FINITE DIVINE
Missive #33 - Transcribed Poetic Dictation
[13, 23, and 33 are three of my forever favorite numbers—and this missive is, in my eyes, well deserving of the honor of its numeration. We return back to presently dictated transcriptions with the first of 2024 proper. For the past few days it has been bubbling. In all conversations, the theme of {divine mundanity ~ mundane divinity ~ the divine mundane} recurs, like a dream, routinely returning to lucid states of awareness of just how special the ordinary things are. Simple, plain things. What do we do in the face of such overwhelming global movements? We re~turn to the proximal, to the relational immediate. How you talk to yourself. How you engage with those in your life. The (r)evolution is mundane, and shall be proven in the everyday interactions we host. Linger a little longer in that feeling, in that sense of being-with. What does your golden age look like? What can you do to live it a little more in your life, in your relationships? The will is coming back in style, the ghost in the machine. Let your ghost sing out in praise of what it loves. I send my love out to you—boundless, finitely bounded, in all directions, echoing~ ] Received 1/23/2024 | 4-4:39pm
Listen to the Recitation:
FINITE DIVINE
Nothing that is is not natural
Just as everything that is cannot be unnatural.
To divine is to petition the divide;
To divine the mundane is to contain
What cannot be contained into what is not divine—
Or rather, what does not seem divine.
The infinite is a classic quality of the sacred
And so to contain it fully is a miracle.
We look at the body and marvel. How can it be?
Something so small that can hold infinitely much.
The mystery unfurls further. What is interesting
Is no longer what is infinite, but what is
Finite, limited, restricted. Represented in
Impermanent form, as if such a thing were
Possible, to do, to be, to live, to die unto
Meaning, derived of all else superficial
Confined to sleeping quarters, torturous isolation
In chambers, bubbling craters bending beneath
Unbearable pressure to fold, up into one
Million paper cranes, snuffed out in a tiny
Fracture flame, burning to ash, again, only
To warm a few small hands, children’s
Dreams interrupted time and time again,
Crying out for someone, anyone, to hear
What cannot be heard by anything infinite
But can be held by two finite arms
Embraced, embracing frail bodies, twisted
In torment found, unfolding again, blistering
Bright, pupils dilate and retinas singe;
Consilience forges in resilience’s demise.
Do not depart before the final bell tolls,
Sounding like a horn, a shofar’s hollow
Echo, blasting as a furnace roars, empty
Bellied bellows puffing air on undying embers
Hot, wisping mirage dances of subtle seas
Lingering, leering over and behind bent over
Figures, hunched shoulders, curling back to
Open, again, the frame of a callous picture:
Ten donkeys in a row with no shepherd to guide them
Crossing a stream on their way to the
Dead Sea, in search of hidden caves
And broken pots, shards of sand glittering,
Pearls dissolving in acidic solutions, melting
Like so many skins, hides pulled to dry
In the sun, cracking lines a topography
Roads and riverbeds running every way
Away from something, towards something else.
Everything moves, nothing remains, still
Upheld and upholding every bizarre
Sublime claim of knowledge, of right of
Way, a path seared crimson in the hot
Canvas of our retina, an ice skating rink
With patches of thin, buckling ice,
Clear as it is surreal, with visions of
Ruins, of forests, of long lost civilizations
Beneath the surface, looming in the depths,
Like a warning, or perhaps a blessing, a boon
For the living memories of every living memory
Remembering how it is to be a memory in the
Everlasting present, wherein no past can be found
Nor any divination of what may lie ahead.
For there is nothing ahead, nowhere the road
Can take you to, and nowhere it leads.
Two goats have joined the ten wandering
Donkeys, Primordial or Proverbial, Prodigal
The whole world watches them as they lumber
Past half-buried statues, past burning jungles,
Past clearcut pastures, past flooded basins,
Past bustling trade hubs and marketplaces,
Past every sunrise and every moonset, every
Field of millions of blooming lilies, lotuses,
Poppies waving, goodbye, good bye, God be
With you, God be with you, all praise
Be to God, to the most high, to the most
Low, to the most mundane, the most ordinary,
And the least, and the middling, and
The average, and the normal uninspired
Bored ordinary, reading gossip for
Some spark, out of habit, to force a
Quick smile, a little rush of pleasure at
The passing of everything, as the donkeys
Pass by even this, even you, even me,
Scribbling away in the cold dark tinkering
Domains of a desperate ascetic clinging
To the vestiges of bliss in the extraordinary,
Praying for a miracle. To pray is a miracle.
To be able to pray, a miracle! The next
Layer of the mystery unveils itself;
We sur-veil it with a predator’s
Insistence, salivating for the reveal.
From shyness, to gregarious, to cold severity,
To humility — to the dull vapid brilliant
Place of mundane relationality. Surrender
To your will. This is your game, your controller,
Your little red buttons in the console.
Press what you will, reap and lay and
Process every sheaf of wheat, of rye;
Pound into flour and bake into bread
Your life, for this is it, the whole of
The secret mystery is in front of you,
All around you, in the relationships
You keep and the ways you keep them.
The will is found in your tone, your time,
Your choice of word, your misspells, your
Divine mis~aligns. Listen carefully and
Carelessly, to the rhythm of your ordinary
Will, of the racing underwater grounds,
Cisterns in pockets of rocks, geodes containing
Water, millions of years old, hidden for you
To find, for you to crack open, and leap,
And exclaim, for joy! at the small secret
Cavern of tiny sparkling rocks, glistening
In their personal profound revelation, cracking
And falling apart in your hands, for you
To hold it all as it all falls apart
As we smile, and laugh, and choke back
Tears for the sheer madness and inanity
Of such a simple pleasure afforded us,
And never again. Reorient yourself to where
You are. Reorient your will to the people in
Your life. This is your playground. We lie,
Again, at the threshold of the golden age, as
Our ancestors before us, wondering as we
Will ourselves to a new finite now, filled
With opportunity for us to prove ourselves
To ourselves, and to those with us on
This path, in the footsteps of ten untired
Untrying donkeys and two complacent goats;
We walk, sometimes stumble, after them
Learning again how to be in this
Finite divine world, which beckons us
Now into a newfound honored way of being, plainly.
