Poemander

As narrated:

No, I wasn't afraid of the old age. I actually waited for it to see how it feels, to see whether I'd become wise, whether I'll eventually learn something or whether I might even happen to uncover some of the world mysteries unattainable to young minds. But no, I wasn't getting much wiser and, strangely, I wasn't getting older; years gone by, but I felt the same like when I still was a high school student. Yes, of course I've got some attributes of an old age – aches here and there, needing a snooze in the afternoon, but inside, I felt still the same, inexperienced young man. The years of work, travel, grown up children didn't change this perception if you know what I mean. I was still this probing ingenuous being roaming about the face of this planet looking for the meaning. Yes, it wasn't much of an actual roaming as I've done in the past: changing countries, pairs after pairs of boots worn into the ground. This time it was more of a mind-roaming, digging through memories, trying to remember the people I met, understand the feelings I've had. You'd probably be right at saying that I have never grown up, or more to it, that people generally do not grow up. I've heard some psychologists discovered that human's cognition rarely develops past the age of fourteen years old; they must be right, at least in my case. The next I remember is walking down the street to the corner shop, thinking of all this, as I usually do, and then, this squealing sound of car breaks. A heat wave inside my temples, very hot. Taste of blood in the mouth.

An image of a young lady running back and forth, leering down at me. She was very distressed. “On my god! I'm sorry, I'm sorry!”, she mumbled pulling the phone out of her pocket. I wanted to calm her and say “Its alright”, but the words wouldn't come out.

Day turned into night and I could only hear the distant sound of siren. People gathered and a man in green shoved them off including this young lady whose tear-flooded emerald eyes and convulsing lips continued to occupy the whole space of my waning consciousness.

Picture flipped, as if now the reverse of things happened to be more important and meaningful than the things themselves. It has actually dislodged like an elaborate transformer, changing shapes and bringing the earlier invisible parts to the surface. They were still the same, but different. I couldn't say why and in what manner, but there was really no need to answer these questions because despite being astounding, all these transformations appeared so logical and simple that no one would even bother explaining them. I continued to be pulled between these instant realisations and the people in jade masks leaning over someone whom I could loosely associate with myself. Then, it was a walk. A walk through the dark forest, or rather, the whole forest walked by me. Every tree was intimately familiar to the point that I wanted to linger and embrace them, but I couldn't as some insurmountable force has started to unravel the already slackened quiddity and persistently untwine the strands of whatever constitutes difference between being and not being. I didn't fight, probably because there was no one to resist, neither outside, nor on the inside. I closed my eyes, or rather the essence of what is normally taken to be the eyes, and prepared to be shut off in absolute gratitude to all there was.

However, due to some inexplicable error, there still remained a faint transparent light. It shone with the soft emerald glint luring me in. No effort was needed at following it as a shimmering halo took the whole space, soon becoming the only entity in existence. It was alive and luminous with the countless fibres of sublime energy and deep mesmerizing transparencies. There was no epithet encompassing enough to describe this entity and the powers it possessed; all the pronouns combined wouldn't be sufficient to correctly address what I have encountered because it was me, he, she, it, them and you at the same time. “Slide”, it said without saying, or rather an instant knowledge of myself commanding and obeying simultaneously. I immediately found myself inside one of the fibres, not that I was trapped, quite the opposite, I was everywhere at once, yet, I somehow chose to concentrate, or condense myself in that particular conduit, and off I went. A sensation of a free fall and gliding. At a breakneck speed I swam without effort inside the torrents of light. I saw oceans and mountains, stars, galaxies and universes pouring onto the stage of this incredible spectacle. The current took me nearer and further, and as if granted some special privilege at the performance of royal opera, it took me behind the curtain and introduced to every character who in turn have told me their remarkable stories. I knew everyone I witnessed, I knew all of them intimately and replied back to their stories with the music of light. Like small rivulets snaking between the tiny obstacles, these stories began to consolidate into one mighty stream ramming boulders and crushing barriers on its way. Rushing forward it continued to strengthen until gaining an absolute supremacy so that the banks themselves would open up giving way to its abundant flow. So great was its power that It didn't have to rush anymore and now flew gracefully carrying the immense ranges of this fidgety substance that people customary associate with life.

On one of the banks, knee-deep in the morning mist, stood a fisherman. You couldn't see his face and only his long white beard was showing from underneath the wide-brimmed conical straw hat. Very absorbed in the process this old man was that he didn't even turn when I sat next to him. He kept staring at a barely visible float bobbing down the river.

“The river flows slowly, yet everything is accomplished”, he said at last without looking at me. A pause had hung like a chunk of a lingering mist until float suddenly dipped tagging the fishing line through the layer of fog. He waited immobile for a second or two before nimbly striking his bamboo rod and masterly pulling out a shiny silver herring flopping around on the other end of a fishing line.

“Where will you go once you have arrived?”, he enquired seemingly from no one while taking the fish off the hook and throwing it in his bucket. “Want to see yourself?”, he asked casually, now prodding the bucket towards me. I didn't understand, but peeked inside the bucket. There was at least a dozen of fishes and this little herring on top, still flapping his tail and gasping for air. I looked closer and stunned as this herring was looking out at myself with my own eyes and face. An inner panic took hold, I lost ground and began to suffocate hopelessly gulping emptiness with the mouth wide open. Jumping up in convolutions and slapping myself mercilessly on the insides of the bucket, I glanced up in despair: two jade stones were starring at me through the veil of fog from underneath the wide-brimmed hat. The old man's eyes were the eyes of a stone fish glistening in a desolate light. “When you let go, you become”, he said as I was sinking into the opaque bottomless pits of his pupils. I sank deeper and deeper, until eventually releasing the grip on this ephemeral existence and allowing the last bit of self-consciousness to escape into the vastness of the old man's stare.

This was the end, the end in a human sense, or in a sense of me, self, mind, soul or anything at all you can name with an appropriate epithet. This has been duly dissolved, annihilated, disintegrated, done and dusted. However, the infinity cares not about the epithets, it knows no ending, no beginning and this is true, whether you agree or not. It has its own intricate and most incomprehensible ways, at least not to this finite and limited comprehension we commonly associate with reason. It has its own ways of diving into the mind-boggling depths, and yet, emerging again on top, fresh and anew. Infinity is such a thing that cares not about the differences or similarities, it sees no difference between the old and the new, the high and the low, the kind or the cruel, and in fact, it doesn't need to see at all: who needs this unpolished crude sight when even the gem of a foresight lies abandoned, gathering dust up in the attic? This dust holds the infinity inside each and every spec. Like crab trails, it protracts the elaborate passages laying out a maze of an astonishing complexity, and it is only a matter of imagination figuring out what makes the entrance and where leads the exit. In these trails roam the dissipated memories of those who dreamt, loved, aspired. They roam and mingle, bumping into each other, until they find themselves again and start whirling with joy bringing up a huge cloud of dust. This cloud flies wherever it wants, and when the dust settles it reveals the shape of those condensed and solidified memories. One of them had a shape of the city, it looked Hellenistic or Roman. I felt the urge to come close and enter inside. So I did.

Instantly I knew that I was sitting in the market, it was cold and I barely had any clothes on apart from the tattered robe and a travelling sack. People rushed by, busy talking and bargaining. I seemed to recognise their language, even though they must have spoken several completely different dialects. Some threw a coin, others a lump of bread into a wooden bowl that stood by my side. I got up and started to walk towards the harbour. The lighthouse towering across the bay gave an awe inspiring view reflecting the rays of the rising sun. The structure of magnificent splendour, truly deserving an admiration. At night its light is visible miles away from the sea, it beckons ships seeking harbour; at day, the curved mirror signals the approaching vessels with the beam of sunlight. Like the navigators of those ships, I've followed the light delivering here the cargo of still yet unknown content. Merchants have already flooded the Jewish quarter as I turned across from the wide Canopic boulevard. I knew the streets well although I must have looked like a stranger. I travelled many years from the land of Ashoka. Basking for a moment in warmth of the morning sunlight, I continued to walk towards the eastern bay passing close to the barracks and then strolling along the royal harbour. The moorings were already busy with many ships setting off and a many more ready to enter the bay. It was starting to get breezy and before the connecting mole I lurked into the adjacent gardens cutting through to the Mouseion. There I found a comfortable limestone bench and sat down facing the direction of Pharos. It was immensely peaceful despite the continuous noise brought by the wind from docks, only two streets up the front, and people walking up and down the massive stairs of the library immediately behind. As I fixed my sight on the gleaming sea, a bulky dark figure sat next to me on the right. I continued to stare in the distance.

The stranger spoke first: It is a good day today. I knew you would come.

Wonderer: Who are you?

Stranger: People call me Tresmigistus. To Masters I am Poemander.

Wanderer: How then do I call you?

Stranger: You don't need to call me; I am always where the seekers seek.

Wanderer: If I am a seeker, than what am I searching for?

Stranger: Your dream. Don't you remember? The emerald light you saw back in Baktria? You, the son of Sakai, long you have travelled seeking this Emerald Edifice in the land of Yonas. As in your dream, you have searched for it to inscribe the law of Dharma. Have you found it?

Wanderer: No, not yet.

Stranger: People grow sly and stubborn nowadays. They refuse to see the truth unless someone inscribes it for them, in blood. Socrates was the last, look what they've done to him. Euclid, right in this very same building, (Poimandres waved at the Mouseion behind us), had to encapsulate all inside the dodecahedron. Archimedes, right here, today, is squaring the circle. What for? Because for millennia people won't know anything better. People will live in the dark. We all knew this. They are working hard while the sun shines, to preserve what is available to all. The lights are getting dim. The mobs in their cowardice will burn the scrolls, but this fire won't give them the light. My poor Hypatia, they'll molest, torture and burn her on the stack right here (Poimandres pointed to the street towards the harbour). The lights will go off.

Wanderer: You named the great minds. What can I do? I am not worth their shadows.

Stranger: Mind without the vision is a ship without the skipper. A skillful shipwright builds a seaworthy vessel, as today so tomorrow, but you, yourself, will have to sail it. Like this beacon (Pimandres pointed towards Pharos), I can shine the light, but I cannot make you see. I shone the light and you followed. So, be the light-keeper in the mind of darkness! Kindle this light and bear it through the night until one day someone's ready to take the notice.

Wanderer: I shall carry your light, but what is my lot? Where do I go?

Stranger: Your lot is my lot. We're rowing down the same river. I ventured downstream, I met the ocean. Now is your turn. Go ahead and plot the course, then return and tell people what you have witnessed, guide them. Be the pilot in the tides of time!

Wanderer: I shall go and I shall tell, but what if they don't believe me?

Stranger: Believing is throwing sand in a raging bull. To hit the bullseye you need a bow of unwavering patience, a string tightened with daring and an arrow sharpened by intent. Be the archer in the woods of wisdom! Take these scrolls (Poemander extended the scrolls that he was keeping in this left hand), inscribe them on the emerald tablets, infuse them with patience, and when the time is right, shoot your arrow straight through millennia into the daring hearts as fresh as my maiden's tear. This is my intent.

On saying this the stranger placed the scrolls in my open palm squeezing it lightly. I immediately felt the numbing wave spreading over my veins as if they have been imbued with the liquid lead. I turned my head to look at my benefactor, but there was no one. I had no scrolls either; however, I had an absolute clarity and knew exactly what to do. I stood up and went straight towards the harbour.

Long have I sat in the deep cave in the Taurus Mountains. Many things came to fruition, still more have perished, not excluding those that came to fruition. Yet I waited patiently, waited silently until the waiting itself has given up and only the patience remained tightly curled into a deeply cocooned silence. The body was dead, the mind was dead, yet the patience remained alive: the anachronistic moth fluttering above the mummified corpse. It flutters hither and thither, spreading the ancient dust. It, itself, is dust – the patience incarnate, made from the very essence of time. How many times have you seen the decay and have you seen yourself being decayed? If you did, then you must have noticed that the structure of things, not excluding your dear-self, is made of these dust-moths. They hang onto the translucent fabric of meaning, gnaw it, chew it, and when it is duly consumed they have nothing more to hold onto; they fly in all directions, like little fairies, sprinkling everywhere the almost magical, primordial dust.

There were visitors, not many. They came seeking truth, looking for inspiration. However, my truth was nothing but a thick layer of dust covering the Tresmigistus's tablets and the only inspiration available was made of prolonged silence. Nevertheless, they have rightly received what they were coming for – wisdom. Because wisdom isn't something inscribed in the tablets which I have warded with care, but is immanent in their own intentions. Of them built I the emerald edifice with the luminous fibres of deep mesmerising transparency. Of them I sharpened my arrows and shot them across the aeons piercing the hearts of the daring. And as you read this, heed, one of my arrows was pointed at you.

Age has no wisdom, nor the wisdom has the age. Both are made of dust, except the wisdom knows this first. And when my arrows fly past, wisdom takes heed from the cloud of dust they rise and bides its time, whereas the age is busy erecting barriers not knowing that my arrow is already being embedded in its core. And knows the age not that there wouldn't be any core if not for the solid, piercing intent of my arrow.

I too was biding my time, this cleansing mechanism, a washing machine, spinning the dirty rags of knowledge, civilization, culture. And each cycle makes them more stretched, uglier and distorted. Old stains are getting bleaker and gradually covered with the newer marks, blemishes and spills. But no one goes naked, they simply put up with these filthy rags, just because everyone else does. And, lo, god forbear you do otherwise. You dress your kids in them and teach them to be proud of it, and so they do to their progeny. The cycle continues, and one day you'll pull out your washing to discover that there is not much fabric left; nevertheless, you'll put them on and go on the street just to find to your amusement that everyone else wears nothing but a sheer nakedness. This is the function of time – to thin the layers of your dress and reveal everyone's true-self.

And after I shot all my arrows, I myself had become an arrow. I flew through times and embedded myself deeply in what is to become a new cycle. I sat there content, not allowing a minuscule thought to interrupt the radiating impulses of nascent potential. And when the time was right the sea came crashing with the strong undertow pulling me into the funnel of daylight. Waters dried and the magical aether went rushing into expanding lungs. A cry, people in jade masks, soft bosom and the painfully familiar tear-flooded emerald eyes were gazing down at me with indicating kindness. It was warm, it smelled mother, it was all I had and nothing else was needed.