|
When you look deeply enough, you find
there is no one there,
and you come to recognize
that no one is you.
* * *
In Tim Farrington's novel, The Monk Downstairs, the former Brother Christopher replies to Brother James, who remains a monk at the monastery just left by the former, after over 20 years there. Brother James has expressed concern over the sudden departure of Christopher, interested in exploring the fidelity, or lack thereof, of the former monk to his vocation and faith. Christopher writes...
And what have I become? You ask what prayer is for me now? ... There is a prayer that is simply seeing through yourself, seeing your own nothingness, the emptiness impervious to self-assertion. A prayer that is the end of the rope. A helplessness, fathomless and terrifying. No matter how holy or well meaning you were when you started out, no matter how many fine experiences you had along the way, by the time you reach the point of this prayer, you want only to get out.
And God? God is that which will not let you out of it.
Do you see my point? I am a ruined man.
* * *
Prayer is dangerous ~
I mean Prayer
not the mechanical repetition of rote prayers
or the common bargaining with God
I mean Prayer, pure Prayer,
when you keep exposing yourself totally
saying, "Look, see all of me"
and you are left naked, alone before the Alone
that Prayer, the sages have taught,
is a way to lose your way, to lose yourself
Silence takes you to the moving rim of the still Void
where you stand alone, tremulous, unseeing, unknowing,
feeling unseen and unknown
the divine Darkness, at the rim, begins to descend
veiling the senses and God with a blinding Light
such Prayer has a momentum, like a whirl pool,
and, before you know it, you are under, submerged in Night
the danger of Prayer is this getting totally lost
yet, in this lostness one is found, the Way shows itself
presence meets Presence in arid absence, confounding anonymity
one being passive, found by another, the Other ~ "Grace!"
I, like many, have risked the danger of Prayer beyond prayer
and, like them, I am glad I was pulled into the Void, where lives Love
Yes, Prayer is dangerous
and we are drawn to it ~
to the tremulous moment at the rim, just before the falling in
we long to feel this risk of Prayer
to be ruined by this holy Encounter... Why?
to be seen, fully, and accepted totally
to be loved, wholly, with unconditional grace
for the bliss of forgetfulness, weary of our false identities
for the joy of remembering who we are, celebrating our true Name
*(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2018.
*Move cursor over photos for details of copyright owner, title, and source.
|
