| Taken from the Book, MoonChild by Aleistor Crowley "The whirlwind of the Eagle and the Lion! The Tree upon the Mountain that is Zion! The marriage of the Starbeam and Clod! The mystic Sabbath of the Saints of God! Bestride the Broomstick that is God-in-Man! Spur the roufh Goat whose secret name is Pan! Before that Rod Heaven knowns itself unjust; Beneath those hoofs the stars are puffs of dust. Rise up, my soul! One stride, and space is spanned; Time, like a poppy, crushed in thy left hand, While with thy right thou reachest out to grip The Graal of God, and tilt it to thy lip? Lo! all the whirring shafts of Light, a web Wherein the Tides of Being flow and ebb, One heart-beat, pulsing the Eternal stress, Extremes that cancel out in Nothingness. Light thrills through Light, the spindle of desire, Crose upon Crosee of elemental Fire; Life circle Life, the Rose all flowers above, And in their intermarriage they are Love. Lo! on each spear of Splendour burns a world Revolving, whirling, crying aloud; and curled About each cosmos, bounding in its course, the Sacred Snake, the father of its force, Energized, energizing, self-sustained, Man-hearted, Eagle-pinioned, Lion-maned, Exulting in its splendour as it lashes Its Phoenix plu,age to immortal ashes Whereof one fleck, a seed of spirit spun, Whirls itself onward, and creates a sun. Light interfused with Light, a sparkline spasm Of rainbow radiance, spans the cosmic chasm; Light crystalized in Life, Life coruscating In Light, their mood of magick consummating The miracle of Love, and all the awe Of Need made one with Liberty's one law; A fourfold flower of Godhead, leaf and fruit Resolving all the being of its bloom Into the rapture of its own perfume. Star-clustered dew each fibre of that light Wherein all being flashes to its flight! Laugh with the leapings of that fervid fire; Motes in the sunlight, they are drunken of The wine of their own energy of love. Nothing so small, so base, so incomplete, But here goes dancing on diviner feet; And where the Light crosses Light, all loves combine: Behold the God, the worshippers, the shrine, Each comprehensive of its single soul Yet each the centre and fountain of the whole; Each one made perfect in its passionate part, Each the circumference, and each the heart! Always the Three in One are interwoven, Always the One in Three sublimely cloven, Their essence to the Central Spirit hurled And so flung forth, an uncorrupted world, By that which, comprehending in one whole The universale rapture of Its soul, Abides beyond Its own illumination, Withdrawn from Its imperishable station, Upholding all, an arm whose falchion flings With every flash a new-fledged Soul of Things; Beholding all, with eyes whose flashes flood The veins of their own universe with blood; Absorbing all, each myriad mouth aflame To utter the unutterable Name That calls all souls, the greatest and the least, To the unimaginable marriage-feast; And, in the self-same sacrament, is stirred To recreate their essence with a Word; This All, this Sire and Lord of All, abides Behind the unbounded torrent of Its tides, In silence of all deed, or word, or thought, So that we name It not, or name It Naught. This is the Truth behind the lie called God; This blots out the heavens, and indwells the clod. This is the centre of all spheres, the flame In men and stars, the Soul behind the name, All-mover, yet the one thing immobile. Adore It not, for It adoreth thee, Tha shadow-shape of Its eternity. Lift up thyself! be strong to burst thy bars! For lo! thy stature shall surpass the stars!" Back to Stories |
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