Monday 9 May 2011

Journey into the Mind

Journey into the Mind
(Oct. 1995)

My mind is black. Let there be light. It is now whiter than snow, not touched since time began, blazing in the eerie darkness of nothing in particular. But for my mind, time has only just begun. The mind should know when time began because the world is perceived through the mind. The eyes are opened and upon the carpet of blankness is stained a drop of blood, one image. The memory begins to buzz as more dots filter on. It is too bright and the mind is becoming dark and stained. Ideas converge upon the little morsel of tissue, fibres. The eyes close. The buzzing stops. The machinery is at rest. For it is time for lubrication.

Sodium and Phosphorus have now stopped work. The ideas are absorbed, tidied and compressed. The mind works upon existence. And each one blooms into a flowery plant. The black stains transform to colours red, green, blue. The mind is tired of thinking about itself. Thinking about itself is the same as thinking about what one is thinking. The mind becomes confused as an endless sequence of sentences spring to mind. It cannot evade it. It is bound by the strings of memory, and memory reacts, bursts out and splits as if squeezed into two pieces by the metal strings of the cage. In and out. Enlarging. Splitting. The reactions slow down. The surfaces are moulded, remoulded. They are now as smooth as … the mind ponders over this, hesitates. Apples. The thought slows. The memory is bursting, forgets; it splits the golden apples and looks inside.

Remembers! It then remoulds. The substance dries upon the windy airs of warm thoughts. The Mediterranean swings to mind. Then recedes back into the haven where it came. The mind is now swimming in the cool sea shallows. The waters lowers. It lies upon the beach to dry. The roller balls of thought resort to hide themselves upon the two-dimensional sheet of paper. The carpet is rolled out and all is stamped. The flowers blazing wilt, fade and now upon the hazes of far forgotten memories stored, perhaps never to be recovered by the flowing mind as it darts and journeys.

The mind tries to remember. The image is still there. The sides, however, are blurred and their apparition is surrounded by a transparent film, fixed, motionless. Bubbles enter like blind spots in a vision, but in large numbers. They swivel in and out in curves elliptical in shape, yet undefined in space or time. For the mind inhabits yet some other dimension in the realms of fantasy and the universe above is a house with many floors: the one of life, the one of death and then the mind, time and the 23rd dimension. The carpet shifts a millimetre or two to the left or the right. For certainty is not present when the object is not there and certainty is not certain where one is, seeing something which one might be dreaming in a semi-conscious state without the recognition. The eyes now open to see the world around. The head swerves to look out of the open window and the view is what the eyes behold and perception is our opinion of our several six senses and the one we lack is true indubitable knowledge.

I am walking now upon the hills in Spain. A cold breeze blows against my face. I smell the scent of hay for it is almost summer now and flies would swarm if heat persisted longer. I look into the distance and see greenery, yet nothing is green for the grass is yellow with the scorching sun and lack of rain, yet in my mind I know this place as greenery, so I shall call it green, for in the early months of the season Spring, the flowers burst upon the valleys far and stain the world with colour and with light. And like my mind, the summer comes and plants shall shrivel to their death, but in my mind, death is but a passing wave of transition to a further region of my thoughts and less consulted one. For my brain is like a filing cabinet, quicker to flick through, yet inefficient due to memories which drift into the further regions, faded so the eye is blind to what they say or show and microscopes are not permitted for lack of room.

I climb now up a rocky hill and through the tall palm trees and avenues of pines, bent by summer winds from far off lands or seas, and behold before me, I can see a large black rock. I walk now closer and examine. My mind is boiling over with excitement. I look upon the surface. Quartz grains mark it clearly. I look closer now and see that all these markings make the figure ‘S’. I look around. I pinch my arm. I am wide awake and yet has nature played a trick on me or is it some man’s grave or place of refuge? I look around. Upon the ground two yards away a snake lies waiting for its pray. Its jaws are open. It slashes through the grass, razor sharp in speed and movement. Astonished by this brusque attack, I leap upon the rock and down it shudders, slides away. Time passes and I hear a bird begin to sing.

Jumping down, I grab the rock and heave. My mind buzzes wilder as I fail to dislodge this mystery of volcanic rock, for many a mountain lake and valley in this region have I explored and in not one was there a crack in the Earth’s crust. For paradise is unbroken in its beauty. I heave again with force unwarranted and the stone moves off the place below. I stagger and upon my back I fall. The snake comes to my mind. I get up rapidly and look, but no, the birds are singing still their songs of joy. I turn round now and see a large wide gaping hole, a blackness, a painted blackness with images streaked and coloured.
 
I crawl inside, the rock slides shut, and I am in my mind again, caged up within its thoughts and processes, protected from the world of heaven, but also from the world of hell, sheltered in a cave called Earth on which my mind shall ever dwell.

10 comments:

  1. For some reason this reminds me very much of the blog I just posted.

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  2. It's funny how some things resonate and others don't. And I find I can never tell in advance...

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  3. One should only and ever write to the water in oneself. Worrying what others think, contrives us.

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  4. Of course, but I'm not writing this now, just posting it. But not agreeing with others' judgments of literary merit is what put me off writing as a child and made me prefer the sciences.

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  5. If you over think something write it down. I like you 'in your mind.'

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  6. An excellent prose-poem to show the way our monkey-minds work, haha, very apt and well put.
    Let the mind be, let it play, let it create time from timelessness, this is the time to experience this side of our cosmic play.

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  7. Thanks Rose, and really cool you noticed this blog Hille. There's the primeval snake archetype you were talking about, but I was old enough by then to know the Eden story, so it was conscious up to a point. Not to over-analyze, but I'm imagining the hole under the rock to be home of the snake, and it has ominous markings as such, yet in fact it represents protection from evil, yet also restriction, maybe very much like the protective environment within which we would like to keep our children. Maybe I yearn for freedom, but fear the snake?

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  8. The greatest explorer on this earth never takes voyages as long as those of the human who descends to the depth of their heart Few make that journey

    " Maybe I yearn for freedom, but fear the snake? " Might be a healthy fear as well

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  9. I remember that quote from you!

    I think it's a healthy fear when we are children. It is a protection. Like a young tree might need supports so as not to be blown over. But ultimately, what are we protecting? Love leaves no room for fear and is infinitely more powerful. I don't know that experientially, but I have faith in it. My first poem after I joined Multiply:
    http://jamintoo.multiply.com/journal/item/4/Fear

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