38.

In the Talons of the Hawk

The snake will rise to heaven in the talons of the hawk. In their season a thousand boats sail. Forever shadows and light clutch the world and the river floods. Men rise to walk, full of themselves, inundating earth with life. Such is the way of existence—the empty filling and the full emptying. In their season date palms grow. The earth covers you and in your season you rise. From the blue egg was born dark and light.

When you see the slaughterer, kiss him and fall down. His sword is swift. It brings you life. You shall die and rise as Osiris, born in the magic of sky. Suckled by the mother's teat, you will learn the nature of love. In your hands the slaughterer places the sword with which you must conquer darkness. You shall live not by faith, but with certainty; not in sacrifice, but in ecstasy, and know the coming and going of flowers, the passion of love, of loss and pain.

In my hand I took the sword I was given and I learned to use it. I severed the heads of the children of darkness and felt no pity for the fallen. I brought suffering and pain, but wicked men grieved and were changed. Blood ran through the fields. Wheat grew waist-high. Green was the color of grace.

Those who saw light and remained unchanged fell to the earth and became asses, into the water and became fish. Their names shine in heaven no longer. Though they see Egypt's people pass through the house of heaven and walk earth's fields again, though they watch boats sail on waters and lotuses float beneath stars, though they pray, their prayers are unanswered. Neither born again nor dying, they remain in silence, unchanged; without soul or form, less than the air between us they are. Nothing.

Therefore, when I saw darkness in myself, I cut it from me and wept for the pain was unbearable. Blind and mourning, I stumbled into the desert, scooping up the blue virtue of sky and setting it in my heart. Then my heart flew out and circled above like a hawk. It joined a thousand birds circling, serpents writhing in their talons. And I wept, for without love or loss or pain I would not have known this happiness.

There is joy on earth and in heaven—joy unimaginable. In every blade of grass rises the strength of the sun. In every mortal shines the star of immortality. All things demand adoration and respect. In each child an old man lies coughing and dying, and in old men fresh children are singing. Though dead perhaps a million years, each day I sail with the sun. On my lips the taste of frankincense hangs. The soles of my feet are perfumed with myrrh. Above the fields of malachite golden hawks fly and, in gold upon golden tablets, the gods write. Let men sing loudly and cast incense in the fire. Let ducks be roasted. In this world the sun rises. The sky is unbound. Rains fall to take our thirst. We breathe beneath heaven and upon the earth, in the presence of gods and goddesses.

And the quiet that settles on our skin before dawn keeps company with those whose dreams are troubled.