Seeker Magazine
AVANT SOUL
Rhapsodies in Words
to reawaken our fascination with the ever-original SOUL
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Through the Bushes:
A Philosophical Look At Survival Through the Next Four Years
The Fat Lady Sings
Inspired by Where Angels Fear to Tread
I feel there is hope for the world
And the feeling for solace
and hope
arrived in a most unexpected way
An opera singer, unbelievably fat, her gown
and hair curiously casual and unfussed over
Opened her seductive mouth and out poured a voice
so much like an unapologetic angel
That the entire audience, first spellbound,
was then swept to their feet, cheering,
Enraptured by her beauty and perfection. Hers was a voice
so tellingly and brilliantly sweet
It was as if a lark sprouted wings of a tiger lily
And flew into the hot orange sun,
Emerging on the other side unscathed
As a shining stream of glacial notes, collected into a pool,
inexplicably warm and inviting, which beckoned to us.
The fat woman was no longer ugly. Her essence
Transcended all temporal illusions and assumptions
as to shape, size and societal morés.
The purity of her expression was like this sky-blue lake
And each of us threw off our smug attitudes and
airs and self-important congratulations
To swim amongst bright orange goldfish, buttery koi,
Whose delicate tails and fins became the wings of butterflies
Lifted into the sky.
All of eternity was somehow summarized in that simple archway
and cascade and luminous rainbow of shimmering song
Which beckoned to each one of us like a personal bridge
To cross to a promised land not here, far from our magnetized sorrows.
We removed our clothes.
We dived in.
She smiled.
She knew.
And she was not smug.
Men openly wept
and women's faces shone with an inner light
And briefly we were catapulted to remember
Why we were here and what had taken us so long
To acknowledge our coming.
When she stopped singing, for one glorious moment
The air parted, and each of us could look into our hearts
And without a single rancorous thought realize
That we actually were blessed beyond belief
To share in the rapture of our adventure.
For every sorrow we had ever felt
There were now petals of a burnished red rose
And we were riding on a wave of bright sound like petals
That embraced our soul and removed every thorn
when we had ever felt separation,
felt abandoned, felt mistreated,
or even felt lost. Bless the fat woman! Crown her and bring her grapes!
The sounds beckoned, and we climbed a spiral staircase
of fragrant notes arching like a climbing rose
Until each blossom became a faraway star
In a sky that was now a meadow
We were children, awakened
And yet not unknowing.
In our own way, we each kissed this perfectly round woman,
More realized and complete than all the cosmos,
Mother Nature, the earth goddess and the very planet.
She stopped singing. We crashed, dizzyingly,
Back into our bodies. We got into our cars and drove home.
(Copyright 2001 by Darius Gottlieb - No reproduction without express permission from the author)
Letter to the Author at CelloMorpheus@aol.com
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