it whispers into your ear – if you will listen – that you should love and never lose belief in what you learn.

Sometimes it may seem that darkness is all – a storm of darkness. Yet something tiny is out there, something quite powerless, like a spark which is hunting in all the world’s forgotten places for its own power – the power to quell the mighty dark. This spark may bring stillness to the storm. A prayer conceals the answer it contains. It is itself made of a light it can scarcely understand. That light, burning true, remains the flame which at its heart is deepest blue.

Learn

Is any word as gentle as a prayer?

What gives itself and knows it will receive

without being said and nothing giving there?

And grows in sound and silence, I believe.

The answer is as gentle as the dove,

makes no command and asks for no return.

It whispers in your ear that you should love

and never lose belief  in what you learn.

Blue

The storm of darkness may be stilled at once

by what is tiny, powerless as a spark,

which in the world’s forgotten places hunts

for its own power to quell the mighty dark.

A prayer conceals the answer it contains,

a light which it is made of, burning true,

and scarcely understands that it remains

the flame which at its heart is deepest blue.

Best wishes, today,

Landar

© landar 2010. All rights reserved.

Love itself appears in the here and now, a living light. Between the layers of time, as if returning from a distant fight or a high mountain, love appears. It takes its place within, like a second self, where there had been a hollow space before. And what has never been at last can be, a place where love will stay for ever more.

Love made me, and love was made for me. My eyes were made by light, to see light. My voice was made by words, to speak the words I need to tell. And likewise love, which saw and heard itself at the beginning of all things, finds a true home in me, in order to give me back to eternity.

And when the human being finds wholeness, he adds glory to the work of God that he is, just as a sunset will add glory to the sky. Yet nothing is complete till he flies to the heart of the creation that is his. As a totality he was conceived in the holy fire which remembers why it called him into being. When he receives his higher nature he’ll fill the sacred world with his seeing.

For Ever More (for H.)

You’re here and now for me, a living light,

I see you there between the layers of time

returning to me from a distant fight,

a mountain long ago you had to climb.

You’re with me now, a second self in me,

where there had been a hollow space before,

and what has never been at last can be,

a place where love will stay for ever more.

Shell

By love I’m made, and love is made for me –

a gift of God it fills my empty shell.

My eyes were made by light, the light to see,

my voice by words, to find the words to tell.

And so I welcome love into my heart

to give me back to that eternity

which saw and heard itself right at the start

and found a shell to house what it should be.

Seeing

The whole man, like a sunset to the sky,

adds glory to the work of God he is.

But nothing is completed till he fly

to the heart of the creation that is his.

The holy fire in which he was conceived

remembers why it called him into being,

and when his higher nature is received

he’ll fill the sacred world with his seeing.

Best wishes, today,

Landar

© landar 2010. All rights reserved.

My own small heart dwells within the great heart of the cosmos. There I find my life, my being, the reason for my existence. And yet the great cosmos lies hidden in my own heart too, waiting for its chance of discovery. In a sense, it can only live and find its wings if I allow it. This very fact is contained within me like a secret which the mind itself is barely able to comprehend. The inner being is the one who resides, like the genie in the lamp, neither waiting nor expecting but set out in the dark for a time when, at love’s insistence, I will approach.

There’s a promise of forever living in this, as hidden as the inner being itself, but offering a vastness and a shape of light which is, again, brighter than the small mind can anticipate. Love asks the genie for its wishes, has the power to detain it, if it so wills, or, finally, to set it free. The pure, small light of love marries the eternal flame in the heart which is able to hold them.

Therefore I approach the inner being as a poor man and not a prince. Yet when I have command of the lamp’s genius I can turn its light towards the gentle face of my life – my heart and soul – where the vision of  my worthiness will appear. But I cannot keep the garb of a prince because, with my third wish, I must give the genie his freedom. The spirit, the inner being, will then have the freedom of the land that is his own. The fact that he made me a prince remains like a dream for my heart and soul, which will, I hope, continue to love me even in poverty, because they have seen and recognized my true worth.

Greatness

The little heart is deep within the great,

but which one holds the other? My small heart

curls up in the care of the greater one,

yet It can only beat within my own.

Almost no mind can understand this fact,

except the one whose polished genius hides

within the lamp we set out in the dark,

when love adds greatness to the little heart.

Forever

There’s a forever living in the heart,

as concealed as the spirit in the lamp,

but with the vastness and shape of a light,

brighter than the small mind can comprehend.

And love alone can ask its three wishes,

command its detention and set it free.

Its pure small light and its eternal flame

are married in the heart which contains them.

Worth

You might see the poor man and not the prince

till he has command of the lamp’s genius

and turns its light towards your gentle face

where the vision of worthiness appears.

So let me be yours still when I am poor,

when I’ve given the genie his freedom,

and the prince he made me becomes a dream

in the eyes of one who has seen my worth.

Best wishes, today,

Landar

© landar 2010. All rights reserved

Clearly life isn’t equal to death as it’s overturned by it. Love is the basic substance of our being – originally divine but eventually our own element to handle, therefore our origin and our goal. As the power which calls life into being in both a human and divine sense, it’s also the place we return to when life is complete – therefore it holds the balance over the beginning and the end. I believe in this sense death can’t surpass love and love is the equal of death. However, we’re just beginners!

Our life is dissolving in us all the time – the breakdown of cells, the ageing process. So where do we have to look for continued life, during life? Do we look for it in the non-physical part of our being? No, because during life every part of us is oriented towards furthering our existence on earth. That includes what we ordinarily call the ego or the soul. We have to look further, to what I call the Well of Youth, or the Spring of Eternal Life. This occurs in stories or sometimes as landmarks in sacred places. The Well of Youth is the ever-renewing inner part of our being. We have to look for it in times spent away from the realities of physical life – moments of silence and inspiration. The eternal part of our being then works into the temporal. This is the Self beyond the self. It rests in the hands of the Being who is Love in the highest sense. This Being lives and moves within the inner self. Therefore the Fountain of Inspiration, the Well of Youth, the Spring of Eternal Life, all give hope of life before death and certainty of continued being afterwards.

Best wishes, today,

Landar

© landar 2010. All rights reserved.

Does the fact of death make a nonsense of the whole of life? In a few seconds everything’s gone. Nothing’s left. No part of my life on earth remains. Even my thinking about this will be gone. Does this render life null and void? Does this turn my naive belief that life is sufficient into a laughing-stock?

Of course life has meaning and value and no one goes about thinking that the answer to this question is yes. But there it is – it won’t go away. This question makes itself into the most important in the world and has to be faced.

Death retains its immediacy. Every weekend for a long time I suffered what I called a ‘Saturday-doom’. A feeling of doom or a sense of dread which almost incapacitated me. I realized it had to do with my father’s death when I was a boy. He died quite suddenly on a Sunday. The Saturday was the last full day I knew him. This translated into a deep sense of foreboding. It attacked my own adulthood. The only way I could deal with it was to say a prayer for help on a Thursday night and to be attentive all weekend.

The question of death making a nonsense of life first struck me when I was seven years old. I remember running from the dinner table in tears when my sister mentioned that a friend’s grandmother had been cremated. My father came to comfort me – the same father whose own death affected me so much a few years later. He talked about Heaven and how everything we love will be there. But the force of death remained with me.

Now I feel I have to face it, to look at it full-on. To go right down into it, as it were. The results are interesting. Quite the opposite of making a nonsense of life the fact of death now deepens my hold on existence. It brings the whole inner being into view. Ultimately this is because the inner self is rooted in the Being of Love. And there is no greater fact than this – that Love is equal to Death.

Best wishes, today,

Landar

© landar 2010. All rights reserved.