The Western Gate

Lunar (Eclipse) Full Moon Eve. (2024)

I dreamt of the discourse between Rumi the poet and Jerome the translator. They both share my birthday and one I call the logical and the other the creative. Rumi was born and Jerome dies;- Where Poetry Lives and its commentary dies. Between them both, perhaps, the mind pervades and cognizes reality. Jerome began and explained to me that I needed to remember the following and began a talk and yet I wandered in my mind and would not listen, Rumi began to laugh and jeer at Jeromes insistence that I listened, “does the Moon adhere to one station or will it dance, Badru does not wish to hear of things set in stone,” he said to Jerome.

It will be a lunar eclipse, and as fate and ‘fortune’ cast their dice, it will be the 711th Full moon since my birth, auspicious and yet, again, I am at a loss to understand the point or purpose of this path.

It were a long dream, far more lucid and stable. Between them both I stood as the mediator, the vision of the two, of Swords (balance between the two possibilities) of wands I stood still or I moved, of Pantacles the dynamism and polarity between them in infinite equilibrium and of the cups -the union, the partnership~ that of two- the one mind is set.

The Moon will shine in Libra tomorrow, and as it is balanced perfect so life and nature renews. All Nature is renewed by the fire of the Sun, INRI-Igni Natura Renovatur Integra.

I heard a sound, the dawn call of the little Wren that mocks me in the garden as I salute the Sun, it were if I could imagine so, a refrain of music, and I remember that the Magic flute was first performed on my birthday and therefore I should remember this call, this song, it were a shrill crescendo like a spiral, followed by three chrips, a pause, one call and then a descending spiral that wavered and merged with the wind. It was the dance of a serpent uncoiling.

Jerome continued teaching some obscure text. “If you say ‘Behold!’ one more time” I said, “I will render this veil and awake.” This amused Rumi who gestured with a tight lip that would have broke into laughter if those lips had parted. perhaps it was intentional, or stubbornness or unwavering from my request, but he said “Behold!..” I clapped my hands and awoke.

In the garden that morning as I gazed into the tree (pictured) that sits amidst the conclave of houses, I ‘forgot’ my mind in this body and merged with nature, I felt the Red of my blood with the Green of the ‘Nature Devas’, I felt her as one voice that connected throughout nature until we met the sea and could not fall further than this land I live upon… the little Wren flew to my neighbours apple tree, on cue, and sang that song I heard in my dream, and still, as Socrates says, “I know that I know nothing”, and even, if I knew I would surely wander elsewhere, just to dance another tune.

As the song goes for us Cockneys who talk in Rhyme ,”the great Bells of Bow said, I’m sure I don’t know”