Month: February 2012

The moment that I closed my eyes a vision of celestial glory burst upon me. I stood on the silver strand of a translucent, boundless lake, across whose bosom I seemed to have been just transported. A short way up the beach, a temple, modeled like the Parthenon, lifted its spotless and gleaming columns of alabaster sublimely into a rosy air — like the Parthenon, yet as much excelling it as the godlike ideal of architecture must transcend the ideal realized by man. – Fitz Hugh Ludlow – The Hasheesh Eater

(Eugene Delacroix-The Women of Algiers)

Be Sure To Visit Our New Site On Tumblr!: EarthRites

I am pretty excited about the new site, It has a certain off the cuff feeling to postings. It does involve some of the same thought patterns as Turfing, but the feel of it is different.

I am stretching my wings as of late with new art projects, which will appear here soon. I am getting ready for future art shows, and will have many new prints soon!

On This Entry:
So here is part 2 of The Hasheesh Eater. I have included some quotes from The Hasheesh Eater Being Passages From The Life Of A Pythagorean – Fitz Hugh Ludlow… Which I discovered in the mid 70′s from the wonderful edition published by Michael Horowitz & Cynthia Palmer Illustrated by the late great Wilfred Sätty. (I still have my copy!) This of course is not the same, but a good companion to the article at hand.

We have some great Epigrams from Nossis, Music from Elizabeth Fraser and Art from various Orientalist. I hope you enjoy this edition!

Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm
~~
On The Menu:
The Links
Elizabeth Fraser – Underwater
Cannabis Quotes
Nossis – The 12 Epigrams
The Hasheesh Eater Part 2
Elizabeth Fraser – Moses
Art: Various Orientalist
~~~~~~
The Links:
All machine and no ghost?
Teller Reveals His Secrets
WikiLeaks: Leaked Emails Expose Inner Workings of Private Intelligence Firm Stratfor, a “Shadow CIA”
Saudi Journalist Faces Threats from Militants
~~~~~~
Elizabeth Fraser – Underwater

~~~~~~
Cannabis Quotes:

“Hashish will be, indeed, for the impressions and familiar thoughts of the man, a mirror which magnifies, yet no more than a mirror.”
– Charles Baudelaire, The Poem of Hashish

“The Scythians take kannabis seed, creep in under the felts, and throw it on the red-hot stones. It smolders and sends up such billows of steam-smoke that no Greek vapor bath can surpass it. The Scythians howl with joy in these vapor-baths, which serve them instead of bathing, for they never wash their bodies with water.”
– Herodotus, Histories IV

“Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.”
– Harry J. Anslinger, Federal Bureau of Narcotics Chief, 1929

“May 12-13: Sowed Hemp at Muddy hole by Swamp. August 7: Began to separate the Male from the Female at Do – rather too late.”
– George Washington, Diary

So long as large sums of money are involved – and they are bound to be if drugs are illegal – it is literally impossible to stop the traffic, or even to make a serious reduction in its scope.”
– Milton Friedman, Economist, Nobel prize winner, “Tyranny of the Status Quo”

“Marijuana is rejected all over the world. Damned. In England heroin is alright for out-patients, but marijuana? They’ll put your ass in jail. I wonder why that is? The only reason could be: To Serve the Devil – Pleasure! Pleasure, which is a dirty word in Christian culture.”
– Lenny Bruce
~~~~~~
Nossis – The 12 Epigrams
(Nossis’ surviving work)

Nothing is sweeter than Love; every other joy
is second to it: even the honey I spit from my mouth.
Thus Nossis says: and who didn’t love Kypris,
knows nothing of what sort of roses her flowers are.
~~

Away from the wretched shoulders threw these shields the Bruttium men,
beaten in the fray by the Locrians fast in the fight,
now, laid down in the temple, devote hymns to their bravery,
neither regret the arms of the cowards left without them.
~~

Holy Hera you who often descend from the heavens
visit your Lacinian sanctuary sweet-scented with incense,
accept the byssus cloak which Teofilis, daughter of Kleochas,
wove for you with Nossis, her noble daughter.
~~

Artemis, which reign over Delos and over the lovable Ortygia,
put back in the lap of the Charites the bow and the arrows intact,
purify your body in the waters of the Inopus and come
to the house of Alketis, to free her from the difficult labour pains.
~~

With pleasure Aphrodite received the lovable offering
of the small bonnet which wound the head of Samyta:
It’s really of exquisite workmanship and it gently smells of the nectar
with which the goddess sprinkles the handsome Adonis.
~~

There she is, Melinna in person! Look her lovely countenance
seems to turn to us the glance gently sweet;
really for all the daughter looks like the mother.
It’s wonderful that the children look like their parents.
~~

Even from afar the effigy of Sabetides
appears recognizable, full of style and majesty.
Give yourself up to gaze at her: you seem to see
her sweetness and her wisdom. Praise to you, wonderful woman!
~~

Pass by over me with a ringing laugh, and then tell me
a friend word: I am Rinthon, the one of Syracuse.
A small nightingale of the Muses; from the tragic phliaxes
I was able to pick an ivy different and mine.
~~

Stranger, if you sail to Mitylene, land of beautiful dances,
to catch there the most out of Sappho’s graces,
tell that I was loved by the Muses, and that the Locrian land bore me
My name remember is Nossis. Now go!
~~

Arrived in front of the temple we gaze at this statue of Aphrodite
embellished by a dress embroidered with gold.
Polyarchis offered it, having made out a large fortune
from the beauty of her own body.
~~

The little picture shows the beautiful figure of Taumareta:
represented with skill the proud grace of the girl with the delicate eyelash
The dog watching the house could wag her tail
seeing you, believing you her own mistress.
~~

In the temple of the blonde Aphrodite Kallò dedicated this picture
painted with a portrait exactly alike her.
What a tidy attitude! And which grace pervades her!
Hail! Of all your life nothing could be blamed.
~~~~~~

~~~~~~
The Hasheesh Eater Part 2
Anonymous

(Leon Francois Comerre – Odalisque)

Putnam’s Magazine
September 1856
After that, I hastened wildly over earth, across many countries, and through many successive aaes, alone always, avoided always, an object of fear, of horror, of incredible detestation. Every one that saw me, knew me, and fled from my presence, even to certain death, if that were necessary, to evade my contact. I saw men of Gomorrah rush back into the flames of their perishing city, when they beheld me coming humbly to meet them. Egyptians, who had barely escaped from the Red Sea, leaped again into the foaming waters as I ran torward them along the shore. Everywhere that I went, populations, even of mighty cities, scattered from my track, like locusts rising in hurried flight before the feet of a camel. The loneliest shipwrecked sailor, on the most savage island of the sea, fled from his hut of reeds, and plunged into untracked and serpent-haunted marshes at the sight of my supplicating visage. Unable to obtain the companionship of men, I at last sought that of wild beasts and reptiles — of the gods of ancient mythology, and the monsters of fairydom; but, all to no purpose. The crocodiles buried themselves in the mid-current of the nile, as I stealthily approached its banks. I unavailingly chased the terrified speed of tigers and anacondas through the stifling heat of the jungles of Bengal. Memnon arose from his throne, and hid himself in the clouds, when he saw me kneeling at his granite feet. I followed in vain the sublime flight of Odin over the polar snows and ice-islands of both hemispheres. Satyrs hid from me; dragons and gorgons avoided me. The very ants and insects disappeared from my presence, taking refuge in dead trunks, and in the bowels of the earth. My punishment was constant and fearful — it was greater than I could bear; yet, I bore it for ages. I tried in many ways to escape from it by death; but always unsuccessfully. I sought to fling myself down precipices, but an unseen power drew me back; I endeavored to drown myself in the sea, but the billows upheld me, like a feather. It was not remorse that prompted me to these attempts at self-destruction. Remorse, penitence, and every other noble emotion had been swallowed up in mere anguish under the dreadfulness of my punishment. Sometimes I could not believe that all this was a reality, and struggled with wild, but useless ragings to break the dreadful presence of horror. At other times I felt convinced of its perfect truth; because I saw that the punishment was exactly suited to the offense, and that it reproved, with astonishing directness, that unsocial and almost misanthropic spirit which I had so long encouraged by my habits of life and temper of thought. Thus, dragging about with me a ghastly immortality, I wandered through miserable year after year, through desolation after desolation, until I stood once more on the deck of the steamer to Marseilles. now I again performed my journey homeward, passing, as before, through a succession of steamers, railroads, and diligences. But the steamers were empty; for the passengers and sailors leaped overboard at my appearance: and the vessel reeled on unguided, through wild, lonely seas that I knew not. Just in the same manner, every one fled before me from the rail-cars; and, through deserted plains and valleys, I arrived, at headlong speed, in great cities, as the only passenger. My diligence journeys were performed without companion, or conductor, or postillion, in shattering vehicles, drawn by horses which flew in the very lunacy of fright. Paris was a solitude When I entered it — without man, and without inhabitant, and without beast — silence in its streets, in its galleries, and in its palaces — the sentinels all fled from the gates, and the children from the gardens.

At last I arrived at the entrance of my native city; and now I hoped that in presence of this familiar spot my vision would break; but it did not, and so I paused in a most miserable stupor of despair. It was early dawn, and the sky was yet gray; nor had many people arisen from their sleep. I heard dogs barking in the streets, and birds singing in the orchards; but, as always, neither the one race nor the other ventured near the spot where I stood. I sat down behind a thicket, where I could see the road, but could not be seen from it, and wept for an hour over my terrible misery. It was the first time that tears had come to soften my terrible punishment; for, hitherto my anguish had been desperate and sullen, or wild and blasphemous; but now I wept easily, with some feeling of tender penitence, and speechless supplication. I looked wistfully down the street, longing to enter the town, yet dreading to see the universal terror which I knew would spread through the inhabitants the moment I stepped in among them.

At last persons began to pass me; chiefly, I believe, workmen, or market people; but among them were some whose faces I had seen before. I cannot describe the thrill of tremulous, fearful, painful pleasure with which I looked from so near upon these familiar human countenances. How I longed, yet dreaded, to have one of them turn his eyes upon me. At last I said to myself: “These people know of my crime; perhaps they will not fly from me, and will only kill me.”

I stepped out suddenly in front of a couple of ruddy countrymen, who were driving a market-cart from the city, and fell on my knees, with my hands uplifted toward their faces. For a moment they stared at me in ghastly horror, then, wheeling their rearing horse, they lashed him into violent flight. I rose in desperation, in fury, and, with the steps of a greyhound, leaped after them through streets now resonant with human footsteps. Oh, the wild terror! oh, the agonized shrieking! oh, the wide confusion! and oh, the swift vanishing of all life which marked my passage! I hastened on, panting, stamping, screaming, foaming in the uttermost extremity of despair and anguish, until I reached the house where my darling had once lived. As I neared the steps, I saw a person whom I knew to be Harry. He did not shriek and fly at my approach, but met me and looked me steadily in the face. His eyes, at first, were full of inquiry; but, in a moment, he seemed to gather the whole truth from my visage; and then, with a terrible tremor of abhorrence, he drew a pistol from his bosom. “It is right, Harry,” I said; “kill me, as I killed her.”

But with a quick motion which I could not arrest, he placed the muzzle to his own temple, drew the trigger, and fell a disfigured corpse at my feet. I howled as if I were a wild beast, and sprang over him into the door-way. I saw Ellen and her father and mother flying with uplifted hands out of the other end of the passage. I did not follow them, but turned into the parlor where I had committed my crime; and there, to my amazement, I saw Ida lying on the sofa in the same position in which I had left her; her head fallen backward, her eyes closed, her throat hidden by her long hair, and her hands clasped upon her bosom. On the floor lay my knife still open, just as it had fallen. I picked it up and passed my finger over the keen edge of the blade muttering: “Now, I know that all this is real; now I can kill myself, for this is the time and the place to die.”

Just as I was placing the knife to my throat, I saw a sweet smile stealing over Ida’s lips. She has become a seraph, I thought, and is smiling to see the eternal glory. But, suddenly, as I looked at her for this last time, she opened her eyes on me, and over her mouth stole that sweet pleading expression which was the outward sign of her gentle spirit. “Stop, Edward!” she cried, earnestly; and springing up, she caught my hand firmly, although I could feel that her own trembled. In that moment, my horrible dream began to fade from me, and I gazed around no longer utterly blinded by the hazes of the hasheesh demon. She was not harmed, then! No, and I was not her murderer; no, and I had not been the loathing of mankind. Nothing of the whole scene had been real, except her slumber on the sofa, and the knife which I held in my hand. I hung it fiercely from me; for I thought of what I might have done with it had my madness been only a little more persistent and positive. Then, struck by a sudden thought, half suspicion and half comprehension, I ran to the front door-way. Harry was not, indeed, lying there in his blood; but he was there, nevertheless, upright and in full health; and we exchanged a delighted greeting before the rest of the family could reach him.

“Why, Harry,” said the doctor, in the parlor again, “that was a most interesting substance you sent us — that hasheesh. I have made an extraordinary experiment with it upon Edward here. He muttered wonders for an hour or two in my study. He then went to sleep, and I missed him about two minutes ago. I really had no idea that he had come to.”

That closing dream of crime and punishment, then, had passed through my brain in less than two minutes; and I had been standing by the sleeping form of my little girl all the time that I seemed to be wandering through that eternity of horror.

“What!” said Harry, “has Edward gone back to the hasheesh again?”

“Yes,” I replied; “but I have taken my last dose, my dear fellow. With your permission, doctor, I will pitch that infernal drug into the fire.”

“Really,” said the doctor, “I–I–don’t know. I should like to reserve a few doses for experiments.”

“Oh! don’t throw it away,” urged Ellen. “It is such fun. Edward has been saying such queer things.”

“Where is it?” asked Harry resolutely. “I will settle that question.”

“It is in the fire, brother,” replied Ida. “I threw it there half an hour ago.”

I raised the little girl’s hand to my lips and kissed it; and since then I have taken no other hasheesh than such as that.
~~~~~~
Elizabeth Fraser – Moses

~~~~~~
They were all clad in flowing robes, like God’s high-priests, and each one held in his hand a lyre of unearthly workmanship. Presently one stops midway down a shady walk, and, baring his right arm, begins a prelude. While his celestial chords were trembling up into their sublime fullness, another strikes his strings, and now they blend upon my ravished ear in such a symphony as was never heard elsewhere, and I shall never hear again out of the Great Presence. A moment more, and three are playing in harmony; now the fourth joins the glorious rapture of his music to their own, and in the completeness of the chord my soul is swallowed up. I can bear no more. But yes, I am sustained, for suddenly the whole throng break forth in a chorus, upon whose wings I am lifted out of the riven walls of sense, and music and spirit thrill in immediate communion. – Fitz Hugh Ludlow – The Hasheesh Eater

(Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres – Odalisque with a Slave(

(Gaetano Previati – Women Smoking Hashish)

Sunday Afternoon:
Mary is away with a friend, Rowan is filming and I occupy the house alone.

I put this edition together over the last week, a bit slow on the draw and all, but it has some good elements to it. From recordings of Donovan that I never heard, to Anne Waldman finally gracing our pages with poetry, to tales of Hasheesh… It is all here.

I hope you enjoy!

Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm
~~

On The Menu:
The Links
Poetry: Anne Waldman
Donovan – Live 1967 Anaheim – Sand and Foam
The Hasheesh Eater Part 1
Donovan – Live 1967 Anaheim – The Lullaby of Spring
Art:Various
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Links Of Interest:
Art Palettes Of The Masters For Artist
HR. Giger Retrospective At Fantastic Visions
The Problem With Beliefs
The Rebel Clown Army Manifesto
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Poetry: Anne Waldman

“Thy” of No Dire Greenhouse Effect

Yea tho I am walking
yea tho I walk forever in thy direction which is thy “thyness”
yea tho thy “thyness” be friendly
that it be no shadow, that it be no death
yea that thy “thy” be willing, be aura, be oracular
yea that “thyness” be without gender without godhead
godhead is no way to be walking towards “thy”
thy is no kingdom come
thy is no purple privileged glory
thy is no flag, no rod, no scepter, no staff of brutality
thy is no random particle
thy is a kind site of no dire greenhouse effect
thy is a place with conscientious war tribunals
they is of mercy and follows all the days of tracking war criminals
thy is the hours of constant tracking
thy will keep you awake in any time zone tracking
because thy is observation, is a current affair, is tracking “thy”
thy goes back to any older time you mention
a time the increments of language were simpler, were strange
thy was a module, thy was a repository
thy was a canticle for future discipleship
thy is architecture, thy is the entire book for the things of “thy”
thy is a book of thy “thyness” which is not owned
can you guess the “thy” in all the days of my defiance
yea tho I fear thy terror of “thy” amnesia, thy negligence
yea tho it stalks me in the valley
yea that it beseeches me to lighten up
yea tho it behooves me to abdicate “thy”
I will keep the sleep of ancient times
of Arcady of the holy cities where thy hides
thy could be done, thy could be stationary in any language
and then thy could be moving as I do in pursuit of sanity
that they track the war profiteers
that they track the war criminals
that they track the murderers
who slaughter innocents
that they are exposed in the market place
that they are brought to justice.
~~
A Phonecall from Frank O’Hara

“That all these dyings may be life in death”

I was living in San Francisco
My heart was in Manhattan
It made no sense, no reference point
Hearing the sad horns at night,
fragile evocations of female stuff
The 3 tones (the last most resonant)
were like warnings, haiku-muezzins at dawn
The call came in the afternoon
“Frank, is that really you?”

I’d awake chilled at dawn
in the wooden house like an old ship
Stay bundled through the day
sitting on the stoop to catch the sun
I lived near the park whose deep green
over my shoulder made life cooler
Was my spirit faltering, grown duller?
I want to be free of poetry’s ornaments,
its duty, free of constant irritation,
me in it, what was grander reason
for being? Do it, why? (Why, Frank?)
To make the energies dance etc.

My coat a cape of horrors
I’d walk through town or
impending earthquake. Was that it?
Ominous days. Street shiny with
hallucinatory light on sad dogs,
too many religious people, or a woman
startled me by her look of indecision
near the empty stadium
I walked back spooked by
my own darkness
Then Frank called to say
“What? Not done complaining yet?
Can’t you smell the eucalyptus,
have you never neared the Pacific?
‘While frank and free/call for
musick while your veins swell’”
he sang, quoting a metaphysician
“Don’t you know the secret, how to
wake up and see you don’t exist, but
that does, don’t you see phenomena
is so much more important than this?
I always love that.”
“Always?” I cried, wanting to believe him
“Yes.” “But say more! How can you if
it’s sad & dead?” “But that’s just it!
If! It isn’t. It doesn’t want to be
Do you want to be?” He was warming to his song
“Of course I don’t have to put up with as
much as you do these days. These years.
But I do miss the color, the architecture,
the talk. You know, it was the life!
And dying is such an insult. After all
I was in love with breath and I loved
embracing those others, the lovers,
with my body.” He sighed & laughed
He wasn’t quite as I’d remembered him
Not less generous, but more abstract
Did he even have a voice now, I wondered
or did I think it up in the middle
of this long day, phone in hand now
dialing Manhattan
~~

Cabin

eviction people arrive to haunt me
with descriptions of summer’s wildflowers
how they are carpet of fierce colors

I bet you hate to see us they say and yes
I do hate to have to move again especially from here
destruction brought to place of love

the uneven smiles that win she’s a business woman
blond tints that glow at sunset as profits rise
alas what labor I employ

but to ensure a moment’s joy
sets branches trembling & arms chilled
dear one long returning home, come to

clammy feverish details, muffed sorrow
I turn to throw a tear of rage in the pot
never remorse but hint of scruples I’d hope for

it is error it is speculation it is real estate
it is the villain and comic slippery words
the work of despotic wills to make money

I scream take it take your money! make your money
go on it’s only money, here’s a wall of dry rot
here’s an unfinished ceiling, just a little sunlight

peeks through this (lark, no luminance! exquisite St. Etienne
stove doesn’t work icebox either too hot or frozen
firescreen tumbling down

kitchen insulation droops is ugly & a mess
ah but love it here, only surface appearances
to complain of, nothing does justice

to shape of actual events I love
but a fight against artificiality
its inherent antagonism, bald hatred of moving

and problem of thirsty fig tree in Burroughs
apartment wakes me I don’t want to go down there yet
& how to orchestrate the summer properly

the problem of distress & not denying pride from it
too atomized to make pleasure of melancholy
& an uncontrollable enthusiasm for throne & altar

I want to sit high want simple phalanx
of power independent of everything but free will
& one long hymn in praise of the cabin!

it is a confession in me impenetrably walled in
like aesthetics like cosmos an organ of
metaphysics and O this book gives me a headache

dear Weston La Barre let’s have an argument
because I see too clearly how rational I must be &
the kernel of my faith corrupted

because you have no reliance on the shaman & outlaw
or how depth of mind might be staggering
everywhere except in how important science is

science? no he won’t he fooled by visions
whereas I wait for dazzling UFOs they announce
will arrive high in these mountains

I repair the portal even invite stray horses in
have a little toy receiving station
that sits by the bed

at the edge of night all thoughts to place of love
all worries to this place of love
all gestures to the place of love

all agonies to place of love, thaws to place
of love, swarthy valley sealed
in wood, log burst into flame

in home of love, all heart’s dints
and machinations, all bellows & pungency
antemundane thoughts to palace of love

all liberties, singularity, all imaginings
I weep for, Jack’s sweet almond-eyed daughter to
place of love, & heavy blankets

and terracing & yard work & patch work
& tenacity & the best in you
surround me work in me to place my love

dear cirques, clear constraint, dissenting
inclinations of a man and a woman, Metonic cycle
all that sweats in rooms, lives in nature

requiems & momentum & trimmings of bushes
dried hibiscus & hawks & shyness
brought to this place of love

trees rooted fear rooted all roots brought
to place of love, mystery to heart of love
& fibers

and fibers in sphere of love a whole world makes
spectators of slow flowering of spring
& summer when you walk to town for eggs

and continuous hammerings as new people
arrive & today we notice for first time
a white-crowned sparrow out by the feeder

with the chickadees & juncos & I missed
that airplane-dinosaur in dream nervous
to travel again, miss buds pop open

to shudder in breeze, their tractability
makes sudden rise of sensibility you are
shuddering too & your boy laugh

comes less frequent now you’re drawn into
accountability, will I return to find all
stuff tidy in silver truck

ready to go? it’s you in this place I lose
most because it’s here in you I forget
where I am, this place for supernaturals

perched high in sky & wind, held by wind in stationary
motion as bluebird we observe over meadow or caught
up with jetstream dipping in valley’s soft cradle

power & light & heat & radiance of head it takes
power & light & heat & radiance of head it takes to
make it work while

down there someone building replicas of what
it feels like to be a human multitude, fantasy
molded clumsily, spare my loves

and love of glorious architecture when you really put
outside in, the feeling of cloud or mountain
or stone

having developed an idea of idyllic private life
& sovereignty of spirit over common
empirical demand

I tell you about renunciation, I tell you holy
isolation like a river nears ocean to
dissolve

and cabin becomes someone’s idea of a good place
discretion you pay for it wasn’t mine either
but sits on me imprints on me

forever splendor of fog, snow shut strangers out
gradual turn of season, ground stir, pine
needle tickle your shoulder, peak curve, fresh air.
~~

Alphabet of Mother Language

If Kali were a car, what kind of car would she be? A Batmobile? She, as primordial vehicle. She with emanations to wiles of any mother. She with hair on fire. Mouth a flame with wrathful breath. This is the feminine speaking, this is the mouth and body and curse of the female. See her on the street, in the subway, at the endless-wait terminal. She waiting. Many storms of waiting. Just below the surface. Red eyes, gaping mouth, lolling tongue. Definition in a defining way the deafening roar of Kali which is the roar of Time. She is Time. And She devours Time. Naked Time. Naked Kali. She is an open system. She eats energy and manifests energy. No concept need apply. She is the flickering tongue of Agni, fire. She is the mother of language and mantra. She is all 51 letters of the Devanagari alphabet, each letter a form of energy, a twinge of energy, a torque of energy. Each letter a star, each letter a sign, each letter an empyrean gesture, each letter a captured sound, each letter a resolve, each letter a rune, each letter a whiplash, each letter a scorching brand, each letter a flame, each letter a twitch, each letter a bundle of firewood, each letter a thirsty pioneer, each letter a charnel ground, each letter a rice harvest, each letter a cooking pot, each, each letter a treasure, each letter a tide now rising, each letter an eolithic moon, each letter a sun in shadow, each letter a love affair, each letter a possible mistake, each letter a symbol of change, each letter a wheel, each letter a wheel of change, each letter a triumph, each letter a solar wind, each letter a storm, each letter a cameo appearance, each one a treaty, each one a place where plutonium safely resides, each one an hedrumite resolution, each one an epitrope, each one an orchestra of many gongs, each one an evening, a morning with snow, a morning with scorching heat, each one a necessary tribulation, each one a massacre that will be revealed, each one a torture that will be revealed, each letter a bamboo thicket, each one a candle lit to all the deities in all ten directions of space, each one a pillow, a mat, a blanket, each one a water buffalo, each one a bride, each one a hag, each letter a palpable hit…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Donovan – Live 1967 Anaheim – Sand and Foam

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Hasheesh Eater Part 1
Anonymous

(Leon Gerome – An Arnaut Guard Blowing Smoke At His Dog)

Putnam’s Magazine
September 1856

It was at Damascus that I took my first dose of hasheesh, and laid the foundations of that habit which, through the earlier years of my manhood, imprisoned me like an enchanted palace. It was surely a worthy spot on which to build up such an edifice of hallucinations as I did there erect and cement around my soul by the daily use of this weed of insanity. Certainly no other spot could be so worthy, unless it were Bagdad, the marvelous city of the marvelous Sultan, Haroun al Rashid. I need not tell the reasons: every one can imagine them; every one, at least, who knows what Damascus is; much more everyone who has been there. It was among shadowy gardens, filled with oriental loungers, and in Saracenic houses, gay as kaleidoscopes with gilding and bright tintings, that I made myself the slave of the hasheesh. It was surrounded by objects so suitable for dream-work, that, by the aid of this wizard of plants, I fabricated that palace of alternating pleasure and torture which was for years my abiding place. In this palace I sometimes reveled with a joy so immense that I may well call it multitudinous; or I ran and shrieked it through its changeful spaces with an agony which the pen of a demon could not describe suitably; surrounded, chased, overclouded by all the phantasms of mythology or the Arabian Nights; by every strange, ludicrous, or horrible shape that ever stole into my fancy, from books of romance or tales of spectredom.

It is useless to think of relating, or even mentioning, the visions which, during four or five years passed through my drugged brain. A library would not suffice to describe them all: many, also, were indistinct in their first impressions, and others have so mingled together with time, that I cannot now trace their individual outlines. As the habit grew upon me, too, my memory gradually failed, and a stupor crept over me which dulled the edges of all events, whether dreams or realities. A dull confusion surrounded me at all times, and I dropped down its hateful current, stupid, indifferent, unobserving, and never thoroughly awake except when a fresh dose of the plant stimulated my mind into a brief consciousness of itself and its surroundings. The habit and its consequences naturally deepened my morbid unsociability of temper, and sunk me still more fixedly in the hermit-like existence which I had chosen. For some years I made no acquaintance with the many European travelers who pass through Syria; and I even, at last, got to avoid the presence of my listless oriental companions — keeping up no intimacy except with those who, like myself, daily wandered through the saharas and eases of hasheesh dreamland. Never before did I so completely give myself up to my besetting sin; for a sin I now consider it to cast off one’s moorings to humanity to fly from one’s fellow-beings and despise, at once, their good will and their censure.

A terrible fever at last came to my relief and saved me by dragging me, as it were, through the waters of death. While the sickness continued, I could not take the hasheesh; and when I recovered, I had so far gained my self-control, that I resolved to fling the habit aside forever. I am ashamed to confess that it was partly the urgings of an old friend which supported me to this pitch of real heroism. He was a young physician from my own city, and we had been companions and often room-mates through school and college, although it was by the merest accident that he met me in Beirut a few days before my seizure. Two months he watched by me, and then perfected his work by getting me on board the steamer for Marseilles, and starting me well homeward. I shall have to speak of him again; but I cannot give his name, further than to call him Doctor Harry, the pet title by which he was known in his own family.

I reached Marseilles, hurried through France, without passing more than a night even at Paris, and sailed for New York in a Havre steamer. In less than a month after I stepped from the broken columns which lie about the landing place of Beirut, I was strolling under the elms of my native city in Connecticut. The spell was broken by this time, and its shackles fallen altogether both from mind and body. I felt no longing after the hasheesh; and the dreary languor which once seemed to demand its restorative energy had disappeared: for my constitution was vigorous, and I was still several years under thirty. But such chains as I had worn, could not be carried so long without leaving some scars behind them. The old despotism asserted itself yet in horrible dreams, or in painful reveries which were almost as vivid, and as difficult to break as dreams. These temporary illusions generally made use of two subjects, as the scaffolds on which to erect their troublesome cloud-castles: First, the scenery and personages of my old hasheesh visions; second, the incidents of my journey homeward. I was not at all surprised to find myself haunted by sultans, Moors, elephants, afreets, rocs, and other monstrosities of the Arabian Nights; but it did seem unreasonable that I should be plagued, in the least degree, by the reminiscences of that wholesome, and, on the whole, pleasant flight from the land of my captivity. The rapidity and picturesqueness of the transit had impressed themselves on my imagination; and I now journeyed in spirit, night after night, and sometimes day after day, without rest and without goal; hurried on by an endless succession of steamers, diligences and railroad trains, all driven at their utmost speed; beholding oceans of foam, immeasurable snow mountains, cities of many leagues in extents and population, whose multitudes obstructed my passage. But these illusions, whether sleeping or waking, were faint and mild compared with my old hasheesh paroxysms, and they grew rapidly weaker as time passed onward. The only thing which seriously and persistently annoyed me was an idea that my mind was slightly shaken. I vexed myself with minute self-examinations on this point, and actually consulted a physician as to whether some of my mental processes did not indicate incipient insanity. He replied in the best manner possible: he laughed at me, and forbade my pursuing those speculations.

All this time I amused myself in society, and even worked pretty faithfully at my legal profession. I shall say nothing of my cases, however, for, like most young lawyers, I had very few of them; all the fewer, doubtless, because long residence abroad had put me back in my studies. But I must speak at some length of my socialities, inasmuch as they soon flung very deep roots into my heart, and mingled themselves there with the poisonous decay of my former habit.

The first family whose acquaintance I renewed, on reaching home, was that of my dear friend, Doctor Harry. His father, the white-headed old doctor, and his dignified, kindly mother, greeted me with a heartiness that was like enthusiasm. I had been a school-fellow of their absent son; and more than that I had very lately seen him; and more still, I spoke of him with warm praise and gratitude. They treated me with as much affection as if it were I who had saved Harry’s life, and not Harry who had saved mine. A reception equally cordial was granted me by the doctor’s two daughters: Ellen and Ida. Ellen, whom I knew well, was twenty-three years old, and engaged to be married. She was the same lively, nervous, sentimental thing as of old; wore the same long black ringlets, and tossed her head in the same flighty style. Ida, four years younger than her sister, was almost a stranger to me; for she was a mere child when I first became a beau, and had been transferred from the nursery to the boarding-school without attracting my student observation. She was quite a novelty, therefore, a most attractive novelty also — the prettiest, unobtrusive style of woman that ever made an unsought conquest. I was the conquest, not the only conquest that she ever made, indeed; but the only one that she ever designed to accept. I could not resist the mild blue eyes, the sunny brown hair, the sweet blonde face, and the dear little coral mouth. She had the dearest little expression in her mouth when she was moved; a pleading, piteous expression that seemed to beg and entreat without a spoken word; an expression that was really infantine, not in silliness, but in an unutterable pathetic innocence. Well, she quite enslaved me, so that in three months I was more her captive than I had ever been to the hasheesh, even in the time of my deepest enthrallment.

I would not, however, offer myself to her until I had written to Doctor Harry, and asked him if he could permit his little sister to become the wife of the hasheesh eater. His reply was not kinder than I expected, but it was more cordial, and fuller of confidence. He knew little, in comparison with myself, of the strength of that old habit; nothing at all of the energy with which it can return upon one of its escaped victims. He was sure that I had broken its bonds; sure that I never would be exposed to its snares again; sure that I would resist the temptation, were it to come ever so powerful. Yes, he was quite willing that I should marry Ida; he would rejoice to meet me at his home as his brother. I might, if I chose, tell my history to his father, and leave the matter to him; but that was all that honor could demand of me, and even that was not sternly necessary.

I did as Harry directed, and related to the old physician all my dealings with the demon of hasheesh. Like a true doctor, he was immensely interested in the symptoms, and plunged into speculations as to whether the diabolical plant could not be introduced with advantage into the materia medica. No astonishment at my rashness; no horror at my danger; no grave disapproval of my weak wickedness; no particular rejoicing at what I considered my wonderful escape. And when, a few days after, I asked him if he could surrender his child to such a man as I, he laughed heartily, and shook both my hands with an air of the warmest encouragement. I felt guilty at that moment, as well as happy; for it seemed as if I were imposing upon an unsuspecting ignorance, which could not and would not be enlightened. Nor did Ida say no any more than the others, although she made up a piteous little face when I took her hand, and looked as if she thought I had no right to ask her for so much as her whole self. So I was engaged to Ida, and was happier than all the hasheesh eaters from Cairo to Stamboul.

It was about a month after our engagement, and two months before the time fixed for our marriage, that a box reached us from Smyrna. It contained a quantity of Turkish silks, and other presents from Harry to his sisters, besides the usual variety of nargeelehs, chibouks, tarbooshes, scimitars, and so forth, such as young travelers usually pick up in the East. The doctor and I opened the packages, while Ellen, Ida, and their mother skipped about in delight from wonder to wonder. Among the last things came a small wooden box, which Ellen eagerly seized upon, declaring that it contained attar of roses. She tore off the cover, and displayed to my eyes a mass of that well-remembered drug, the terrible hasheesh. “What is it?” she exclaimed, “Is this attar of roses? No it isn’t. What is it, Edward? Here, you ought to know.”

“It is hasheesh,” I said, looking at it as if I saw an afreet or a ghoul.

“Well, what is hasheesh? Is it good to eat? Why, what are you staring at it so for? Do you want some? Here, eat a piece. I will if you will.”

“Bless me!” exclaimed the doctor, dropping a Persian dagger and coming hastily forward. “Is that the real hasheesh? Bless me, so that is hasheesh, is it? Dear me, I must have a specimen. What is the ordinary dose for an adult, Edward?”

I took out a bit as large as a hazelnut, and held it up before his eyes. He received it reverently from my hands, and surveyed it with a prodigious scientific interest. “Wife,” said he, “Ellen, Ida, this is hasheesh. This is an ordinary dose for an adult.”

“Well, what is hasheesh?” repeated Ellen, tossing her ringlets as a colt does his mane. “Father! what is it? Did you ever take any, Edward?”

“Yes,” mumbled the doctor, examining the lump with microscopic minuteness; “Edward is perfectly acquainted with the nature of the drug; he has made some very interesting experiments with it.”

“Oh, take some, Edward,” cried Ellen. “Come, that’s a good fellow. Here, take this other bit. Let’s take a dose all round.”

“No, no,” said Ida, catching her sister’s hand. “Why, you imprudent child! Better learn a little about it before you make its acquaintance. Tell us, Edward, what does it do to people?”

I told them in part what it had done to me; that is, I told them what mighty dreams and illusions it had wrapped around me; but I could not bring myself to narrate before Ida how shamefully I had been its slave. When I had finished my story, Ellen broke forth again: “Oh, Edward, take a piece, I beg of you. I want to see you crazy once. Come, you are sane enough in a general way; and we should all enjoy it so to see you make a fool of yourself for an hour or two.”

She put the morsel to my lips and held it there until Ida pushed her hand away, almost indignantly. I looked at my little girl, and, although she said nothing, I saw on her mouth that piteous, pleading expression which appeared to me enough to move angels or demons. It moved me, but not sufficiently; the smell of the hasheesh seemed to sink into my brain; the thought of the old visions came up like a wave of intoxication. Still I refused; two or three times that afternoon I refused; but in the evening, Ellen handed me the drug again. “It is the last time,” I said to myself; and taking it from her hand I began to prepare it. The doctor stood by, nervous with curiosity, and urged caution; nothing more than caution; that was the whole of his warning. Ida looked at me in her imploring way, but said nothing; for she only suspected, and did not at all comprehend the danger.

I swallowed the drug while they all stood silent around me; and I laughed loudly, with a feeling of crazed triumph, as I perceived the well-remembered savor. My little girl caught my sleeve with a look of extremest terror; the doctor quite as eagerly seized my pulse and drew out his repeater. “Oh, what fun!” said Ellen. “Do you see anything now, Edward?”

Of course I saw nothing as yet; for, be it known, that the effect of the hasheesh is not immediate; half an hour or even an hour must elapse before the mind can fully feel its influence. I told them so, and I went on talking in my ordinary style until they thought that I had been jesting with them, and had taken nothing. But forty minutes had not passed before I began to feel the usual symptoms, the sudden nervous thrill, followed by the whirl and prodigious apparent enlargement of the brain. My head expanded wider and wider, revolving with inconceivable rapidity, and enlarging in space with every revolution. It filled the room — the house — the city; it became a world, peopled with the shapes of men and monsters. I spun away into its great vortex, and wandered about its expanses as about a universe. I lost all perception of time and space, and knew no distinction between the realities around me, and the phantasmata which sprung in endless succession from my brain. Ida and the others occasionally spoke to me; and once I thought that they kneeled around and worshipped me; while I, from behind a marble altar, responded like a Jupiter. Then night descended, and I heard a voice saying: “Christ is come, and thou art no more a divinity.”

The altar disappeared at that instant, and I came back to this present century, and to my proper human form. I was in the doctor’s house, standing by a window, and gazing out upon a moonlit street filled with promenading citizens. Beside me was a sofa upon which Ida lay and slept, with her head thrown back, and her throat bared to the faint silvery brilliance which stole through the gauze curtains. I stooped and kissed it passionately; for I had never before seen her asleep, nor so beautiful; and I loved her as dearly in that moment as I had ever done when in full possession of my sanity. As I raised my head, her father opened a door and looked into the room. He started forward when he saw me; then he drew back, and I heard him whisper to himself: “She is safe enough, he will not hurt her.”

The moment he closed the door a window opened, and a voice muttered: “Kill her, kill her, and the altar and the adoration shall be yours again” to which innumerable voices from the floor, and the ceiling and the four walls responded: “Glory, glory in the highest to him who can put himself above man, and to him who fears not the censure of man!”

I drew a knife from my pocket, and opened it instantly; for a mighty persuasion was wrought in me by those promises. “I will kill her,” I said to myself, “dearly as I love her; for the gift of Divinity outweighs the love of woman or the wrath of man.

I bent over her and placed the knife to her throat without the least pity or hesitation, so completely had all love, all nobleness, all humanity, been extinguished in me by the abominable demon of hasheesh. But suddenly she awoke, and fixed on me that sweet, piteous, startled look which was so characteristic of her. It made me forget my purpose for one moment, so that, with a lunatic inconsistency, I bent my head and kissed her hand as gently as I had ever done. Then the demoniac whisper, as if to recall my wandering resolution, swept again through the eglantines of the window: “Kill her, kill her, and the altar and the adoration shall be yours again.”

She did not seem to hear it; for she stretched out her hands to give me a playful push backwards, while, closing her eyes again, she sank back to renewed slumber. Then, in the height of my drugged insanity, in the cold fury of my possession, I struck the sharp slender blade into her white throat once, and once more, with quick repetition, into her heart. “Oh, Edward, you have killed me!” she said, and seemed to die with a low moan, not once stirring from her position on the sofa.

I took no further notice of her; I did not see her in fact after the blow; for the smoke of sacrifices rose around me, obscuring the room; and once more I stood in divine elevation above a marble altar. There were giant colonnades on either side, sweeping forward to a monstrous portal, through which I beheld countless sphinxes facing each other adown an interminable avenue of granite. Before me, in the mighty space between the columns, was a multitude of men, all bowing with their faces to the earth, while priests chanted anthems to my praise as the great Osiris. But suddenly, before I could shake the temple with my nod, I saw one in the image of Christ enter the portal and advance through the crowd to the foot of my altar. It was not Christ the risen and glorified; but the human and crucified Jesus of Nazareth. I knew him by his grave sweetness of countenance; I knew him still better by his wounded hands and bloody vestments. He beckoned me to descend and kneel before him; and when I would have called on my worshipers for aid, I found that they had all vanished; so that I was forced to come down and fall at his pierced feet in helpless condemnation. Then he passed judgment upon me, saying: “Forasmuch as thou hast sought to put thyself above man, all men shall abhor and shun thee.”

He disappeared, and when I rose the temple had disappeared also, with every trace of that mighty worship by which I had been for a moment surrounded. Then did my punishment commence; nor did it cease throughout a seeming eternity; for, in order to complete it, time was reversed, and I could live in bygone ages; so that I ran through the whole history of the world, and was avoided with loathing by every generation. First I stood near the garden of Eden, and saw a hideous man hurrying by it, alone, with a bloody mark on his forehead. “This is Cain,” I said to myself; “this is a wicked murderer, also, and he will be my comrade.”

I ran toward him confidently, eagerly, and with an intense longing for companionship; but when he saw me he covered his face and fled away from me, with incomparable swiftness, shrieking: “Save me, O God, from this abominable wretch!”

To Be Continued…
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Donovan – Live 1967 Anaheim – The Lullaby of Spring

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(Fabio Fabbi – Oriental Dancers Cairo)

Faun and Nymph, 1868 – Pal Merse Szinyei

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“If of thy mortal goods thou art bereft
And from thy slender store two loaves (of bread) alone to thee are left
Sell one, and with the dole
Buy hyacinths to feed thy soul.”

Moslih Saadi, Persian poet who lived in 13th century (from Ibn!)
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Follow The Flow Daily!: EarthRites on Tumblr!

It has been a week of wonders here at Caer Llwydd. Rowan & Jessa came back from a very successful filming of Pelt at the coast. (More to follow on this, look for it on the next Turf!) There was high praise for him and his crew from the Rangers at Fort Clatsop for their work there, and the way they cared for the facility etc.

We have been working away, and life is showing renewal here in Portland. Buds everywhere, the bulbs are pushing up, and the rain has now taken on the aspects of spring. I love it here.

This is a post I put together over the last week or so, with spring in mind. Of course all things Pan/Fauns/Dryads/Nymphs play through my head. Getting back to source as usual for my way of thinking.

Life is so swift with the changes. We watch with wonder as the world rages around us in celebration of life, and from which life flows, love. What is the heart from which all things flow? What is this source of all beauty, terror, joy, and absolute holiness?

Blessings,
Gwyllm
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On The Menu:
The Links
Sungrazer – Mountain Dusk
The Diamond Sutra
Pan Poems
Rudolph Nureyev : ‘L’apres-midi d’un Faune’

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The Links:
Greek Astrology Started In Babylon?
Scientists create brain cells from human skin in possible breakthrough for autism, Alzheimer’s research
Thanks To Walker For These 2 Links!
Hamilton And The Philosopher’s Stone
The Double Bind
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A Wee Bit Of Dutch Psychedelia….
Sungrazer – Mountain Dusk

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The Diamond Sutra

Excerpt:

“All living beings, whether born from eggs, from the womb, from moisture, or spontaneously; whether they have form or do not have form; whether they are aware or unaware, whether they are not aware or not unaware, all living beings will eventually be led by me to the final Nirvana, the final ending of the cycle of birth and death. And when this unfathomable, infinite number of living beings have all been liberated, in truth not even a single being has actually been liberated.”

“Why Subhuti? Because if a disciple still clings to the arbitrary illusions of form or phenomena such as an ego, a personality, a self, a separate person, or a universal self existing eternally, then that person is not an authentic disciple.”

“Furthermore, Subhuti, in the practice of compassion and charity a disciple should be detached. That is to say, he should practice compassion and charity without regard to appearances, without regard to form, without regard to sound, smell, taste, touch, or any quality of any kind. Subhuti, this is how the disciple should practice compassion and charity. Why? Because practicing compassion and charity without attachment is the way to reaching the Highest Perfect Wisdom, it is the way to becoming a living Buddha.”

“Subhuti, do you think that you can measure all of the space in the Eastern Heavens?”

“No, Most Honored One. One cannot possibly measure all of the space in the Eastern Heavens.”

“Subhuti, can space in all the Western, Southern, and Northern Heavens, both above and below, be measured?”

“No, Most Honored One. One cannot possibly measure all the space in the Western, Southern, and Northern Heavens.”

“Well, Subhuti, the same is true of the merit of the disciple who practices compassion and charity without any attachment to appearances, without cherishing any idea of form. It is impossible to measure the merit they will accrue. Subhuti, my disciples should let their minds absorb and dwell in the teachings I have just given.”
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Pan Poems:

Offering to Pan – Anna de Noailles
translated by Jethro Bithell

This wooden cup, black as an apple pip,
Where I with hard insinuating knife
Have carved a vine-leaf curling to its tip
With node and fold and tendril true to life,

I yield it up to Pan in memory
Of that day when the shepherd Damis rushed
Upon me, snatched it, and drank after me,
Laughing when at his impudence I blushed.

Not knowing where the horned god’s altar is,
I leave my offering in the rock’s cleft here.
–But now my heart is burning for a kiss
More deep, and longer clinging, and more near . . .
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Pipes of Pan
by: Arthur Guiterman (1871-1943)

“I love, you love, we love!”
Trilled the pipes of Pan
On the golden lea, Love,
When the world began.

Birds on every tree, Love,
Caught the mellow notes.
“I love, you love, we love!”
Pulsed their tiny throats.

“I love, you love, we love!”
Hear the echo still
By the summer sea, Love,
On the quiet hill!

So our simple glee, Love,
Ends where it began.
“I love, you love, we love!”
Trill the pipes of Pan.
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The Afternoon Of A Faun – Stéphane Mallarmé Poem

ECOLOGUE

The Faun:

These nymphs I would perpetuate.

So clear
Their light carnation, that it floats in the air
Heavy with tufted slumbers.

Was it a dream I loved?
My doubt, a heap of ancient night, is finishing
In many a subtle branch, which, left the true
Wood itself, proves, alas! that all alone I gave
Myself for triumph the ideal sin of roses.
Let me reflect . . .

if the girls of which you tell
Figure a wish of your fabulous senses!
Faun, the illusion escapes from the blue eyes
And cold, like a spring in tears, of the chaster one: But, the other, all sighs, do you say she contrasts
Like a breeze of hot day in your fleece!
But no! through the still, weary faintness
Choking with heat the fresh morn if it strives,
No water murmurs but what my flute pours
On the chord sprinkled thicket; and the sole wind
Prompt to exhale from my two pipes, before
It scatters the sound in a waterless shower,
Is, on the horizon’s unwrinkled space,
The visible serene artificial breath
Of inspiration, which regains the sky.

Oh you, Sicilian shores of a calm marsh
That more than the suns my vanity havocs,
Silent beneath the flowers of sparks, RELATE
‘That here I was cutting the hollow reeds tamed
By talent, when on the dull gold of the distant
Verdures dedicating their vines to the springs,
There waves an animal whiteness at rest:
And that to the prelude where the pipes first stir
This flight of swans, no! Naiads, flies
Or plunges . . .’

Inert, all burns in the fierce hour
Nor marks by what art all at once bolted
Too much hymen desired by who seeks the Ia:
Then shall I awake to the primitive fervour,
Straight and alone, ‘neath antique floods of light,
Lilies and one of you all through my ingenuousness.

As well as this sweet nothing their lips purr,
The kiss, which a hush assures of the perfid ones,
My breast, though proofless, still attests a bite
Mysterious, due to some august tooth;
But enough! for confidant such mystery chose
The great double reed which one plays ‘neath the blue:
Which, the cheek’s trouble turning to itself
Dreams, in a solo long, we might amuse
Surrounding beauties by confusions false
Between themselves and our credulous song;
And to make, just as high as love modulates,
Die out of the everyday dream of a back
Or a pure flank followed by my curtained eyes,
An empty, sonorous, monotonous line.

Try then, instrument of flights, oh malign
Syrinx, to reflower by the lakes where you wait for me!
I, proud of my rumour, for long I will talk
Of goddesses; and by picturings idolatrous,
From their shades unloose yet more of their girdles:
So when of grapes the clearness I’ve sucked,
To banish regret by my ruse disavowed,
Laughing, I lift the empty bunch to the sky,
Blowing into its luminous skins and athirst
To be drunk, till the evening I keep looking through.

Oh nymphs, we diverse MEMORIES refill.
‘My eye, piercing the reeds, shot at each immortal
Neck, which drowned its burning in the wave
With a cry of rage to the forest sky;
And the splendid bath of their hair disappears
In the shimmer and shuddering, oh diamonds!
I run, when, there at my feet, enlaced. lie
(hurt by the languor they taste to be two)
Girls sleeping amid their own casual arms;
them I seize, and not disentangling them, fly
To this thicket, hated by the frivilous shade,
Of roses drying up their scent in the sun
Where our delight may be like the day sun-consumed.’
I adore it, the anger of virgins, the wild
Delight of the sacred nude burden which slips
To escape from my hot lips drinking, as lightning
Flashes! the secret terror of the flesh:
From the feet of the cruel one to the heart of the timid
Who together lose an innocence, humid
With wild tears or less sorrowful vapours.
‘My crime is that I, gay at conquering the treacherous
Fears, the dishevelled tangle divided
Of kisses, the gods kept so well commingled;
For before I could stifle my fiery laughter
In the happy recesses of one (while I kept
With a finger alone, that her feathery whiteness
Should be dyed by her sister’s kindling desire,
The younger one, naive and without a blush)
When from my arms, undone by vague failing,
This pities the sob wherewith I was still drunk.’

Ah well, towards happiness others will lead me
With their tresses knotted to the horns of my brow:
You know, my passion, that purple and just ripe,
The pomegranates burst and murmur with bees;
And our blood, aflame for her who will take it,
Flows for all the eternal swarm of desire.
At the hour when this wood’s dyed with gold and with ashes
A festival glows in the leafage extinguished:
Etna! ’tis amid you, visited by Venus
On your lava fields placing her candid feet,
When a sad stillness thunders wherein the flame dies.
I hold the queen!

O penalty sure . . .

No, but the soul
Void of word and my body weighed down
Succumb in the end to midday’s proud silence:
No more, I must sleep, forgetting the outrage,
On the thirsty sand lying, and as I delight
Open my mouth to wine’s potent star!

Adieu, both! I shall see the shade you became.

~~
Rudolph Nureyev : ‘L’apres-midi d’un Faune’

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At evening, as he [Pan] returns from the chase, he sounds his note, playng sweet and low on his pipes of reed: not even she could excel him in melody–that bird who flower-laden spring pouring forth her lament uters honey-voiced song amid the leaves. At that hour the clear-voiced Nymphai are with him and move with nimble feet, singing by some spring of dark water, while Ekho wails about the mountain-top, and the god on this side or on that of the choirs, or at times sidling into the midst, plies it nimbly with his feet. On his back he wears a spotted lynx-pelt, and he delights in high-pitched songs in a soft meadow where crocuses and sweet-smelling hyacinths bloom at random in the grass.

-Homeric Hymn 19 to Pan

Return is the movement of the Tao.
Yielding is the way of the Tao.

All things are born of being.
Being is born of non-being. – Lao Tzu

Nigredo “The dose makes the poison.”

On The 1000th Posting Of Turfing:

“I, coming forth am amen (the hidden one) pure of heart within the pure of body. I live thru my words”.

With that phrase, Ibn put Turfing up for us, 7 years ago. Without Ibn’s efforts, there would of been at least for awhile, no Turfing, (and he also provided us a home for Earth Rites Radio in the beginning. Honestly, we are still trying to get it going again.) I want to acknowledge the part of friends and companions on this trip. Without the support and feedback it would of been much more difficult.

It has been a fun voyage. It will continue, and grow I hope. I want to thank all who have paid attention to it, and who slogged through so many, many postings. I am a person who discerns common/uncommon patterns. I see reality at times like a pointillist canvas. Too close, just dots, chaos. Further back, patterns, a vision. Turfing has been an examination and immersion into the tides of culture. Culture seeds itself, and if anything, I hope that Turfing has turned over the earth for some of you. Has it inspired you ever to add to the stream? I pray so.

I do have an announcement for those who find Turfing a bit of a trudge at times… We have a new Turfing Lite at EarthRites.Tumblr.Com ! This is not a substitute, but a concurrent stream. I post daily, or pretty much daily there. Check It Out! You can click on the follow button, or you can track it on Twitter.com/@EarthRites

So, on this occasion, thanks again. Drop me a line here! Make a comment! Feedback is always appreciated! If you have an email addy, or a link to a friend who might enjoy or benefit from Turfing, let me know. I will include them on my alerts.

In pursuit of knowledge,
every day something is added.
In the practice of the Tao,
every day something is dropped.
Less and less do you need to force things,
until finally you arrive at non-action.
When nothing is done,
nothing is left undone.

True mastery can be gained
by letting things go their own way.
It can’t be gained by interfering. – Lao Tzu

Thanks So Much,
Gwyllm

~~

So, this is not the largest of Turfs, but one with a couple of favourite elements for yours truly…. The poetry of Arthur Rimbaud, and the music of Eat Static.
On The Menu:
Eat Static – Pharoah
4 Poems – Arthur Rimbaud
Eat Static – Epoch calypso

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Eat Static – Pharaoh

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
4 Poems – Arthur Rimbaud

Genie
He is affection and the present moment because he has thrown open the house to the snow foam of winter and to the noises of summer—he who purified drinking water and food—who is the enchantment fleeing places and the superhuman delight of resting places.—He is affection and future, the strength and love which we, erect in rage and boredom, see pass by in the sky of storms and the flags of ecstasy.

He is love, perfect and reinvented measure, miraculous, unforeseen reason, and eternity: machine loved for its qualities of fate. We have all known the terror of his concession and ours: delight in our health, power of our faculties, selfish affection and passion for him,—he who loves us because his life is infinity…

And we recall him and he sets forth…And if Adoration moves, rings, his Promise, rings: “Down with these superstitions, these other bodies, these couples and ages. This is the time which has gone under!”

He will not go away, he will not come down again from some heaven, he will not redeem the anger of women, the laughter of men, or all that sin: for it is done now, since he is and since he is loved.

His breathing, his heads, his racings; the terrifying swiftness of form and action when they are perfect.

Fertility of the mind and vastness of the world!

His body! the dreamed-of liberation, the collapse of grace joined with new violence!

All that he sees! all the ancient kneelings and the penalties canceled as he passes by.

His day! the abolition of all noisy and restless suffering within more intense music.

His step! migrations more tremendous than early invasions.

O He and I! pride more benevolent than lost charity.

O world!—and the limpid song of new woe!

He knew us all and loved us, may we, this winter night, from cape to cape, from the noisy pole to the castle, from the crowd to the beach, from vision to vision, our strength and our feelings tired, hail him and see him and send him away, and under tides and on the summit of snow deserts follow his eyes,—his breathing—his body,—his day.
~~

Motion
The swaying motion on the bank of the river falls,
The chasm at the sternpost,
The swiftness of the hand-rail,
The huge passing of the current
Conduct by unimaginable lights
And chemical newness
Voyagers surrounded by the waterspouts of the valley
And the current.

They are the conquerors of the world
Seeking a personal chemical fortune;
Sports and comfort travel with them;
They take the education
Of races, classes, and animals, on this Boat.
Repose and dizziness
To the torrential light,
To the terrible nights of study.

For from the talk among the apparatus,—blood, flowers, fire, jewels—
From the agitated accounts on this fleeing deck,
—You can see, rolling like a dyke beyond the hydraulic motor road,
Monstrous, illuminated endlessly,—their stock of studies;
Themselves driven into harmonic ecstasy
And the heroism of discovery.

In the most startling atmospheric happenings
A youthful couple withdraws into the archway,
—Is it an ancient coyness that can be forgiven?—
And sings and stands guard.
~~
Memory
I

Clear water; like the salt of childhood tears,
the assault on the sun by the whiteness of women’s bodies;
the silk of banners, in masses and of pure lilies,
under the walls a maid once defended;

the play of angels;—no…the golden current on its way,
moves its arms, black, and heavy, and above all cool, with grass. She
dark, before the blue Sky as a canopy, calls up
for curtains the shadow of the hill and the arch.

II

Ah! the wet surface extends its clear broth!
The water fills the prepared beds with pale bottomless gold.
The green faded dresses of girls
make willows, out of which hop unbridled birds.

Purer than a louis, a yellow and warm eyelid
the marsh marigold—your conjugal faith, o Spouse!—
at prompt noon, from its dim mirror, vies
with the dear rose Sphere in the sky grey with heat.

III

Madame stands too straight in the field
nearby where the filaments from the work snow down; the parasol
in her fingers; stepping on the white flower; too proud for her
children reading in the flowering grass

their book of red morocco! Alas, He, like
a thousand white angels separating on the road,
goes off beyond the mountain! She, all
cold and dark, runs! after the departing man!

IV

Longings for the thick young arms of pure grass!
Gold of April moons in the heart of the holy bed! Joy
of abandoned boatyards, a prey
to August nights which made rotting things germinate.

Let her weep now under the ramparts! the breath
of the poplars above is the only breeze.
After, there is the surface, without reflection, without springs, gray:
an old man, dredger, in his motionless boat, labors.

V

Toy of this sad eye of water, I cannot pluck,
o! motionless boat! o! arms too short! neither this
nor the other flower: neither the yellow one which bothers me,
there; nor the friendly blue one in the ash-colored water.

Ah! dust of the willows shaken by a wing!
The roses of the reeds devoured long ago!
My boat still stationary; and its chain caught
in the bottom of this rimless eye of water,—in what mud?
~~

Tale

A Prince was annoyed at always being occupied with perfecting vulgar generosities. He foresaw amazing revolutions in love, and suspected that his wives could come up with something better than complacency adorned with sky and luxury. He wished to see the truth, the hour of essential desire and satisfaction. Whether or not this was an aberration of piety, he wanted it. He possessed at the very least a rather broad human power.

All the women who had known him were murdered. What wanton pillaging of the garden of beauty! Beneath the saber, they gave him their blessing. He ordered no new ones.—The women reappeared.

He killed his followers, after the hunt or after drinking.—They all followed him.

He amused himself with cutting the throats of thoroughbred animals. He torched palaces. He hurled himself on people and hacked them to pieces.—The crowds, the golden roofs, the beautiful beasts still lived.

Is it possible to become ecstatic amid destruction, rejuvenate oneself through cruelty! The people didn’t complain. No one offered the support of his own opinions.

One evening he was galloping fiercely. A Genie appeared, of an ineffable, even unavowable beauty. From his face and bearing sprang the promise of a multiple and complex love! of an unspeakable, even unbearable love! The Prince and the Genie probably disappeared into essential health. How could they not die of it? So they died together.

But this Prince passed away, in his palace, at a normal age. The Prince was the Genie. The Genie was the Prince.

Wise music is missing from our desire.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Eat Static – Epoch Calypso

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Those who know don’t talk.
Those who talk don’t know.

Close your mouth,
block off your senses,
blunt your sharpness,
untie your knots,
soften your glare,
settle your dust.
This is the primal identity.

Be like the Tao.
It can’t be approached or withdrawn from,
benefited or harmed,
honored or brought into disgrace.
It gives itself up continually.
That is why it endures. – Lao Tzu

“As long as you have certain desires about how it ought to be you can’t see how it is.” – Ram Dass

Turfing Edition 999: Here we are, on the edge of it. 999 in the UK is the equivalent of 911 in the US, yet it is of course not an emergency, perhaps just a state of mind. Turfing gave birth to The Invisible College Magazine, and projects since.

Stay tuned for an announcement on our next entry for a new project!

I want to thank Michael Horowitz for the Tim Leary article.

Blessings,
Gwyllm

~~
On The Menu:
Pelt (The Film)
The Links
AIR – Talisman
Chinese Poetry: Red Pine Translations
Ram Das/Richard Alpert Quotes
Timothy Leary Makes a Surprise Visit to Liberty Plaza
AIR – La Femme D’Argent
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pelt (The Film)

Rowan’s film is proceeding as planned. He will be filming at the coast, close to the old Lewis & Clark Fort location. Prop construction is underway! Lend some support by signing up and commenting at this address: Trifecta Every comment and hit they get pushes them closer to the front. It would be a big help, and if you care to post the link, or donate via The Pelt Site, or Trifecta Site, it would be appreciated!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Links:
“And through strange aeons, even Death may die”
Forteana: Bournemouth resident mystified by ‘blue sphere shower’
Morgellons: All In The Head?
Weird & Wild: Male Mice Have “Singing Voices”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

AIR – Talisman (Live in France, 2007)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chinese Poetry: Red Pine Translations

Snow
Hānshān Déqīng 1564-1623

Snow besieges my plank door I crowd the stove at night
although this form exists it seems as if it doesn’t
I have no idea where the months have gone
every time I turn around another year on earth is over
~~

New Bamboo at East Lake
Lu You 1125-1210

I planted thorns and built a fence to keep them safe
Their growing emerald canes shimmer in the ripples
Autumn arrives first where a breeze cools the earth
The summer sun overhead is far away at noon
They make a rustling sound as they discard their wrappers
And cast spindly shadows as they put forth new branches
I plan to visit often as soon as I stop working
And take my mat and pillow when I go
~~

The Frost and the Moon
Li Shangyin 813-858

By the time I hear geese the cicadas are gone
From a hundred-foot tower the water is like the sky
Chang’e and Qingnu don’t mind the cold
In the frost and moonlight they contest each other’s charms
~~

Winter Lantern
Hānshān Déqīng 1564-1623

a solitary winter lantern casts a feeble shadow
wind blows through my flimsy hut and covers me with snow
I remember sitting cross-legged on Wutai
a makeshift door amid ten-thousand -year-old ice
~~

Written on Mister Lakeshade’s Wall
Wang Anshi 1021-1086

Below your thatched eaves you’ve swept away the moss
You yourself planted the path of flowering trees
A stream guards your fields encircling it with green
Two peaks swing open and welcome the blue
~~

Yellow Crane Tower
Cui Hao 704-754

A man rode off on a crane long ago
Yellow Crane Tower is all that remains
Once the crane left it never returned
For a thousand years clouds have wandered in vain
The trees of Hanyang shine in midstream
The sweet plants of spring overrun Parrot Isle
At sunset I wonder which way is home
Mist on the river only means sorrow
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ram Das/Richard Alpert Quotes:

“The most exquisite paradox… as soon as you give it all up, you can have it all. As long as you want power, you can’t have it. The minute you don’t want power, you’ll have more than you ever dreamed possible.”

“Your problem is you’re… too busy holding onto your unworthiness.”

“If you think you’re free, there’s no escape possible.”

“Everything changes once we identify with being the witness to the story, instead of the actor in it.”

“Inspiration is God making contact with itself.”

“I would like my life to be a statement of love and compassion–and where it isn’t, that’s where my work lies.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timothy Leary Makes a Surprise Visit to Liberty Plaza

Michael Horowitz, Tim’s longtime friend and archivist, claims he overheard the following imaginary conversation:

Tim: I like your mask. I had one like that I wore at the Swiss Mardi Gras back in 1972, when Nixon’s agents were chasing me across four continents.

Anonymous: We Are Anonymous.

Leary: I should have been more anonymous, but it wasn’t in my DNA.

Anonymous: We Are Everywhere.

Leary: There are probably almost as many cops in riot gear and plainclothes FBI agents with cameras as people actually protesting here. But you know what? A hundred million people are watching this on their computers and iPhones, or are seeing it on Al Jazeera TV and other progressive websites.

Anonymous: We are not slaves. We are not beaten. We will not lay down and take this any more.

Leary: This is the best possible image the U.S. can put out to the rest of the country and the world right now.

Anonymous: This is what democracy looks like. We Are the 99%.

Leary: Especially to the young people in the Middle East — or anywhere people are rising up to try to get some control over their own futures. Greece, Spain, Toronto, Seattle, Pittsburgh, Madison!

Anonymous: We Are Global.

Leary: Twitter is the most important invention since movable type. Everyone has a global voice. Remember McLuhan?

Anonymous: The medium is the message.

Leary: This is the Twitter revolution. Tweets are to the 21st century what the Gutenberg Bible was to the 15th.

Anonymous: We do have the power. We do have a voice. We are legion.

Leary: They are broadcasting to the world via hand-held digital cameras, smart phones and live streaming video, while the obsolete mainstream media ignores them. Calls them hippies! How about that!

Anonymous: They will hear us, but we have to speak loud.

Leary: This is the wake-up call.

Anonymous: This is our chance America.

Leary: Turn On, Tune In, Take Over.

Anonymous: Expect us.

From Timothy Leary’s Chaos and Cyber Culture (1994), original version published 1990, after the fall of the Berlin Wall:

It has finally happened: the inevitable and long-awaited climax of the youth revolutions. The next uncontrollable 15 years (1995-2010) will accelerate this dizzying explosion of mind power. The fragmentary remnants of the old centralized social systems of the feudal and industrial civilizations are crumbling down. The 21st century will witness a new global culture, peopled by new breeds who honor human individuality, human complexity, and human potential.

They will be the creative implementers of the new technologies for communicating at light speed. Change-oriented, innovative individuals who are adept in communicating via the new cyber systems.

Thanks To Michael Horowitz & Lisa Rein and all the folks at Timothy Leary Archives.org

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
AIR – La Femme D’Argent (Live in France, 2007)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“The most important aspect of love is not in giving or the receiving: it’s in the being. When I need love from others, or need to give love to others, I’m caught in an unstable situation. Being in love, rather than giving or taking love, is the only thing that provides stability. Being in love means seeing the Beloved all around me.” ― Ram Dass