Thinking of John Coltrane
FOR JOHN COLTRANE 40 YEARS AFTER HIS PASSING
I did not know with certainty until now that we share a field of consciousness--a green field at its most serene and sustaining. I did not know with certainty until now that premonitions of joy or danger are part of a telepathy we all share as full or partial participants in this consciousness. And I did not know with certainty until now why I endlessly repeated and still repeat William Carlos Williams' line, "All beauty and its enduring," as the apotheosis in words of our guardianship and intended history here.
To accept Christ, or Buddha or Bawa, I realized this morning, is to accept our shared, common kinship in and as the dominion of God. To live according to this holy intelligence (perennial wisdom) at the core of our beings is our salvation. We are redeemed the moment this intelligence, greater than our 'selves' but contained as seed within them, bursts into our share of eternal being. Seed becomes tree whose fruit feeds us and whose shade comforts us. God is the only ancestor.
There is a hymn that Johnny Cash recorded a few times called, "Let the Lower Lights Keep Burning," about our duty to keep the gnostic lights glowing in acts of kindness and compassion that represent our remembered and accreted deputizing as sons of God. This world is His and we are asked to tend it. This world is His and yet it is entrusted to us. The rescue we pray for comes from our inheritance and legacy as God's children. There is no greater salvation than receiving and spending this inheritance (inhere-ance). If we do not exercise that native intelligence (heritage), then we risk losing this place lit by the lower lights of our love and learning. The fires of war must be sublimated into the light of peace.
On July 17, 1967, John Coltrane died. To many of us, it was news as saddening as the death of JFK. As tribute to him and all that he meant to me, I sent songs of his to friends this morning. Dear brother, rest in the peace it is within us to attain here.
I did not know with certainty until now that we share a field of consciousness--a green field at its most serene and sustaining. I did not know with certainty until now that premonitions of joy or danger are part of a telepathy we all share as full or partial participants in this consciousness. And I did not know with certainty until now why I endlessly repeated and still repeat William Carlos Williams' line, "All beauty and its enduring," as the apotheosis in words of our guardianship and intended history here.
To accept Christ, or Buddha or Bawa, I realized this morning, is to accept our shared, common kinship in and as the dominion of God. To live according to this holy intelligence (perennial wisdom) at the core of our beings is our salvation. We are redeemed the moment this intelligence, greater than our 'selves' but contained as seed within them, bursts into our share of eternal being. Seed becomes tree whose fruit feeds us and whose shade comforts us. God is the only ancestor.
There is a hymn that Johnny Cash recorded a few times called, "Let the Lower Lights Keep Burning," about our duty to keep the gnostic lights glowing in acts of kindness and compassion that represent our remembered and accreted deputizing as sons of God. This world is His and we are asked to tend it. This world is His and yet it is entrusted to us. The rescue we pray for comes from our inheritance and legacy as God's children. There is no greater salvation than receiving and spending this inheritance (inhere-ance). If we do not exercise that native intelligence (heritage), then we risk losing this place lit by the lower lights of our love and learning. The fires of war must be sublimated into the light of peace.
On July 17, 1967, John Coltrane died. To many of us, it was news as saddening as the death of JFK. As tribute to him and all that he meant to me, I sent songs of his to friends this morning. Dear brother, rest in the peace it is within us to attain here.
posted by David Federman @ 5:42 AM
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