Allow but a little consciousness.
To be conscious is not to be in time
But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden,
The moment in the arbour where the rain beat,
The moment in the draughty church at smokefall
Be remembered; involved with past and future.
Only through time time is conquered.
I return to TS Eliot at the end of a busy weekend, a time of whirling thoughts and memories. In the company of a friend who is a pilot I was drawn back a quarter century to a point when I was an amateur aviator. That was before I had ever ridden a horse. Now I am invited to make those experiences again tangible and wonder what course life might take. Where might I steer my course? Now I feel as if I have a hand upon the helm, yet appreciate that which is beyond my control. Material and spiritual meet, classical and romantic discover that through concession they may coexist. This is a curious and exciting period of discovery. It is rehabilitation from the shadow of that distant Transylvanian valley.
There is light and there is dark, and the two do not rightly combine to make grey. We seem to see grey but that is a faint shade of black. So that valley was shadowy but there was light in patches and those sunlit spots I remember happily. But one could step from light to dark in a moment. Thus as a ship's bottom become fouled so one became burdened. However the healing stream cleanses, and I see that living water in the eye of my mind.
There is a cool clean flow between mossy boulders, and a small waterfall beneath which I may stand in order to be washed clean. Then the sun shall dry and warm my naked body.
Through the whirl of change and growth there stands Doru patently on the quiet pasture. Time passes and he seems not to notice. Yet in my mind time passes to conquer the ill effects of time past. A part of that victory is a shedding of the suffocating heavy cloak, and another part is the recognition of that which was good. For this walk is not just a fight against darkness but a celebration of that which is good and light. And for that my eyes must be opened to see the light.
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