Written by
Rg Gregory |
(an ascetic poem for karen's birthday)
fancy having a birthday on a thursday
when you do the buying of the doughnuts
and others lick their sticky fingers
thinking good old karen letting
us share the eating of her birthday
not me of course - i sit at home (alone)
reflecting it is purification day
today and i do not have a doughnut
thank you karen for letting me have
a taste of self-denial on your birthday
and such a spiritual gain- in this way
you and i share the high-church position
while others lick the sugar off their lips
guzzling their souls away benightedly
with you great circe in your birthday play
luckily i have no envy of doughnuts
i sit here (alone) appreciating the pure
a step aside from doughy lust and greed
enjoying your birthday in its proper light
-a time of abstinence starvation longing
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Written by
Rg Gregory |
in my reading of the moment i have learned
the figure next to christ in da vinci’s last supper
(a painting i have actually seen in a milan church
fragilely restored) is a woman – an honour earned
by mary magdalene who (according to research)
turns out to be christ’s wife – hang on what a whopper
cry those who can’t contemplate centuries of teaching
down the drain – who suck up to the precious thought
of divine purity (eternity’s abstention from all
the dirty business of the body) pasteurising preaching
let christ stay a product of the time before the fall
(da vinci had a darkness different from what’s taught)
mona lisa (amon-isis) – enigmatic smile and code
for male and female balance – offensive to the powers
that ran the bible their way (hoodwinked future ages)
turned the bright sun black to mask the path they strode
wrapped their ascetic bloodstreams in the holy pages
before which (even today) the congregation cowers
da vinci was an artist scientist (probably a necromancer)
had his own black sun – dabbled in the anti-matter
that official truth hates (creates) – that nurtures riddles
through passageways that breed the ill-reputed answer
(soiled honour’s defence against sly caesar’s fiddles)
hissing its way lightwards through conspiracy chatter
christ had a woman at his right hand – locked together
(so da vinci had the painting say) like the letter m
the rumoured whore redeemed – the partner siamesed
into the one flesh – sharing the equal tragic tether
the whole edifice of the holy roman church teased
into collapse – virginal rose snapped at the stem
not that it seemed to make a difference – the vatican
still had its glory years ahead (its gory inquisitions)
da vinci stayed honoured in the breeches the word advanced
though its priests wore skirts – the brutality of man
multiplied its converts (scientifically enhanced)
not one power in the world changed its dirty dispositions
yesterday was aeons ago – tomorrow’s loath to come
no one really cares if magdalene was wife or whore
da vinci is someone to gawp at – all’s mutable (unreal)
what’s truth - we still know bugger-all (live by rule of thumb)
so educatedly dumb can’t trust what we think know feel
a thriller brought this on – half opened a not-there door
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Written by
Rabindranath Tagore |
At midnight the would-be ascetic
announced:
"This is the time to give up my
home and seek for God. Ah, who has
held me so long in delusion here?"
God whispered, "I," but the ears
of the man were stopped.
With a baby asleep at her breast
lay his wife, peacefully sleeping on
one side of the bed.
The man said, "Who are ye that
have fooled me so long?"
The voice said again, "They are
God," but he heard it not.
The baby cried out in its dream,
nestling close to its mother.
God commanded, "Stop, fool, leave
not thy home," but still he heard not.
God sighed and complained, "Why
does my servant wander to seek me,
forsaking me?"
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Written by
Constantine P Cavafy |
Said Myrtias (a Syrian student
in Alexandria; in the reign of
Augustus Constans and Augustus Constantius;
in part a pagan, and in part a christian);
"Fortified by theory and study,
I shall not fear my passions like a coward.
I shall give my body to sensual delights,
to enjoyments dreamt-of,
to the most daring amorous desires,
to the lustful impulses of my blood, without
any fear, for whenever I want --
and I shall have the will, fortified
as I shall be by theory and study --
at moments of crisis I shall find again
my spirit, as before, ascetic."
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Written by
G K Chesterton |
If I had been a Heathen,
I'd have praised the purple vine,
My slaves should dig the vineyards,
And I would drink the wine.
But Higgins is a Heathen,
And his slaves grow lean and grey,
That he may drink some tepid milk
Exactly twice a day.
If I had been a Heathen,
I'd have crowned Neaera's curls,
And filled my life with love affairs,
My house with dancing girls;
But Higgins is a Heathen,
And to lecture rooms is forced,
Where his aunts, who are not married,
Demand to be divorced.
If I had been a Heathen,
I'd have sent my armies forth,
And dragged behind my chariots
The Chieftains of the North.
But Higgins is a Heathen,
And he drives the dreary quill,
To lend the poor that funny cash
That makes them poorer still.
If I had been a Heathen,
I'd have piled my pyre on high,
And in a great red whirlwind
Gone roaring to the sky;
But Higgins is a Heathen,
And a richer man than I:
And they put him in an oven,
Just as if he were a pie.
Now who that runs can read it,
The riddle that I write,
Of why this poor old sinner,
Should sin without delight—
But I, I cannot read it
(Although I run and run),
Of them that do not have the faith,
And will not have the fun.
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Written by
Rabindranath Tagore |
Take back your coins, King's Councillor. I am of those women you
sent to the forest shrine to decoy the young ascetic who had never
seen a women. I failed in your bidding.
Dimly day was breaking when the hermit boy came to bathe in
the stream, his tawny locks crowded on his shoulders, like a
cluster of morning clouds, and his limbs shining like a streak of
sunbeam. We laughed and sang as we rowed in our boat; we jumped
into the river in a mad frolic, and danced around him, when the sun
rose staring at us from the water's edge in a flush of divine
anger.
Like a child-god, the boy opened his eyes and watched our
movements, the wonder deepening till his eyes shone like morning
stars. He lifted his clasped hands and chanted a hymn of praise in
his bird-like young voice, thrilling every leaf of the forest.
Never such words were sung to a mortal woman before; they were like
the silent hymn to the dawn which rises from the hushed hills. THe
women hid their mouths with their hands, their bodies swaying with
laughter, and a spasm of doubt ran across his face. Quickly came
I to his side, sorely pained, and, bowing to his feet, I said,
"Lord, accept my service."
I led him to the grassy bank, wiped his body with the end of
my silken mantle, and, kneeling on the ground, I dried his feet
with my trailing hair. When I raised my face and looked into his
eyes, I thought I felt the world's first kiss to the first woman,
-Blessed am I, blessed is God, who made me a woman. I heard him say
to me, "What God unknown are you? YOur touch is the touch of the
Immortal, your eyes have the mystery of the midnight."
Ah, no, not that smile, King's Councillor, -the dust of
worldly wisdom has covered your sight, old man. But this boy's
innocence pierced the mist and saw the shining truth, the woman
divine....
The women clapped their hands, and laughed their obscene
laugh, and with veils dragged on the dust and hair hanging loose
they began to pelt him with flowers.
Alas, my spotless sun, could not my shame weave fiery mist to
cover you in its folds? I fell at his feet and cried, "Forgive me.
" I fled like a stricken deer through shade and sun, and cried as
I fled, " Forgive me. " The women's foul laughter pressed me like
a cracking fire, but the words ever rang in my ears, " What God
unknown are you?"
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Written by
Emily Dickinson |
Besides the Autumn poets sing
A few prosaic days
A little this side of the snow
And that side of the Haze --
A few incisive Mornings --
A few Ascetic Eves --
Gone -- Mr. Bryant's "Golden Rod" --
And Mr. Thomson's "sheaves."
Still, is the bustle in the Brook --
Sealed are the spicy valves --
Mesmeric fingers softly touch
The Eyes of many Elves --
Perhaps a squirrel may remain --
My sentiments to share --
Grant me, Oh Lord, a sunny mind --
Thy windy will to bear!
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Written by
Edgar Lee Masters |
How did you feel, you libertarians,
Who spent your talents rallying noble reasons
Around the saloon, as if Liberty
Was not to be found anywhere except at the bar
Or at a table, guzzling?
How did you feel, Ben Pantier, and the rest of you,
Who almost stoned me for a tyrant,
Garbed as a moralist,
And as a wry-faced ascetic frowning upon Yorkshire pudding,
Roast beef and ale and good will and rosy cheer --
Things you never saw in a grog-shop in your life?
How did you feel after I was dead and gone,
And your goddess, Liberty, unmasked as a strumpet,
Selling out the streets of Spoon River
To the insolent giants
Who manned the saloons from afar?
Did it occur to you that personal liberty
Is liberty of the mind,
Rather than of the belly?
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Written by
Rabindranath Tagore |
No, my friends, I shall never be an
ascetic, whatever you may say.
I shall never be and ascetic if she
does not take the vow with me.
It is my firm resolve that if I
cannot find a shady shelter and a
companion for my penance, I shall
never turn ascetic.
No, my friends, I shall never leave
my hearth and home, and retire into
the forest solitude, if rings no merry
laughter in its echoing shade and if
the end of no saffron mantle flutters
in the wind; if its silence is not
deepened by soft whispers.
I shall never be an ascetic.
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Written by
George William Russell |
ON the bird of air blue-breasted glint the rays of gold,
And its shadowy fleece above us waves the forest old,
Far through rumorous leagues of midnight stirred by breezes warm.
See the old ascetic yonder, ah, poor withered form,
Where he crouches wrinkled over by unnumbered years
Through the leaves the flakes of moon-fire fall like phantom tears.
At the dawn a kingly hunter swept in proud disdain,
Like a rainbow torrent scattered flashed his royal train.
Now the lonely one unheeded seeks earth’s caverns dim:
Never king or prince will robe them radiantly as him
’Mid the deep enfolding darkness follow him, O seer,
Where the arrow will is piercing fiery sphere on sphere,
Through the blackness leaps and sparkles gold and amethyst,
Curling, jetting, and dissolving in a rainbow mist.
In the jewel glow and lunar radiance rises there
One, a morning star in beauty, young, immortal, fair:
Sealed in heavy sleep, the spirit leaves its faded dress,
Unto fiery youth returning out of weariness.
Music as for one departing, joy as for a king,
Sound and swell, and hark! above him cymbals triumphing.
Fire, an aureole encircling, suns his brow with gold,
Like to one who hails the morning on the mountains old.
Open mightier vistas, changing human loves to scorns,
And the spears of glory pierce him like a crown of thorns.
High and yet more high to freedom as a bird he springs,
And the aureole outbreathing, gold and silver wings
Plume the brow and crown the seraph: soon his journey done
He will pass our eyes that follow, sped beyond the sun.
None may know the mystic radiance, King, will there be thine,
Far beyond the light enfolded in the dark divine.
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