I yearn profoundly for a simpler time,
however distant it may seem;
a time begotten by a foolish dream.
I speak of a sweet fragrance lingering in the air
and vibrant meadows stretching across the land
and birds on high singing in the tongue of Peace.
I remember being there before,
when I was not yet me.
I now wish to see this unseen land just once more.
But it is not a childish sentiment that stirs inside my core;
in the hollowness of the dark there is something more.
There is a voice calling me from the depths of my being,
resonating within my every bone,
in the darkness, where there is no hope of seeing,
saying relentlessly, but with a graceful tone:
“No less than one's life is needed
if the call of the Distant One is to be heeded.”
I don't know You, still
and if I could know You
I'd wonder if You'd be real.
But I am speaking out of turn,
for You are nothing if not Truth and Way;
it would remain so even if this world were to burn on this mournful day.
Mayhap I am the one standing in the distance,
while You were always Here;
if that is so I pray that only You I may feel –
next to You it is I who was never real.
And if I meet You on the morrow,
even if I greet you with the deepest sorrow,
and in the shadow of my eyes there remains no glee,
please be kind as only You can be.
No words would be needed if we were to meet face to Face,
even if I were to vanish at the end of our embrace.
You would meet me as if Me were You,
could I then be audacious enough to remember that I was once You?
If I could only – and I speak this with a tremble – repose in your Presence
for a moment – and this is the great existential gamble – I know I could never not be
even if I were no longer me.
I will not presume to name You on this sordid and blessed night,
for you are always more and less than everything there is;
I only hope that You shall grant me a semblance of Your majestic sight,
so that I may for a fleeting second see that which is not to be seen
and that which is true and which is not to be covered with a sheen.
I am filled with awe and with dread at the thought of Your Name,
which I cannot speak, because a word spoken never stays the same.
And in You there is no change;
You are always both forthcoming and strange,
unlike me.
But even if I say “You” and even if I say “me”,
what is that but a name I do not yet fully see?
So I implore You – a beggar undeserving of being Me –
that You, in Your Abundance, give me Your Eyes to see.
I would then know that
there is no You, nor is there me.
Only then, as One, could we both – You and Me – truly Be.
