In The Depths

The true heart, doubting, introspective, self clarifying

With indomitable spirit and unbending integrity

In arduous pursuit of the truth, is searching for what is lost

That which is invaluable, a priceless jewel

Confused thoughts, crowded mind

Without comprehending, as though deaf and dumb

Entirely in the hands of others, an inconceivable way of being

Existing only in your mind

Like trying to sweep away fog, or halt a river with outstretched arms

Face the fire and lightning

The raging torrents surging down from the summits

Wild roaring waves, lonely, moaning winds

Poisonous mists, mountains stunned into senselessness

Rivers frozen with fright

Into this maelstrom, into this wild and bitter struggle

Battered by heaven

Pursued by the hounds of hell itself you run headlong

With love clutched in one hand

And with hope in the other

A gentle breeze is blowing from the south

Succumb to these corrupting winds

You have brought on your own downfall

Illusory thoughts spin through your mind

Standing outside the gates you peer within

Penetrating secret depths

The mind is deep as an ocean

A sheer and profound stillness

A transparent mass of boundless emptiness

Silver waves, sad musings, a great rising pain

Spirits of the past

Dying ten thousand deaths in their one life

Arising and subsiding thoughts falling into fixed views

An ancient dwelling place

A pitfall that buries you alive, just like a fragment from an old coin

Dragging you down into the abode of delusory surmise

Everything real ceases to exist

A solid piece of emptiness, fixed firmly in the ground

A deep hole of sheer, black silence

Deeper than you can even conceive

No longer troubled by afflicting passions

Pushing down into the cave of understanding

Release your hold on the edge of the precipice

Attachment to the past is cut away

Soon the cherry blossoms are in flower and the river is full and flowing

Bringing new life to the tender shoots, to scorched buds and shrivelled seeds

Once withering in long-parched desert lands

But what happens if the source is not deep, or the stream is not long

The trees fall and the wisteria withers, thorny forests arise

As far from the lush ancient groves as earth is from heaven

With nothing but the sobbing of dead spirits to break the silence of their world

Lying useless and forgotten as an ancient cemetery

Cold and no more life within than last night’s ashes

In the light of a solitary flame

Amid heaven and earth

Each instant contains all time

In all the universe

There is here in the depths of sorrow

Love

© Ann Bagnall and AnnieB222.wordpress.com, 2012. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ann Bagnall and AnnieB222.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.