The Diamond and the Lotus

Ah, to speak of I know with one who knows,
Would be to converse with the timeless lotus herself.
For, she has many tales to tell of her journey though the cracks.
Of the upward battle, and the inevitable lunge toward the light,
And the perilous odds.

I know her well....

For, I am the concrete through which she sprang.
Once liquid and free to flow.
The lotus and I once drank from the same pool.
Ah, but she did not feel the insidious pull of the trap,
With it's shiny lure of knowing all before all can be known.

It seems one must learn all that they need to know
Before the hunter removes the bait from the trap
And hands it to them, free of teeth.
For to know the essence of know,
is to know no more...
And with greedy heart,
and shining eyes,
I lunged forward without pause....

And I was still.

And in my stasis I hardened.
Nothing to stimulate my movement.
For, there was nothing left worth knowing.
Or so I thought

Alas, to turn hard is to turn brittle.
The harder, the more fragile.
Until you become like glass.
For very, very few
become the miracle of the diamond.

The diamond that braves the most difficult of paths against all odds
Just as the lotus pushed forth, the diamond pulled itself down
And herein lies the secret in plain view, but seen only by the few.
The underlying element in all creation returns all back to the creator,
Most, against their will, or what they consider their will-

Back to enlightenment.

We all are on this same path but only few know it.
The diamond was once a humble lump of coal.
But humility brings strength,
and with that strength it impossibly pulled itself down
Until basking in the light at the center of all things,
Turning fluid again in its’ tremendous heat.

Pleased with the efforts of this-
the most most humble of all his creations,
His creator took him into his loving hands,
And squeezed into him
the gift
of eternal impermeability.

Yes, in my stasis,
I have become hard and brittle.
The flat, expansive nature of my own mass
allows me neither to sink nor rise.
Yet, herein lies my salvation.

As I look up at the lotus
in love and admiration,
Her beautiful words caressing my ears,
The earth itself has moved,
The rain has fallen in torrents,
And the sun has beaten down with no remorse.
And my pain has become my salvation

And hers.

For, did she not need the cracks
that now run through my beaten surface to bloom?

Yes, the diamond and the lotus are rare indeed,
And many will covet their beauty as such.
But my newfound knowledge
has given me a love
of my place as the humble concrete.
Unnoticed by the masses that trod my surface.

And as I look up now
at her timeless beauty,
and hear her beautiful words,
I am saddened by the knowledge
that anyone could come along and pick her.

And the rivers of time flow over me,
Rushing faster at every moment,
The cracks multiply,
And the feeling of its’ movement
returns life to my stiffened body.

The river dries up,
And the suns’ relentless hammer
beats its timeless rhythm down on me.
Eventually,
I’m turned to dust.
The wind enters my heart,
And I’m off-
Free once again, to resume my journey,
Back to the center of all things.

But I will never forget that sunny day so long ago,
And my conversation with the rarest of flowers.

8/6/09..........Realms...........