Photography by John Holliger
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What is meant by uncreated Light?

8/28/2019

 
Picture
Picture
Uncreated Light
 
Long before
Edison’s glowing filament,
The ancients spoke of uncreated light.
 
In my younger, literal years,
My either/or, all-or-nothing left brain wanted
Easy, obvious steps.
 A favorite cliché was,
That’s a “no brainer.”
 
As a protective defense,
My intuitive,
Creative,
Imaginative voice was in hiding
In fear of being heard and my essence scorned.
 
I was repulsed by the gibberish language of mystery,
Inexplicable Metaphors, and
Fresh images which pained my ordered mind,
My reptilian, unconscious mind
that walked the same path out and back,
Day by day,
Believed that getting back without being noticed was
a successful day.
 
Then this rigid manner of living collapsed,
And my voice,
Hidden so deeply for decades
Began a long journey,
One with no map.
Finding myself in a cul-de-sac
I didn’t know I had wanted to find all along,
Turned me toward a Light, Uncreated by me or any other,
Inviting me to make a new path to a distant Aura
A Presence,
A Soft
Gentle
White.
 
That Uncreated Light
That shown evenly through icons onto the one
Standing there, gazing back,
An Otherness
Sensed in the forest when alone,
Or at the water’s edge of a Great Lake,
From my wet feet to the other side of that horizon of white mist.
 
The Ancient Japanese painters knew this white, Uncreated Light,
Separating and Connecting the images of village life on those long scrolls,
Hiding and revealing the odd shaped, narrow mountains
Thrusting into the clouds beyond sight.
 
 
Uncreated Light
 
Revealed so dependably here and there by morning’s mist,
The midwife to a new way of pondering.
Uncreated Light
Revealing surprising, captivating visions,
Kindness
A touch
An unspoken word
That says everything.
 
Uncreated Light  comes
From I know not where.
 
 
 
John Holliger ©2019

August 28th, 2019

8/28/2019

 
Picture
Picture
                 Turning onto a gravel road
 in search of a stand of old growth red spruce,
I crept along for miles
swerving around emerging boulders,
riding the high mounds of eroding streams,
creating their own path across and down the gravel road,
an “unimproved road,” forgotten, neglected,
paths within this path.
Now dropping into unseen depths,                                                                 
then surging up and out and forward,
skidding across ripples of stone,
Mile following creeping mile,
no map, no signs, many “posted” on trees,
an unknown distance from that first turning
onto this gravel path miles ago.
Into a patch of sunlight,
surrounded by weeds as desiccated as the gravel.
 
Many times,
 forgotten
gravel roads,
undisturbed by humans,  
Unveil unexpected songs, trickles
from springs hidden miles beyond sight upstream.
Here,
I pulled off the road and stopped.
I don’t know why, here, but something
Said, “Stop, here,” and I did.
“Get out and listen, look.”
I discovered again that refreshing feeling,
Opening the door  
And standing up,
then a few steps.
I remember the joy of walking
And the compressed tolerance of sitting for a season of driving.
 
Standing and walking,
Crushing stems and snapping branches,
I hear chanting, coming from somewhere near.
A deep voice,
Hidden,
Vocalizing in her own language,
Her contentment and gratitude.
In her mezzo-soprano tones,
She is thanking the Earth’ s spring,
flowing water to the sea,
and her life,
Her path,
so much like my own.
No maps, no signs, no “posted” signs on trees,
But
her path
Unknown yet trusted.
Hidden beneath curling branches.
My curiosity was focused,
Longing to see the one who sang.
By moving sideways, crablike
Across wobbly stones,
I came closer to her artful presence.
Dropping beneath branches intent on protecting
Her unseen place,
Her beauty, playfully vocalizing,
A gift of freedom.
 
Here
In secret,
She could fall over ancient rocks,
Singing ever-changing melodies of her luscious joy.
 
Here,
These stones were also
Singing their own song, I could not hear,
the protecting branches chanting their song, I could not hear,
My gift was my attentive silence,
For the stones, the moss, the spring, the branches, the water,
A silence that would not disturb the chorus of joy,
 
Here,
in this forgotten place
of gravel and desert. 
 
 
©John Holliger 2019

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